Grace mudded waters to ouster Mujuru but it is folly for her to try the same on "Ngwena" Mnangagwa!

Grace Mugabe has developed her own devilish way of attacking and dispatching her political rivals; first she accuses them of plotting to unseat her husband by starting and fanning the factionalism and division within the party, when in fact she is the one starting and fanning the war because she fears that her rivals are getting more popular than her and her husband. Then, under the disguise of the peacemaker bearing the olive branch, she savagely attacks her rivals, destroying their support bases and building her own.

 

Whilst it is actively encouraged to support Grace in the race to be Mugabe’s successor; anyone seen supporting her rivals in this rat-race is now guilty of a new crime called “factionalism”.

 

“Kuro imbwa wakavhinga mupinhi!” is what the Shona would say about Grace’s devilish modus operandi. The English equivalent would be the bad wolf attacking the sheep downstream accusing them of mudding his drinking the water!

 

Grace used her simple and very effective devilish scheme to ouster Joice Mujuru and her followers; the simpleton and her followers did not see it coming and they scattered in all direction in total confusion. Grace launch her attach in August out of nowhere by December, in time for the party’s elective congress, her husband was able to deliver the coup de grace on Mujuru and her supporters!

 

VP Mnangagwa now standing in her way to be Mugabe’s successor and she is using her tried and tested dirty tactics on him.

 

 

"Don't be fooled into engaging in factionalism. Vanhu varikuita zve factionalism ndivo mapenzi vanoita zvekugeza kuchinaya (Those engaged in factionalism are fools)," Grace told Zanu PF supporters in Chimanimani known to be backing her in the succession rat-race.  "Vese varikuita zvakarerekera ku factionalism (Those supporting factionalism), you stop it."

 

 

She was in Chimanimani to further the interests of her new G40 faction fighting to wrestle control of the party from VP Mnangagwa faction which emerged as the strong side after the more popular Mujuru group was booted out last year. The G40 faction never existed, Grace is the one who has started it and is building it up! 

 

President Mugabe and his wife did not have much trouble “baby dumping” Joice Mujuru and her followers but doing the same with Mnangagwa and his supporters will not be so easy! 

 

“Generation 40 is just a nuisance to the party. There are cronies of diversionists coming from power-hungry clowns misguided by errant professors from nowhere who have found their way into the party,” hit back Minister Chris Mutsvangwa, a known Mnangagwa supporter.

 

“No single fisher organisations has succeeded outside the legitimacy conferred by the liberation war. They mean nothing and will fail the way the Mujuru cabal failed…they should stop it now. They won’t succeed against war veterans, they are too young,” he continued.

 

“That is exactly what Jabulani Sibanda thought,” responded political commentator Patrick Guramatunhu, “not realizing that Mugabe had his own sinister agenda. Where is Sibanda now? Mutsvangwa has crossed swords with Mugabe, he too will go the same way!”

 

I beg to differ there with Patrick, for all their macho bravado Grace and her G40 faction are much too weak and feeble to take on Ngwena (crocodile) Mnangagwa. The party is still licking its wounds from its dog-eat-dog fight with Mujuru and her supporters, many of whom are still in the party and will hit back from within; it would be foolhardy to trigger off yet another fight by booting out Mnangagwa and his followers too.

 

It is one thing Grace throwing insults at Ngwena and his supporters from the safety of Mugabe’s protection but the day he goes, old age and poor health has taken its toll and not even the $3 million per trip visits to Singapore can save his from immortality, Grace and her G40 will be singing the blues! No I do not believe Mutsvangwa will go the same way as Sibanda, not without a fight anyway,

 

Ever since Grace Mugabe bust into Zanu PF politics last year she has mudded the party’s already muddy waters to ouster Mujuru, her greatest rival to be her husband’s successor. She soon realized that she was not going to have it all her way as VP Mnangagwa emerged as the front runner. The succession rat-race is hotting up and Grace is way out of her depth and the minute Mugabe dies she will know just how dangerous a provoked crocodile can be especially in these mudded waters - he is in his element.

Mugabe created factionalism the now his wife is losing the rat-race he blaming the media

Charamba can deny there is no serious infighting going on in Zanu PF the truth is there is.

"He works so well with his two Vice Presidents and the two Vice Presidents work so well with each other. Decisions in the party are done consensually. They are not done by factions because they don't exist,” he said.

Of course there are two warring factions and VP Mpoko has nothing to do with any of the warring factions. He was roped in to attend Grace Mugabe’s Chimanimani rally only to be humiliated and completely ignored.

Mnangagwa and Grace are the leaders of the two factions fighting it out to be Mugabe’s successor.

Factionalism is a nonsense charge made against Joice Mujuru by none other than Mugabe and his wife Grace. Mujuru had amassed the support of 8 out of the 10 provinces going into an elective congress. She and her supporters should have known better that Mugabe is a control freak who has never tolerated anyone in the party being seen as popular with party members or the electorate.

In 2004 Mnangagwa was set to win the VP position after amassing the support of 6 out of the 10 provinces. Mugabe step in the last minute and unconstitutional and unilaterally changed the party’s constitution demanding that the position could only be filled by a woman. So Mugabe effectively vetoed the party members’ electoral wish. Mugabe nominated Mujuru and congress just rubber stamped his wish.

In 2014 it was Mujuru, a woman, who had the mass support and so Mugabe had to come up with something else to stop her being elected by popular vote. So she was accused of this new crime “factionalism” because she had 8 out of 10 provinces set to vote for her. Mnangagwa, her main challenger for the position who had the support of the remaining 2 provinces was NOT accused of “factionalism” and Mugabe appointed him VP.

The operative phrase is “Mugabe appointed” Mnangagwa VP and not the party members making Mnangagwa beholden to Mugabe and not the party members just as Mujuru was beholden to Mugabe in 2004 and until 2014 when she was kicked out of the party.

If Mujuru had been elected VP in last year’s elective congress that would have put her in pole position to be Mugabe’s successor that is why she had to be stopped by hook or by crook. It was Grace Mugabe who led the campaign to “baby dump” Mujuru, as she so crudely put because she wants to be Mugabe’s successor, she made that very clear too from the start.

“Am I not a Zimbabwean?” She asked, rhetorically.

Having successfully “baby dumped” the unlucky Mujuru Grace faced up to Mnangagwa who saw the demise of Mujuru as the renewal of his long cherished hope of being Mugabe’s successor. Mnangagwa was not accused of leading a faction last year going into the elective congress but as soon as that was out of the way and Mujuru well and truly “dumped” he was on Grace’s cross wires, he was accused of leading a faction.

Unfortunately for Grace “baby dumping” Mujuru was easy doing the same with Mnangagwa is proving to be near impossible.

Mnangagwa was going to lose to Mujuru last year because many people in the party did not trust him. He is nicknamed Ngwena, crocodile, and many members trust him as much as you and I would trust a crocodile. Still Mnangagwa had a lot more followers than Mugabe, he is the ruthless loner who was feared by all but trusted by no one.

So poor Grace has inherited very few followers from her husband, hers is a faction of opportunists who had never fitted anywhere and have never had any followings themselves; people like Jonathan Moyo and Patrick Zhuwao. The former is a clever strategist but totally untrustworthy; Mugabe himself has called him a “weevil” and “devil incarnate”!

As for the latter, Patrick Zhuwao, he is being roped in to beef up the Grace faction because he is Mugabe’s nephew and Grace is desperate for more members. Zhuwao was a Zanu PF MP before, nobody noticed him back then because he is a feather and feathers do not make even a ripple. Mugabe has since brought him back and appointed him Minister of Youth and Empowerment and poor Zhuwao has been doing his best to create waves only to make a complete ass of himself.

Even some of the nut-cases in Zanu PF have finally come round to accepting that the party’s indigenisation law forcing foreigners to give up 51% of their shares will empower the ruling elite in theory but not in practice. The foreign investors have shied away from Zimbabwe and left the Chef with 51% ownership of nothing! The party was now ready to ditch this law as a lost cause only for Zhuwao to adopt it as his cause celebre!

The obnoxious indigenisation law is one of the root causes of the country’s worsening economic meltdown as the economic hardship get worse the whole nation will demand the scrapping of such stupid laws. The indigenisation law is doomed and so is Minister Zhuwao and so too is Grace’s faction!

Mugabe created this new animal called factionalism to justify Grace’s savage attack of Joice Mujuru and as used it to justify her attack of VP Mnangagwa. Now that it is clear her campaign to ouster Mnangagwa is getting nowhere Mugabe wants to pretend there is no factional fighting in his party. Indeed he is now accusing the media of creating this animal and threatening to punish all those who continue to report of Zanu PF infighting!

"Its clear that this (reporting on Zanu PF’s intensifying factional wars) is now manipulative reporting. Its not longer professional reporting. Mind you laws are not models. They have to be tethered in social reality. We might have best model laws for media legislation, they will never be transposed to Zimbabwe,” warned Mugabe’s spokesman, George Chamba.

"Zimbabwe must still look at its own situation and then make laws that respond to that situation. Now the situation we are having is one of media excesses and vasazochema (should not cry)."

Mugabe is a sick and old man; that is a fact. Mugabe is mortal just like every other living thing on this earth; not even the regular trips to Singapore, in 2012 he made no fewer than 8 such trips at $3 million @ trip, will keep him alive for much longer – that too is a fact. Once Mugabe is incapacitated or died someone has to take over from him and since he has time and again frustrated all efforts to this resolved once and once for all he has per se imposed this factional and fractious rat-race.

Threatening to muzzle the media will not change the fact that Mugabe is not immortal or end the rat-race to find his successor. The rat-race will go on regardless of the muzzle, threats or even murders – Mugabe’s most tried and trusted way of silencing his opponents, critics, reporters, etc. The regime is being torn apart by the factional fighting and regardless who wins the race the is one thing that is certain, Zanu PF is losing it’s strangle hold on power. Regime change is as certain now as the sun rising tomorrow. 

Yes George Charamba, Zanu PF can institute its most brutal reign of terror in its dying days, worse than anything the regime has inflicted on the nation these last 35 years. Ask yourself, George whether that will stop regime change?

Woe to tyrant and all his thugs and acolytes for dragged this nation into this political and economic nightmare, when regime change happens, as it is now set to happen, they will have a lot to account for! That is no empty threat Charamba, watch this space!

Implement GPA reform and end all dictatorship or accept coalition and keep the dictatorship

Youth and Empowerment Minister, Patrick Zhuwao, says he will go ahead and impose a new 10% indigenisation levy on gross income which only foreign companies who have not sold the 51% shares to locals will pay.

"The levy will be distributed through 61 registered community share ownership trusts established country wide,” the Minister said. “From our calculations, each community trust will at least receive $1.5 Million."

Yes Minister Zhuwao, let us kill the goose that lays the golden egg so we get ALL the golden eggs and share them out. It is all nonsense of course as common sense will tell you kill the goose and you will get one or two reasonable size eggs and the rest are no bigger that pin heads.

The thing is Zimbabweans has not been empowered in any way by the regime’s 2008 indigenisation law forcing foreigners to sale 51% of their company shares to locals; Zanu PF Chefs have not only kept the two reasonable size eggs of that goose but have kept the pin head size too!

The world over investors, be they foreign or local it does not matter, are welcomed because they help produce wealth which is then shared out in the form of wages for the workers, taxes payable government and the rest is paid to the investors as profits or dividends. In 2008 this Zanu PF regime passed an indigenisation law forcing all foreign investors to sale 51% of their company shares to a local black partner(s) over and above all the other traditional commitments.

The would-be foreign investors asked why they were being forced to have a partner. When it became clear the Zanu PF regime would impose who the local partner(s) will be and what would constitute the payment for the 51% shares; investors saw this for what it is – an institutionalized scam to rip them off! Of course, the foreign investors have since shied away from Zimbabwe. 

In 2012 Zimbabwe attracted as little as 4% of the foreign direct investment Mozambique received in the same year, for example. The most notable difference between the two countries is that the later does not have the obnoxious indigenisation Zimbabwe has or anything comparable!

So many Zanu PF Chef who thought they will be the proud owners of controlling shares of foreign owned companies and live is comfort befitting the owner of a multimillion dollar company have been bitterly disappointed. Many Zanu PF Chef are living in total abject poverty. Heroes Acre is filling with Zanu PF chefs who should not be there but are there early because poverty kills.

 If you have your own concession in Marange bringing billions of dollars you live to a ripe old age of 91 years still counting. Mugabe raked in $2 billion from Marange in 2012 alone according to Partnership Africa, a Canadian NGO monitoring the trade in bloody diamonds.

It is not just the Zanu PF Chefs, sick to the back teeth of waiting to rip off these illusive foreign investors, who have cause to be disappointed with this indigenisation law the overwhelming majority across the land are very disappointed too.

Since the foreign investors have shied away there have been no new companies to create the much need jobs, the situation has been made worse by the closure of many existing companies for various reasons included lack of new additional investment. Unemployment has soared to dizzying height of 90% plus and millions of our people now live in abject poverty. People are absolutely desperate for work.

 

The shrinking number of companies and workers has resulted in the fall in collected revenue for the government. The regime has struggled to raise enough money to pay civil servant wages let alone to pay for maintenance, etc. 

There is no doubt that the indigenisation has completely failed to economically empower anyone not even those who were to get the 51% controlling shares; they were empowered in theory but not in practice because there have been no foreign companies to take over.

51% of zero Foreign Direct Investment = zero empowerment + zero jobs + zero tax revenue

That is a mathematical reality that not even Minister Zhuwao can change!

Just when many people were beginning to believe that the penny had finally dropped in the nut-case heads in Zanu PF that the obnoxious indigenisation law must be scrapped because it was empowering no one whilst impoverishing million; along comes Minister Patrick Zhuwao, and he throws the spanners in the works.

Minister Zhuwao is not just another Zanu PF minister, he is Mugabe’s nephew and in a regime where all power rest with one man – Mugabe – those who have the tyrant’s ear wield a lot of power. Grace Mugabe bust on the Zimbabwe political stage from nowhere and babbling nonsense but because she had successfully carried out “a bedroom coup”, as Jabulani Sibanda so gauchely put it, the whole nation had no choice but to treat the nonsense as divine wisdom and suffer the consequences that followed. This time it is Zhuwao whose nonsense we must accept and suffer.

"I am implementing the law and I have not received any instructions from my boss of any idea of reviewing the act," said Zhuwao with finality when he was asked whether the proposed levy would be reviewed.

Zimbabweans know there is nothing to be gained from killing the foreign investor goose that lays the golden egg; they are the ones who have paid dearly ever since the indigenisation law was passed in 2008. The $1.5 million per community is just another political gimmick no different from Mugabe’s promise of 2.2 million new jobs in Zanu PF’s 2013 election manifesto. What matters is we are stuck with indigenisation law and now this levy even though we know that we, the people, will continue pay dearly for this folly; such is the price we pay for having a tyrant for president.

Of course Mugabe rigged the 2013 elections and as long as he can continue to rig elections Zanu PF will remain in power and impose economic policies to gratify the ruling elite’s insatiable appetites for political power and economic wealth. He does not care how much suffering, misery and even deaths these policies may cause of the ordinary people.

If Zimbabweans are serious about ending the economic suffering brought on by the worsening economic meltdown the nation is facing right now then the people must demand the full implementation of the 2008 GPA reforms. We need the reform to have free and fair elections and need free and fair election to stop Zanu PF rigging elections and imposing unworkable policies guaranteed to bring grief to millions.

Mugabe is like Samson in the Book of Judges, just as Samson derive his Herculean strength from his hair, Mugabe derives his tyrannical powers from rigging elections and then pretend the elections were free, fair and credible and he has the mandate of the people. Implement the democratic reforms and he will not be able to rigging the elections and expose the lie of popular support.

Minister Zhuwao promise 61 trusts @ $1.5 m a year from killing the investor goose that lays the golden egg!

Youth and Empowerment Minister, Patrick Zhuwao, says he will go ahead and impose a new 10% indigenisation levy on gross income which only foreign companies who have not sold the 51% shares to locals will pay.

"The levy will be distributed through 61 registered community share ownership trusts established country wide,” the Minister said. “From our calculations, each community trust will at least receive $1.5 Million."

Yes Minister Zhuwao, let us kill the goose that lays the golden egg so we get ALL the golden eggs and share them out. It is all nonsense of course as common sense will tell you kill the goose and you will get one or two reasonable size eggs and the rest are no bigger that pin heads.

The thing is Zimbabweans has not been empowered in any way by the regime’s 2008 indigenisation law forcing foreigners to sale 51% of their company shares to locals; Zanu PF Chefs have not only kept the two reasonable size eggs of that goose but have kept the pin head size too!

The world over investors, be they foreign or local it does not matter, are welcomed because they help produce wealth which is then shared out in the form of wages for the workers, taxes payable government and the rest is paid to the investors as profits or dividends. In 2008 this Zanu PF regime passed an indigenisation law forcing all foreign investors to sale 51% of their company shares to a local black partner(s) over and above all the other traditional commitments.

The would-be foreign investors asked why they were being forced to have a partner. When it became clear the Zanu PF regime would impose who the local partner(s) will be and what would constitute the payment for the 51% shares; investors saw this for what it is – an institutionalized scam to rip them off! Of course, the foreign investors have since shied away from Zimbabwe. 

In 2012 Zimbabwe attracted as little as 4% of the foreign direct investment Mozambique received in the same year, for example. The most notable difference between the two countries is that the later does not have the obnoxious indigenisation Zimbabwe has or anything comparable!

So many Zanu PF Chef who thought they will be the proud owners of controlling shares of foreign owned companies and live is comfort befitting the owner of a multimillion dollar company have been bitterly disappointed. Many Zanu PF Chef are living in total abject poverty. Heroes Acre is filling with Zanu PF chefs who should not be there but are there early because poverty kills.

 If you have your own concession in Marange bringing billions of dollars you live to a ripe old age of 91 years still counting. Mugabe raked in $2 billion from Marange in 2012 alone according to Partnership Africa, a Canadian NGO monitoring the trade in bloody diamonds.

It is not just the Zanu PF Chefs, sick to the back teeth of waiting to rip off these illusive foreign investors, who have cause to be disappointed with this indigenisation law the overwhelming majority across the land are very disappointed too.

Since the foreign investors have shied away there have been no new companies to create the much need jobs, the situation has been made worse by the closure of many existing companies for various reasons included lack of new additional investment. Unemployment has soared to dizzying height of 90% plus and millions of our people now live in abject poverty. People are absolutely desperate for work.

 

The shrinking number of companies and workers has resulted in the fall in collected revenue for the government. The regime has struggled to raise enough money to pay civil servant wages let alone to pay for maintenance, etc. 

There is no doubt that the indigenisation has completely failed to economically empower anyone not even those who were to get the 51% controlling shares; they were empowered in theory but not in practice because there have been no foreign companies to take over.

51% of zero Foreign Direct Investment = zero empowerment + zero jobs + zero tax revenue

That is a mathematical reality that not even Minister Zhuwao can change!

Just when many people were beginning to believe that the penny had finally dropped in the nut-case heads in Zanu PF that the obnoxious indigenisation law must be scrapped because it was empowering no one whilst impoverishing million; along comes Minister Patrick Zhuwao, and he throws the spanners in the works.

Minister Zhuwao is not just another Zanu PF minister, he is Mugabe’s nephew and in a regime where all power rest with one man – Mugabe – those who have the tyrant’s ear wield a lot of power. Grace Mugabe bust on the Zimbabwe political stage from nowhere and babbling nonsense but because she had successfully carried out “a bedroom coup”, as Jabulani Sibanda so gauchely put it, the whole nation had no choice but to treat the nonsense as divine wisdom and suffer the consequences that followed. This time it is Zhuwao whose nonsense we must accept and suffer.

"I am implementing the law and I have not received any instructions from my boss of any idea of reviewing the act," said Zhuwao with finality when he was asked whether the proposed levy would be reviewed.

Zimbabweans know there is nothing to be gained from killing the foreign investor goose that lays the golden egg; they are the ones who have paid dearly ever since the indigenisation law was passed in 2008. The $1.5 million per community is just another political gimmick no different from Mugabe’s promise of 2.2 million new jobs in Zanu PF’s 2013 election manifesto. What matters is we are stuck with indigenisation law and now this levy even though we know that we, the people, will continue pay dearly for this folly; such is the price we pay for having a tyrant for president.

Of course Mugabe rigged the 2013 elections and as long as he can continue to rig elections Zanu PF will remain in power and impose economic policies to gratify the ruling elite’s insatiable appetites for political power and economic wealth. He does not care how much suffering, misery and even deaths these policies may cause of the ordinary people.

If Zimbabweans are serious about ending the economic suffering brought on by the worsening economic meltdown the nation is facing right now then the people must demand the full implementation of the 2008 GPA reforms. We need the reform to have free and fair elections and need free and fair election to stop Zanu PF rigging elections and imposing unworkable policies guaranteed to bring grief to millions.

Mugabe is like Samson in the Book of Judges, just as Samson derive his Herculean strength from his hair, Mugabe derives his tyrannical powers from rigging elections and then pretend the elections were free, fair and credible and he has the mandate of the people. Implement the democratic reforms and he will not be able to rigging the elections and expose the lie of popular support.

We failed to end vote rigging not because we are "in shock" - shock lasts days not years!

“My aunt, who is a nurse by profession, once told me that when someone is in shock; they will drown in water a few feet deep because they cannot think straight to stand up! We are drowning, stuck in this Zanu PF made hell-on-earth because we are in such a state of shock we cannot think straight to stop President Mugabe from blatantly rigging the next elections!” argued Patrick Guramatunhu.

 

I have heard of that one; a slap in the face will help most victim to snap out of the shock and start thinking straight again.

 

A clever argument Patrick but will not wash here; we cannot the whole nation in a state of shock for over two years? It is quite possible that the people were stunned into silence the day of the elections and the effect lasted for a few days or even a few weeks. It is now over two years since the rigged national elections at least some people some have started demanding an explanation from both MDC – why the elections had been rigged when they had insisted throughout they would free and fair – and from Zanu PF - demand an explanation for the treasonous vote rigging acts.

 

Indeed Zimbabwe has yet to hold free and fair elections so if we will have failed to think straight and demand an end to rigged elections because we are in a state of shock then we have been in shock for 35 years!

 

I agree that we are starving in the Garden of Eden; “drowning is water a few feet deep”, if you like; “because we cannot think straight to stand up”. But that is not because we are in shock but rather that we are too lazy to think straight.

 

Some people have argued that Zimbabwe is a very repressive state and the populous have been cowed into silent submission. I readily acknowledge that indeed the Mugabe regime’s track record of over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans murdered by the tyrant’s thugs plus millions harassed, beaten and/or raped for political in 35 years say it all.

 

“I have degrees in violence!” Mugabe was often boasted!

 

Yes Mugabe is a corrupt and murderous tyrant and Zimbabweans have had good reason to fear him and his ruthless henchmen.

 

Still it is in the nature of every human being to desire and strive for freedom and liberty much more so when economic condition one is being forced to live in are unbearable as is the case in Zimbabwe. Millions are now living in abject poverty as a result of the decades of criminal worse of human and material resources. And so the people should have been restless and always on the lookout for unlocked door or window through which to escape from this hell-on-earth Mugabe had frog-matched them into.

 

It so happened that the nation got its get-out-of-hell card when Mugabe was forced to sign the 2008 GPA in which he agreed to a raft of democratic reforms designed to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship and replace it with a democratic system of government.

At the end of the five years of the GNU we were supposed to have free, fair and credible elections and thus walk out of the Mugabe hell. We did not have free and fair elections and hence the reason why we are still in this hell under the same tyrannical subjugation.

 

We did not use our get-out-of-hell card because MDC leaders betrayed us and failed to implement even one reform in five years of the GNU. The very fact that the people have never taken the MDC leaders to task over this goes to show just how slow the people themselves have been in their thinking.

 

There is no reason why the people of Zimbabwe, not just a few but all of them on-mass, had failed on-mass to see the golden opportunity the GPA presented for them to end the Zanu PF dictatorship and to seize. When you get a get-out-of-jail card, use it. You do not complain of the jail’s high walls, razor fence, etc. The doors and gates have been thrown open; walk out. There is no reason that is other than the people have completely switched-off and will not think straight because they are too lazy to think.

 

So as I said in the last article, those who will not learn from the past will be forced to repeat the lesson over and over again and pay dearly for each repeat. We are in this political and economic mess because for the last 35 years we have wished for an end to this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship but not with any passion and conviction. We should be demanding to know why past elections have were rigged, this is a necessary first step in securing this basic and fundamental human right for ourselves and posterity and our ticket out of this hell-on-earth Mugabe frog-matched us into.

 

Until we snap out of this self-induced sloth-like comatose state – shock would last for days not years - and start thinking straight then the political chaos and economic meltdown gripping our nation will only get worse; we ain’t seen nothing yet!

We have no clue how last elections were rigged and so cannot stop it happening again

Right up to elections day on 31 July 2013, many Zimbabweans believed MDC’s promise that the elections will be free, fair and credible. So when this did not happen, a more vigilant electorate would and should have demanded to know what happened. It is now over two years since the rigged elections and yet many Zimbabweans still do not have a clue what happened.
 
How can we say in all honest that we want a democratic Zimbabwe when we do not even care that elections – one of the critical pillars of a democratic system - are blatantly rigged? Of course we deserve this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship and its equally corrupt and incompetent MDC opposition because we have done precious little to end the dictatorship and to secure for ourselves and posterity a healthy and functioning democracy.
 
 Zimbabweans have yet to learn the universal truth that it is not enough to want peace, freedom, economic prosperity, etc. to have all these things one has to earn them through sweat and sinew and, if need be, blood. There is no such thing as a free lunch this side of the grave!
 
For Zimbabwe, the last 35 years have been a relentless match into political chaos and economic ruin. Today the nation has the world record unemployment rate of 90% plus for a nation not at war; millions of our people in our cities and towns do not have access to something as basic as clean running water.
 
The country has some of the best land and climate for grow food and before independence we produced enough food to feed the nation and exported the surplus. Today 1.3 million Zimbabweans are facing starvation. We are starving in the Garden of Eden!
 
Life expectancy, the qualitative and quantitative measure of one’s wellbeing, has plummeted from 68 years in 1980 to 34 year in 2004.
 
Those who will not learn from the past will be forced to repeat the lesson over and over again and pay dearly for each repeat. We are in this political and economic mess because for the last 35 years we have wished for an end of this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship but not with any passion and conviction find out something as basic as find out why and how elections are rigged and most important of all how to ensure that does not happen again! The price for our complacent indifference is the political chaos and economic meltdown will get worse and so will our suffering and misery. We ain’t seen nothing yet!

Biti leading "chorus" for coalition - do better getting GPA reforms implemented!

“People have increasingly become apathetic and disillusioned by the failure of the opposition to deliver them from their tormentor President Robert Mugabe and his ruining party Zanu-PF,” said Tendai Biti.

 

“That is why we in the PDP are leading the chorus on coalition formation, leadership renewal and ideas-based politics.

“We believe that through a coalition, opposition political parties can appeal to a broader constituency beyond our individual bases and thereby mitigate the possibility of splitting the opposition vote to Zanu-PF's benefit.”

 

You are spot on Mr Biti, our people have indeed become “apathetic and disillusioned by the failure of the opposition to deliver them from their tormentor President Mugabe”. What is perplexing is your failure to grasp the reason why the opposition has been such a total failure.

 

You say you and your political party PDP “are leading the chorus on coalition formation, leadership renewal and ideas-based politics”.  MDC had the majority in the GNU parliament had more cabinet members in that cabinet than Zanu PF and yet MDC failed to implement even one of the democratic reforms every greed were absolutely necessary for free, fair and credible elections.

 

SADC leaders reminded MDC leaders again and again throughout the five years of the GNU to implement the reforms but their warnings fell on deaf ears. The regional leaders literally begged MDC not to take part in the 2013 elections but of course MDC leaders ignored the pleas too.

 

There are three logical reasons why MDC failed to implement even one reform in the five years of the GNU:

 

1. MDC leaders are incompetent; as Tsvangirai has already admitted the party believed they have the mass support to overwhelm whatever vote rigging Mugabe and Zanu PF throw at them. How hopelessly wrong MDC strategists turned out to be; Zanu PF did not just rig the elections but did so blatantly and “won” the elections with a landslide.
    
2. MDC leaders are arrogant; this a common weakness right across the Zimbabwe political divide. Tsvangirai and his friends did not pay heed to the warning and pleas from SADC or anybody else because they really believed they knew best. Indeed the only reason Tsvangirai has changed the party’s constitution so he can stay on as party president belong the original maximum two five-year terms is because he believes he is the only one competent to lead. His fellow MDC leaders are no different, they too want to stay on as leaders regardless of the pathetic track records as leaders these last 15 years.
    
   But talk of Mister-Know-It-All arrogance and what better example than Robert Mugabe; he has led the nation for 35 ruinous years, he is so old and sick he can hardly stay awake for more than a few hours, etc. and yet he is more desperate than ever to stay in power.
    
3. But most important of all MDC leaders are corrupt; again a common cancer across the country’s political divide. Five years is a long time for even the most incompetent MDC leaders like Tsvangirai not to have realized that the raft of democratic reforms were important for free and fair elections. Not even one reform was implemented because Mugabe bribed the entire MDC leadership the gravy train lifestyle, the $4 million Highlands mansion for Tsvangirai, etc. MDC leaders took the bribes and kicked the reforms into the tall grass. Of course MDC leaders sold-out.
    
   “Vanhu veMDC vadzidza kudya vanyerere!” (MDC people have learnt to enjoy the gravy train spoils of power and not rock the boat!) Boasted one Zanu PF politician to the repeated question during the GNU why MDC leaders had not implemented even one reform.
    
   “"Your own mouth condemns you, and not I,” I was tempted to remind the boastful Zanu PF buffoon. Zimbabwe has sunk into these depths of economic ruin with regime has ridden roughshod over the people’s freedoms, humans rights, hopes and dreams because Mugabe has bribed Zanu PF politicians; top brass in the Police, Army and CIO; the Judges; Editors and Journalist in the country’s public media; etc. so they all turn a blind eye his corrupt and tyrannical excesses.

 

So to turn back to Mr Tendai Biti; Mugabe did not “win” the 31^st July 2013 elections because there were too many opposition parties resulting in the “splitting the opposition vote to Zanu-PF's benefit”. Zanu PF won because the party was able to blatantly rig the elections. The only way the opposition can stop Zanu PF rigging the next elections is by implementing ALL the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA.

 

Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC-T party supported by 18 local NGOs led by Elections Resource Centre (ERC) have been calling for the implementation of the electoral law reforms, which “are not a threat to anyone (meaning Zanu PF)” as Tawanda Chimhini, ERC Director has readily admitted. So if their proposed reforms are not going to stop Zanu PF rigging the next elections there is really very little point in implementing them and thus contesting the next elections with or without opposition coalition.

 

Most of the top leaders in PDP, the various MDC factions, Zapu, Mavhambo, Mujuru’s People First, etc. are recycled deadwood from Zanu PF or MDC; the same corrupt and incompetent lot. You obsession with coalition as the way forward show just how breathtakingly incompetent you really are because if you have deadwood in the individual parties to start with surely you will still have deadwood, only a bigger pile, even if you succeeded in bringing all the opposition parties together.

 

The opposition have been a great disappointment in the past because there were no quality leaders. Put quality before quantity and you will get the desired results those who have put emphasis on quantity have, as a rule, found themselves going round and round in circles.

 

If the truth be told MDC and Zanu PF leaders have never wanted all the democratic reforms in the 2008 GPA implemented because both parties knew their own leadership position will not be secure if there was a healthy and functional democratic system because both parties have truck-loads of deadwood each.

 

What Zimbabwe needed MDC to do during the GNU was to implement ALL the democratic reforms; sadly that was not done. The country needs these reforms implement now just we did during the GNU because only when we have a healthy and functional democratic system can we be assured of quality leaders emerging. We do not need a coalition of mediocre leaders and much less the watered down Tsvangirai reforms to be implemented!