Zimbabwe’s
land reform has been a total failure; many have argued that it was the farm invasions
that triggered the country’s economic decline from which it will never recover
until the matter is properly dealt with. But since it is only Zanu PF’s voice
that is heard on the matter; the party’s position and thus the nation’s
position is the land reform has been a resounding black empowerment success.
Mugabe
has taken the land reform as his greatest legacy he now has Zanu PF hardliners
and war vets who have taken it upon themselves to defend this legacy with their
very lives. In other words the nation is stuck with a failed policy it
desperately need changed to turn round the economic decline!
It
is not only Mugabe and Zanu PF who have taken advantage of the fact that the
Zimbabwean people have no political voice and have thus sort to impose their
own narrative on the nation. The country’s opposition leaders and parties have
done the same. Professor Welshman Ncube has jumped on to the same bandwagon.
Professor
Ncube, together with his fellow MDC leaders like Morgan Tsvangirai,Tendai Biti,
david Coltart, Obert Gutu, Eddie Cross, etc. were tasked after the signing of
the 2008 GPA to implement a raft of democratic reforms and write a new
democratic constitution to ensure future elections are free, fair and credible.
At the time, the GNU was given 18 months but it lasted 60 months over three
times as long but, worse still, they failed to deliver the set tasks.
MDC
failed to get even one of the many reforms implemented; not one.
The
new Copac constitution presented to the nation was a weak and feeble one which
was never going to deliver free and fair elections contrary to MDC leaders like
Professor Ncube and Tsvangirai’s repeated promises before the March 2013
referendum that it will.
Just
as Mugabe has stubbornly refused to admit his land reform was a total failure
and offered all manner of stupid excuses for the subsequent economic failures;
MDC leaders too have stubbornly refused to own up that they sold-out in failing
to implement the reforms and they too have offered all manner of feeble
excuses.
“Readers
will recall that the new national constitution contained new clauses on electoral
reforms and that an agreed new Electoral Act had been agreed to,” proffered
Professor Ncube. “But before it could be
enacted and operationalized, ZANU PF abandoned the GPA electoral roadmap and
with the support, some might say connivance, of the then Supreme Court sitting
as a constitutional court, frog marched the country to premature elections
which were then conducted under electoral laws enacted by Presidential decree
but not operationalised.”
This
is nonsense of course because the new constitution alone, even if it had been a
democratic one, was never going to deliver free and fair elections without the
raft of reforms. MDC had failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!
Even
if the nation was to accept that the operationalization of the Electoral Act
was all that was required to guarantee free and fair elections; one has to ask
why MDC had failed to get the new constitution approved and the Act operational
in five years. They were supposed to have done all this in 18 months, they had
60 months instead and yet still failed to complete the job!
If
there was any question of Mugabe “frog matching” the nation into the elections
then there was also the question of MDC dragging their feet to avoid elections.
“I
still remember vividly the woman from Binga,” wrote Professor Ncube, “who had
voted for the party at a polling station in Binga and was shocked on reading
the election results put up at the door of the polling station showing that the
candidates she had voted for had obtained no votes at all and had to sell her
goat to come to the MDC Bulawayo Regional office to seek an explanation as to
how it could have happened when she together with others had voted for the
party at that polling station. Even more disappointing for her was our inability
to explain to her how such electoral outcomes were possible in those
circumstances.”
Why
did you not tell her the truth Professor; that she was not the only one
disappointed with the rigged elections; that you had been warned about
implementing the reforms by ignored warnings because you had sold-out; that you
are boycotting all elections because all party donors deserted you because you
are corrupt and incompetent; etc.
“I therefore insist that by not participating we are sending a strong message that there should be a change. It is not the mechanistic exercise of fake elections that brings democracy. Elections must be Elections, which means they must present a real opportunity for people to make a choice between or among different political parties/ individuals,” pleaded Professor Ncube.
“My colleagues and I who lead the
opposition parties have to be prepared to defer our dreams for better national
good rather than pursuing rent-seeking parochial interests. The MDC and I are
in it for the long haul – to win – not just dressing the devil in pin -striped
suits to conceal its evil nature.”
But
is that not the point Professor; that throughout the five years of the GNU you
and you fellow MDC leaders “pursued rent-seeking parochial interests” and kicked
the reforms into the tall grass. You are now counting on the Zimbabwe
electorate not noticing you betrayed them and thus get yourself elected back
into power again.
If
Zimbabwe had been a healthy and functioning democracy you, Professor Ncube, and
your MDC friends would have apologized to the nation on 31 July 2013 for
selling-out and then resigned from the political stage, never to be heard or
seen again. Since you lot will not do the honourable thing and resign someone
has to tell the nation the truth about you and ensure you are never ever
elected into office again.
9 comments:
“President Mugabe is one among other African leaders who has excellent leadership qualities that are admired by most leaders worldwide,” you say?
If that was true then how come Zimbabwe is in this economic and political mess?
"However, Obert Gutu the MDC-T spokesperson defended Tsvangirai saying his leader was expressing anger at Zanu PF’s reluctance to reform electoral laws when he said peo-ple should boycott the by-elections."
MDC will never accept responsibility for selling out during the GNU. They had five years to implement the democratic reforms agreed in the GNU but failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!
As a nation we paid a very heavy price to get MDC into the GNU on the promise that they will deliver meaningful democratic changes. They failed to bring any change because they accepted bribes from Mugabe to do nothing about the reforms. The biggest challenge of this generation is to understand why we failed to see MDC leaders for the corrupt and incompetent individuals they are.
As long as we continue to have an electorate that is so naïve and gullible to elect corrupt and incompetent leaders like Tsvangirai and Biti then we will never get out of this political and economic mess because no democratic reforms will ever be implemented.
“The opposition has been a disaster,” said Tendai Biti. “The opposition owes an apology to the people of Zimbabwe. They have been impotent, divisive, divided and hubristic. But the people of Zimbabwe too must shoulder the responsibility; you are as good as the opposition or the government you get. The people of Zimbabwe have not asserted their space, and their right to protest and protect themselves against the insanity of Zanu PF and the mediocrity of the opposition.”
There are three points here that Mr Tendai Biti has made; first and foremost he has admitted that the opposition has been corrupt and incompetent, he got that one right.
Second, he is right the opposition owe the nation a big apology for betraying the nation by failing to implement even one of the democratic reforms. There is no doubt that they did this because they had been bribed by Mugabe to do nothing regarding implementing the reforms. They sold-out, period! The reforms are a very serious matter and selling-out is an equally serious offence so much so that an apology is not enough. The MDC leaders must apologize and resign from all public life!
Tendai Biti is right that we, the people of Zimbabwe, must shoulder the responsibility of having a corrupt and tyrannical government and an equally corrupt and incompetent opposition. In the long run, people always get the government they deserve; we sure deserve what we have.
If we want a democratic government then we have to show it by first and foremost electing a competent opposition and not these village idiots!
Nyamutata this is an excellent article and thank you for your timely warning that we are “sleepwalking into an era of instability, more serious than we have witnessed so far”. Sadly we have been this for the last 35 years; so what may have started as a dirty habit has now become ingrained into other national ethos, it is an integral part of who we are. We are now a nation of sleepwalkers!
Our chance to turn back away from this disastrous path Mugabe and Zanu PF have been frog marching us was during the GNU. The MDC leaders were tasked implement a raft of democratic reforms designed to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship. The task was supposed to be carried out and completed in one year and half; MDC had five years but failed to get even one reform imple-mented. Not one!
It was easy for MDC to betray the nation on the reforms just as it had been easy for Mugabe and Zanu PF to frog march the nation into this hell because the people themselves did not have a clue on what the reforms were about just as at independence the people did not have a clue what democracy was all about. The people have been sleeping since 1980 and they are still at it!
Yes Mugabe has held the nation together these last 35 years using a mix of fear and his charm but most important of all he had the economic wealth to buy the loyalty of the public and his party cro-nies. After independence the Zimbabwe economic had the fat to enable Mugabe to implement his free education, free health and many other socialist ideas, for the first decade at least.
Three and half decades of mismanagement and corruption have taken a heavy toll on the economy, there is no fat left to pay for free education and all the other give away socialist policies. Indeed instead of mass prosperity what we have now is mass poverty. The threat of social arrest in Zimbabwe today is now certainty because the people fear poverty more than they fear Mugabe’s Riot Police. Charm does not work on a restless people, not even Mugabe’s mojo charm!
The economic meltdown has left its mark on Zanu PF itself; the dog-eat-dog factional fighting in the party is caused by member fighting over the ever shrinking national cake. Mugabe has held the party together because he had loot to dish out, take away the loot and already the party is imploding! Indeed it is Mugabe himself who has initiated the implosion by firing Mujuru and her followers; he had no choice in the matter, there was not enough to feed everyone in the bloated party.
Zimbabwe is facing a political and economic nightmare; not even Mugabe can stop what is coming, not even if he knock fifty years from his present age!
The basic reality is that Zanu PF would have lost the 2013 elections if MDC had implemented the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging elections because the people lost confidence in the party as far back as 2000. Mujuru and her followers are being naive if they think that the people will now fall head over heels in love with them just because they have been purged out of Zanu PF.
People see Mai Mujuru and her followers as part and parcel of the corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship and nothing has changed. Mai Mujuru does not give a damn about the suffering masses all she is fighting for is to get back into power!
The only way Mai Mujuru's People First will get back into power is for them to rig the elections and the chance of them cheating the Mugabe and Mnangagwa axis is zero!
@ Maita
The country is going nowhere politically or economically until we implement the reforms!
Fancy that, MDC is now calling on Zanu PF to implement the reforms but they did not make the same call in their five years in the GNU! What is even more surprising is that all those who believed that MDC was powerless to implement or have them implemented during the GNU now believe everyone word MDC says! How naive and gullible!
We are in this hell hole because we have more than our fair share of naive and gullible voters and we are not getting out of this hell as long as we continue to have people who will follow blindly whatever leader is put before them!
ZUNDE has a lot of work to do because Zimbabwe is in a real big mess! Nothing is Zimbabwe is working because Zanu PF has done a great job of destroying the economic infrastructure and the political fabric of society. This is not a question of business as usual as everything, absolutely everything has to be scrapped and rebuilt from scratch.
@ Patrick
How is ZUNDE going to square this round hole! By declaring that ZUNDE is going to take part in the 2018 elections the party has per se accepted that status quo - ie a flauded electoral process in which Zanu PF is free to tamper with the voters roll, threaten voters, abuse the public media, use the Police and Courts, use violence, etc.
As long as there are political parties prepared to contest elections under the present situation Zanu PF will never ever want to change.
MDC should have implemented the democratic reforms when they had the chance to do so. Getting the reforms implement now is the toughest challenge before this nation. The need for free and fair elections is at the heart of all political and economic change; nothing of substance ever be achieved until we have all the democratic reforms implemented!
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