Tsvangirai in a fruitless effort tohave reforms implemented after his Copac folly!

PM Tsvangirai met SA President Zuma on Sunday and will meet the Tanzanian President on Monday in his last minute effort to get SADC to force Mugabe to implement democratic reforms.  

MDC shot itself in the foot by agreeing to by agreeing to a weak Copac constitution and to having it approved before the reforms were implemented. As expected, Zanu PF was going to turn to the new constitution as the blueprint for where the nation should be and refuse implementing any more reforms; which is exactly what Professor Jonathan Moyo, Zanu PF’s key strategist is now doing.

“The new constitution is the mother of all reforms. You cannot wish for better than that,” said Moyo. “As things stand today, there is no single issue which was previously claimed to be outstanding by any of the three GPA parties which did not find expression in the new constitution one way or another,” he added

Tsvangirai can tour all the SADC countries all he wants, the fact remains that once the Copac constitution is signed into law Zanu PF will wave it in the SADC Heads' faces and remind them that it was approved by 95% of the people and it does NOT call for any of reforms MDC is now asking for!

Tsvangirai should have thought carefully before he accepted the Copac rubbish; sadly, he did not and now he and the nation at large must pay of his folly.

"The new constitution is the mother of all reforms," says Moyo. He knows MDC made a blunder and he is not one to resist rubbing their nose in it. Mother of all reforms, indeed!

Zimbabwe is now the third poorest country in the world, says IMF.

Zimbabwe is now the third poorest country in the world according to the International Monetary Fund World Economic Outlook Database.

It was a lot easier and faster to fall to third poorest country in the world; it took Zanu PF three decades to do that. It is going to be a lot tougher and take longer, five decades at the very least, to climb up again.

Mugabe’s indigenisation policies will drag the nation down and make it even harder to climb up.

The best MDC will have achieved if they get into power is that they slowed down the implementation of Mugabe’s policies; they really do not have the political vision to reserve the many things Mugabe has done to get the nation into this mess! It is inconceivable that the national economy will start the difficult climb up without getting full production in the agricultural sector first, for example. By passing the faulty Copac constitution, MDC have aided Mugabe and his cronies to claim ownership of the farms they looted although they have failed to put the land to productive use and thus holding the nation to ransom.

President Zuma in a mad dash to get reforms implemented but it is all too late!

SADC is pushing hard to have the security sector reforms, media reform, etc. agreed in the GPA implemented.

This is a last second of the last minute push because these reforms should have been implemented a few months after the signing of the GPA – it was signed back in September 2008! MDC should not have agreed to a new Copac constitution which did not have the reforms included into the supreme law and before the reforms were implement. But is exactly what MDC did!

The new Copac Constitution does not call for any of these reforms; it was approved by 95% in the referendum and is now just a few days away from being proclaimed the supreme law in the land. It is really naïve to think that Mugabe and Zanu PF having resisted pressure to implement these reforms all these years will do so now when neither MDC nor SADC have any GPA leverage left to force Mugabe to comply!

“The purpose of the facilitation team is to make sure what is in the GPA is implemented and to make sure all the necessary institutions and frameworks for free and fair elections are in place” argued Lindiwe Zulu, the head of President Zuma SADC team. “That is the responsibility of SADC. Nothing in the GPA is a closed chapter until it’s completed.”

That was the responsibility of SADC; nothing is going to stop Mugabe signing the new constitution into law and thus end the GPA and SADC’s role in it.

We have been heading for this all these years and both MDC and SADC paid no attention and now there is this mad dash to have the reforms implemented but, of course, it is too late!

The failure to get the democratic reforms implemented is MDC's Achilles heel!

It is wishful thinking to talk of "free and fair elections" in Zimbabwe. It is tempting to point at the relative peace as proof there will be no violence but this could be the calm before the storm.

By refusing to implement the democratic reforms, Mugabe ensured the threat of violence, at least, is always there. This time the violence will not as blatant and wanton as in 2008 but will be selective and a lot more subtle because the people do not hate him and Zanu PF with the same burning passion this time as they did in 2008.

Even if violence was to play no part in this year's elections, there are other ways of ensuring the elections neither free nor fair. There is still the problem of no free media; the Police and Judiciary continue to act in their partisan way; Zanu PF using the war chest from Marange diamonds to fund its campaign and, no doubt, buy votes; etc.

But MDC's Achilles heel going into these elections is the party’s failure to implement the democratic reforms that would have dismantled the Zanu PF dictatorship. Throughout the five years of the GNU PM Tsvangirai has again and again failed to stand up to Mugabe whose has reduced him to nothing more than the tyrant’s messenger boy. By failing to have these critic reforms implemented PM Tsvangirai showed just what a feather weight political weakling he really is. And, worse still for MDC, by failing to have the reforms carried out meant Mugabe and Zanu PF still wield huge dictatorial political and economic muscles which no one, including MDC, can ignore.  

The political reality is it really does not matter if it not Zanu PF seating on the throne they will still be the real power behind the throne.

John Robertson, a veteran Zimbabwe economist, told the SA Star newspaper MDC would not change anything even if the party won the elections because they "might not have the courage to implement the radical reforms needs to rescue the economy".

The international community, quick off the block, has accepted the opportunity for democratic change in Zimbabwe has been lost and the West has started lifting sanctions imposed on Zanu PF leaders and to improve relations.

If there is no violence, the Zimbabwe electorate will no doubt vote for MDC; in the hope that there will be political and economic change this time, but of course there will be none. If there is violence, which is a near certainty, one hopes the people will have the common sense to realise that putting a weakling on the throne is not worth dying for!

UN offer to pay for Zimbabwe's elections is straw to drowning man!

The UN has promised to help fund Zimbabwe’s upcoming elections but on condition that a UN needs-assessment team is allowed to meet government officials and NGOs. Mugabe has said no to the team meeting the latter.

Denmark is the only country that has offered to pay for the elections, not that the country needed this help, according to Finance Minister Tendai Biti.

Minister Biti said if there was honesty in diamond revenues, Zimbabwe should not even be asking for election funds from outsiders. He said Zimbabwe’s diamond exports should have brought in US$800 million last year but Treasury only got $45 million.

We all know the reason why Mugabe does not want anyone in the West or the UN to have look-in in the electoral process is because Zimbabweans will once again by systematically denied a meaningful democratic say in to the governance of the country.

Mugabe has yet to hold a free and fair elections after 33 years and already there is overwhelming evidence the coming elections will not be any different including the refusal to implement meaningful democratic reforms and the withholding of billions of dollars of diamonds revenue.

Even if the UN was allowed to meet all local NGOs; does anyone really think that will stop the Police and the Judiciary acting in their usual partisan manner, will have all the Zanu PF thugs like Jabulani Sibanda and Chipango rounded up and thrown in jail, will end Zanu Pf control of the public media, etc., etc.? Anyone, that is other than Prime Minister Tsvangirai who, having failed to get the reforms implemented in four and half years when he had the support of SADC and the world at large, now expects to accomplish the task in as many weeks. And for backup, he is counting on presence of outside election observers delivering free and fair elections. This is the hopeless politics of despair of PM Tsvangirai, like a drowning man, limply clutching on straws when a vigorous use of the hands and feet could save his life.

What is really disappointing here is how some countries like Denmark and institutions like the UN are ignoring all this evidence and working with the tyrant, giving him and his devilish electoral schemes legitimacy. And the same token they are also giving failed leaders like Tsvangirai encouragement that his hare-brain foolishness could still deliver free and fair elections regardless of the now entrenched Zanu PF dictatorship!
The people of Zimbabwe want and need friends but friends who going to help them get out of this political and economic mess. The last thing they want is some rich fiends throwing their money around which only serves to keep them in the mess!