Thursday, 20 March 2014

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!

6 comments:

Zimbabwe Light said...

@ Zvobgo

The same reason you talk about Mugabe and Zanu PF. MDC may be politically dead but the trouble they cause will be felt for generations to come.

Mugabe and Zanu PF should have been buried by now if MDC had not blundered. We still talk about the tyrant because he is still messing all our lives!

You should stop having such a childish view of life. Only a child would think that by closing their eyes whoever was in front of them will disap-pear. Tsvangirai lost the elections through rigging but the blundering idiot is still there making a mess of things as usual.

Our people are naïve and gullible and need to be constantly reminded about failed leaders like Tsvangirai who would happily take advantage of them again.

Looking at the tyrant Mugabe alone is not the answer here!

Zimbabwe Light said...

“I wish to applaud the Zimbabwe electoral commission for exposing itself to this scrutiny exercise which will ultimately pave way for improved preparations for the next elections,” said Minister Mnangagwa.

Some improvement when 34 years after independence you government has failed to produce a voters roll!

Minister be rest assured that the truth of what happen in the July 2013 elections will be known; every last detail from the work Nikuv did to corrupt the voters roll to the names of the youths bussed around to vote. For that is what will pave the way for free, fair and credible elections.

Minister the issue of the rigged elections is not over, not by a long shot!

Zimbabwe Light said...

@ KWV

ZEC can try to gloss over the vote rigging but this is the one issue that is not going away. Indeed Zimbabwe's economic melt-down can be traced back to the rigged elections. The West is not giving Mugabe a penny for the much needed ZimAsset because the regime is illegitimate because it rigged the elections. With China refusing to bankroll the regime’s recovery, the focus in back on the West and thus on the legitimacy.

Zimbabwe is not getting out of this economic mess except by the one door - hold free, fair and credible elections.

ZEC glossing over the rigged elections will only serve to confirm that Mugabe and Zanu PF are not yet ready to face the reality that they are not getting away with rigged elections. The international community has all the time in the world to wait it is Mugabe and Zanu PF who do not have the time. The Zimbabwe economy is in a real mess and is sinking fast!

Zimbabwe Light said...

“Water problems at Parirenyatwa have gone on for years and last year relatives of patients admitted there were asked to bring in water from their homes to avert an outbreak of water borne diseases,” reported S W Radio Africa.

There are some who refuse to accept there is a serious economic problem in Zimbabwe. Let us hope reports like this will finally wake them up to the economic reality.

Zimbabwe Light said...

The water shortage in Harare is not a new phenomenon, and over the years it has had devastating health consequences.
In 2008-2009, cholera swept the country, killing more than 4,000 people and bringing disease to over 100,000 more. To-day, diarrhoea is responsible for 10% of deaths of children under age 10
Zimbabwe’s water and electricity shortages, nauseating unemployment rate of 80%, poor wages for the few lucky enough to have a job, etc. can all be traced back to the 34 years to gross mismanagement and rampant corruption. The later took a serious a sadistic turn with the violent seizure of white owned farms marking the all-out looting spree.

The looting was continued with stories of exorbitant salaries paid to CEO in government owned / controlled institutions like PSMAS and City Council across the land. The CEOs constitute those at the bottom end of the ruling elite. Those at the pinnacle of the looting elite like Mugabe were busy too; Mugabe had his $1 million birthday bash one week, a $5 million wedding for his daughter the next week and week after that the nation learnt the tyrant had paid $5 million for two bronze statues in his own image.

What Zimbabweans have to realise is the national economy is in free fall things are not going to get better going forward but worse, a lot worse. Mugabe and Zanu PF are not going to stop the rot because they are the rot.

The rot will only stop the day this corrupt and oppressive regime of Mugabe is removed from office. Leaving this until the 2018 election is a luxury Zimbabwe does not have, not when the country is seating on a ticking time bomb!

Zimbabwe Light said...

@ Chimbwido

Yes of course there is need for "an orderly land resettlement programme" as you say. The problem in Zimbabwe is that Zanu PF is the only one that thinks it has the exclusive right to define what is order and what is not. The ordinary people have been denied their basic rights and human dignities - denying them a meaningful share of the land and other resources, right to vote and even the right to life - and Mugabe and you, his acolytes, say that is order.



I have told you, one of these days you will have the chance to explain your right to shed the blood on you hands! If you fail then the is the hangman's rope for you! Those who will not live by the law must die by the law!