Obert Gutu is just an empty drum making a lot of noise! He is just one of the MDC leaders who, having tasted the good life of the political gravy train during the 2008 to 2013 GNU, has fought tooth and nail to get back on the gravy train. And when you are an empty drum, fighting tooth and nail means making lots, and lots of noise!
Last week Gutu wrote a long piece arguing for the lifting of all sanctions against Mnangagwa and his fellow Zanu PF cronies. Gutu did not acknowledge the sanctions would have been lifted if Zanu PF had kept its promise to hold free, fair and credible elections, the single most important issue on the matter.
Everyone knows that Zanu PF blatantly rigged last year’s elections; the regime failed to produce something as basic as a verified voters’ roll, a common sense and legal requirement. Gutu and his former MDC Alliance colleagues Nelson Chamisa, Tendai Biti, David Coltart and all the other opposition candidates and parties participated in the election regardless of all the evidence the process was flawed and illegal.
Gutu and others in the opposition camp all knew Zanu PF would blatantly rig the elections to secure the presidency and 2/3 majority in parliament. They also knew that Zanu PF will also give away a few gravy train seats, to entice the opposition to take part in the elections. This has worked like a charm, there were 23 presidential candidates in last year’s elections!
Obert Gutu and his fellow MDC-T members led by Thokosani Khupe and he is her deputy, have already endorse the election process, with all its glaring flaws and illegalities, free, fair and credible and Mnangagwa duly elected and legitimate. MDC-T earned themselves a few brownies points with Mnangagwa for that. The call to have sanctions against Zanu PF lifted is yet another brownie point.
There is talk of another GNU in response to the worsening economic situation; Obert Gutu is to cash-in the brownies points in retain for a seat on the gravy train. Meanwhile Gutu is coming up with all manner of nonsensical suggestions to earn himself and MDC-T a few more brownie points!
"Zimbabweans should think about creating jobs and desist from merely seeking employment!" twittered Gutu.
“Remember every dark cloud has a silver lining!
“Remember, the darkest hour is before dawn!”
In other words, the 90% unemployed Zimbabweans out there have only themselves to blame for their plight; they should have desisted looking for employment years ago and would have been very successful entrepreneurs with thriving business by now.
By destroying the Zimbabwe economy; Zanu PF has done the nation a great favour, it created the dark cloud and the challenge is for us to find the silver lining.
For the last 39 years Zimbabwe has seen nothing but stead economic decline, the country and blundered from pillar to post. The few ruling elite has grown filthy rich but at the expense of the overwhelming majority who now live in heart-breaking abject poverty.
For all his rhetorical claims of “Zimbabwe is open for business!”, promise to end corruption, promise to hold free, fair and credible elections, etc.; President Mnangagwa has done nothing address these underlying economic problems. Zimbabwe was a detested pariah state under Mugabe, that has not changed.
For the last 39 years the people have been told “this is the darkest hour before dawn”, things have got progressively worse and not better. As long as Zimbabwe remains a pariah state ruled by corrupt and vote rigging thugs the country’s economic decline will continue.
After 39 years the nation must now wake-up to the reality that the new dawn will only come from us doing something to end the scourge of corruption and the curse of rigged elections. Mnangagwa, his cronies and the sell-out opposition leaders like Gutu would like us to believe we can have our cake and eat it too. Wake-up Zimbabwe!
Zimbabwe's economic environment is so caustic that many, many companies have been forced out of business including well established and well resources companies like Meikles, Kariba Batteries, etc. Only a first class idiot like Obert Gutu would expect the impoverish Zimbabweans, many of whom are earning as little as US$30 per month or less to start their own company and thrive!
What the country needs and has been dying for these last 39 years is an economic environment is which existing and well establish companies can thrive alongside new companies. The caustic economic environment was created by the decades of corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship, a man-made problem.
What the country needs and has been dying for these last 39 years is an economic environment is which existing and well establish companies can thrive alongside new companies. The caustic economic environment was created by the decades of corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship, a man-made problem.
We have had many opportunities to end the Zanu PF dictatorship with the best chances falling to Obert Gutu and his fellow MDC friends during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. All MDC leaders had to do was implement the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections. They failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!
Ever since MDC leaders’ failure to end the Zanu PF dictatorship they have abandoned all pretence of implementing the reforms and ensuring free, fair and credible elections in favour of the present status quo in which Zanu PF is allowed to blatant rig the elections as long as the opposition get a few gravy train seats. Opposition leaders like Obert Gutu, Nelson Chamisa, etc. have been hunting with the Zanu PF hounds and running with the economically impoverish and politically powerless majority.
For 39 years and counting it has been getting darker and darker because we have sinking deeper and deeper into this hell-on-earth. As long as Zimbabwe remains a pariah state then the country will continue to sink. Only an idiot would believe Zanu PF would ever get us out of this mess after 39 years of dragging us into the mess.
4 comments:
@ Mike Carter
This is how the people of Zimbabwe demonstrate. Peacefully and full of joy! They were never asked whether they would support some crazy "military-assisted transition". Former Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa was clear when just after the coup he said that the so-called "military-assisted transition" was an internal Zanu-PF affair and not a national issue.
The interesting thing about Cross's attempt to claim that peoples' demonstration confers legitimacy on the process of transition, is that it unconsciously opens the door to the same thing happening to Mnangagwa.
Cross also claims that Mnangagwa, like South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, is a minority leader within his ruling party; Generation 40 (G40) faction held 100 seats and were intent to remove him; but he survived the election by the skin of his teeth.
He now admits that 100 seats were won by G40. The implication of this is huge. There is a very large probability that voters who voted for a G40 candidate in Parliament would not have voted for Mnangagwa for the Presidency. Probably they would have voted for Chamisa.
The issue of political legitimacy cannot be dismissed as "water under the bridge". Without political legitimacy and using the fatally flawed judgment that the economy can recover without democracy, truth and justice in place, the Government of Zimbabwe is causing needless and avoidable suffering on Zimbabweans which will inevitably increase.
If Mnangagwa indeed did win the election, he had the opportunity during the Con-Court challenge to instruct Zec to produce all the results for everyone to see. This would have entrenched his legitimacy as president.
Could not agree with you more on this point; as long as Zimbabwe remains a pariah state ruled by corrupt and vote rigging thugs, there will be no meaningful economic recovery.
"The main agenda of the workshop is to mobilise and capacitate civic organisations and individuals to stage purported effective demonstrations and disturbances to overthrow the Zanu-PF government". Mathema said his ministry will ensure that law and order prevail in the country.
The ministry has since directed ZRP commissioner-general Godwin Matanga to put adequate security measures in place to deal with anyone who engages in any form of violence and disturbances.
"The police will thwart any civil disobedience or violent machinations by individuals, political parties and civic organisations under the guise of freedom of assembly and other hidden activities. Let me emphasise that no NGO can teach us about freedom of assembly and democracy," he said.
Mnangagwa has failed to revive the economy and now he thinks he can retain power by beating everyone into submission. The people os Zimbabwe and, indeed, the whole world knows that these are not empty threats, this is a regime desperate retain power and will not hesitate to use wanton violence.
Still, we can be certain that the people of Zimbabwe will cry out because humans are not sheep expected to suffer and die in silence! The worsening economic situation will force the people to cry out.
Said the Ministry, "Government has noted reports that Parirenyatwa and Mpilo Hospitals are failing to repair broken down radiotherapy machines due to forex challenges. The US$53 000 needed was availed last week, but the hospitals are failing to transact owing to sanctions restrictions on the banks they use.”
This sounds like a case of the Bank not having the foreign currency because there is a chronic shortage of forex in Zimbabwe. With the collapse of the country’s agricultural sector, commerce and industry the country has been importing 70% of the nation’s basic needs hence the skewed balance of payment. We are imported far more than we earn from exports and hence the chronic shortage of foreign currency.
The tragedy of Zimbabwe is we have people like Obert Gutu who are now focused on their own selfish interest at the expense of the common agenda of fighting for free, fair and credible elections. It is nonsensical that anyone, let alone an aspiring leader, would ever consider last year's elections free, fair and credible. And yet that is what all those in the opposition camp did!
Post a Comment