Zuma joins Mugabe in boycott accusing EU of causing "unnecessary unpleasantness" - aspiring tyrant fighting for a tyrant!

There is a lot more to President Jacob Zuma’s boycott of the EU – Africa summit than meets the eye and every freedom loving South African must now seat up and pay attention before it is too late!

 

“I think that time must pass wherein we are looked as subjects,” President Zuma told SABC. “We are told who must come, who must not come. We have not attempted to decide when we meet Europe; who must come and who must not come. It is wrong and causes this unnecessary unpleasantness.”

 

The European Union, United States of America, Australia, Canada and many other Western countries did not impose the targeted sanctions on Mugabe and his cronies out of the blue; the imposed the sanctions to show their displeasure at the tyrannical regime’s repeated failure to hold free and fair elections and thus deny the ordinary Zimbabweans a meaningful say in the governance of the country.

 

Of all the leaders in this world President Zuma knows only too well how Mugabe has repeatedly rigged the elections. He and Thambo Mbeki, before him, have seen the reported on how Mugabe rigged the 2002 elections. Indeed he is the one who has stubbornly refused to release the report even when the Court said he should.

 

Of all the leaders on earth President Zuma should know the suffering and despair millions of Zimbabweans have endured as a consequence of Zimbabwe’s political and economic mess. SA has seen more Zimbabwean political and economic refugees than any other country in the world.

 

Mugabe is a corrupt and murderous tyrant; this is a myth but a daily reality for the people of Zimbabwe. 34 years of gross mismanagement, rampant corruption and brutal political repression have reduce Zimbabwe into one of the poorest in the region. Zimbabwe’s continued economic and political mess is the single biggest threat to economic growth and stability in the SADC region.

 

It is inconceivable that someone like President Zuma has failed to see Mugabe for the corrupt and murderous tyrant he is. That is simply impossible. President Zuma is refusing to see Mugabe for the tyrannical dictator he is because he is himself becoming one!

 

Only last week President Zuma was heavily criticized for spending $20 million of unauthorised public funds improving his rural mansion. He refused to own up and his ruling ANC party all rallied behind him. The motive of the other ANC leaders in supporting him is as clear as day; they too can now indulge themselves in all manner of corrupt activities confident Zuma will turn a blind eye to it all.

 

Two decades after the end of apartheid millions of black South Africans still live in abject poverty. Stories of rampant corruption amongst the governing ANC leaders will only pour petrol to the fire and fury of the restless masses. Worse still, the passing away of the iconic ANC leader Nelson Mandela; has meant more than the death of the leader but of the democratic ideals he fought for all his life.

 

The late President Mandela’s contempt of Robert Mugabe for the tyrant’s greed and betrayal of freedom and liberty is a matter of public record. President Zuma knew well enough where Madimba stood with Mugabe. In a way that President Zuma was careful not to follow Mugabe’s footsteps, at least not whilst Madimba lived.

 

Madimba is dead and President Zuma’s own political popularity and that of ANC are sinking like a stone one does not to be University graduate in Political Science to know what President Zuma is thinking. He is definitely planning to bend if not outright break the democratic rules to stay in power!

If you are going to commit the same offence it makes sense side with those who have themselves committed the same crime, particularly when the criminal is a cunning fox like Mugabe would only be to glad to expose you as a hypocrite otherwise. One does not want to cosy up with the judges of the crime either.

 

President Zuma has an excuse should the West ever be critical of his contact in the future; “They are punishing SA for refusing to have Europe dictate to Africa!” An answer straight from Comrade Robert Mugabe’s red book: “The West imposed the sanction on Zimbabwe because we took away the land from the white farmers!”

 

When President Zuma failed to failed to impose his authority Mugabe throughout the GNU although, as SADC head in the crisis he had the political and economic clout and the moral authority and obligation to do; alarm bells should have started to ringing the whole SADC region but loudest in SA itself. Tyrants and dictators are like bad a storm; they do not suddenly appear.  The storm is announced by the gathering winds and the darkening sky. And so too are tyrants; corruption and lawlessness are their forerunners!

 

During the dark years of apartheid President Zuma, like all the other African leaders, strongly supported the imposition of sanctions against the white racist and oppressive regime. Today even lesser sanctions are imposed of a corrupt and tyrannical regime and you calmly accuse those doing something positive to end this tragic affair of being disrespectful of Africa. Their stance is “wrong and causes this unnecessary unpleasantness”! You are clearly not on the side of the long suffering masses of Africa; that much is clear!   

Under pressure, suspended ZBC CEO names Charamba so he will not suffer alone!

Criminals are like vampire-bats; when they are in trouble they will always rope in the others!

 

I once saw a documentary on vampire-bats. Vampire-bats, as the name suggest, feed on blood. In the documentary it was found that the retches were the carriers and spreading rabbis in domestic and wild animals. Instead of killing the bats one by one which would have taken a long time the scientist had an ingenious way to do so.

 

They smeared each bat they caught with a grease paste lased with poison and release. The bat flew back to its roost and before it settled down it wandered amongst the rest smearing them in turn with the paste. Each bat then ingested the poison when it tried to lick of the paste to clean itself.

 

Suspended ZBC CEO, Happison Muchechetere, was arrested and questioned over allegations that was involved an outdoor broadcast van valued at £100 000 but ZBC paid $1 million.  The suspended CEO clearly has no intention of going down alone and is thus busy smearing George Charamba and others.

 

 “ZBC drew money without notice from its company financial resources as contribution following (Charamba’s) demand (for ZBC to cover the Buhera gala in Charamba’s rural home). This was done at a time the parent ministry knew that ZBC staff was in salary arrears,” said Muchechetere.

 

Whether or not the amount of money involved would not have paid a faction of the suspended CEO’s month salary is of no consequence; what matters is the demand was illegal and corrupt. From May 2009 to December 2013 Muchechetere pocketed as much as $2.3 million in salaries and allowances!

 

The Buhera gala corruption poison lick will have given our vampire-bat Charamba indigestion; it is not the only corruption scandal involving Mugabe’s spokesman. Charamba was named as one of the PSMAS directors; he has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in directorship fees! A belly-full of the corrupt poison from that!

 

Increase the pressure on Charamba and he too will soon talk of the man who gave him the orders! To get rid of rabbis of corruption we only need to catch a few corrupt individuals and let them rope in their follow vampire bats.

It is officially confirmed: Mugabe will not attend EU - Africa summit because his wife was denied a visa but other African Leaders will!

So Mugabe has decided to boycott the EU-Africa summit and the AU, has flip-flop, and has decided the rest of the African leaders will attend.

 

“President Mugabe will not be travelling to the summit and there will be no Zimbabwean delegation at the summit. This means our seat will be empty,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Joey Bimha told reporters. The summit would be the better for the empty seat!

So George Charamba's "What God has put together the EU is trying to separate," nonsense had no effect of the dominantly Christian EU countries. It was not meant for the African leaders themselves for their moral compasses, like everything else, damaged beyond repair by their insatiable greed and heartlessness.

 

Where were Mugabe's Christian values of not separating what God has put together when he repeatedly seduced Grace, a married woman to father Bona, when his first wife Sally was alive? Where were his Christian values when he rigged the elections again and again and again? Only a sadistic hypocrite would talk of the sanctity of marriage when his hands a dripping of the blood of over 30 000 innocent people he murdered to gratify his love for power and wealth!

 

It is every thinking Zimbabwean's fervent that Africa's breaking of rank with the Zimbabwe tyrant, Mugabe, marks the beginning of the continent's acknowledge of Mugabe as a corrupt and ruthless tyrant and to deal with the tyrant accordingly.

 

It was a stupid AU decision   to have agreed to boycott the EU - Africa summit to plicate a tyrant for fear he would throw tantrums. Let Mugabe throw his tantrums! The summit is definitely better off without him there - seating there snoring like a pig!

"God has put together" evoked Charamba in a desperate pinch for EU legitimacy, forgetting God witnessed the vote rigging!

The trouble with tyrants is they disregard the rules when the law get in their way but are the first to quote you chapter and verse of the law if it suits them. Mugabe has been an outstanding defender of Zimbabwe’s sovereignty and independence only to throw these out the minute they get in his way.

"We are sovereign and equals and the EU cannot decide on our delegations. The president, and Zimbabwe will not be there if they continue to hold out on the visa," Mugabe's spokesman George Charamba argues.

Excuse me, but that is exactly why the EU imposed the targeted sanctions against Mugabe; for his blatant violation of the ordinary people of Zimbabwe’s sovereign right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country and the right to life itself. By rigging the elections Mugabe put himself above the law and therefore lost legitimacy. He is illegitimate in the eyes of the people of Zimbabwe and the world.

All Mugabe has been doing since the July 2013 rigged elections is restore his legitimacy by hook or by crook. He bamboozled the blundering and confused Tsvangirai into accepting his presidency “as a political reality,” as the MDC leader put it. SADC and the AU accepted him as fiat accompli and to wash their hands of his tantrums. Now Mugabe is doing his best to arm-twist the EU into accepting him has by evoking Zimbabwe’s sovereignty – the very thing he has so flagrantly devalued.

In his desperate, desperate search for legitimacy Mugabe has even gone to the extent of evoking the name of God Almighty "What God has put together the EU is trying to separate," Charamba argues.

Mr George Charamba; would Mugabe swear before the same God you have so readily acknowledge that he did not rig the 2013 elections; knowing that He knows a lot more about how the elections were rigged than the EU or most of us mortals do? Indeed we ordinary mortals would have been content if Mugabe had released the voters roll.

Mugabe knows the voters roll is the smoking gun to the rigged elections.

Tyrants like Mugabe should not be allowed to benefit from rights and respect accorded to sovereign heads of state when they have blatantly reduced the whole nation into nothing more than down trodden serfs. As for evoking the name of God; is Mugabe 100% sure God was outside Zimbabwe’s sovereign borders when he rigged the elections and murdered the over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans for his selfish political gain?!  

IMF fails to donate a cent into ZimAsset begging bowl, telling "Scrooge" Mugabe to "implement (economic) structural reforms" or be "scrooged"!

The IMF like the ghosts from Christmas Past, Present and Future tell “Ebenezer Scrooge” Robert Mugabe to “implement structural (economic) reforms” or be “scrooged”!

“Achieving Zimbabwe’s fuller growth potential over the medium term depends on pursuing strong macroeconomic policies, including building up fiscal and external buffers and increasing budgetary resources going to non-personnel related spending, and implementing structural reforms to foster investment, improve the business climate, and strengthen governance and institutions, including by increasing the transparency of the minerals regime.” The IMF said.

 

Of course everything the IMF has said makes sense, indeed they have said the same thing countless times in the last 34 years all to no avail. It went in one ear and straight out the second without as much as a pose!

 

Mugabe has never implemented any of these reforms because to do so would have meant abandoning his political patronage system - the very foundation on which Zanu PF stands.

 

Back in 1990 when Mugabe was forced to adopt the first of the two five-year Economic Structural Adjustment Programmes (ESAP) the regime implemented the cuts affecting the ordinary people but only trimmed a few thin branches when it came to cuts affecting the ruling elite. If anything it was the later areas that needed whole branches hacked off!

 

The first ESAP failed to deliver the much hoped for economic recovery and thus making the second programme necessary and the IMF and World Bank, who had proposed and were funding the programmes, asked for even deeper cuts in the ruling elite's size of the national cake. Again Mugabe did not have the political will to implement the cuts.

 

By the end of the second ESAP in 2000 Mugabe was even blaming the IMF and WB for the country's economic down turn. The two institutions, tired of throwing good money into the Zanu PF black-hole, stopped all lending to the regime.

 

The reforms the IMF was asking for are the same it has been asking for even before the ESAP. The only subtle difference is the IMF is not putting a cent of its own money put front because it has since learnt that Mugabe will take the money but will not implement anything!

 

In the past Mugabe had met the IMF team, they wittered on about "implementing structural reforms to foster investment," blah, blah, blah. The tyrant put up with all that nonsense because the team gave him a fat cheque at the end of the lecture. When it was clear IMF will not donate even a cent to his $27 billion ZimAsset begging bowl the tyrant was no doubt "too busy" to meet the team!

 

Over the years Zimbabwe's national economy has got progressive worse and worse but has never sunk to the same frightening depth as it has sunk - and it has not hit the bottom yet - and never this quickly.

 

Mugabe did not want to be out done by Tsvangirai with his $4 billion JUICE and so he came up with his $ 27 billion ZimAsset but that empty begging bowl is mocking him!

AU threaten to boycott EU-AU summit because Grace Mugabe is refused a visa - EU must call AU's bluff!

African Union is threatening to boycott the EU-AU summit because the EU has refused to issue Grace Mugabe a visa to travel to Brussels.

“The African Union Peace and Security Council took a decision that the European Union was in violation of an AU resolution that they do not have the right to determine the composition of Africa’s delegation,” Zimbabwe’s Foreign Minister, Simbarashe Mumbengwengwi said.

The EU made the mistake of allowing itself to be dictated to by the likes of Mugabe. Give him an inch and he will be back demanding a mile! The EU should must put its foot down once and once for all. Africa needs the EU more than the EU needs Africa just as much as the ordinary Africans need good governance more than they need EU aid; indeed if they had good governance the continent will NOT be so dependent on foreign aid!

Tsvangirai calls for another GNU - he learnt nothing from the folly of the first GNU!

Tsvangirai calls another GNU as the way out of the country’s economic crisis. It is clear; he learnt nothing from the first GNU.

 

Tsvangirai, even now with the benefit of hindsight does not get it; yes Mugabe rigged the elections but only because he had failed to implement not even one democratic reforms.

 

The principle task for the GNU was to implement the reforms and held free, fair and credible elections. This was not done!

 

To be fair to SADC they did remind Tsvangirai and MDC countless times to "follow the GPA road map" but it went in one ear and out the other.

 

Tsvangirai has not said how the new GNU would implement the reforms this time. He did not appreciate the importance of the reforms back in 2008 and he still does not today. All he wants is for him and his friends to be back on the gravy train.

 

The way forward is for Mugabe and Zanu PF to step aside so that the task of implementing the reforms and then holding free and fair elections can start.

 

The GNU was a stupid idea back in 2008 and it is even more so today! Only some one as incompetent as Tsvangirai would have accepted it back in 2008 but one would have thought he learnt the lesson and would never advocate it ever again. Well we now know he is that incompetent to suggest it again!

Mudede admits Zimbabweans are leaving the country in droves "escape the economic crisis"!

Zimbabwe’s economic melt-down is here and even the normally secretive Zanu PF government is openly acknowledging it and the extremes the people are now going to to escape the economic hardships it has brought.  

 

"There is a high demand for passports in Zimbabwe as people are leaving to escape the economic crisis the country is facing," admitted Registrar General Tobaiwa Mudede to a parliamentary committee last week.

 

Zimbabweans are going mainly to SA and Botswana, the only countries where the can go now. Tens ago they went further afield, UK, USA, Australia, Canada, etc. but the doors to most of these other destinations have since been slummed shut to Zimbabweans.

 

Zimbabwe’s industries are all but died and so almost all the manufactured goods now imported from SA or Botswana. These two countries have benefited greatly from all this trade and a number of border towns have mushroomed and boomed, selling to Zimbabweans. Zimbabweans have also flocked to these countries to shop but also in search of work given the country’s 80% plus unemployment rate.

 

It is hard to distinguish cross border traders from those seeking employment. Both SA and Botswana have been deporting Zimbabweans who overstayed or were working without permits. This new flood of Zimbabweans into SA and Botswana are bound to cause some economic and social problems sooner or later.  And there will another flood after this!

 

Zimbabwe’s economic crisis is set to get worse, a lot worse because none of the causes fuelling it are being addressed. None!

 

The immediate causes of the economic crisis are the three decades of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption by this Mugabe regime. Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa admitted there is “rampant corruption” when he announced the $6 000 per month cap on pay packages of CEO in government owned / controlled institutions like Public Service Medical Aid Society (PSMAS), ZBC, City Councils, etc.

 

Before the cap, the CEO of PSMAS, Cuthbert Dube, took home $ 500 000 per month. The Minister had a list of 180 similar institutions including Plum Tree Council whose CEO was paid a princely sum of $ 17 027.00 a month – his salary was a modest $1 173.00 boosted by generous allowances of $15 854.00.

 

These salaries were even more scandalous when one looks at the performance of the institutions these individuals were leading. PSMAS members were being denied any medical service because the society was no paying the service providers. The same was true with the Councils; the rate payers were not getting even the most basic services and the lowly paid Council workers were going for months without being paid.

 

Years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption have left all of these government owned / controlled institutions in desperate need of large financial injections (same is true for the rest of the other sectors of the economy). The Minister should not have stopped at capping the salaries of these fat cats but instituted action to recover as much as possible the wealth they have looted over the years. Every little helps!

 

As for the additional large cash injection these institution would have looked to government and more specifically to its $27 billion ZimAsset. Sadly no outsiders have offered to bankroll ZimAsset and so the scheme is died in the water. Mugabe was sure the Chinese would help but they have since said they are not going to contribute even a penny.

 

The other important point about the CEO salary cap is that it does not apply to the big chefs with government itself. If is no secret that all the top brass in the Army, Police, CIO, Judiciary, and other senior civil servants are paid obscene salaries and allowances whilst the lower get very poor wages.

 

How can anyone believe the regime is finally stamping out corruption when Mugabe spends $1 m on birthday bash one week, $ 10 m on a daughter’s wedding the next and a further $ 5 m of statues of himself when a 100 children are dying every day of preventable disease across the country?

 

After Mugabe blatantly rigged the July 2013 elections it was clear the West was not going to provide any financial assistance to the Mugabe regime. By rigging the elections Mugabe was saying the mismanagement, corruption and brutal political repression which had been the hallmarks of his rule in the past were going to continue. It was going to be business as usual after the restraints imposed on him during the GNU. The West’s reply was clear enough – they did not much care to do business with him!

 

Zimbabwe’s economic crisis was brought on by the decades of mismanagement and corruption and without financial help the country is clearly not going get out of this hole. Mugabe rigged the 2013 elections, with the help of MDC who failed to implement not even one democratic reform, to stay in power. But now that he is back in State House Mugabe is now realizing that bamboozling Tsvangirai and rigging the elections were easy “rigging” economic recovery is impossible.

 

The only way out of this political and economic quagmire, is for Mugabe to go so that the nation can hold free and fair elections to produce a government with the mandate to rule and international legitimacy. It is the duty of all Zimbabweans to ensure that Mugabe goes or else the economic crisis the nation is facing today will only get worse.

Mugabe to assume charmanship of SADC regardless of his illegitimacy as president and the dire consequences of that!

SADC is set to meet this August in Victoria Falls when Mugabe will take over as chairman of the regional body. Some people are questioning Mugabe’s suitability hold this position given Zimbabwe’s economic melt-down made worse by the tyrant's lack of legitimacy.

 

All the economic signs are there to prove the Zimbabwe economy is in serious trouble; more companies have closed sending unemployment to the nauseating rate of 90%, the government so broke it has been forced to release early hundreds of prisoners, for example, or see them starve to death because there no money to feed them.

Ever since Mugabe blatantly rigged the 2013 elections the much needed foreign investors and the West immediately released the country would not be returning to the rule of law as long as Zanu PF remained in power. They have voted with their foot by staying away from Zimbabwe and refusing to invest or grant loans to the regime.

Zanu PF's own flagship $27b economic recovery plan, ZimAsset, in now dead. The plan hope Zimbabweans in the diaspora would buy $2b of government bonds. The regime was hoping to cash in on the $1.6b a year Zimbabweans have been sending back to help their families.

The economic collapse means Zimbabweans back home are even more dependent on the diaspora dollar to need their basic requirements. What good is a government bond to someone who is starving? Even if some Zimbabweans had wished to help; the regime had just refused the people in the diaspora a vote but is now asking for their money! Even those who did not have the spare cash to buy the bonds joined in in giving Mugabe and Chinamasa the middle finger!

Mugabe was sure the Chinese would bankroll ZimAsset to the tune of $30 b but has since revised the figure downwards to $10b, $3b, $400m and a few weeks ago the Chinese announced that they will not contribute a penny.

Mugabe took the tough decision to acknowledge corruption was rampant and to cap the salaries of CEO of government controlled / owned institutions like PSMAS, ZBC, City Councils, etc. shows the tyrant is aware of the seriousness of the economic crisis. Corruption is still rampant in the form of scandalous high salaries and allowances for high ranking government officials in the Police, Army, judiciary and all other government departments. He did not dare touch them - not whilst he continued to squander $10 m on his daughter's wedding!

So the signs of economic collapse are there but so too are the signs that the regime is not doing anything to stop the collapse. Even big hospitals like Parerenyatwa are going for a week without something as basic as running water.

The shortage of clean drinking water is already being felt; diarrhea is responsible for 10% of deaths of children under age 10. In 2008-2009, cholera swept the country, killing more than 4,000 people and bringing disease to over 100,000.

 

The situation cannot go on; two things are now certain to happen as a result of the economic collapse, either the people will riot in protest or there health time-bomb caused by the water shortage is going to finally explode killing hundreds of thousands.  

It is important to realize that regards of all the evidence that Mugabe has been a total failure. The proof that it was the rampant corruption that has cause the economic collapse and not the sanctions as he claimed, the self-evidence that he is helpless to stop the rot and the dire consequence of letting this situation continue; Mugabe is not going to relinquish power. It is not in the nature of tyrant to give up power willingly.

 

The only way to end Zimbabwe’s economic problems and defuse all health and social time-bombs it is seating on is for Mugabe to go and end his illegitimate rule so there can be free, fair and credible elections. As long as there is this illegitimate regime in Harare, the country’s isolation with continue.

 

So yes, Mugabe is preparing for the SADC meeting and to taking over as chairman of the regional block because regardless how poorly the economy performs, how much Zimbabweans do not want him as president, etc. he is going to remain president, period.

Mugabe paid $ 54m for SA scholarship students before 2013 elections, bribe to the Zanu PF rump, but not $1 m now!

The President Mugabe Scholarship Programme was founded in 1995 to give academically gifted students from poor families a chance to study at South African universities, that is the official line. Like many other things in Zimbabwe, there is a world of difference between theory and the reality on the ground.

 

The in practice the scheme has benefited middle ranking Zanu PF officials who were becoming increasingly disgruntled that whilst the chefs were sending their children out of the country to get away from the country's substandard education after years of under funding they could not do the same. They did not ask for better funding so all could benefit, no. They want to send their children out of the country too.

The need to send ones’ children to UK, USA and other countries was more than a social status symbol; it was a must especially at University level because Zimbabwe’s own education system was substandard by then due to poor funding. The middle rank was content that their children were going to SA at least. 

 

The middle ranking Zanu PF officials are the rump of the Zanu PF dictatorship and Mugabe had no choice but to offer something to placate them.

 

As the economy continued to shrink and the chefs’ appetites continued to soar to new nauseating heights funding to education, health and all the other basic services affecting the common people were cut and, not surprising, so too was funding for the President Mugabe Scholarship funds.

 

“In 2010, he allocated $3 million which cannot cater for the 15 universities accommodating our children in South Africa. In 2011, he allocated $2 million and in 2012, he allocated $1 million which is far from the budgeted expenditure per annum,” Chris Mushowe said, the scholarship director.

 

In July last year Mugabe found the US$ 54 m to pay off the accrued debt to the various SA education institutions rather face the anger of the parents and students. SA was threatening to expel the students.

 

“Kana tichi kwereta tinokwereta!” (If we have to borrow, we will borrow.) Mugabe had reassuring said at the time. He needed to assure them; he was facing a “fight for our lives” election as he readily admitted and had a vote ridding operation for which he needed the full cooperation of the Zanu PF rump to implement.

 

“It is almost certain that Mugabe will NOT pay the next fees,” I had said in my weekly Wilbert on Wednesday S W Radio Africa broadcast on 10 July 2013. That is exactly what has happened.

 

“We owe South African universities R11 million (US$1 million) hence we decided to suspended enrolling further students until we clear the arrears,” Mushowe said.

 

Mugabe has just spent $1 m for his birthday, $10 m on his daughter’s wedding and $5 m buying statues of his image from North Korea in the last month alone but cannot find money so that a critical institution like Parerenyatwa Hospital has running water.

 

As for the middle ranking Zanu PF officials who children are now stuck in SA, they can rot there. The students are paying for their parents’ sins who played a critical role in the vote rigging in 2013 and/or other criminal activities by this Zanu PF dictatorship! The nation is facing this political and economic nightmare because of the selfishness of middle ranking Zanu PF officials who have propped the dictatorship.

ANC says Zuma is not corrupt altho report says he "unduly" benefited from $ 23m home improvement - what then is corruption!

SA Public Protector Thuli reported that President Zuma and his family had unduly benefited from US$20m security upgrades on his family home. There is outstanding work estimated at $3.36m, to do.

 

ANC, President Zuma’s ruling party, has already come out in support of its leader saying he had no case to answer. If “unduly benefiting” from public funds is not corruption then what is?

 

In any case the Police should be allowed to carry out their own thorough investigations and then let the courts decide. ANC is now the investigators and the Judge in a case were their impartiality is self-evident. Once again if this is not corruption at its ugliest then what is?

 

It is clear why Zuma was not keen to see Mugabe go; now he can tell his people "look I have done nothing wrong compared to Mugabe!" Where is he going to stop with this, it is anyone's guess; my money is on him rigging the elections!

 

South Africans have been deafeningly quite about what SADC and more specifically what SA did in Zimbabwe. Botswana has stood up again what Mugabe has been doing including his rigging of the 2013 elections.

 

What goes round comes round: South Africans failed to condemn President Zuma when he condoned corruption and vote rigging in Zimbabwe, now it is South Africans themselves who are the victims of corruption and vote rigging. Now let us see how they like it!

Makarau tells elections review conference focus on "process and not results" - yes a cow with no horns is a donkey!

One of the tragic results of three decades of this Zanu PF brainwashing is that it has lowered the people's ability to think logically. Zimbabweans have become masters of rhetorical nonsense; yes, even Supreme Court Judges too are at it.

 

"Most commentators reacted more to the result than to the process," Supreme Court of Zimbabwe and ZEC chairperson Justice Rita Makarau told delegates at the start to a three day conference at Harare International Conference Centre.

 

The conference is All-stakeholders review conference on the 2013 referendum and harmonised elections hosted by ZEC.

 

To start with; if ZES has the money to host this three day conference at the nation's most expensive conference centre then surely it must have the money to fix the computer problem that the commission said is stopping the release the voters roll!

 

Second, if the conference is meant to stop a repeat of the serious shortcoming in last year’s elections then why is Judge Makarau obsessed about restricting the discussion on the one aspect, the process, and not the process and results?

 

This is rhetorical nonsense; to give an accurate description of a donkey one does not restrict oneself to the front or behind of the animal but covers the whole animal because the donkey has both a front and behind. A thorough and meaningful review the elections must therefore cover each aspect of the process and every aspect of the results to see how one affected the other.

 

In fact Judge Makarau not only wants us to focus on just the process but is narrowing this down further to the “patently good practices that attended the process." This is like looking at the front of the donkey, zoom in on its head and then, rightly, conclude that donkeys have no horns.

 

Yeah; but there are cows that do not have horns and yet they are still cows not donkeys!

 

ZEC is obsessed about the process and not the results as if the commission was appointed to deliver on a process. The Commission does not want to talk about the results because they know the results were not a true reflection of the democratic wishes of the people of Zimbabwe. Everyone knows that Mugabe rigged the elections.

 

One of ZEC’s key responsibilities is to make sure a clean voters roll is released at least a month before the elections. ZEC has failed to release a voters roll even now; seven months after the elections although there have been repeated calls for the commission to do so. If ZEC was to discuss the results or gapping loopholes in the process that allowed the vote rigging then commission will have to answer the difficult questions of why the voters roll has not been released, for example.

 

ZEC’s excuse for not releasing the voters roll was that the computer with the data has broken down. That was in August 2013! We are expected believe the computer has not been fixed and there is not one single hard copy available to be released. This is one computer that will never ever be fixed!

 

The voters roll will never be released because it is the smoking gun to how the elections were rigged.

 

Of course there is no hope that the next elections, whenever they are going to be held, will not be rigged once again and thus the people again denied a meaningful say in the governance of the country. The failure to hold free elections is the core reason why the nation is in this political and economic mess and another rigged election is another forfeited chance to get out of the mess.

 

What hope is there of stopping the vote rigging if those tasked to ensure free and fair elections will not even look at their serious failures but contend themselves with hiding behind rhetorical nonsense!

 

“The perception that we have gained maybe correctly or incorrectly is that immediately after the harmonised elections, most commentators reacted more to the result than to the process,” said Judge Makarau.

Yes Judge your perception is impeccable; a cow with no horns must be a donkey!

Mugabe caps CEO salaries from $500k to $6k but it is too little too late- horse has bolted and stable and whole farm is on fire!

After months of half-hearted denials and dithering on the exorbitant salaries and allowances of government owned and controlled institutions Mugabe has finally decided to cap the $ 500 000 per month for the likes of MSMAS CEO Cuthbert Dube and others to a mere $ 6 000 per month.

 

Before you ask; no the tyrant is not going to do anything to recover the wealth these fat cats have looted over the years. Doing that would start a fire that would certainly end up getting him in turn thrown out of Blue Roof.

 

The salary cap will stop haemorrhaging from the boardrooms but still the patient needs large financial injection to recover. And there is the thing; the regime is broke and no one will lend it a penny!

 

The one thing the rampant corruption stories have settled beyond doubt is that it was corruption and looting that have caused Zimbabwe's economic melt-down and not the targeted sanctions. Zanu PF has vehemently maintained it was the sanctions that did all the damage. It was the party's denial of corruption that allowed it to grow into the monster now before us. The monster had now reached the point where it was sucking everything.

 

The PSMAS continued to collect membership subscription only the members were not getting the medical services when they needed them because after paying the exorbitant salaries and allowance Cuthbert Dube, Board Member George Charamba and all the other top dogs there was no money left to pay doctors who examined the sick members. Nothing!

 

ZBC paid its top dogs so much there was no money left to pay the lowly paid staff much less produce quality programs to the people who were continuous harangued to pay the exorbitant radio and TV license fees. The story is the same at ZESA, Air Zimbabwe and Councils across the land.

 

How anyone could expect the nation to prosper when corruption was taking all the wealth out of the economy is the mystery Zanu PF should now explain.

 

Capping the exorbitant salaries of the fat cats will stop further haemorrhaging of wealth yes but that is not enough. The patient has lost so much blood and starved of nourishment for so long they will need a blood transfusion and a drip feed.

 

Capping the salaries will stop the fat cats creaming off all the goodies in future but what about those that have been doing this for the last donkey years? Surely something should be done to recover the loot they stole.

 

Something could be done but not by this Mugabe government; any further action could open a big can of worms in which many senior party leaders will be roped in right up to Mugabe himself. Mugabe’s Borrowdale Mansion, the Blue Roof, has become the beacon of corruption others have set out to follow! He certainly does not want the spot light turned on him much less to set the example of people losing their loot and end up with himself kicked out of the Blue Roof! No way!

 

So capping all future excessive fat cat salaries with nothing said about recovering looted wealth is all the nation will ever get.

 

ZESA, Air Zimbabwe, Harare City Council, NRZ, etc. all these bodies will need a big financial injection to get them back on their feet again. They will all be looking to government to provide that financial boost directly or indirectly starting with government paying its huge unpaid bills.

 

The Zimbabwe government is broke, it has lived from hand to mouth for decades now and it is up to itself eyes in debt. It would borrow even more, of course, it is just that no one will lent it even a penny. IMF, WB and all other lenders know the regime does not pay its debt; no banker likes throwing money in a black-hole where not even light ever comes back!

 

Mugabe has taken great pleasure in giving the middle finger to the West at every opportunity the later has lost all patience with the tyrant. Even the Chinese who have not cared about how corrupt the regime was as long as their get what they want have too decided not to bankroll the regime's extravagances.

 

There is no chance of the West softening they stance with the regime because they know in Zimbabwe's mudded political waters it will not be long before corruption resurfaces again and the whole cycle start - deny it even exist until the national economic is once again back in intensive care in need of another huge financial injection.

 

The only way to stop the corruption and the nauseating cycles of denial and scapegoating is by removing this corrupt and repressive tyrannical regime.

 

The criminal waste of human and material resources by this Zanu PF has grown worse and worse over these last 34 years. We have now reached the point where if the nation does not stop Mugabe he is going to push the nation over the edge. Like all tyrant he is never going to admit that he has failed and step down; we have to force him to or events will. 

Events like street riots will force Mugabe to step down, yes; but the thing about such events is they are a child of chaos. A rioting mob is not control by reason by a burning passion to destroy everything they can lay their hands on. And more often than not more innocent blood will be shed!