Ali boasted AND delivered, some people boast endlessly but never ever deliver

Ali boasted and delivered; some people boast but never deliver!

“I shook up the world! I shook up the world!” screamed Muhammad Ali after beating Sonny Liston in 1964. His critics were quick to call him “big mouth” and no matter how much many of them wished someone would shut him up, throughout his illustrious boxing career few ever did shut him.

Ali boasted of “whipping good” his opponents off the ring and did just that in the squared circle!

“I shook up the world! I shook up the world!” screamed Ali, it he was not boasting but stating a fact!

In Zimbabwe we have our own home grown “big mouth” one Robert Gabriel Mugabe; sadly unlike Muhammad Ali, Mugabe is all talk. Boy oh boy the man can talk; denouncing the West is by far his favourite subject.

He has denounced the “British imperialists and their allies for imposing illegal sanctions” against Zimbabwe. He pronounced his “look East” as a defiant counter measure although the country’s economy has got progressive worse and not better.

Before the 2013 national elections he promised the nation 2.2 million new jobs by 2018. We are now three years down the line and he has yet to create even one new job. He has reverted to blaming the “illegal sanctions” for his government’s failure to revive the economy and create the desperately needed employment opportunities.

If he had been in the boxing ring then a left hook reminding him he promised the jobs knowing fully well there were sanctions would has caught him on jaw. Followed this up with a hammer-blow right in the breadbasket; reminding him of his own admission that the country lost $15 billion worth of diamond revenue, how can any nation prosper given such serious economic haemorrhaging. Technical Knock Out (TKO)!

But by far the greatest lie to come out of Mugabe is that he has the popular political support of the people of Zimbabwe when he has systematically denied them the basic right to free, fair and credible elections.

In 2008 elections, by far the worst case, Mugabe lost the March vote and withheld the results for five weeks whilst he “cooked” them to force a presidential run-off. He then deployed rogue war veterans and selected members the Police, CIO and Army to harass, beat, rape and even to kill innocent Zimbabweans to force them to vote for him in the run-off.

The blatant and wanton violence was so widespread and brutal Tsvangirai accused Mugabe of “declaring war on the people” he withdrew from the race. None of the election observers; not even SADC and the AU known for turning a blind eye to vote rigging; would endorse the elections having been free and fair.

SADC and the AU told Mugabe they would not recognize his government as legal and forced him to form GNU with his rivalry, Tsvangirai. The GNU was tasked to implement democratic reforms designed to ensure the next elections would be free, fair and credible. The task to implement the reforms fell on Tsvangirai and his MDC friends and they had five years to implement the reforms.

SADC Heads of State did their best to remind MDC to implement the reforms throughout the GNU but were ignored. Mugabe was able to blatantly rig the July 2013 elections. He used the billions of dollars looted from Marange and Chiadzwa diamond mining to bankroll elaborate but very expensive vote rigging schemes. He used violence but not as extensively as in 2008 and so did not need the war veterans as much.

Mugabe has his fallen out with war veterans and they have since confronted the tyrant demanding that he must step down.

“I am created, as president, by the people; the people of Zimbabwe,” he answered back.

“Once the party says you rest, fine, or if I ask the party that, no, I think the time has come for me to rest, I will tell the party that.

“But for as long as the party still wants me to serve, if I still have the energy, and still have the life and the blessings of God, I will continue,” he said.

In other words the people cannot deliver the TKO because he has a well-established and funded vote rigging system.

The war veterans have helped Mugabe rig elections in the past but they cannot now stand-up and declare the people did not elect him and spill all the vote rigging secrets to prove it; not without incriminating themselves. They would risk a double KO only if Mugabe should seek to knock them out. They have warned Mugabe that they will not back him in the next elections. He can live with that since he is now relying on spending billions to bankroll his vote rigging schemes; he still has billions rolling in from the looting in Marange that has continued even after his March 2016 admission of looting.

The only way to peaceful shut Mugabe up is for the people to demand the full implementation of the democratic reforms to ensure free, fair and credible elections. We, the people, must demand the reforms and see to it that they are implemented and not leave this to the opposition parties, especially MDC leaders who have already show that they have no clue what the reforms are about.

Implement the reforms so there are free and fair elections and Mugabe’s boastful lie “I am created, as president, by the people!” will finally be exposed and force him to shut up! Once there is regime change a thorough investigation must be carried out and put the record right that he had indeed rigged past elections! 

We "know how to rig elections and to take power" boost Zim PF - we cross swords.

In her first interview since the registering of her Zimbabwe People First (ZimPF) party, Joice Mujuru confirmed what many had known all along – that she was a lazy and corrupt simpleton who was promoted way above her level of competence with no clue what was going on under her own nose! She was asked by the British Sunday Times what she knew about the July 2013 rigged elections.

"I never saw the rigging… I am sure it was a very small clique that was doing it," she answered.

She was telling the truth, she saw the vote rigging but she failed to comprehend what was going on much less how it was done. One has only to look at how easily Mugabe bamboozled her and 150 other senior Zanu PF leaders and booted them out of the party hardly a year after the rigged national elections. Then Mai Mujuru and her Zim PF friends were as dumbfounded as Tsvangirai and his MDC friends had been after the July 2013 elections – both could see they had been cheated but had no clue how!  

Zim PF National spokesman, Jealousy Mawarire, is now tell us that Zim PF leaders KNOW how Mugabe rigged the last elections and, better still, will use the knowledge to won the coming 2018 elections.

“We have people with vast experience in our camp who are good at overhauling things; who have killed people and seen how elections were manipulated,” he said.

“That is why we are saying - why don't you come join us now so we work together as a mass force so we work together, because we know how an election is won.”

Of course Mawarire is lying, Mujuru, Mutasa and the rest in ZimPF have no clue how Mugabe and the “small clique” have rigged past elections; all the years they were in the party and office they were just passengers. Anyone who joins ZimPF in the hope that the party "knows" anything of substance is an idiot; they have to be to be conned by a simpleton like Mujuru!

“Do not worry if you vote for us, we know how power is taken. We have brigadier-generals on our side,” added Mawarire.

“You could attack them for what they did during the war and at other times, but when it comes to negotiating power because here people have a tendency of saying soldiers are the ones who will give troubles whenever Zanu PF has been defeated in an election but we have our own soldiers.

“They will simply order their mates to retire to the homesteads.”

Well that should knock the stuffing out of anyone had harboured the foolish notion that Mai Mujuru and her Zim PF had their Damascene transformative moment turning them from their incompetent, corrupt and dictatorial Zanu PF mentality to become sane people with at least some semblance of common sense of freedom, human rights and justice. Zim PF are advocating rigging elections, using the army to impose a government on the nation, etc.; the very things Mugabe has been doing; the very things the nation has been fighting to end all those years!

Mai Mujuru is a simpleton and she has no clue why the country is in this political and economic mess much less know how to fix it. The only thing she has understood is her being booted out of Zanu PF and she is fighting Mugabe to put that right. She is fighting to end Mugabe’s dictatorial rule but only to replace it with one made in her own image!

We are fighting not just to remove the present dictator but to uproot and burn the corrupt and tyrannical dictatorial system of government and replace it with a healthy and functional democratic system where leaders are elected by the people in free, fair and credible elections.

It will be sheer folly to support ZimPF and elect them back into power only to cross-sword with them immediately as she fights to consolidate her hold on power by imposing her Zim PF dictatorship whilst we demand the dismantling of the dictatorship by implementing all the democratic reforms.

Only now Mutsvangwa condemns violence - hyena moaning mauling but still love goat meat.

The lump rose in my throat to hear Mutsvangwa and Mujuru condemning Mugabe’s increasingly bullish behaviour not because they were wrong to condemn the tyrant but at the sheer hypocrisy of the other two!

"The violence in that language is totally uncalled for in a State that aspires to be a modern constitutional republic. Even unpleasant views should be entertained unless they carry with them the threat of illicit armed enforcement," said Mutsvangwa in response to Mugabe’s threats against the war veterans who have asked him to step down.

"To invoke the danger of armed mutiny among people that were demobilised and disarmed nearly four decades ago and are in their 60s is just misplaced."

Mutsvangwa and his rogue war veterans have terrorized defenceless povo for the last 16 years denying the people their freedoms and basic rights including the right to a meaningful free vote to impose this de facto one-party cum one-man dictatorship. As the regime’s storm troopers, the war veterans led from the front in the violent white farm invasions and corralled civilians, especially in the rural areas, to attend Zanu PF rallies and vote for the party; they did not think of their advanced ages then.

The war veterans have played a key role is keeping Mugabe is power using brute force and it was none other than the war veterans themselves who administered the violence. They made Mugabe the monster he is today and it is rich for them to object now that the tyrant is using the same brute violence on them.

If anyone deserves to be roughed up then it is these rogue war veterans!

"We are shocked as ZimPF by President Robert Mugabe's rants against political opponents, especially his revelation that he used to throw political opponents from within his then Zanu into dungeons packed like mice,” added former VP Joice Mujuru.

"It is quite alarming that, of late, Mugabe has been using the spectre of macabre and grossly horrifying human rights abuses perpetrated by him, his government and his merchants of violence to ward off political opposition to his rule.”

This woman has been in Zanu PF throughout the war of independence and then was in Mugabe’s cabinet for 34 years, the last ten years of which she was the number two and she is shocked and alarmed that Mugabe has used violence against his political opponents! The regime has murdered over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans in its 36 years in power for Pete’s sake!

If she really did not know Mugabe was a vote rigging and murderous tyrant all these years then what the hell has she been doing other than looting and piling up the pounds in weight! And now she is out campaigning for the nation to put her back into office; what a sick joke.

Zimbabwe is in this economic mess with unemployment a world beating record at 90% plus and millions of our people living in abject poverty and despair because of decades of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption. The people realised as far back as the mid-1980s that Zanu PF was taking the nation where we did not want to go but failed to force Mugabe to first of all change course and when that failed to remove Zanu PF from office. We would not be in this economic mess is the nation was able to hold Mugabe and Zanu PF to account in free, fair and credible elections.

The economic meltdown has not space Zanu PF leaders other than Mugabe, his family and a select few. It is no secret that Zanu PF grandees like the late Nathan Shamuyarira and Enos Nkala lived the last years and died in abject poverty. Zanu PF, with the cynicism of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, painted Shamuyarira’s Borrowdale house and filled the pot-holes in the road to his house to hide the decades of rot and decay betraying the sorry state of those who dwelt there.

The economic meltdown has been so serious Zanu PF members are fighting over the dwindling wealth like clans of hyenas fighting bones of any elephant whose flesh was picked clean a long time ago. Mai Mujuru and her ZimPF friends were the first to be booted out of the imploding Zanu PF and now it is Mutsvangwa and his rogue war veterans’ turn.

For Mai Mujuru and Mutsvangwa to accuse Mugabe now of being a corrupt, vote rigging and murderous tyrant is as nonsensical as a hyena accusing another of being a ruthless killer. It would be foolish for the long suffering Zimbabweans to have any sympathy for Mai Mujuru or Mutsvangwa for any ill treatment they now getting from Mugabe, they dished out the same to us during the Zanu PF days.

It is not for the goat to feel sorry for a hyena that has just received a serious mauling from another hyena; a hyena is a hyena mauled or not it still loves goat meat, any goat foolish enough to think mauled hyena is a vegetarian will never live to tell the tale! 

Musewe, Mahiya and Mugabe alike can be wrongfully charge but not "wrongfully arrested". By Patrick Guramatunhu

The foolishness of people like Vince Musewe is as predictable as the sun rising tomorrow! He has argued the nation not just to forgive the corruption and incompetent MDC leaders who, by failing to implement even one democratic reform during the GNU, allowed Zanu PF to blatantly rig the July 2013 elections landing us in this hell-hole. But more significantly he wants the nation to forget the MDC leaders ever sold-out and embrace them as the leaders who will get us out of this hell-hole. It is a foolish argument because if MDC leaders failed to get us out of this hell during the GNU when the winds of change were blowing in their favour, how will they do so now when Zanu PF hold the tramp cards!

When President Mugabe booted out the corrupt and incompetent Mai Muju and her equally corrupt and incompetent followers; Musewe and others including Tendai Biti and Morgan Tsvangirai welcomed her and her Zim PF friends with open arms of the father welcoming the prodigal son. We were told the later were now democrats who had their “Damascene moment”! Yeah right!

Mai Mujuru has had many opportunities to repent and confess her corrupt and criminal Zanu PF past and instead chose to pretend she was as innocent as a new born baby to sinful mother. She has even claimed that she was booted out of Zanu PF because she had condemned corruption. She was not corrupt herself. Never!

Now details are coming out that she and her late husband are responsible for looting “a chunk” of the $15 billion President Mugabe admitted was looted. Did she have her Damascene moment but forgot about the $15 billion or is it that she is the same corrupt and incompetent Joice Mujuru who is now fighting to get back on the gravy train. She never had the Damascene moment; it is a figment of the imagination of foolish!

The foolishness has not stop, we are now being asked to embrace as friends the rogue war veterans who, until recently, have betrayed the nation by propping up President Mugabe as the tyrant’s thugs ruthlessly enforcing the no-regime-change mantra.  

“You see, the enemy wants us to be like them and in that way it vilifies their nature. However we the progressive citizens of Zimbabwe who want to create a better society must reject the predictable tendency of wanting those who have caused us suffering to suffer too regardless of circumstances or the rule of law,” argued Musewe.

“Incidentally, this would mean that if President Mugabe were to be wrongfully arrested, we would also have to apply this same principle. I however do not want to imagine that at this juncture.”

If you did not always force yourself to have this myopic tunnel vision you would not make such foolish decision time after time, my brother!

President Mugabe is going after the rogue war veterans who dared demand that he should go and they will be charged with attempting to remove him from office “unlawfully”. But given that he rigged the last elections, the rogue war veterans know this because them helped him rig the vote, he clearly has no lawful right to be president.

However for their role in rigging elections, any rogue war veteran who is thrown in jail today may be wrongfully charged but not “wrongfully arrested”!

By the same token President Mugabe may be wrongfully charged but not “wrongfully arrested” because he has rigged elections, looted the nation’s resources, murdered over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans; and it would be very foolish to release him therefore on such flimsy technicalities!

“Zimbabwe has certainly changed for the better and we must now carry the burden together for challenging and changing our circumstances. I am glad that we are now together as citizens and we must take things a notch up,” said Musewe in his conclusion.

We must ask ourselves; if Mahiya and rogue war veteran friends had their wish, Mugabe stepped down and VP Mnangagwa took-over will they accept Mnangagwa being defeated in a free, fair and credible elections? Or will they be campaigning for no-regime-change as ruthlessly as before!

Of course rogue war veterans like Mahiya still firmly believe that they are “the stockholders of Zanu PF and Zimbabwe” and therefore are entitled to a veto on who should rule the country who should not. Just because these rogue war veterans have crossed sword with President Mugabe, fools like Musewe once again see the “Damascene transformative moment” where none exist.

“My message to the war vets is therefore that if anything, this is the time to pull together and support that which is right. It is time we deliver one message and one massage only- enough is enough and we want our freedom from ZANU (PF) and Mugabe back right now. We must demand it and stop negotiating for it. It is ours by right and not some favour being done for us,” continued Musewe.

He is arguing us to “stop negotiating” our freedoms and basic rights and yet he is the one arguing we forget what these rogue war veterans have been doing before they have even admitted their past wrong doings, ask for forgiveness and, most important of all, give up their erroneous claim to having a veto instead of the vote like everyone else.

We have missed many opportunities to deliver meaningful democratic change in the past including 1980 and 2008 because fools like Musewe would not see leaders like Mugabe and Tsvangirai for the fallible mortals they are but saw instead super humans who would do no wrong. So instead of taking our time building strong democratic institutions we did nothing and the super heroes took full advantage of this to create the tyrannical regime we are now suffering under.

Today we have a real chance to build a free, progressive and democratic Zimbabwe we must not waste it by listening to the foolishness of people like Musewe who have us believe that the same corrupt, incompetent tyrants of yesterday will build a democratic Zimbabwe for us!

"You are Angel Gabriel" recite Police recruits to Mugabe - Zim will never be DPRK. By Patrick Guramatunhu

I have heard of the mind numbing praise singing of such tyrants as the Supreme Leader Kim Il-sung of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) where soldiers would stand attentively first thing every morning for half an hour without failure reciting quotations from the great leader followed by the ceremonious polishing of his portrait. I never imagined such a thing happening in Zimbabwe and yet this is exactly what is happen!

"Like Jesus Christ who was crucified by a people whom He saved, you have innocently grappled with all forms of persecution. Your Excellency, the writing is clear on the wall that you are the angel Gabriel sent to deliver Zimbabwe and Africa.

"Because of you (Mugabe), Zimbabwe is a land of peace and tranquillity, equity, equality, freedom, fairness, honesty and the dignity of hard work. You have been attacked for championing the cause of the people, justice and equality, for denouncing racial segregation, immorality, corruption, human rights abuse and violence," reported Newsday quoting the parrot like reciting of Zimbabwe Republic Police recruits at Morris Deport.

They said this to Mugabe himself, not his portrait, as part of swearing in ceremony which he presided over! Anyone else would have been outraged at such misplaced flattery; not Mugabe, he approved and was pleased.

These Police recruits must be truly grateful to have a job, even if the pay is low and pay-dates are constantly shifting like sand dunes. In a country where unemployment rate has soared to 90% plus, where up to 76% of the population are living in soul crushing poverty, etc. you would be foolhardy to forfeit a job offer by refusing to recite whatever nonsense is put before you, even when it lies and downright blasphemy.

How can anyone believe Mugabe has liberated the people of Zimbabwe when he has replaced the racist and oppressive white colonial regime with a corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical dictatorship? He and his cronies have systematically denied the ordinary people their freedoms, human rights including the right to a meaningful free vote and ever the right to life!

A week or so ago President Mugabe was accusing Pastor Evan Mawarire of reading the Bible upside down; but even if one did that, there is no way one would find Angel Gabriel presiding over the cold blood murder of anyone let alone the over 30 000 President Mugabe has murdered for selfish political gain.

In spite of all his effort to get his wife Grace to take over from him and thus have the beginnings of his own dynasty comparable to that of Kim Il-sung; President Mugabe will never turn Zimbabwe into the North Korea of Africa. The people of Zimbabwe know they are being short changed, this Zanu PF tyranny is not what they fought Ian Smith for. The fight to end this corrupt and tyrannical Mugabe rule is gathering pace, change is now as certain as a ripe mango falling.  

Mavambo et al foot-stomping rejection of Biometric Voting System is set to cause political earthquake.

In a very rare moment of genius (common sense amongst this lot is so rare it is considered genius) a few of Zimbabwe’s opposition parties have actually said something that is sensible. They have condemned the country’s proposed computerized biometric voting system (BVS) as unworkable.

"Zanu PF and ZEC control the passwords and any override authority. These are the very people whom the Zimbabwean people do not trust. They can alter the data at any time. Remember whoever has the authority to add a voter`s data, can change or delete it and none of us can ever detect it," reads the Coalition of Democrats (CODE) statement.

CODE brings together a handful of Zimbabwe’s many, many (28 contested the 2013 elections) opposition parties including MDC (Ncube), Simba Makoni’s Mvambo/Kusile/Dawn and Elton Mangoma’s Renewal Democrats of Zimbabwe (RDZ). Whilst the nation and the whole world at large have largely ignored CODE as just a bunch of lunatics doing anything and everything just to be noticed. Well in condemning the BVS they have made themselves, for once, standout and be noticed!

ZEC launched BVS with the usual fun-fare, song and dance to silence all the critics for the Zanu PF regime’s failure, once again, to hold free, fair and credible elections. ZEC went to great lengths to explain how the new system would be a significant improvement on the old although the commission failed to explain how BVS would stop some of the glaring voting irregularities such as opposition supporters’ details being deliberately posted into constituency roll other the one they expected.

Both MDC-T and PDP, two of the country better known opposition parties – they had some MP and Senators in power, not that they have ever accomplished anything even when the MDC had the majority during the GNU – have already come out in support of BVS. They ignored all those who said without implementing the far reaching democratic reforms first BVS will not stop vote rigging.

ZEC has already done some trial runs with BVS and so the regime is set to introduce the new system in the next elections, set for July 2018 – exactly two years away!

By condemning BVS CODE have really set themselves apart from MDC-T and PDP who will now be forced to explain how indeed anyone is going to stop Zanu PF and ZEC adding, deleting and other vote rigging dirty data shenanigans on the new BVS! This presents a really difficult political decision for both MDC-T and PDP; they have publically supported BVS and now they will be forced to flip-flop. Flip-flopping is bad enough even for a party like MDC-T known for doing so but doing so at the behest of the “lunatic” fringe will make that a lot harder to swallow.

Yet both Biti and Tsvangirai will have no choice but come out and admit that BVS will do nothing to deliver free and fair elections. The longer they try to defend BVS the more ridiculous they will look. And if Zanu PF goes on to rig the next elections using the same dirty tricks they are been warned of now then this time their names will be proverbial “Mud!”

“A Biometric voting system will bring several other issues without any extra benefits. CODE therefore rejects the BIOMETRIC VOTERS ROLL,” read the CODE statement, a pointed dagga in the back both Biti and Tsvangirai know they cannot ignore.

If both MDC-T and PDP were to reject BVS that would be a pointed dagga forcing the dozy Mugabe to bolt upright! The prospect of him having to rely on the same dirty vote rigging tricks as he use last time especially when he has just quarrelled with the war veterans – the boots on the ground storm troopers who did all the donkey and dirty work!

BVS must have offered the tyrant more modern and technically advanced ways of rigging the elections. The prospect of having to revert to the old system and having to rely on the brainwashed morons likes of Jabulani Sibanda or Kudzai Chipanga with so many enemies demanding his fall must be really frightening even for someone like him with a hippopotamus thick political skin!

It is said that the beat of a butterfly’s wings in Japan may be the innocent beginning of a deadly hurricane in North America! Mavambo et al may be the lunatic fringe of Zimbabwe politics, still their foot-stomping rejecting of the BVS has send out a shock wave that will reverberate and amplify and end up causing the greatest political earthquake of our time in Zimbabwe! 

Zim is not "helpless society" insist Musewe - the self-indulgence behind the helplessness. By Nomusa Garikai

Musewe you are now becoming more and more like President Mugabe; even when it is as clear as day you are the root cause of the problem you are always looking for someone else to blame. Blaming the British for Zimbabwe’s political paralysis is daft!

“The British approach of appeasing Mugabe's regime is wrong and unforgivable. I take note of British Ambassador to Zimbabwe's statement explaining their position on the unfolding political, social and economic disaster,” wrote Musewe.

“However in my view, it appears that they is no firm decision by the British to fight on the right side of history in partnership with the people of Zimbabwe who continue to suffer violence and lack because of Mugabe's greed for power. They think that ZANU (PF) can reform. That is a joke.”

There was nothing in the whole article to substantiate his allegation that the British were appeasing the Mugabe regime. If anyone is guilty of our current political paralysis then it is us Zimbabweans ourselves or more specifically MDC leaders.

During the GNU we did have a golden opportunity to end this Zanu PF dictatorship peacefully by implementing the democratic reforms. MDC had five years to implement the reforms but failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!

Whilst Vince Musewe has been quick off the mark in accusing the British for their “colonial welfare mentality” he has never ever acknowledged that MDC leaders were corrupt and incompetent in failing to get even one democratic reform implemented. If anything Musewe has continued to sing the praise of corrupt and incompetent individuals like Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti and Joice Mujuru.

We would not be in this political mess if MDC had implemented the reforms because Zanu PF would not have rigged the July 2013 elections.

“As progressive Zimbabweans we are calling for the immediate step down of Mugabe and his replacement by an inclusive citizens' National Transitional Authority (NTA) whose responsibilities have been clearly articulated by us in the PDP in our economic blue print – HOPE,” concluded Musewe.

“There is an opportunity now for the British to redeem themselves and play a more positive and decisive role in helping to build a new democracy in Zimbabwe other than assisting a regime whose demise is inescapable. I do hope the new foreign secretary Boris Johnson follows through on his thinking on Zimbabwe.”

First of all, there is nothing “progressive” about Zimbabwe recycling corrupt, incompetent sell-outs which is what you and your PDP, MDC and Zim PF friends are trying to do, since these are MDC or ex Zanu PF leaders. They are ones who got us into this mess in the first place and it is naïve to think they can get us out. Second, we must stop this culture of blame other people for our own problems to the extent of digging up historic archives; Zimbabwe’s political paralysis and economic mess are problems of our own post-independence making.

“I thoroughly detest any insinuation by those that come from the West that we in Zimbabwe are a helpless society only in continual need of their largesse and that they have the "solutions" to our problems. That is utter nonsense and we must never accept that narrative because it disempowers us as a society,” Musewe had started off.

My brother you are your own worst enemy, you have disempowered yourself. Your larger than life egotistic self-indulgence is stopping you from seeing Tendai Biti for the corrupt and incompetent he is, for example, even when all the evidence has been presented before you. By denying the problem you have effectively denied yourself the opportunity to do something to put it right. It is the failed leadership of the post-independence black leaders who have landed us in the present mess but by blaming the British and other factors you have allowed the failed leaders to stay on and wreak more damage. 

The continued narrative by people like you that we do not have a problem of corrupt and incompetent leaders is the real “utter nonsense” holding the nation back. 

#ThisFlag greatest appeal was its easy to digest messages - sadly, with little nourishment

Many people have asked Pastor Evan Mawarire why his #ThisFlag videos have been so popular. Many people have asked members of the public what was it they found so appealing about #ThisFlag? In both the Pastor and the public’s varied answers four things have come out:

1.       The Pastor talked about bread and butter issues they could relate to in their own lives; his failure to pay his children’s school fees, for example.

2.       He talked about economic hardships at the time when the economic hardships are an ever present reality for millions of people given the country’s soaring unemployment rate of 90% plus, the fact that 76% of the people cannot afford even one decent meal a day, etc.

3.       He offer simple solutions with a chance of a quick return; “Fire corrupt ministers!” “We want our $15 billion back!” and “Want the 2.2 million jobs!” read some of the twitters doing the rounds.

4.       The campaign was conducted within the confines of the 140 maximum twitter character limit making the whole debate exceptionally easy and mind numbingly simple!

Indeed the key to the success of the whole campaign is EASY whether it effective or had any hope of changing anything was never even considered. Zimbabweans have known that corruption was one of the country’s biggest problems for donkey years, for example. They have asked Mugabe to do something about it for all these years but only to see the problem get worse and worse.

In March Mugabe admitted that $15 billion worth of Marange diamond revenue was looted. The country’s GDP is $14 billion. It turns out that the $15 billion the people have been demanding must be paid back, “a big chunk” of it was looted by former VP Mujuru alone according to Minister Kasukuwere which meanings the looting is a lot worse since she is certainly not the only one who has been looting! Looting is a very serious problem indeed.

Neither Pastor Mawarire nor any of his followers expected Mugabe to fire corrupt ministers and thus end the corruption. Even when he has fired the odd corrupt minister, the corruption has surfaced somewhere else; it has been like squeezing a balloon.

After 36 years of this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship there can be no doubt Pastor Mawarire and even the slow witted ones amongst his followers would have figured out by now that the only way the country would ever get any meaningful economic recovery is by removing Zanu PF from office through free, fair and credible elections. It must be blatantly obvious that the country is stuck with this corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Mugabe regime.

In other words the Pastor and his followers are calling for Mugabe to fire corrupt ministers because that is easy to do although they know it will yield nothing in terms of economic recovery and alleviating their economic suffering. If they were serious about wanting to end their economic suffering then they would be calling for the implementation of the democratic reforms necessary for free, fair and credible elections, that is more difficult and will take a lot more than the 140 characters to explain.

Throughout the GNU most Zimbabweans heard a lot of talk about the need for MDC to implement the democratic reforms out never bothered to find out what the reforms were and that they were necessary for free, fair and credible elections. Even with the benefit of hindsight of the rigged 2013 elections most people still do not understand that it was MDC’s failure to get even one democratic reform implemented that allowed Mugabe to blatantly rig the 2013 elections.

The reason why Zimbabwe is in this political paralysis and economic mess can be traced to the political and economic choices we have made along the way; we have chosen the easy route time and time again even when it was self-evident there was little or nothing to be gained compared to the more difficult but high yield alternative.

“Zvinokupiyi  kuzudza muti mutete asina chirimo!” goes the Shona adage. (What is the point of shaking thin tree if it has no fruit yield!)

So far #ThisFlag’s great appeal was its easy to digest message but providing no nourishment. Unless the hundreds of thousands of #This Flag activists can upgrade their political consciousness to campaigning for free, fair and credible elections and thus stop Zanu PF rigging the next elections then their activism will be judged as just another easy option flash in the pan that in the end changed little! 

Ncube led PCC's transition gvt offers subtle and critical gems well worth supporting.

“A group of prominent Zimbabweans calling themselves “concerned citizens” have proposed a non-political National Transitional Authority to take over the running of the country from the Mugabe regime until “fair” elections can be held,” said a report by Peta Thorncroft.

There is nothing original or new about the call for a transitional government as a way out of Zimbabwe’s political paralysis and economic mess what is new is that the group accepts the need for deep rooted democratic reforms as contrast to the wishy-washy “electoral law realignment” Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC-T and Tendai Biti’s PDP have been calling for.

“We are of the opinion that no election in the current political climate, whether called early or in 2018, can resolve the deep structural deficits in the state; and, in any event, no election without considerable reform of the state and the creation of a level playing field, can possibly lead to a legitimate outcome,” the group said.

The group calling itself Platform of Concerned Citizens (PCC) has 25 members including Trevor Ncube, Elinor Sisulu and by Judith Todd.

However the group’s proposal to keep the existing parliament and senate is a none-starter. The group has already accepted the need to implement far reaching democratic reforms to ensure the next elections are free, fair and credible. So if both parliament and senate are stuffed with busy-bodies who are only there because they rigged the elections there can only be one reason why they are being allowed to stay on – a soap to Mugabe and his cronies to accept the transition government.

Parliament and senate are the highest law making bodies in the land and if the transition government acknowledges this political reality then it must accept the consequence that parliament and senate will dictate to the transition government. Zimbabwe is in this political and economic mess because for 36 years the nation has sort to appease Mugabe and his cronies instead of doing the right thing.

The right thing to do here is to set up a transition government and allow it to get on with the job of dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship, which is a challenge in itself given the dictatorship extends from the highest office in the land right down to village, and not be hamstrung with institutions whose only interest would be to preserve as much of the dictatorship as they can.

Mugabe and Zanu PF have dragged this nation to the very edge of the abyss and if nothing is done as a matter of urgency the nation will tip over the edge with tragic consequences for the people of Zimbabwe and the whole SADC region! This must not be allowed to happen. The proposed transition government by the PCC offers a viable way out.

We in the Zimbabwe Social Democrats whole heartedly support the PCC’s proposed transition government and would edge all Zimbabweans, SADC and the International community to do the same.  

Many support Mugabe because "the people and not war veterans" elected him - wink, wink! By Nomusa Garikai

The rogue war veterans’ demand for President Mugabe to resign has definitely thrown the cat amongst the caged hawks. There is both surprised and anger on the part of the hawkers at this reckless intrusion. They know the cat is not there for a friendly chat. There is surprise and confusion on the part of the cat; it can see from those aggressive hawk-eyes, hooked beak and dagga talons that these are NOT pigeons! This is not a fight for a meal but a fight for dear life, the vanquished will be the victor’s dinner!

Ever since last week when the war veterans issued their demand for President Mugabe to resign, he has been at sixes and sevens as to what to do, who to trust and distrust, fight or flight. The one thing that has been crystal clear to him is that this is going to be his toughest fight ever; it is not just his political career that is at stake here, his very life too is at stake.

President Mugabe has used, abused and betrayed so many people so many times in his long political career he knows that many of them now hate him with a consuming passion. With so many enemies baying for his demise he does not know who to trust and he hears the sarcasm in every pledge of loyalty!

"We don't subscribe to that as war veterans. War veterans have no mandate to talk against the President because he was not elected by war veterans but by the people of Zimbabwe,” said George Mlala, a member of the war veterans' council of elders.

"What has been said in that communique is out of context and not supported by war veterans. If there are any war veterans who don't want President Mugabe to be their patron anymore, they should say it out at congress not through a communique."

Almost everyone who has pledged their continued support of President Mugabe since last Thursday has been very emphatic of his electoral mandate “he (Mugabe) was not elected by war veterans but by the people of Zimbabwe” as if their continued supported hinges on that fact. Everyone who is anyone in Zanu PF, in Zimbabwe and beyond knows that President Mugabe has been rigging elections for years. They have only now woken up to the possibility that Mugabe rigged the elections and hence are seeking reassurance that he was indeed elected by the people in free, fair and credible elections!

Worse still for Mugabe, the people he has used extensively in all his vote rigging activities are the people he is having the fight with here – the rogue war veterans. It was them who carried out most of the harassment, beating, rape and some of the murders in the wanton violence of the 2008 elections. They are also the foot soldiers who did the subtle work of coercing the public to attend Zanu PF rallies and then marshalled the bussed supporters casted the multiple votes in 2013 elections.  

If anyone knows the details of how President Mugabe has rigged past elections it is the war veterans. If anyone can produce damaging evidence on vote rigging, it is the war veterans and we know that if they are pressured, they will do so.  

 When President Mugabe booted out war veteran president Jabulani Sibanda from the party in 2014 and the regime tried to harass him further and he started talking of the "Third Force" in the 2008 elections. There was no doubt that was a warning shot across the bow for President Mugabe to back-off and the harassment stopped. Chris Mutsvangwa, who took over the war veteran presidency from Sibanda, is no novice to political intrigue and blackmail!

“An old woman is always uneasy when dry bones are mentions in a proverb,” wrote Chinua Achebe in his book Things Fall Apart.

At 92 years of age, the mention dry bones will make President Mugabe too ill at easy. But it is the mention of rogue war veterans, of growing demands for him to go and of how he was elected by the people in free, fair and credible elections (the sarcasm is never lost on him) that his dry bones rattling like a rattle snake. It is sheer terror that grips him; he has amassed so many enemies there will be no victory for him because they will all fight him one after another until he is defeated.

Given Zim is a dictatorship, if Mugabe is not accountable even to the rogue war veterans then who is he accountable to! By P Guramatunhu

The statement by rogue war veterans, madzakutsaku aMugabe (for those not familiar with the name dzakutsaku, this is derogative name given to Smith rogue black soldiers who would not fight the freedom fighters but terrorized unarmed civilians instead, sadly history is repeating itself with these soiling the good name of real committed liberation war freedom fighters), calling on President Mugabe to resign raises an very important political point – Who in Zimbabwe today can vote President Mugabe out office? These war veterans, dzakutsaku or not, clearly thought that had the power and authority to do so given their elevated position in the nation and so they did.

When President Mugabe realized that his popularity with the electorate was sinking fast in the late 1990s he instituted his no-regime-change mantra whose sole purpose was to deny the masses their freedoms and basic human rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections. He corrupted the war veterans in the security sector and those who had been disbanded to abandon their liberation war commitment to freedom, liberty and human rights to become the principal enforcers of his tyrannical mantra. He turned respected liberation war heroes and heroines into the despised dzakutsaku.

President Mugabe knew the people would resist his authoritarian rule and so he granted carte blanche powers to the rogue war veterans to harass, beat, rape and even kill opposition politicians, their supporters and innocent Zimbabweans alike; beating the nation into submission. After decades of exercising this carte blanche power and successfully keeping President Mugabe and his cronies in power by denying the masses a meaningful vote the rogue war veterans claimed credit for themselves since those in power were not doing it.

The rogue war veterans made it clear early this year that they “were the stockholders of Zanu PF and Zimbabwe” and everyone else including the President himself was a “stakeholder who can come and go”.

“The lizard that jumped from the high iroko tree to the ground said he would praise himself if no one else did,” wrote Chinua Achebe in Things Fall Apart.

Our dzakutsaku lizards have effectively denied the masses the vote and felt it was now them who had the veto on who ruled the nation; when they reminded all that they were the stockholder of the party and the country, this was just the lizard praising himself! When they released the statement last week demanding that President Mugabe must resign, it was them exercising their veto!

If we put to one side for one moment the inherent injustice in President Mugabe’s no-regime-change mantra and the foolishness of madzakutsaku aMugabe one is left with the intriguing question; If the ordinary Zimbabweans have no vote and the rogue war veterans’ veto can itself be vetoed then who is(are) the individual(s) with the super-veto?

Everyone knows that President Mugabe has ruled the party and country with an iron fist, his word is law. His follow leaders in the party and in government have been reduced to cowing subservient minions, “vakadzi vaMugabe” as Margaret Dongo so aptly put it. So the one person wielding this super veto, the mother of all vetoes is President Mugabe.

"I watched ZBCtv (on Friday and learnt) that they made a statement, but I haven't read it. If they said the President must resign, then that is nonsensical. If they are true war veterans, the President is their Commander-in-Chief and they must be loyal and committed,” commented VP Mnangagwa.

"I don't think those who say such things are loyal or genuine war veterans. They must be loyal."

Is this VP Mnangagwa being his usual self of deliberately coy and obtuse? This is a very serious matter and demands to be treated as such. If President Mugabe is not accountable to the ordinary people, to his subservient harem and now we learn that he is also not accountable to the rogue war veterans too. He is accountable to absolutely no one but himself this is clearly a very dangerous scenario no nation in its right mind can tolerate especially when we have hen-pecked president whose wife’s insatiable greed for power and wealth knows no limit.

The prospect of President Mugabe appointing his wife to succeed him is real and I shudder to think what new depths of despair and depravity she will take us!

If VP Mnangagwa had any sense at all then he must surely see dangerous situation the country is in right now because President Mugabe has enjoyed absolute power all these donkey years. The situation is now so dangerous that there is no excuse whatsoever for allowing this situation to continue even for one more day; be it out of ignorance, selfish greed, political expedience, subservient nature gone nuts somukadzi mukuru waMugabe (as the most senior member in the Mugabe harem).

All those who thought that removing Mugabe now and replacing him with Mnangagwa was a strategic move must now review their position. If today Mnangagwa is asking loyalty to tramp over the urgent need to end this destructive culture of absolutism out of feigned loyalty to President Mugabe will he not do so again with ruthless resolve tomorrow to consolidate his own hold on power!

We must soldier on and demand the full implementation of the democratic reforms designed to end the Zanu PF dictatorship. The rogue war veterans’ demand for President Mugabe to resign so they can appoint another tyrant is just a clever way of preserving the dictatorship by giving the illusion of change. It is not a half-way pit-stop some people think; neither Mnangagwa nor his rogue war veterans backers will ever concede to give up their veto if they ever got into power. 

Mugabe cannot charge war vets with treason for firing him - he gave them carte blanche powers.

Government threatens to seek out all those behind the widely covered war veterans statement calling on Mugabe to resign.

"Government, therefore, dismisses the said traitorous so-called communiqué which is treasonable in the constitutional democracy that Zimbabwe is, with utter disdain and all the contempt that it deserves," said Secretary for Welfare Services for War Veterans Brigadier-General (Retired) Walter Tapfumaneyi.

"While multi-agency investigations are underway to establish its origins, authorship, ownership and purpose which will bring all associated with it to justice, the ministry urges all patriotic veterans of the liberation struggle to remain loyal to His Excellency the President and to the party, to remain disciplined and principled while at the same time being wary of the divisive machinations of Zimbabwe's detractors.”

Loyalty is a double edged sword that cuts both ways; Mugabe cannot expect anyone, especial these rogue war veterans who have already betrayed the people by teaming up with him to impose this corrupt and tyrannical de facto one-party cum one-man dictatorship, to remain loyal to him when he has not been loyal to them. The root cause of this dog-eat-dog fight within Zanu PF itself and between Mugabe and the war veterans is that they are poor and hungry and are sick and tired of waiting for him to throw scraps at them.

Whilst they have betrayed the people, denying them their freedoms and rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections to ensure Mugabe and Zanu PF remain in power all these years. Talk of blind loyalty! He has promised them a good life but has never honoured his promise. When they tried to demand greater loyalty from them; he tear-gassed the lot! How is that for repaying someone for decades of blind loyalty!

Now that the war veterans know Mugabe has declared war on them they know this is going to be a fight to the finish and no-holds barred.

The regime cannot charge any of these rogue war veterans “treason and trying to remove a democratically elected government” because these men and women were the regime’s storm troopers who carried out its order to cheat, harass, beat, rape and even kill to impose Mugabe’s no-regime-change mantra. One cannot cheat, harass, etc., etc. political opponents and the public at large and still claim to have been “democratically elected”; it is an oxymoron.

Mugabe is the one who granted the rogue war veterans carte blanche licences to ruthlessly to deny the people their freedoms and rights including committing murder. Many of these war veterans know they were committing high treason and hence the reason they have said nothing about their criminal activities, so far. The minute they feel threatened, they will sing!  

If Mugabe arrest any of the war veterans for demanding that he resign; they will hit back by revealing the details showing how they helped him rig the elections. No one can ever be guilty of “trying to remove a DEMOCRATICALLY elected government” if can be shown that the same said government was if fact NEVER democratically elected in the first place. 

For Pete's sake, not everyone who say Mugabe must go is a democrat. By Nomusa Garikai

I totally disagree with those who are tripping over each other to thank Mutsvangwa and his band of rogue war veterans for asking President Mugabe to go. These lawless thugs are late converts to democracy and the importance of free, fair and credible elections; they still believe there are the “stockholders of Zimbabwe” with a veto on who should rule and for how long. They are just exercising their veto and, yes it just so happen that for this snapshot in time, it is what we the masses wanted, but it is foolish to ignore what happened before and what is certain to happen after and judge Mutsvangwa et al democrats!

“We have to learn to give gratitude, say thank you God, even small gestures that he prepares for us for our final journey to victory, final independence of our great country Zimbabwe, albeit 36 years later. It may appear small gesture because it came late, better late than never!” argued Nomazulu Thata.

“The recent bold statement that was issued by the War Veterans must be commended. The decision and announcement of a divorce from President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU PF regime,” a statement from ZAPU.

“The MDC would like to whole-heartedly thank and salute war veterans for publicly acknowledging that Robert Mugabe has outlived his relevance and as such, he should immediately proceed to resign,” came the statement from the usual suspect, Obert Gutu the MDC-T spokesman.

Thanking Chris Mutsvangwa and his rogue war veterans for demanding that their old master should go; knowing fully well they are the ones who have imposed the tyrant on the nation in the first place is tantamount to letting known murderer off the hook because he has just helped an old lady cross the street.

The central issue here is that these war veterans believe that they are “the stockholders of Zimbabwe” and that the rest of us the populous are merely “stakeholder who come and go”. As the stockholders they believed they alone have the veto on who rules the country and have wielded that veto decisively again and again since 2000. The vote compared to the veto has been like fighting an enemy wielding an AK47 rifle firing life bullets with a toy gun blowing bubbles at the enemy!

 “What was achieved by the gun cannot be undone with a pen!” stated President Mugabe. He was egged on the war veterans and the State Security personals in 2008 operation “Mavhotera papi” (Whom did you vote for!) as they rod roughshod over the masses to reinforce the tyrant’s no-regime-change mantra and the war veterans’ veto power.

Today the war veterans’ demand that President Mugabe must resign is, in fact, in pursuance of their position as the stockholders wielding their veto power. They have used their veto to keep him in power all these last 36 years and now they want him to go and they expect him to go.

What the country’s own constitution or what the masses think on the matter is of little consequence because these war veterans have a veto over the constitution and the people. It just so happened that the masses wanted him to go too but that is certainly coincidental.

It is downright naïve to assume that just because the war veterans’ agenda that President Mugabe must go overlaps with the national agenda for this brief snapshot moment is proof that the rogue war veterans are now democrats fighting with the masses for democracy, justice, free and fair elections, etc. The very fact that we already know the war veterans want VP Mnangagwa to take over from President Mugabe, proof this is them flexing their veto muscle; turns downright naivety into downright stupidity.

“Please do not tell us to endorse VP Mnangagwa for a coronation after Mugabe fall from power. We want full democratic changes to take place. Whatever changes that will take place in Zimbabwe now, there should be democratic and not power trust upon some individual,” pleaded Nomazulu Thata. She is wasting her breath, of course!

President Mugabe has already tear-gassed these rogue war veterans and shot them down with water cannons and has already labelled them “dissidents” evoking the debauchery of Gukurahundi. These rogue war veterans are naïve and stupid but not that naïve and stupid not to know that President Mugabe will have them killed if he can get another lot of naïve and stupid people to do his dirty work, just as he had got the war veterans to do his dirty work in the past.

“If you see a frog blowing his own cover hopping in the midday heat as if his very life depends on every hop, you can be certain that something is after it,” so goes the old adage. The rogue war veterans would not be so foolhardy to be taking President Mugabe head-on if nothing was threatening their very lives – grinding poverty.

The war veterans have not been spared the consequences of the country’s economic meltdown the nation is facing right now; President Mugabe promised them, as he has done everyone else, economic prosperity but never delivered. Over the years President Mugabe has introduced policies designed to alleviate to favour the war veterans over the rest of the population; in much the same way one would throw scraps at the dog leaving the chickens to content themselves with the crumbs too small for the dog to pick.

The war veterans know that if President Mugabe was to have his wish and appoint his successor from the G40 faction then they will not get even the scraps! The all-consuming economic hardships of 90% unemployment rate, 76% of the people so poor they cannot afford a decent meal, etc. is the forest fire inferno the rogue war veterans frogs are escaping from. The anger and fury of the tyrant is nothing compared to the prospect of grinding poverty many of them know only too well already.

Mutsvangwa et al are fighting Mugabe head-on to secure their own positions as the stockholder of Zimbabwe, their veto in deciding who rules the country and, it goes without saying – “zvine muto ndozvineyi” as one would say in Shona, the secure their right to preferential treatment. They want President Mugabe to go because he only threw scraps at them. Of course, they expect the next president to do a lot better than that or he/she too will go!

Having taken Mugabe head-on, it is naïve to think that the war veterans will ever want to give up their veto. In the next elections the nation can expect them to campaign for their preferred candidate with the same vigour and ruthlessness befitting one validating the supremacy of the veto over the vote.  

Indeed thanking Mutsvangwa et al for demanding that Mugabe must go is akin to letting murderous thugs off the hook because they have ditched their present Godfather knowing fully well have not forsaken their Mafia lifestyle and have every intention of carrying on with the corrupt and murderous ways as soon as they have a new Godfather!

Indeed it is this naïve and blinked approach where everyone is forced to focus on one snapshot in time to the exclusion of everything else that in known about the event or individual that has landed us into this hell-hole as a nation.

We elect individuals like Tsvangirai, Biti and all the other MDC leaders to champion our fight for democratic change, for example, for no better reason than that a snapshot in each one of them showed that they were anti-Mugabe. We refused to listen to warning of USA Ambassador Chris Dell who said Tsvangirai was “a flawed and indecisive character”. Even today when there is a mountain of evidence that MDC leaders are breathtakingly corrupt, incompetent and they sold-out by failing to implement even one reform during the GNU; still some Zimbabwe continue follow them blindly like sheep.

Chris Mutsvangwa et al, like Joice Mujuru and her Zim PF before them, are fighting Mugabe only because the tyrant is not giving them a share of the looted wealth and not because they are against the dictatorship itself. For Pete’s sake, not everyone who says Mugabe must go is a democrat; especially when they have a proven track record of being the exact opposite! 

War vets' demand for Mugabe to go is a parallel but opposite and conflict agenda by Nomusa Garikai

We must raise not one single cheer in support the war veterans’ call for President Mugabe to resign because only to impose another tyrant. We want the tyrant to go and the whole dictatorship too so that we can have a democratic system of government and the next president is elected by the people is a free, fair and credible election. These are two parallel, in so far as we both want the current dictator to go, but ideological opposed and conflicting agendas.  

These war veterans are fighting to remove one corrupt and murderous tyrant; they imposed the tyrant on us and today they are fighting to remove him but only to impose another tyrant in his place. These war veterans’ mentality has not changed one bit; they still believe they alone are the “stockholders of Zimbabwe” whilst we are “stakeholders who come and go”. As the stockholders, they believe they have the right withhold our right to a meaningful vote and have even use brute violence to deny us the vote and impose their political will, a veto.

As long as these rogue war veterans continue to hold on to the belief they are special and deserve a veto they are not welcome in the camp of the democrats.

“The MDC would like to whole-heartedly thank and salute war veterans for publicly acknowledging that President Robert Mugabe has outlived his relevance and as such, he should immediately proceed to resign. As a social democratic political party, the MDC has always applauded the patriotic and selfless role that was played by thousands of gallant sons and daughters of the soil in fighting the racist colonial settler regime ultimately leading to our independence as a sovereign republic on April 18, 1980,” wrote MDC-T spokesman Obert Gutu.

“We now call upon President Mugabe to take heed of the very clear advice that he has been freely given by his erstwhile comrades, the war veterans. Mugabe remains the single biggest threat to Zimbabwe's national political stability as well as economic prosperity.”

This is the shortsighted political opportunism and incompetence the nation has come to expect from MDC; the same opportunism and incompetence behind MDC’s failure to implement even one democratic reform during the GNU. Sadly, they have learnt nothing from the past and so they are at it again now.

During the GNU, Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends were tasked to implement the democratic reforms necessary to stop President Mugabe rigging the next elections. They are five years to do this and yet failed to get even one reform implemented.

President Mugabe entrapped Tsvangirai et al with gravy train good-life plus the $4 million Highlands mansion for Tsvangirai; proof, so the MDC leaders thought, Mugabe had accepted them as bona fide members of the country’s highly privileged ruling elite. They kicked the reforms into the fire and made sure they were reduced into ashes, they knew implementing the reforms would have jeopardized their continued ruling elite membership!

Boy-oh-boy! Tsvangirai and MDC friends were really shocked when President Mugabe blatantly rigged the July 2013 elections and kicked them off the gravy train. Some MDC leaders were so desperate to keep their gravy train seats they reportedly begged President Mugabe to give them any role, according to Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Dr Misheck Sibanda. It is the same naïve and political opportunism that is behind MDC-T’s praise of the war veterans today.

The rogue war veterans Gutu is praising today have been the vanguard of President Mugabe’s tyrannical rule since 2000 to February this year when he tear-gassed them and hosed them down with water cannons. We are fighting to end tyranny and replace it democracy and good governance and they are fighting to remove one tyrant so they can impose another tyrant. These are two parallel but opposite agendas.

If we come out today in support of the war veterans’ removal of one tyrant knowing fully well their plan is to impose another tyrant we will have no cause to complain after they have imposed the second tyrant.

It is the economic meltdown, more than the demands of a totally discredited group of thugs, that is finally forcing President Mugabe and his Zanu PF cabal to accept political change. We, the people of Zimbabwe, must be absolutely clear that kind of political change we after is the end of this dictatorship and the creation of a healthy and functional democracy in its place.

We must make is absolutely clear that we totally reject the proposed political fudge by a bunch confused and egotistic war veteran lunatics seeking to save the corrupt and tyrannical one-party dictatorship by swapping one dictator for another.  One has to remind the impressionable MDC village idiots in Harvest House applauding the rogue war veteran thugs that the nation is paying dearly for the idiots’ foolishness during the GNU, they must not compound the situation.

Some people called for MDC leaders to resign and be banished from public life soon after the rigged July 2013 elections. Now I accept that was the wise thing to do; as a nation we have done ourselves a great disservice by trying to recycle leaders with a proven track record corruption and incompetence. MDC leaders have sold-out before and they will do so again given half a chance!