Tsitsi, Mugabe is a master at playing the game of smoke and mirrors. The Zimbabwe economy is still in a mess and is set to get even worse.
The international community who had step in after the formation of the GNU to get help the recovery of the country’s hospitals, schools, prisons and other humanitarian aid dependent activities are cut back. They had hoped to see the GNU getting its act together and take over these functions only to see the later seat back. Indeed in some cases the members of GNU have turned round to make ridiculous demands for the sole purpose of unashamedly enriching themselves – the demand that all MPs and Senators should be involved in the consultation process for the new constitution and be paid a cool US$300 daily allowances being one example.
The GNU is as good as died; Mugabe can see that. He knows fresh elections are the only way out; he has to decide when will be the most opportune time. But even there, he does not have much room to play with.
Mugabe knows winning the next elections will be a Herculean task but he also knows he can not afford to lose the elections either. When one has so much dirty to hid as he has, losing an elections and let his past come out is simply unthinkable!
For the last ten years Mugabe has used the land issue as the only election issue. He has milked it for all he could, 90% of the white farms are already occupied by him and his cronies. So he needs another election issue. And the targeted sanctions against him and his cronies is emerging as THE issue.
Mugabe has always blamed Zimbabwe’s economic melt down on the sanctions and now he can hit at the West for imposing the sanctions and hit MDC for calling for them to be imposed and now for failing to have them lifted.
Zanu PF youths have the outward excuse for beating up MDC supporters; the underlying and unspoken excuse is to stop MDC threatening Mugabe’s struggle hold on political power at all cost.
Tsvangirai really believed he could talk the West into lifting the targeted sanctions regardless of just how phony the GNU turned out to be. He was being naïve, of course. Mugabe is only capitalising on Tsvangirai and MDC’s incompetency – not for the first time!
Thursday, 25 February 2010
Thursday, 18 February 2010
MUGABE THREATENS TO PULL OUT OF KIMBERLY PROCESS RATHER THAN PLAY BY ITS RULES!
Zimbabwe Times reported that President Robert Mugabe threatening to pull Zimbabwe out of the control of the Kimberly Process (KP) if the diamond mining regulator continued to insist that Zimbabwe abides by KP’s stringent measures on diamond trade.
The important thing is Mugabe does not play anything by the rules.
He is a stickler with the rules if they save his purpose. He has refused to appoint MDC’s Roy Bennet minister because the later has court case pending. He has appointed Zanu PF ministers in a similar situation or worse.
When the rules do not suit his sinister schemes he disregards them. The Kimberly Process rules here are asking Mugabe to use free labour to mine the diamonds and sell them in the open market. He has repeatedly refused to do so preferring to use force labour, soldiers policing the whole process and selling the diamonds with no paper work trail that would otherwise lead to those benefiting.
The Chiyadza and Marange diamonds are worth US$ 1 billion a year according to those in the know. And no one knows who is getting the money because Mugabe has the whole process shrouded in a blanket of secrecy. He is not going to give up this valuable source of wealth to finance his dictatorial activities.
It is about time that the Kimberly Process showed some political will and spine and stand up to Mugabe.
The important thing is Mugabe does not play anything by the rules.
He is a stickler with the rules if they save his purpose. He has refused to appoint MDC’s Roy Bennet minister because the later has court case pending. He has appointed Zanu PF ministers in a similar situation or worse.
When the rules do not suit his sinister schemes he disregards them. The Kimberly Process rules here are asking Mugabe to use free labour to mine the diamonds and sell them in the open market. He has repeatedly refused to do so preferring to use force labour, soldiers policing the whole process and selling the diamonds with no paper work trail that would otherwise lead to those benefiting.
The Chiyadza and Marange diamonds are worth US$ 1 billion a year according to those in the know. And no one knows who is getting the money because Mugabe has the whole process shrouded in a blanket of secrecy. He is not going to give up this valuable source of wealth to finance his dictatorial activities.
It is about time that the Kimberly Process showed some political will and spine and stand up to Mugabe.
Tuesday, 16 February 2010
SEIZURE OF WHITE OWNED BUSINESSES SET TO CAUSE UNTOLD SUFFERING TO MILLIONS
When Mugabe started seizing white owned farms the whole world was told that it was to resettle the landless peasants. Well the reality on the ground has turned out to be shockingly different. Very few landless peasants were actually resettled as most of the farms were taken over by Mugabe and his cronies.
The ordinary Zimbabweans, the very people who were supposed to benefit from the farm seizures, were caught in a four pronged pincer squeeze. The farm seizures resulted in a dramatic collapse of the country’s agricultural sector and, since this was the main and remaining pillar on which the Zimbabwean economic stood, with it the national economy. So the ordinary Zimbabweans found themselves out of work and yet facing the soaring food prices because Zimbabwe became a next importer of food. As for the hundreds of thousands of farm workers they found themselves out of work – the new ruling elite who took over the farms failed to keep the farms productive and so fired the workers. And for the farm workers they were under attack on the fourth front, in siding with their white farmer employers they became the easer targets of Zanu PF thugs then the white farmers.
This new law forcing all none black business owners cede 51% of their business to blacks in clearly meant to achieve the same thing Zanu PF accomplish in its violent seizures of white owned farms. With this latest move there is no pretence that it will benefit the ordinary Zimbabweans. They have neither the funds to buy any of the 51% shares nor the political connections to be on the minister’s pre-selected list. But once again, it is the ordinary people who will pay dearly for this law.
Zanu PF’s seizure of white owned farms showed the country had no respect for individual property rights and the rule of law. This certainly worried the would-be investor and when Zanu PF passed this new law in parliament it confirmed something that people saw coming. For any business owner already in the country they held back on further investments. For a country with a staggering 90% unemployment rate this was sheer midnight madness!
This law is clearly meant to benefit Mugabe and his cronies at the great expense of the masses of Zimbabwe. If there is justice in this world then all those who benefit from this must be severely punished for severely punishing the rightful owners of these businesses and in the process severely punishing millions of ordinary Zimbabweans
The ordinary Zimbabweans, the very people who were supposed to benefit from the farm seizures, were caught in a four pronged pincer squeeze. The farm seizures resulted in a dramatic collapse of the country’s agricultural sector and, since this was the main and remaining pillar on which the Zimbabwean economic stood, with it the national economy. So the ordinary Zimbabweans found themselves out of work and yet facing the soaring food prices because Zimbabwe became a next importer of food. As for the hundreds of thousands of farm workers they found themselves out of work – the new ruling elite who took over the farms failed to keep the farms productive and so fired the workers. And for the farm workers they were under attack on the fourth front, in siding with their white farmer employers they became the easer targets of Zanu PF thugs then the white farmers.
This new law forcing all none black business owners cede 51% of their business to blacks in clearly meant to achieve the same thing Zanu PF accomplish in its violent seizures of white owned farms. With this latest move there is no pretence that it will benefit the ordinary Zimbabweans. They have neither the funds to buy any of the 51% shares nor the political connections to be on the minister’s pre-selected list. But once again, it is the ordinary people who will pay dearly for this law.
Zanu PF’s seizure of white owned farms showed the country had no respect for individual property rights and the rule of law. This certainly worried the would-be investor and when Zanu PF passed this new law in parliament it confirmed something that people saw coming. For any business owner already in the country they held back on further investments. For a country with a staggering 90% unemployment rate this was sheer midnight madness!
This law is clearly meant to benefit Mugabe and his cronies at the great expense of the masses of Zimbabwe. If there is justice in this world then all those who benefit from this must be severely punished for severely punishing the rightful owners of these businesses and in the process severely punishing millions of ordinary Zimbabweans
Saturday, 6 February 2010
ZIMBABWE CIVIL SERVANTS ON STRIKE: TENTATIVE STEPS IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION!
The Civil Servants, like the rest of Zimbabweans, have been very patient; I am surprised it has taken them this long before saying enough is enough. It is nonsense for this government to say it does not have the money to pay Civil Servants a living wage when the politicians are squandering millions of dollars on questionable activities.
Tsvangirai MDC promised to government expenditure by reducing the size of government; before the 2008 elections he promised there would be 15 ministers, for example. How quickly he forgot. There are now five times as many ministers; counting the governors, ministers, Prime Minister, Deputy PMs, President and Deputy Presidents. What exactly is the Minister of National Healing supposed to doing and we have three Ministers sharing this portfolio for good measure! And, of course, each minister has an army of civil servants, drives ministerial car and is paid all manner of allowances!
Mugabe has fostered a new class and culture system on Zimbabwe; we have the ruling elite who are pampered and spoilt, they are to be denied nothing money can buy and they are, as a rule, a-law-unto-themselves. They constitute 10 to 20%. The rest, the ruled, are not entitled to any basic rights including the right to life itself and they are expected to make any sacrifice demanded of them in a fight for resources to meet their basic needs as contrast to buying luxuries for the ruling elite. So schools and hospitals for the ruled have closed for lack of funding and meanwhile the state has spent millions buying plasma TV for Judges, Mercedes Benz for Ministers, financing countless overseas trips for ministers, etc. The ruling elite have not been affected by the school closures since the send their children outside Zimbabwe for their education.
In Mugabe's Zimbabwe it is those who have political power and have pledged their loyalty to Mugabe who have been granted unfettered access to the nation's resources. In the last five years Mugabe has expanded his loyalty base by giving seized farms to more and more people and thus expand the "ruling elite" class. For most of the new "ruling elite" the farm is the only asset they have, take that away they, like the overwhelming majority in Zimbabwe today, will have absolutely nothing. It this fear of joining the dispossessed masses that Mugabe is hoping will spur the new farm owners to defend status quo and thus help him and his cronies who have commandeer and now own the lion's share of Zimbabwe wealth and resources keep their loot.
Mugabe and his cronies have seized the nation's wealth and resource but have failed to put it to good use through mismanagement and corruption. They took over the farms, factories, etc. not because they were the best farmers, etc. They took over the farms because of greed and because they had the political muscle to do as they pleased.
If Zimbabwe is ever to become a just and prosperous country then we must break this culture of greed and lawlessness. The nation's resources must be used for the good and benefit of all and not just a select few. All citizens must have an equal opportunity to keep resources like land and those who are going to use a given resource productively must considered first before those who will seat on it.
After years of unmitigated looting of the nation's wealth and resources there will be those who want the political system that allowed them to be favoured at the expense of all other to stay. Or at the very least, that they should be allowed to keep their loot. This can not and must not be allowed. First in the interest of common justice, the looters must be punished not rewarded for bring the whole nation into this sorry state of affairs. Allow these crooks to keep their ill got wealth and there will be no end to the mischieve they will fund! Secondly, more practically, the only chance the nation has for future prosperity is by making sure that the looted wealth is in the hands of those best able to use it to create even more wealth for the good of all.
A concerted Civil Servants strike will not by itself dismantle Mugabe’s dictatorship and bring sanity to the nation. Still, it is a tentative step in the right direction!
Tsvangirai MDC promised to government expenditure by reducing the size of government; before the 2008 elections he promised there would be 15 ministers, for example. How quickly he forgot. There are now five times as many ministers; counting the governors, ministers, Prime Minister, Deputy PMs, President and Deputy Presidents. What exactly is the Minister of National Healing supposed to doing and we have three Ministers sharing this portfolio for good measure! And, of course, each minister has an army of civil servants, drives ministerial car and is paid all manner of allowances!
Mugabe has fostered a new class and culture system on Zimbabwe; we have the ruling elite who are pampered and spoilt, they are to be denied nothing money can buy and they are, as a rule, a-law-unto-themselves. They constitute 10 to 20%. The rest, the ruled, are not entitled to any basic rights including the right to life itself and they are expected to make any sacrifice demanded of them in a fight for resources to meet their basic needs as contrast to buying luxuries for the ruling elite. So schools and hospitals for the ruled have closed for lack of funding and meanwhile the state has spent millions buying plasma TV for Judges, Mercedes Benz for Ministers, financing countless overseas trips for ministers, etc. The ruling elite have not been affected by the school closures since the send their children outside Zimbabwe for their education.
In Mugabe's Zimbabwe it is those who have political power and have pledged their loyalty to Mugabe who have been granted unfettered access to the nation's resources. In the last five years Mugabe has expanded his loyalty base by giving seized farms to more and more people and thus expand the "ruling elite" class. For most of the new "ruling elite" the farm is the only asset they have, take that away they, like the overwhelming majority in Zimbabwe today, will have absolutely nothing. It this fear of joining the dispossessed masses that Mugabe is hoping will spur the new farm owners to defend status quo and thus help him and his cronies who have commandeer and now own the lion's share of Zimbabwe wealth and resources keep their loot.
Mugabe and his cronies have seized the nation's wealth and resource but have failed to put it to good use through mismanagement and corruption. They took over the farms, factories, etc. not because they were the best farmers, etc. They took over the farms because of greed and because they had the political muscle to do as they pleased.
If Zimbabwe is ever to become a just and prosperous country then we must break this culture of greed and lawlessness. The nation's resources must be used for the good and benefit of all and not just a select few. All citizens must have an equal opportunity to keep resources like land and those who are going to use a given resource productively must considered first before those who will seat on it.
After years of unmitigated looting of the nation's wealth and resources there will be those who want the political system that allowed them to be favoured at the expense of all other to stay. Or at the very least, that they should be allowed to keep their loot. This can not and must not be allowed. First in the interest of common justice, the looters must be punished not rewarded for bring the whole nation into this sorry state of affairs. Allow these crooks to keep their ill got wealth and there will be no end to the mischieve they will fund! Secondly, more practically, the only chance the nation has for future prosperity is by making sure that the looted wealth is in the hands of those best able to use it to create even more wealth for the good of all.
A concerted Civil Servants strike will not by itself dismantle Mugabe’s dictatorship and bring sanity to the nation. Still, it is a tentative step in the right direction!
Thursday, 4 February 2010
BITI SAYS MDC IS READY FOR ELECTIONS - TRUTH IS MDC HAS NO CHOICE NOW!
“The MDC is ready for this election” says Minister Biti. After all the humiliation and contemptuous treatment by Mugabe; what other option does MDC have but to accept elections at the dictator’s terms!
It took Tendai Biti a very long time to finally, finally realise that Mugabe and Zanu PF could not be trusted. Here is the man who has been dealing with Zanu PF up front and personal ever since his party entered into negotiations long before the 2008 elections.
Only a few months ago Tendai Biti himself was full of praise of the dictator calling the brute “a Victorian gentleman” who should be “knighted”. A ruthless dictator who has brought our great nation to knees and has the blood of hundreds of thousands of our people on his hands, some of the blood still fresh after the 2008 presidential run-off; knighted?
Minister Biti, you may choose to call what you and your fellow leaders in MDC have done “sincere” and do acknowledge even being “naïve”. What you did is a lot worse than that. You betrayed the people of Zimbabwe who had risked so much over the years and many lives lost to end the reign of terror and bring about real democratic change. The people paid dearly for the electoral mandate they gave you in March 2008. And you gave it away for a place at Mugabe’s high table.
Minister Biti it was not after the Zanu PF Congress in December 2009 that the unlawful farm invasions, disobedience of lawful court orders, etc. started. These things have been going one all along. MDC has said little and done nothing about these criminal activities by Mugabe and his thugs because people like Biti and Tsvangirai had been appointed Minister and Prime Minister by Mugabe and did not want to rock the boat.
You are complaining now because Mugabe did not share the spoils of power fairly with you.
Only a week ago Prime Minister Tsvangirai was quick off the mark to slam down President Zuma’s call for fresh elections. Now Minister Biti is calling for elections and asking SADC to supervise. It is the contemptuous way, “vitriolic” to you, Mugabe continues to treat Tsvangirai that has forced you to change you mind?
Minister Biti; MDC is NOT ready for elections. MDC lost faith with the people when it cosy up to Mugabe. Mugabe used the time to rebuild his own party, get the Army and the Police to reaffirm their allegiance to himself and Zanu PF. What people saw in December 2009 is as strong and united Zanu PF as Mugabe can ever get it to be; given the chaotic state of the national affairs. So Mugabe has now decided to ditch Tsvangirai and MDC; he has too if only to stop Zanu PF falling apart again!
Minister Tendai Biti’s belated bravado is fooling no one. Mugabe is the one calling the shots here. With MDC discredited and his party as united as he can get it to be; Mugabe is now looking for the opportune moment to call for fresh elections. There will be no fresh elections until Mugabe is good and ready; his say is the only one that really matters – absolute power for you.
Ironically, it was MDC’s blundering that ensured Mugabe would still have absolute power after signing the GPA! Poor Biti, he of all people, has egg all over his face but has now to pretend he and MDC still have a say in all this.
It took Tendai Biti a very long time to finally, finally realise that Mugabe and Zanu PF could not be trusted. Here is the man who has been dealing with Zanu PF up front and personal ever since his party entered into negotiations long before the 2008 elections.
Only a few months ago Tendai Biti himself was full of praise of the dictator calling the brute “a Victorian gentleman” who should be “knighted”. A ruthless dictator who has brought our great nation to knees and has the blood of hundreds of thousands of our people on his hands, some of the blood still fresh after the 2008 presidential run-off; knighted?
Minister Biti, you may choose to call what you and your fellow leaders in MDC have done “sincere” and do acknowledge even being “naïve”. What you did is a lot worse than that. You betrayed the people of Zimbabwe who had risked so much over the years and many lives lost to end the reign of terror and bring about real democratic change. The people paid dearly for the electoral mandate they gave you in March 2008. And you gave it away for a place at Mugabe’s high table.
Minister Biti it was not after the Zanu PF Congress in December 2009 that the unlawful farm invasions, disobedience of lawful court orders, etc. started. These things have been going one all along. MDC has said little and done nothing about these criminal activities by Mugabe and his thugs because people like Biti and Tsvangirai had been appointed Minister and Prime Minister by Mugabe and did not want to rock the boat.
You are complaining now because Mugabe did not share the spoils of power fairly with you.
Only a week ago Prime Minister Tsvangirai was quick off the mark to slam down President Zuma’s call for fresh elections. Now Minister Biti is calling for elections and asking SADC to supervise. It is the contemptuous way, “vitriolic” to you, Mugabe continues to treat Tsvangirai that has forced you to change you mind?
Minister Biti; MDC is NOT ready for elections. MDC lost faith with the people when it cosy up to Mugabe. Mugabe used the time to rebuild his own party, get the Army and the Police to reaffirm their allegiance to himself and Zanu PF. What people saw in December 2009 is as strong and united Zanu PF as Mugabe can ever get it to be; given the chaotic state of the national affairs. So Mugabe has now decided to ditch Tsvangirai and MDC; he has too if only to stop Zanu PF falling apart again!
Minister Tendai Biti’s belated bravado is fooling no one. Mugabe is the one calling the shots here. With MDC discredited and his party as united as he can get it to be; Mugabe is now looking for the opportune moment to call for fresh elections. There will be no fresh elections until Mugabe is good and ready; his say is the only one that really matters – absolute power for you.
Ironically, it was MDC’s blundering that ensured Mugabe would still have absolute power after signing the GPA! Poor Biti, he of all people, has egg all over his face but has now to pretend he and MDC still have a say in all this.
Tuesday, 2 February 2010
ZIMBABWE'S CATCH 22: HAVE A DICTATOR WHOM THE OPPOSITION IS SCARED STIFF OF AND THE PEOPLE ARE SCARED OF GETTING RID OF THE BLUNDERING OPPOSITION.
This would be really funny if it was not that the consequences are unbearable! MDC President and Prime Minister of Zimbabwe is in Davos, Switzerland calling on the West to lift sanctions “to reward the progress made by the inclusive government”. Back in Zimbabwe his key party leaders, Minister Nelson Chamisa and Minister Tendai Biti are saying there is NO PROGRESS.
The parties to the inclusive government have been negotiating on the trivial issues of who occupies what office and a year later, they still can not agree. The really important issues affecting the ordinary people like restoring law and order and getting the national economy back on track remain untouched. The people continue to suffer and die!
What is the way forward? The people of Zimbabwe have to realise that this circus will continue until they finally learn that they have to look to themselves to force change. We have been conditioned to look “to our political leaders” for the answers to all our problems. When they leaders themselves are the problem, as is the case here; it is a totally different kettle of fish!
Tsvangirai is now the problem, just as Mugabe became a problem soon after independence. People realised Mugabe was incompetent, corrupt and repressive as far back as 1985 and yet for years they really believed Mugabe face up to all his serious short comings.
After years of breath taking blundering, flip-flopping and down right betrayal of the people by MDC, particularly its leadership; many Zimbabweans have finally reached the point were they are “angry” with MDC. The people are angry but not enough to reject MDC and search for a way out themselves; that is a bridge-too-far for them.
Just as Tsvangirai and MDC have the political muscle to force Mugabe out of power but are too scared to stand up to him; the ordinary Zimbabweans themselves have the political power to force Tsvangirai and Mugabe out of office but they too are scared to use this people’s power. Mugabe has of course taken full advantage of this to give Tsvangirai the run around. Similarly Tsvangirai too learnt to do as he please and completely ignore the wishes of the people and their tragic on going suffering.
We are is a catch 22 situation in Zimbabwe: we want to get rid of a dictator using an opposition party too scared to use the people’s mandate we gave them and we are too scared to use our people’s power to remove the ineffective opposition!
The parties to the inclusive government have been negotiating on the trivial issues of who occupies what office and a year later, they still can not agree. The really important issues affecting the ordinary people like restoring law and order and getting the national economy back on track remain untouched. The people continue to suffer and die!
What is the way forward? The people of Zimbabwe have to realise that this circus will continue until they finally learn that they have to look to themselves to force change. We have been conditioned to look “to our political leaders” for the answers to all our problems. When they leaders themselves are the problem, as is the case here; it is a totally different kettle of fish!
Tsvangirai is now the problem, just as Mugabe became a problem soon after independence. People realised Mugabe was incompetent, corrupt and repressive as far back as 1985 and yet for years they really believed Mugabe face up to all his serious short comings.
After years of breath taking blundering, flip-flopping and down right betrayal of the people by MDC, particularly its leadership; many Zimbabweans have finally reached the point were they are “angry” with MDC. The people are angry but not enough to reject MDC and search for a way out themselves; that is a bridge-too-far for them.
Just as Tsvangirai and MDC have the political muscle to force Mugabe out of power but are too scared to stand up to him; the ordinary Zimbabweans themselves have the political power to force Tsvangirai and Mugabe out of office but they too are scared to use this people’s power. Mugabe has of course taken full advantage of this to give Tsvangirai the run around. Similarly Tsvangirai too learnt to do as he please and completely ignore the wishes of the people and their tragic on going suffering.
We are is a catch 22 situation in Zimbabwe: we want to get rid of a dictator using an opposition party too scared to use the people’s mandate we gave them and we are too scared to use our people’s power to remove the ineffective opposition!
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