Tsvangirai says he wants Biti back; is he hoping to panic Mujuru just as he used Locadia to panic Elizabeth into marriage!

Speaking in an interview with the Daily News last week, the former prime minister in the government of national unity said his fallout with Biti and Mangoma was "based more on personal differences as opposed to ideology".

What is Mr Tsvangirai talking about! If they ever had any ideology and sense of where they were going then why did they fail to implement the democratic reforms during the GNU? They five years to do it and failed to get even one reform implemented.

All Tsvangirai, Mangoma, Biti and the other MDC leaders ever wanted was to get into power and milk the system for as much as they can and if that meant betraying the people who got them into power in the first place then so be it. If being corrupt, incompetent and selling-out are now the new hallmarks of chivalry and honour then God help us.

Since the rigged July 2013 elections, which saw many MDC members kicked off the gravy train, they have been fighting tooth and nail to get back on the gravy train. Sadly for them, some of the Zimbabwe electorate has woken up to the dangers of electing corrupt and incompetent leaders who sold-out during the GNU! They learnt an important lesson and one they are determined never to repeat.

"I don't bear grudges with anyone. Of course, there are colleagues who walked away citing grievances, but when it comes to the question of the people and their quests for change, freedom and a better life for all, you will find me very co-operative," said Tsvangirai.

In other words the reality of lost political credibility with the donors and now with the electorate is finally sinking in; Tsvangirai is so desperate to save his fast sinking political career he will willingly kiss and make up with Biti and Mangoma even as a last ditch attempt to save his career..

For the last twelve months Tsvangira has been courting Joice Mujuru to get her to join him into a political coalition. He is blowing reunion kisses to Biti and Mangoma to get Joice to panic and accept his hand just he did with Elizabeth.

The carefully stage managed traditional marriage to Locadia had Elizabeth fighting for him like two female pandas on heat and the window of opportunity is closing fast and he is the only male around!

Frankly Joice Mujuru is not such a prize catch; she “corrupt, incompetent and lazy” as Grace Mugabe said – Grace may well be wrong about everything she said about Mai Mujuru but on those three points, she was spot on. But Mujuru supporters will, no doubt, remind everyone that Tsvangirai is no prize catch neither since he too is corrupt and incompetent!

So this is the classic case of “Is your son so much to look at? The way he looks and the way she sees; it’s a perfect match!”

Both Tendai Biti and Elton Mangoma have done miserably ever since they broke away from Tsvangirai. The worst thing to happen to the two and all those foolish enough to follow them who had been lucky enough to get a parliamentary or senatorial seat; they all lost their seats.  Tendai Biti had assured then they would never lose their seats; “or my name is Morgan Mugabe” he had said. What a worthless guarantee that has turned out to be!

Tsvangirai had parliament recall the break group only to hand over all the elected seats to Zanu PF on a silver platter. It was better that Zanu PF had the seats than MDC Renewal that said volumes about how much Tsvangirai hated the breakaway group!

Biti’s attempt to heap all blame for MDC failure to get even one reform implemented on Tsvangirai did not cut much ice with the thinking electorate. The GNU lasted for five years enough time for any other MDC leaders to have done something to ensure the reforms were implemented if they really wanted. Indeed the reading public remembered that it was none other than Tendai Biti himself who had joined his MDC colleagues in praising Mugabe to the high heavens calling the corrupt and murderous tyrant the “unflappable father of the nation”!

Tendai Biti has tried to rescue his sinking political fortune by seeking a political marriage with former VP Joice Mujuru, more for her money than anything else. She let him, as with other suitors, know which is her favourite brand of Swiss chocolate; she has enjoyed the chocolates and said nothing on the marriage proposal. Her extended thinking-about time and expensive taste have left big holes in the People Democratic Party and its President, Tendai Biti’s shallow pockets!

So both signori Biti and Mangoma may well grab Tsvangirai’s offer of reunion in much the same way a drowning will clutch at straws or the hand of a follow drowning man. If you are going to sink into oblivion it is better doing so in company than alone!

Getting Biti and Mangona back in his big tent would be major scalp for Tsvangirai and that is why he will be following this public offer with private talks. For him this is the last throw of the dice; if the prospect of getting Biti in his tent does not panic Joice Mujuru into accepting his coalition offer then nothing else will! 

Nkulumane by-election exposes the folly of thinking there can be free and fair elections with GPA reforms.

“We failed to secure critical reforms before participating in the elections. The whole world advised us not to get into the elections without reforms, and so in everything that we have been saying we have failed to acknowledge that we also made a mistake,” confessed Samuel Sipape Nkomo soon after him, Tendai Biti and few others had broken away to form the MDC Renewal.

“The whole world?” asked the Zimbabwe Independent reporter, Hebert Moyo. “Who actually advised you against the elections?”

“It is common knowledge that Lindiwe Zulu (President Jacob Zuma’s international relations adviser) advised us. (President ) Zuma also advised us and even the Sadc Heads of State meeting in Maputo (Mozambique) also advised not to participate in the elections without electoral, media and security sector reforms, among others.”

We know MDC ignored the warnings and took part in the July 2013 elections which Mugabe went on to blatantly rig.

The recent Nkulumane by-election showed just how easy it is for the regime to rig elections and therefore how important it is that we heed the warning not to hold the next elections without first implementing the democratic reforms.

It should be noted that Nkulumane was considered an MDC strong hold and the seat was won by an MDC candidate in the July 2013 elections so the level of vote rigging dirty trickery in this constituency would have been significantly lower than in those areas Zanu PF had some support and then used multiple voting to increase it vote. Still the Nkulumane by-election uncovered some interesting points:

1)    ZEC released the voter roll 8 days before voting day. This still remains a burning issue; the voters roll from the last July 2013 elections has never been released although the law and common sense dictates it should have been realized at least a month before the elections.

Even the African Union (AU) Election Observer Team noted this serious irregularity in its report and recommended the authority must correct this. Clearly Zanu PF chosen to ignore the AU’s recommendation!

2)    The voters roll ZEC released was electronic with the data in different formats. There is no doubt that the data deliberately scramble to make it impossible to analysed.

Zanu PF paid NIKUV, an Israeli firm notorious for helping African tyrants rig elections, a princely sum of US$ 10 million run-up to the 2013 elections. One of NIKUV’s specialities is – you guessed it – scrambling voters roll data.

NIKUV has remained in Zimbabwe after the July 2013 rigged elections, no doubt for another princely retention fee, which the regime has religious paid on time. The regime can afford to mess around with failing to pay teachers, doctors, etc.’s wages; all performing very useful public services but has paid NIKUV’s “pound of flesh” for its disservice to the nation in corrupting the voters roll and thus making it easy for Mugabe to rig elections.  

3)    807 on the voters roll of 34 118 were migrants from Harare Urban Constituencies alone! Many voters failed to cast their vote on 31^st July 2013 because they name was not in the constituency they expected it to be. Local election observer estimated that nearly one million voters were affected out of over five million valid votes cast in that election. If the July 2013 voters roll was available it would be easy to see how many other voters on the Nkulumane voters roll migrated from other constituencies. The results would show that the local election observers’ nearly a million was very conservative.

Conclusion.

“Your opponents can have the all the votes you will still go on and “win” if all those counting the votes belong to you,” boasted one South American tyrant. Mugabe does not only own everyone in ZEC, Registrar General’s Office, have unfettered access to one of the world’s best voters roll scrambling companies, NIKUV (for a princely modern day thirty pieces of silver), he has the Police, CIO and all the other State Institution at his command. His command has been simple enough stop regime change at all cost.

Mugabe controls every aspect of the electoral process it is nonsense to think the country can have free, fair and credible election.

None of the 2008 GPA reforms were implemented during the GNU; Tsvangirai and his MDC friends were both stubborn and foolish to think the July 2013 elections would be free and fair with no reforms implemented. We must now demand the implementation of all the reforms and not make the same foolish mistake MDC made! 

Free and fair elections are a mirage because voters were naive to trust leaders to deliver!

Democracy is government by the people that is only possible when the people have a meaningful say on who governs. The meaningful say is universally acknowledged as the people expressing their democratic wish through free, fair and credible elections which includes the right to remove one regime and replace it with another.

No one can seriously dispute that Zimbabwe is de facto one-party dictatorship. Mugabe and his cabal have publically advocated their no-regime-change ethos and corrupted state institutions like the Police, ZEC, CIO, etc. to abandon their democratic duties of keeping law and order and defending all Zimbabweans’ freedom and human rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections and even the right to life. So instead of stamping out Zanu PF’s culture of politically motivated violence, for example, the Police have often turned a blind-eye to Zanu PF thuggery and even played an active part in the thuggery.

So if we are serious about ending this corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship we must politically empower the people. It is not enough for the people to know the current political system has failed; the people must understand how we got where we are.

In 1980 and for the next two decades most people believed Mugabe would deliver mass prosperity. Although Mugabe had already showing his tyrannical streak as seen by the murderous Gukurahundi campaign and his knack for rigging elections; still many people would have given up their political freedoms and rights in return for economic prosperity.

By the late 1990s it was clear Mugabe’s mass prosperity was in fact mass poverty. But having lost their political muscle to remove Mugabe and Zanu PF from power through free, fair and credible elections it is not surprising that the nation’s attention has been focused on implementing democratic reforms necessary for free, fair and credible elections.

The best chance ever to end the Mugabe dictatorship was after the tyrant was forced to accept the implementation of a raft of democratic reforms in the 2008 Global Political Agreement (GPA). It was left to Tsvangirai and his MDC friends to implement the reforms. After five years in the Government of National Unity (GNU), MDC failed to get even one reform implemented.

History has a habit of repeating itself! In the first two decades after independence the people allowed Mugabe to impose a de facto one-party dictatorship because the people were naïve enough to without political power they could still have a competent and prosperous government. Throughout the GNU the people were once again naïve to believe Tsvangirai would delivery free, fair and credible elections.

Mugabe is in serious trouble on the economic and political fronts. Three and half decades of mismanagement, corruption and lawlessness have taken a heavy toll on the national economic. When Mugabe rigged the 2013 elections he thought he would rig economic recovery too with his $27 billion ZimAsset plan. He has since failed to get anyone to bankroll the plan resulting is a runaway economic meltdown.

The worsening economic situation has not spared even the Zanu PF chefs. The dog-eat-dog infighting in Zanu PF has its origins on the economic meltdown because anyone eased out of power know they will become destitute!

Mugabe has given up hope of reviving the economy but like all tyrant, he is not ready to give up political power. He would want to hang on to the undemocratic institutions so he can, once again rig the next elections. As long as Zanu PF remains in power, the economic meltdown will get worse, not better.

Of course the worsening economic situation and Zanu PF imploding presents a wonderful opportunity to pressure Mugabe to accept the implementation of the GPA reforms followed by the holding of free, fair and credible elections. The opportunity will be wasted as happened in 1980 - 2000 and during the GNU if the electorate do not understand what the reforms are for them to demand their implementation.

The national economy is in such a mess unemployment has soared to 90% plus; 96% of our people are living on less than $1 per day; there is no clean running water in most cities and towns; etc. Where there is poverty and hunger, disease and death are there also. Of course this is economically, socially and politically unsustainable but it is the people themselves on the coal face of these economic hardships who have to demand change.

Last week Mugabe threw a lavish Christmas party for his ruling elite to sweeten them up in the face of the economic hardship. He did not want to make yet another empty promise of creating 2.2 million new jobs. He complimented the masses for their “resilience”!

Zimbabwe is not a poor country that cannot afford to give her people a decent standard of living. On the contrary, the country is endowed with some of the best farm lands in the world and used to grow enough food to feed all her people with plenty left over for export. But ever since Mugabe seized the farms to give to his wasteful cronies the millions of our people have relied on imported food aid or else starve.

In the day and age when other nations have made the deserts bloom, we are starving in the Garden of Eden; a sad testimony of the corruption and incompetence of our leaders!

What our people have yet to understand is the good, competent and democratic governments come from the people exercising their democratic right to a meaningful vote. When this right has been denied it is for the people to demand that it be restored. There is clearly more room to the nation to sink economically so next year Mugabe can once again boast of Zimbabweans’ resilience!

We say we want democracy; free and fair elections; an end to corruption and misrule; etc. but as long as we have an electorate that is so naïve and gullible they believe role in this world is to suffer and die in silence to prove their resilience we will never have any meaningful change.

The lack of quality in our national the leaders is a reflection of the lack of quality in the electorate. If you have quality milk you will get cream rising to the top but if you have a jar of sewage then scum will rise to the top!

People get the government they deserve; we certainly deserve this corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Mugabe dictatorship complete with its coterie of corrupt and incompetent opposition parties! If we want a democratic government then we, the people, must understand the GPA reforms and then demand their implementation with urgency the matter demands. 

For their independence present povo got the box minus the free vote and since Mugabe has stolen a lot more!

My four year old nephew, nicknamed Bob (did not say it out loud because my sister would have been mad at me) got a battery operated toy car for Christmas. His baby brother got a toy car too but a much cheaper version. Bob was quick to notice that his baby brother was quite content playing with the empty toy box and so the little brother ended up with the two empty toy boxes whilst Bob had the two toy cars.

I nicknamed the four year old Bob because he reminded me of a certain Bob I know only the latter is the embodiment of evil hence the reason any parent would be mad to have their child compared to him.

When Zimbabwe attained her independence in 1980 everyone thought they would enjoy freedom, liberty, justice, human rights and human dignity the white colonialists had until then denied them. But before the ordinary people even got to open their independence day gift Robert Mugabe had stolen from their boxes the most valuable item of all – the right to free, fair and credible elections.

When the people of Zimbabwe went to cast their vote in 1980 few had any illusions this was about electing leaders they believed are best able to rule the nation. They knew this was about voting to end the civil war; Mugabe had it known that if Zanu PF did not win the party will not accept the results and the civil war would continue.

In 1980 Zimbabweans voted “to end the civil war”, said Professor Jonathan Moyo in his book Voting for Democracy. He was a man of the people then but ever since he became a minister he has served the dictator with all his heart and soul.

As soon as Mugabe got into power in 1980 he has worked tirelessly to undermine the independence and professionalism of state institutions like the Police and Judiciary to establish and retain his de facto one party dictatorship. The systematic denial of the people’s freedoms and basic rights, including the right to a meaningful democratic vote and even the right to life itself, has now been institutionalized. Mugabe has legalized his taken the pearls and everything of value out of our independence box, keeping them for himself and the ruling elite; whilst the rest of us have to be content with nothing.

35 years of absolute power have left Mugabe and his cronies filthy rich; Mugabe is getting as much as $2 billion a year from the looting and plunder in Marange alone. Meanwhile 35 years of misrule have destroyed the nation’s economy many companies have closed forcing unemployment to soar to nauseating heights of 90% plus. The majority of the people now live in abject poverty they cannot afford even one decent meal a day.

People can see that the Mugabe regime has failed them and in a healthy democratic country they would have been able to remove the regime and replace it with one more responsive to their needs and aspirations. Zimbabwe is not a democracy, Mugabe has ruthlessly imposed the no-regime-change mantra on the nation and the people have never had the free and democratic vote. Never ever!

We are stuck with Mugabe and his corrupt and tyrannical dictatorship. As long as he remains in power, as long as there is no-regime-change, there will be no end to our economic misery.

When the nation attained her independence in 1980 povo got the present but without the single most valuable thing, the right to a meaningful vote; Mugabe stole that away beforehand. In the years to follow Mugabe has stolen one thing after another from the people, so that today he has absolute political power and unfettered access to the nation’s assets and resources to loot and plunder as he please. Meanwhile the populous languish in poverty and despair but have no political muscle to stop the criminal waste.

For how many more years are Zimbabweans going to pretend the Zimbabwe Mugabe has delivered is the same they dreamt of and wanted?

Zimbabweans have yet to realize that it is not in the nature of tyrants to give up power. If the people want their freedom, liberty, justice and human rights independence bestowed on them then they must demand the restoration of their right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country. Without the free vote nothing can be done to end the misrule and criminal waste of the nation’s human and material resources.

It is one thing for a two year old boy to fail to distinguish the true value of a toy from that of the empty box; it is most disconcerting that a whole nation fails to see the critical importance of the right to a meaningful vote in securing one’s independence, humanity and even the right to life itself. 

Zanu PF Unity Accord was Mugabe's excuse to impose no regime change and reduce us all into minions!

“The observation of the December 22, 1987 Unity Accord is a continuation of Zimbabwe's national aspiration to remain a united people. It is a universally recognised fact that unity breeds harmony, peace and progress in every field of human endeavour,” wrote Saul Ndlovu.

The 22 December 1987 Unity Accord between Zanu PF and PF Zapu was not about peace and progress if they were then where is the peace and progress in a country that is being torn apart is political turmoil and chaos and who economy is in total meltdown.

The Unity Accord was the fulfilment of Mugabe’s tyrannical dream of creating a de facto one-party dictatorship in outward appearance but in fact a one-man dictatorship. In the Unity Accord Mugabe was named as the first secretary of the united party, a clear indication this was going to be a one-man dictatorship.

The December 1987 Unity Accord was preceded by the Gukurahundi massacres in which over 20 000 mainly PF Zapu supporters including unarmed and defenceless civilians were murdered in what every honest analyst will admit was an attempt to destroy PF Zapu as a political entity. Mugabe himself has said again and again during those Gukurahundi days that the regime was fighting those who do not want “unity”. Indeed Mugabe has used the language and applied the same brutal violence since December 1987 against all his political opponents and critics.

More than 10 000 innocent Zimbabweans have been murdered since the signing of the Unity Accords; is that peace?

The one-man dictatorship Mugabe has created has stifled all meaningful debate and democratic competition within Zanu PF itself and in the nation at large in the name of unity. The nation has paid dearly for this stifling political environment because the all-powerful Mugabe has appointed his cronies in every sector of the economy to serve his no regime change agenda above all else allowing mismanagement and corruption to destroy the country politically and economically.

The people of Zimbabwe have aware of Mugabe’s failure to deliver economic prosperity which he has promised again and again but have been stuck with the tyrant. Mugabe has stayed in power for 35 years now because he was able to rig elections at will – in the name of unity, of course.

For 35 years Mugabe has brainwashed Zimbabweans into believing political unite means giving up their fundamental right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country; free, fair and credible elections; in support of his no-regime-change mantra. Unite does not mean agreeing with everything a tyrant like Mugabe says and does and being reduced into subservient minions who cannot think anything for themselves, who do not even know when they are being short changed let alone do something about it! 

Secret to Mugabe's 35 years plus in power - both party and government are full of his subservient "wives"!

Mugabe has turned a “jewel of Africa”, as President Julius Nyerere called Zimbabwe back in 1980, into the basket case of failed state. Life expectancy, the universally accepted qualitative and quantitative measure of a nation’s standard of living, has dropped from 68 years to a merger 34 years in 2004.

Zimbabwe used to grow enough food to feed all her people with plenty left over for export. Today the nation is suffering under the double whammy; we are failing to grow enough food and are too poor to imported food. We are starving in what is, by all accounts, the Garden of Eden; the greatest testimonial to Mugabe’s failed leadership.

So if Mugabe is a corrupt, incompetent and failed leader then why has he remained in power for 35 years and counting, even in the face of physical and mental frailty due to old age and ill health?

Answer: ignorance and fear!

Mugabe has one of the most secretive regimes in the world, his regime is like a black-hole where nothing escapes its gravitational pull and, once in, nothing ever comes out. It was former MDC Finance Minister, Tendai Biti, who first revealed Mugabe’s secretive parallel government, the Joint Operation Command (JOC), a Junta complete with its own source of generous funding, for example. The Junta is composed of the top brass in the security services, a select few in government and the party and headed by Mugabe himself.

The Junta is getting billions of dollars from Marange diamonds amongst other sources. In 2012 Mugabe alone received $2 billion according to Partnership Africa Canada so together the Junta may be racking in as much as $4 billion a year. Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa’s national budget last month was $3.8 billion in other words the Junta gets more money than the formal government!

Mugabe and the Junta has been making all the decisions, parliament and cabinet are there for window dressing and rubber stamp the Junta’s decisions. Even then, Mugabe has never allowed, in all his 35 years as head of State, even one cabinet meeting to go ahead unless he was there to chair it himself. Whatever decision the cabinet would have made, nothing would have been actioned without his go ahead of course and yet he still wanted to be there. He was just rubbing it in that the toothless cabinet was dispensable.

Mugabe blatantly rigged the 2013 elections but very few people, if any, know even half of what really happened. People like Joice Mujuru and Didymus Mutasa although they held very senior positions in the party and government, VP and Minister to whom CIO reported respectively, do not know much about the rigged elections which is why they have said nothing even after they were booted out of the party.

JOC is not legal body and so there are no formal meetings with minutes and Mugabe meets individual members he is the conduit gathering all the information and making all the decisions but to make sure that he alone has total control of everything he deliberately keeps most of the information to himself. Junta members are told the bear minimum on the basis of need to know to complete their set task.

Mugabe has spies and moles everywhere he knows “even what is happening in the private of your home”, as Didymus Mutasa boasted, before he was booted out! Mugabe’s detailed knowledge of his colleagues has given him power over them; knowledge is power as ignorance is powerlessness.

Where there is ignorance there is fear! To say Zimbabweans across the whole political and societal divide fear Mugabe is an understatement; they all tremble and grovel before the tyrant. Simon Muzenda, Morgan Tsvangirai, Emerson Mnangagwa, Tendai Biti, Welshman Ncube, Joice Mujuru, Augustine Chihuri, you name them; none of them have ever stood up to Mugabe regardless his terrible track record as a corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyrant. They have all time and time again grovelled to Mugabe like serfs because, under that potato skin deep mucho and democrat modernity, they are all medieval serfs!

“Mose muri vakadzi vaMugabe!” (You are all Mugabe’s wives!), complained Margret Dongo. She was expressing her contempt at how her former Zanu PF colleagues had allowed Mugabe to ride roughshod over the people and the leaders themselves.

In African culture the wife is subservient to her husband. If the woman is unlike to have an abusive husband then she will turn to the village elders or her own people to stop the abuse. The poor woman (povo) is in serious trouble if the abusive husband (Mugabe) bullies the village elders (political leaders) as easily as they too were his wives!

Mugabe is a corrupt and incompetent leaders and the political and economic mess he has created should have disqualified him years ago from holding public office. He has been in power for over 35 years now and is determined to continue regardless of the nation’s crying need to replace him with a competent leader because he has “his wives” in cabinet, parliament, Police, ZEC, judiciary, everywhere whose primary task is to keep him in power.

If we are serious about ending Mugabe’s dictatorial rule and get out of the political and economic hell-hole he has landed us then we must implement the 2008 GPA reforms designed to sever the undemocratic links Mugabe has create which have corrupted the Police, Judiciary, Public Media, etc. turning them into Zanu PF departments in all but name. It is only after implementing the reforms that we can hope to have free, fair and credible elections and elect competent leaders to replace these Mugabe “wives”. 

Gutu, Mugabe was not "tasting his own medicine" in warning security Chefs to stay out of politics - he was dishing it out!

It is by listening to MDC leaders’ statements, they child-like naivety, that one can see why they failed to implement even one of the GPA reforms design dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship. Obert Gutu, MDC-T spokesman is pleased “Mugabe is having a taste of his own medicine” following the tyrant’s complaining about people in the security services being involved in Zanu PF politics.

"Apa patasvika pekuti vamwe vava kupindira hapana kunaka. Vanhu vari kuuya kwandiri vachinditi zvakanaka here izvi? Inga vamwe vava kupindira, vechisoja, vechipurisa, veintelligence vaakufamba vachiti ava vanodavo ngana avo ndovokwangana. Havadi ngana vanoda party,” Mugabe warned at the Conference.

"Let's stop that. We are ruining the party. Gwara reparty riripo (We have now entered a dangerous era. People are telling me that what is happening is not good and that soldiers, the police and the intelligence services are now also involved in the party's factional wars)."

There was euphoric pleasure in MDC circles at hearing this.

"But then, he (Mugabe) is primarily responsible for openly inviting the securocrats to become active politicians,” commented Obert Gutu.

"How many times have you witnessed uniformed police officers and soldiers, including CIO operatives, openly campaigning for Zanu-PF with the president conveniently keeping quiet about it? Nhasi zvazorwadza nhaika (It is bad now)?" How naïve!

Of course Mugabe has encouraged members of the security services to play an active role in politics. The tyrant has used the Women’s League and Youth League members and in the last 15 years war vets as the party’s foot soldiers for the bulk work of harassment, intimidation, rape and beating. But when it came to the heavy duty stuff of stopping opposition party rallies and the murder of opponents Mugabe has relied of the Police, CIO and Army.

Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri has written his doctorate thesis on Policing in Zimbabwe and in it he boasts that the greatest challenge for the Police was to “stop regime change agenda”. So defending the de facto one-party dictatorship and not the traditional role of maintaining law and order was ZRP’s principal duty.

Mugabe was not moaning the Police or anyone else in the security sector’s role in defending his no regime change mantra or campaigning for the party, he will be very pleased to see them step up their political involved in these area. Very pleased indeed given the pressure the party is in from the within with all the factional fighting and from outside from the worsening economic situation.

What Mugabe was complaining about is stories of those in the security sector siding with the Mnangagwa faction, siding with the G40 faction is fine. Even if no one has said anything, being seen talking to Mnangagwa or any of his cronies could get them into serious trouble given Mugabe’s paranoia.

Mugabe was just reminding everyone in the security services that he has his spies everywhere, that he alone appointed them into whatever post they are in and, more pointedly, that he alone can fire them if he so wished. Watch out!

Mugabe has remained top dog in the party and government not because he is a competent and visionary leader, loved and admired by all in equal measure. He is a corrupt and incompetent leader and a ruthless tyrant, his greatest forte; for it is because of his “several degrees in violence” as he has often boasted, that everyone fears him.

Even with the country in economic ruins and the party imploding because his 35 years of mismanagement, corruption and tyrannical rule; even with every sign that he is both physically and mentally too frail to remain leader because of old age and ill health; Mugabe still maintains that he is the only person best suited to remain at the helm. There is not even one person in Zanu PF who has had the guts to tell him that he should step down. Not even one! They are all frightened stiff to dare contradict him!

For your information Mr Gutu, Mugabe is not having a taste of his own medicine; he is in fact dishing it out in bucketful to his subservient minions. You should know this medicine Mr Gutu, after all you and your fellow MDC minions took potbellies full of it during the GNU. Fear! It was your fear of Mugabe’s anger that stopped you lot from implementing even one democratic reform in the five years of the GNU! Not one!

Indigenisation laws to be enforced from January 2016, insists Mugabe - the economic will sink even deeper faster!

Mugabe tells his Zanu PF conference delegates, the ruling elite who stand to be economically empowered by buying shares from foreign owned business, his regime will start forcing companies to comply with the indigenisation laws.

"Come January and its 2016, that stubbornness and resistance we say should end in 2015…2016, we will not accept a company which refuses and rejects our policy of indigenisation and empowerment."

The trouble with tyrants like Mugabe, who are not accountable to anyone and so they never listen to anyone, is that they see what is not there and then plough on regardless.

In 2008, Mugabe passed his new indigenisation laws designed to “economically empower” blacks by forcing foreign owned companies, both existing and new, to sell as much as 51% of their shares to local black Zimbabweans. It should be said here that companies will economically empower the local people is which they operate in three ways:

1)    Companies pay tax, levies, etc. to central government or local governments and the money is then used to build roads, schools, hospitals, etc. In a country whose revenue base has been shrinking to the point where 83% of the collected revenue going into paying wages when the norm should be half that; increasing the revenue is very important.  

2)    Companies create employment opportunities for locals directly or indirectly. Unemployment in 2008, when the indigenisation laws were passed, was 90%; it dropped to 80% during the GNU but has surged up again to 90% plus today.

3)    Companies can sell company shares on the stock exchange or directly to individuals. Only Mugabe cronies could ever hope to buy these shares just as it was them who benefited from the white farm seizures which inspired the indigenisation laws.

Mugabe’s indigenisation laws are primarily targeting foreign own companies and force them to sell shares to local individuals regardless of whether they wanted any local partner or not needed to raise additional funds or not. The law stipulates that government or some authority will approve the deal and, it is common knowledge that, means the regime will appoint the local partner.  This is what has made these laws so obnoxious and unacceptable; who would want to be forced to have a business partner they never asked for!

The economic reality is that since the passing of the indigenisation laws Direct Foreign Investment (DFI) has dries up. Zimbabwe has as little as 4% of the DFI Mozambique received in 2012. Existing companies have continued to close, especially since the rigged 2013 elections when it was clear the return of Zanu PF will mean the return of such oppressive laws like indigenisation laws.

If Zimbabwe had been a healthy and functioning democracy then Mugabe will have got the message loudly and clearly by now: the indigenisation laws have scarred away DFI and the price the nation has paid in lost revenue and employment opportunities is unacceptably high particularly when the laws is nothing more than the ruling elite holding the nation to ransom.

But Zimbabwe is not a democracy and so Mugabe is not even concerned that millions are out of work and million now live in total abject poverty the ruling elite will holdout with their demand of forcing foreigners to sell shares to his cronies even if even more of the few remaining companies are forced to close down. So Mugabe will force the implementation of the indigenisation laws forcing taxes and revenue to drop even further, unemployment and economic meltdown to get even worse for the sake of a handful of his cronies who will be empowered by buying the very few shares from the tiny number of foreign owned companies still remaining in the country.  

Some people have been hoping that Mugabe and Zanu PF can be talked into scrapping its obnoxious indigenisation laws, end corruption, etc. this ultimatum as to when the laws must be ruthlessly applies has put those hopes to bed. There will never be any meaningful economic reforms without the political reforms designed to restore the people’s power to hold Mugabe or whoever is elected to form the next government accountable to them.

We need to implement all the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA and then hold free and fair elections! 

UK Ambassador says Chamisa "represent the future" - what an insult, he is a GNU sell-out!

“Britain's Ambassador to Zimbabwe Mrs Catrion Laing is reportedly backing former MDC-T national organising secretary and Kuwadzana East legislator Mr Nelson Chamisa to take over the party's leadership from Mr Morgan Tsvangirai,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“The Sunday Mail understands that the British envoy recently divulged this to World Bank staff at a function to officially open the Breton-Woods institution offices in Mount Pleasant, Harare.

“A reliable source who attended the event said Mrs Laing said Mr Chamisa "represents the future" of opposition politics in Zimbabwe.”

There is nothing wrong with the British Ambassador or anyone else for that matter expressing their political opinion on Zimbabwe’s leaders provided the said opinion is honest and expressed in good faith. When someone who should know better  calls a political sell-out like Nelson Chamisa the future of our country it is impossible to view this as anything other than what it is – an insult!

Nelson Chamisa was a senior member of the MDC leadership together with Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti , Welshman Ncube, David Coltart and Eddie Cross, to name but a few,  who failed to implement even one of the raft of democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA during the GNU.  The reforms were necessary for free, fair and credible elections. They had five years to implement the reforms but failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!

The MDC leaders knew about the reforms because they were involved in drafting the GPA and, throughout the GNU, they were reminded again and again to implement the reforms. They paid no heed to the reminders and ignored the warning not to take part in the July 2013 elections without the reforms implemented. A few MDC leaders like Samuel Sipepa Nkomo have since admitted that they were warned and that they ignored the warning.

Mugabe went on to blatantly rig the July 2013 elections landing the nation back in the mess of having a corrupt and tyrannical regime back in office. The GNU offered us the best opportunity since independence to end the Mugabe dictatorship peacefully and that chance was wasted. God only knows how the nation is going to end the dictatorship and at what price!

Of course MDC leaders did not implement even one reform because they sold-out. As SADC Heads rightly pointed out at the time, they “were busy enjoying themselves and forgot why they were in the GNU.”  

Ambassador Laing knows that many British politicians have been forced to resign from public office for such acts of indiscretion as spending the night with a prostitute. We are talking here of politicians conspiring to betray the whole nation for selfish material gain and the consequences of the sell-out in untold human misery and death for many years to come. How someone who is guilty of such treasonous betrayal can still be considered the future of the nation beggars belief.

There are a few Zimbabweans who are doing their best to build a healthy and functioning democracy in Zimbabwe and lowering the democratic standard so that a sell-out is considering a democrat is makes a mockery of democracy.  It is tough enough trying to build a democracy with countries like China and Israel helping Mugabe to rig the elections without having to fight well established democratic nations like the British selling someone we all know is corrupt, incompetent and have sold-out big time only as a democrat!