Africa is one of the richly endowed continents on earth, with
vast tracks of land to grown food, minerals and other natural resources and great
potential growth and prosperity and yet it still remains the poorest continent
on earth. Of course many people had hoped against hope that may be this time
the continent’s leaders will address this problem with the seriousness and
urgency the subject demands. All hope for change was quickly snuffed out!
“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here” wrote Dante in his epic
poem Inferno.
Dante said these are the words at the Gate into Hell! Right
now one feels these same words should have been inscribed at the Sandton
Conference Centre, in Johannesburg, SA, where the AU summit is been held for it
could not have had a more inauspicious start.
Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, who is the chairman of the AU, kicked
off by urged African leaders to follow the footsteps of the founding fathers
who rejected all machinations by the continent's detractors in their quest for
freedom.
Mugabe was echoing Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta who twittered saying Africa should shun foreign aid because it often carries unacceptable conditions and is not a solid basis for prosperity and freedom in Africa. This is just a stupid and confused statement that does not make any sense.
Mugabe was echoing Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta who twittered saying Africa should shun foreign aid because it often carries unacceptable conditions and is not a solid basis for prosperity and freedom in Africa. This is just a stupid and confused statement that does not make any sense.
Aid from the West has often, sadly not always, carried demands
for democratic accountability, economic transparency to curb waste through
corruption and the respect for human rights. Surely these are the pre-requisite
for building a free, just and prosperous nation and yet President Kenyatta is
telling us the exact opposite.
President Kenyatta has his reasons for being anti-West; he is
still angry that he was forced to appear at the ICC over his involvement in
political violence that let over a 1000 people died after the 2007 Kenya
elections. The charges against him have since been dropped due lack of evidence;
it has failed to get any witnesses to testify.
Failure to get witness is no proof the political violence did
occur; there are still over a 1 000 graves who bear testimony of the wanton
violence.
Post independent Africa’s failure to respect the fundamental
right of its people to a free and meaningful say in the governance of the
country lies at the very heart of the continent’s political and economic
regression. There are very few African countries that have upheld their people’s
basic freedoms and human rights including the right to free and fair elections and
even the right to life.
On the economic front, every few African countries have
managed to offer their people a better life than that they enjoyed before
independence. The continent’s autocratic systems of government have allowed mismanagement
and corruption become rampant in Africa. For many countries including Kenya and
Zimbabwe the people look at the pre-independence with nostalgia as the golden
age!
The Africa of the AU’s founding fathers Kwame Nkrumah and
others had white colonial domination and exploitation as the greatest impediment
stopping Africans enjoying their freedom, human dignity and economic
prosperity. Confronting the West as the colonial powers and rejecting anything
Western made good sense then.
The Africa of today has the same challenges the majority of
our people are still not enjoying freedom, human dignity and millions live in
abject poverty. Mugabe’s call for the continent’s leaders to “follow the footsteps
of the founding fathers who rejected all machinations by the continent's detractors
(the West’s colonial powers)” is a monumental lie.
All African countries are now independent, SA was the last to
do so and that was over 20 years ago now. It is not the West but Africa’s own
post independent leaders who are holding back the people and nation from realizing
their freedom and potential. It is the machinations of these tyrants that Africa
must deal with if we are ever to end the mismanagement, corruption, poverty,
political oppression, vote rigging and endless civil strives and wars which
have now become the norm in Africa.
Africa is not Dante’s Inferno but given the narrow mindedness
of its leaders like President Uhuru Kenya and Robert Mugabe the continent has
sure become the hell-on-earth!
The stepping up of the tempo of the anti-West rhetoric by
corrupt, vote rigging and oppressive tyrants like Uhuru Kenyatta and Robert Mugabe
is a deliberate attempt to distract the Africans from the reality that these
tyrants are the one now holding back Africa, they are now the new detractors.
20 comments:
The violent seizure of white own farms in 2000 served two objectives for Mugabe:
1) By then the Zimbabwe economy was already in serious trouble and his wasteful cronies were demand more loot from him, he gave them the only other asset he still had left – land.
2) Mugabe allowed the violent and chaotic seizure of the farms to take place because he needed a distraction from the politically motived violence and chaos he was contacting against his political opponents. It was accident that farm invasions violence flared up again just before elections between 2000 and the watershed 2008 elections.
@ Chiremba
MDC had a manifesto/policies in the 2013 elections but that did not stop Zanu PF rigging the elections!
You cannot accept the reality of anyone criticizing MDC because the party's leaders are corrupt and incompetent regardless of other political interests. You have settled on the position that I am a Zanu PF supporter or ally. Please yourself! As for me, I have been things to do than indulge in your childish political games!
@ Zvazviri
You have said MDC has the numbers and I believe it had the numbers for the 2013 elections; the important question then is why did MDC fail to make their numbers count?
It was in MDC's interest to implement the reforms and have free and fair elections so that their numbers counted. MDC failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one.
If someone acts to harm their own interests they are surely incompetent; by failing to implement even one reform, MDC proved that they are breathtakingly incompetent! You can denying it all you want that will not change the fact that MDC are incompetent.
It is interesting to note that even now with all the facts of the MDC failures during the GNU years in your hands and 2 years for the facts to sink in, you are still failing to get your head round these facts. Zvazviri, (As is) you call yourself, how can you see anything as is when you are mentally blind!
The fact of the matter is that Mugabe rigged the July 2013 elections just as he rigged the 2008 elections; the truth will come out and the whole world will know Fayehun was right. We will see who will be eating humble pie then! The years of rigging elections and riding roughshod over everyone are over, the writing is on the wall, Mugabe can pretend he cannot read but that will not stop the change that is already happening.
Ms Fayehun will find another job with an even bigger media house, now she has proven that she has guts!
Did you see the report of the AU fund-raising dinner where Mugabe pledged to donate 300 cattle and then was urging other leaders to do the same? It was not clear what exactly the money was to be used for and no doubt Mugabe will have ideas what to do with it!
There is so much Africa can do for itself and its long suffering people, the is a lot the people can do for themselves. What is holding them back is the leaders who would feel threatened if people were to learn they are not as helpless as the leaders have forced them to be.
@ Patrick
Greek philosophers like Socrates and Plato, 450 BC or 2500 years ago, defined in great detail the essential tenets of good governance, a democracy. At the very core of democracy are two things; one, the rule of law and that no one is above the law. Two, that the rulers must do so with active participation and approval of the ruled; the essence free, fair and credible elections.
All nations throughout human history that have enjoyed peace, prosperity and good governance have observed these two key tenets of democratic rule. The nation's success has surged up during the periods of good democratic governance and sunk when there is an autocratic tyrant on the throne who disregarded the law and stifled debate and competition.
When Zimbabwe attained her independence in 1980 our people had the benefit of 2500 years of human civilization which even your aunt, Tambudzai and nephew Jokoniya, Patrick, were well exposed to. Indeed even if Zimbabweans had remained completely cut off from the rest of the world, by then one would expect they would have figured out for themselves what system of government works.
It is a great tragedy that with all the collected human history before us we are still failing to come up with a system of government that delivers prosperity, peace, justice, freedom and human rights and dignity to all and not just a select few at the expense of the overwhelming majority. The few are so fearful of the anger of the disposed majority they have turned the nation into a Police State and always keep packed suitcase in the hall ready to take flee or be killed.
The intellectual development of the Greeks 2500 years ago was no better than that of our own people today. We have lacked common sense that is all and sadly that is not something one can pick from a book for no school or university teaches common sense.
When the white supremacists during the years of slavery and then during white colonial rule said blacks were incapable of self-rule; they must have meant blacks have no common sense to come up with working system of government on their own.
Common sense is the ability to learn from other people and or one's own mistakes, something blacks have completely failed to do.
Most African countries do look to the colonial days with nostalgia, as the golden age because since attaining independence they have sinking into the bottomless pit of economic and political despair. 2500 years after the Greeks defined good democratic government we are still trying to prove them wrong that a ruthless autocratic dictatorship too can deliver prosperity, freedom, etc.!
@ Xavier Stobart
MDC ignored implementing the reforms during the GNU but since the rigged elections they have since realized that the reforms are important hence the reasons they are calling for elections boycott until the reforms are implemented. From that alone I would say reforms are important and hence the reason why reforms has been my "song for a long time now".
Until we implement the reforms we will have the same meaningless elections as we have had for the last 35 years in which we go through the ritual only to confirm the no regime change nonsense.
You are 100% right "Mugabe would not have allowed reforms and still does not". But you will have to agree too that Mugabe would not have signed the Global Political Agreement that stipulated the raft of reforms and the power sharing GNU. After the rigged 2008 elections Mugabe lost all political credibility and legitimacy not just with the West but even with the AU and SADC. It was was the two African bodies who forced him to sign the GPA.
Of the parties in the GNU it was for MDC to implement the democratic reforms.
MDC had the majority in parliament and so they would have had no problems getting the proposed reforms through the House. No doubt Mugabe would have put his foot down and refuse to sign the proposals into law but that was where SADC, as the guarantor of the GPA would have stepped in and reminded Mugabe that the reforms were agreed in the GPA.
As it happened Mugabe never refused to sign any proposed reforms because MDC did not even make even one proposed reform. Mugabe bribe MDC leaders at the beginning of the GNU to do nothing about the reforms by granting them all the good life of the gravy train and for Tsvangirai the $ 4 million Highlands mansion was thrown in to clinch the deal.
MDC sold-out and that is the truth! It is important to grasp this basic truth in our search for how to get out of this hell-hole because electing corrupt, incompetent and sell-out, especially the same leaders who have already proven that they are corrupt and incompetent, is not going to get us out of the hole!
@ Mukanya
I am fighting for the implementation of all the democratic reforms, the reforms MDC failed to get even one reform implemented in five years. How is MDC fighting for democracy when it was them who accepted Mugabe's bribes to kick the reforms into the tall grass?
You should not be fooled by MDC who only now demand the reforms but will not explain why they failed to get even one reform implemented during the five years of the GNU, ignoring SADC and other people's warning to implement the reforms.
Zanu PF does not want the reforms implemented and so how can someone fighting for the implementation of ALL the GPA reforms be fighting in Zanu PF's corner beggars belief! Only a moron like you would come up with such nonsense!
@ Kekeke-Bom
“Even a grade one child knows that there can never be any reforms that can ever be im-plemented by the opposition without ZANU PF's approval. Everything is in the hands of ZANU PF and they are even refusing to align the laws to new constitution of which they are a signatory,” you said. And you are 100% right if you are talking about now but I am not talking of MDC implementing the reforms during the GNU years.
During the GNU Mugabe and Zanu PF did not have everything their way. After the rigged 2008 elections Mugabe lost political legitimacy not just with the West but with the SADC and the AU too. He was forced to sign the GPA which included a raft of democratic reforms. The only reason why not even one reform was implemented during the GNU is because Mugabe bribed MDC leaders to do nothing on the reforms.
The only reasons why MDC leaders have got away with this blatant betrayal of the people is that Zimbabwe has some of the most naïve and gullible electorate in the world. Before the July 2013 elections MDC promised the people the elections will be free and fair and the people believed them. SADC literally begged MDC not to take part in the elections without reforms but they were ignored.
Of course the July 2013 elections were rigged and MDC now belatedly accept the elections were rigged and is now demanding the reform be implemented. MDC are now even blaming Zanu PF for the failure to get the reforms implemented before the 2013 elections. What is shocking is the many naïve and gullible Zimbabweans have accepted the lie. They have already forgotten that MDC promised before the 2013 that the elections would be free and fair.
I am only reminding you that MDC failed to implemented the reforms because the sold-out and instead of opening your eyes to this reality you are getting sass with me. That is typical of idiots like you who have spent all their lives with their heads stuck in leaders like Tsvangirai’s backside, you get very sassy when you are told you smell of s***t!
If you stop sticking your head into other people’s backside and think yourself for once then you will not smell of s***t!
@ Magaisa
So because Mujuru has apologized for her "role in the Zanu PF failures" that is enough to turn her from the corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical woman she was for all these 34 years into an exemplary democrats?
This is the kind of nonsense Magaisa dished out to MDC during the GNU when he was Tsvangirai’s chief adviser that resulted in the MDC failing to implement even one democratic reform in five years of the GNU. Now the idiot wants the nation’s hopes in ending this Zanu PF nightmare on a recycled Zanu PF reject! How stupid is that!
@ Patrick
Magaisa is hoping to get his old job back as the purveyor of nonsensical advice by selling his corrupt and incompetent old boss Tsvangirai and the equally corrupt and incompetent Mai Mujuru as the nation's political solution out of this mess!
So Africans are finally sick and tired of Mugabe's antics and are openly calling him a dictator. I was in SA recently and the most SA are not as naive and gullible as they used to be especially with Mugabe. I think SA are becoming increasingly aware that what has befallen Zimbabwe could just as easily happen to them too and are they want their own leaders to know they are not happy.
Although the words were directed at Mugabe, Mboweni's knew his comments will get to the right ears in SA too! "Mukuru anoroverwa pambwa!" as the Shona would say. (You punish the lead in pretending to punish the dog!) And Mugabe is fast becoming Africa's whipping dog too!
Mugabe blames the West for the few African leaders visiting Zimbabwe.
A few African countries, Mugabe said, had at the last minute turned down invitations to visit Zimbabwe for fear of reprisals from powerful countries in Europe and America. -
It does not matter how many times Mugabe tries to blame the West for all Zimbabwe's problems, especially the worsening economic situation, the truth is these are problems of our own making. Zimbabwe's economy is in total meltdown because of decades of mismanagement and corruption. Mugabe has got away blaming the West for decades but in the last decades the chickens have come home to root in their millions!
“IN my piece last week I wrote on poverty and there was one thing that stood out strongly; if all employable Zimbabweans would find a decent job, it would be a giant step, indeed a huge leap towards extricating ourselves from the clutches of poverty, hunger and deprivation,” wrote Ncube.
Great, I hope you are not expecting a medal for saying the obvious!
Since you lost your seat on the gravy train you have for the first time ever done an hour’s work a week to produce this weekly dribble of intellectual nonsense!
Do you realize that if you had done one hour’s work in your five years in power in the GNU then you might have had at least one reform implemented!
@ Zimvigil
Many Africans are beginning to see the lie of black empowerment and see the reality of abject poverty that is in Zimbabwe. You can convince someone the meat in their relish is lamb and not mutton but you cannot do so the same about hot chili.
The country has 90% unemployment rate and millions are living in abject poverty and yet someone insist they are better off! Of course the ordinary Zimbabweans know they are being cheated, they are worse off now than before independence. What is more they would have demonstrated their political disappointment with Mugabe and his lies by voting the tyrant out!
Mugabe is still in power only because he rigged the 2013 elections; it was MDC's failure to get even one reform implemented that allowed him to rig the elections.
@ Mukanya
Give me five hours to cut down a tree and I will spend four hours sharpening the axe! A less man will pay no attention on the axe and start
chopping straight away.
We failed to get even one democratic reform implemented during the GNU because we failed to realize that all the MDC leaders we had entrusted to carry out this very important and critical task were corrupt and incompetent.
Yes the Mugabe and Zanu PF dictatorship is the focus of our attention, the tree we need to cut down, but getting the competent leaders to do this is just as important and demands even more of our time and effort, especially when we failed to accomplish the task last time because we had corrupt and incompetent to do it.
We wasted a golden opportunity to delivery democratic change during the GNU, that will not happen again. Tsvangirai and company are corrupt, incompetent and sell-outs, they will never be elected to positions of trust ever again; take that as read!
If you are corrupt, incompetent or a sell-out, Tsvangirai is all those three, there is no second chance; strike one and you are out. There is no if or but on that one, Tsvangirai and company are out!
@ Patrick Zhuwao
What black empowerment are you babbling about, you empty drum! Who has Mugabe empow-ered?
Amos Midzi, until his purge from Zanu PF a few weeks ago, he was a senior member of the party and holding high office; he died two weeks ago up to his eyes in debt and as poor as a church mouse.
It was Midzi’s poverty that prompted Bishop Lazarus, Sunday Mail columnist to ask: "Can Zanu-PF politicians who hold high offices in the party survive outside Zanu-PF? Can Zanu-PF mem-bers who were fortunate to be appointed as Ministers, Deputy Ministers and so on survive out-side Government?”
We know in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe one has to have the right Zanu PF connections to get any-where and so if those in the very top echelons of power are paupers the ordinary Zimbabweans are languishing in grinding poverty. According to last year’s UNCEF report, 16% or 2 million Zimbabweans are living in abject poverty.
So if Mugabe’s empowerment has reduced senior members of his own party into paupers and forced millions of ordinary Zimbabweans into abject poverty last week, then who the Dickens has the tyrant empowered?
Even you Patrick Zhuwao you were offered a directorship with ZESA to rescue you from abject poverty. The number of power cuts have increased since your appointment, not that anyone expected any real change since you are just a political appointment! It is tough enough that we the oppressed and impoverish have to pay through our nose for doing fcuk-off at ZESA now shut the fcuk-up and spare us your nonsensical talk!
What Roof did cannot be condoned and it is deeply regrettable that we share our world with evil individuals. When the condemnation comes from people like you George Charamba, Mugabe’s spokesman, cum Nathaniel Manheru it does not ring true. You condemn the crime of a few rac-ists individual but have never condemned the murdered of over 500 innocent Zimbabweans in the wanton Zanu PF political violence of 2008 for example.
In the case of Roof, the State Authorities have acted swiftly and had the murderer arrested and will soon face justice. In the Zanu PF political murderers no one was ever arrested, confirming this was State sponsored violence!
The families of the victims of the Roof murders and all the other white racists murders will not want the Zimbabwe government’s sympathy because for a regime that practises institutionalized mass oppression of blacks it is clear the regime does not care about justice or the suffering of blacks but is condemning the white supremacists murders to score points against the American government!
@ Africa
It is not the West that have murdered over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans since 1980 but Muga-be and Zanu PF; you moron!
Mugabe rigged the last elections as he did all the elections in the past so what are you talking about "Democracy is the modern opium"?
You are paid to overlook the suffering of your fellow blacks, to pretend all our problems are caused by the West when it is our corrupt and tyrannical rulers, your pay masters, who are the real problem. You are a sell-out; no different from the blacks who hunted down their own fellow blacks and sold to the white man as slaves. Today you are selling out your fellow blacks to the black tyrants!
Zimbabweans had the chance to end all this nonsense during the GNU by implementing the re-forms agreed in the GPA. MDC failed to get even one reform implemented. What we can do right now is recognize that we fcuk-up and hopefully learn from that!
3333
If we want free, fair and credible elections we must go back to the raft of reforms agreed in the GPA in 2008 and implement ALL the reforms and stop wasting time and resources pussy-footing around. MDC-T's watered down list of eight reforms will not solve this problem.
Tsvangirai and his MDC friends were supposed to implement all the reforms during the five years of the GNU but failed to get even one reform implemented. Mugabe bribed them to kick the reforms into the tall grass and that is what they did.
Tsvangirai and MDC betrayed the nation and wasted the country's best chance ever to end this electoral nonsense of going through the motion of electing someone in a process designed to produce a pre-determined result to confirm the no regime change mantra.
Tendai Biti called the MDC betrayal of the nation the "collective foolishness" of the opposition! He just did not want to spell it out that MDC sold-out!
Getting Zanu PF to step down so that all the GPA reforms can be implemented is the real challenge now; it was infinitely easier to have done so during the GNU when Zanu PF was obliged to honour the agreement. MDC’s suggestion that Zanu PF should implement the reforms is a none started because the party knows it can never win free and fair elections so it will never ever implement the reforms.
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