Next elections are NOT either Mugabe or Tsvangirai - false choice

Zimbabweans have become masters at rationalizing their folly under the disguise it was the better of two equally unpalatable choices when in fact the choices were a false dilemma.

According to WikiPedia, false dilemma (also called false dichotomy, false binary, black-and-white thinking the either–or fallacy) “can arise intentionally or unintentionally, when a fallacy is used in an attempt to force a choice or outcome. It can be the result of habitual tendency, whatever the cause, to view the world with limited sets of options.”

“Would you delay Mugabe's departure for a year or however long it takes to get the competent leaders to replace the corrupt and incompetent Tsvangirai and Mujuru?” asked Patrick Guramatunhu.

“The people of Zimbabwe have their hearts and minds set on removing President Mugabe they would rather vote for Mujuru and Tsvangirai, knowing fully well the two are corrupt and in-competent; that is how desperate the people are to see the back of the tyrant. They would not want to risk delaying the departure of President Mugabe by even a month because they were out scouting for the competent leaders you are talking about.

“They can deal with the consequences of having the corrupt and incompetent Tsvangirai and Mujuru, the people are confident they can have either removed from office very quickly. They cannot deal with the thought of Mugabe staying in power for a day longer if they can help it!”

Patrick, if I have heard this argument once I have heard it thousands of time! We are all being asked to forget that characters Tsvangirai and/or Mujuru are corrupt and incompetent, with well-documented proven records at that, in the interest of a united opposition to defeat Mugabe. There are many glaring false choices and follies here:

1)    Some people have convinced themselves into believing that we can either have Mugabe and Zanu PF to continue ruling the country or a coalition of Tsvangirai and/or Mujuru. This is nonsense because other competent and visionary leaders can easily be found if we created the right democratic political environment.

As long as we have the present tyrannical dictatorship, that has stifled open debate and democratic competition; we will continue to have corrupt and incompetent politicians.

The choice before us is between dictatorship and democracy; Mugabe has fostered the former on the nation it is up to us to dismantle the dictatorship and replace it with a healthy and functional multi-party democratic system of government.

If we elect to go into the next elections without first implementing the democratic reforms designed to dismantle the dictatorship then we have elected per se to elect leaders from the corrupt and incompetent leaders the dictatorship produce.

2)    Tsvangirai has already had many opportunities in the past to defeat Mugabe, with the best chance being during the GNU, he has failed to do so precisely because he is corrupt and incompetent. In 2014 Mai Mujuru amassed the support of eight out of ten provinces in her bid to be elected VP; Mugabe elbowed her out of the way with easy and the contempt of a lion chasing a jackal from a kill. After spending 34 years at Mugabe’s side Mujuru should have known that he rigs elections but she clearly did not know what hit her when she booted out of Zanu PF!

It is sheer folly to believe that uniting Tsvangirai and Mujuru will somehow transform these corrupt and incompetent individuals into formidable political opponents; Mugabe will not bamboozle or cheat them as he did before.

3)     Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown with its 90% unemployment level, government failing to pay civil servants, etc. has created an economic situation that is socially and politically unsustainable. It is the worsening economic situation that is forcing people to protest, that is fuelling the dog-eat-dog fighting that is tearing Zanu PF itself apart, etc. It is the economy that is delivering to the nation the regime change; something Tsvangirai and Mujuru have failed to deliver.

MDC has been calling on Zanu PF to implement electoral law reforms as a way to end the Zanu PF dictatorship. It was just an empty gimmick because only the very naïve would believe Zanu PF would FREELY implement reforms to end the party’s strangle hold on power.  MDC has since abandoned its reform demands and jumped on the bandwagon of street protests demanding an end to the economic hardships.

It is the economic meltdown that is forcing Zanu PF to accept meaningful political change; MDC and the other opposition parties are positioning themselves to claim all the credit and profit from the changes.

4)    Tsvangirai and/or Mujuru are doing their best to have their record as corrupt and incompetent leaders swept under the carpet, they are even offering those who refuse to be so easily fooled the promise they can remove the two from office afterwards. This is just a cheap trick because once elected the two will point to their electoral mandate as proof they are not corrupt and incompetent.

When Jomo Kenyatta died in 1978 many people in Kenya were convinced the corrupt and tyrannical dictatorship he had fostered on the nation will be interned with his bones; few people believed Daniel arap Moi, the docile VP who succeeded Jomo would be a dictator. Wrong! Moi turned out to be even more ruthless, corrupt and incompetent.

Even if Tsvangirai and/or Mujuru should turn out to be tyrants like Mugabe the very fact that they are corrupt and incompetent means the country will not achieve the same rapid economic recovery it would have otherwise achieved with competent leaders.

As for Tsvangirai or Mujuru implementing the democratic reforms we been dying for, that they will never do. They are incompetent but not that incompetent to freely implement reforms that will cost them to loss the next elections.

If Zimbabweans do not force the implementation of democratic reforms before the next elections then the nation will have a battle in its hands to force the new government to implement them!

 So to answer you more directly Patrick; by rejecting failed leaders like Tsvangirai and instead concentrating on the important task of implementing the democratic reforms the nation is rejecting the false choice of either the tyrant or the incompetent opposition. The real and only choice we have to make here is either to keep the dictatorship or to implement the reforms and dismantle it.

The worsening economic situation has forced Zanu PF to accept political change. It is up to us, the people to make sure we implement the democratic reforms, this time. Corrupt and incompetent opposition leaders are trying to stampede the nation into a panic and settle for removing Mugabe and keep the dictatorship. We must ignore these distractors and keep our eyes fixed on the ball – implementing all the democratic reforms BEFORE the next elections! 

Zim "bereft of capacity to reform" - street protest is no cure to inaptitude.

“Zimbabwe is a country in crisis,” wrote Tony Reeler, “bereft of any capacity to reform – neither politically nor economically. This is common cause for all Zimbabweans, and a major reason for the citizens to protest increasingly loudly.”

As for the nation being in a crisis; given unemployment has soared to 90%, we have fallen from our perch of being the breadbasket of the region to become a nation dependent on imported food aid- we have become so impoverished we cannot even afford to pay for the imports.

We are starving in a country that is for all intend and purpose the Garden of Eden.

Zimbabwe’s economic collapse did not happen overnight it was been a steady slid to the bottom that started soon after independence. Unemployment has crept to 80% plus and has stayed there for the last 15 years. The economic meltdown has forced millions of our people to live in abject poverty and hopeless despair.

Of course the people have known that Zimbabwe’s economy was not doing as well as Mugabe wanted them to believe it was doing. Mugabe promised the nation “Gutsa ruzhinji!” (Mass prosperity!” again and again but the reality on ground told its own story of mass poverty. Poverty is like a hot chili-dish; it does not matter how many times someone tells you are doing well when you have no work, are hungry, basic services like education and health have all but collapsed, etc., etc. you know you are poor.

After 20 years of meaningless excuses, scapegoats and downright lies on why the economy was not doing well the majority of Zimbabweans finally came to the conclusion that Mugabe and his Zanu PF friends would never deliver economic prosperity. Since 2000 the Zimbabwean people made a concerted effort to remove Mugabe and Zanu PF from office using the only peaceful means obtainable - the vote. The people failed to accomplish and political change because Mugabe systematically rigged the elections.

Indeed Mugabe’s vote rigging dates back to the very first election in 1980; Mugabe did not send all his war veterans to assembly points as agree but instead kept many of them free to spread the word that if Zanu PF did not win the elections, the civil war was to continue. As the years went by Mugabe had step up his vote rigging to counter his sinking popularity.

When Mr. Reeler described Zimbabwe as a country “bereft of any capacity to reform” (politically), he was spot on for hence lies the heart of the nation’s political clueless inaptitude and helplessness which explains why the nation has been stuck with this Mugabe dictatorship for all these last 36 years allowing the country to sink to such unbelievable depths of hopelessness and despair!

The risk-all street protests are nothing new, we saw the same act of desperation by the people when they risked life and limp to vote for MDC in the 2008 elections. Some people would view this as the answer to the people’s clueless inaptitude in that the people did manage to elect enough MDC members to give the party the majority in parliament and in the GNU cabinet. The truth is the clueless inaptitude was still there hence the reason MDC failed to deliver any meaningful change at the end of the GNU regardless of the fact Tsvangirai had the majority in parliament and had the backing of SADC leaders.

MDC leaders did not have a clue what democratic reforms were needed to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship and so after five years of the GNU they failed to get even one reform implemented.

Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown has left the people so poor and desperate they are once again risking all elect someone like Joice Mujuru or Morgan Tsvangirai as long as Mugabe is removed shows the people are still not cured of their flawed thinking. After 36 years of this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship one expected the people to be as keen as mustard to not just get rid of the tyrant Mugabe but uproot the whole dictatorship his spawned to make sure the country will never have another dictator ever again.

Joice Mujuru was kicked out of Zanu PF, kicking and screaming to stay. Only the politically naïve would believe her nonsense that she had never criticized Mugabe all the 34 years she was at the heart of the Zanu PF government because “a puppy does not open its eyes in one day!” Not even the Mount Darwin (where Mujuru comes from) mongrel puppies take 34 days to open their eyes let alone 34 years!

 If elected back into office Mujuru will take up her corrupt activities where she left off in 2014, when she was booted out of Zanu PF. And she will revive the Zanu PF dictatorship to consolidate her own hold on power.

Tsvangirai had the golden opportunity to implement democratic reforms designed to end the Zanu PF dictatorship during the GNU. He failed to implement even one reform because he and his MDC friends are breathtakingly corrupt and incompetent. Zimbabwe is in a serious political and economic mess and thus the need for competent leaders must be blatantly obvious to EVERY Zimbabwean. So why would anyone vote for someone like Tsvangirai knowing fully well that he is corrupt and incompetent!

Now that the economic meltdown has the people sufficiently roused to risk-all in the fight for regime change many of the country’s opposition are now pushing for elections without bothering about implementing any reforms.  

“We do not need to worry about whom we elect into power, as long as we get Mugabe out,” some have argued. “Once Mugabe is out we can then implement the reforms and elect competent leaders!”

Even the corrupt and incompetent Tsvangirai and Mujuru will be smart enough not to implement reforms that will result in them losing power!

“There is a critical need for transformative reforms that will pre-empt elections or any other elite processes or pacts, and/or succession arrangements, not underpinned by crucial reforms that prioritise the interests of the citizens,” argued Tony.

The most critical transformative change are those to transform the electorate from a naïve and gullible lot to informed and diligent voters who would not be so easily and readily conned to elect a corrupt and incompetent leader knowing he/she is corrupt and incompetent. As long as the electorate are naïve and bereft of common sense we will remain stuck in the hellhole Mugabe landed us in. Street protests are an act of desperation and not proof of the cure of clueless inaptitude.

It is for Zimbabweans to play the leading role in the fight for free elections and not SADC. By Patrick Guramatunhu

"In the end, the solution shall not come from Sadc or the UN but by Zimbabweans themselves," said Farai Maguwu.

Farai is right that SADC, UN and the world at large are looking at Zimbabweans themselves taking the lead in defining why they want to go, especially in the light of the failed 2008 to 2013 GNU. SADC got involved then and Zimbabweans let them down by failing to implement even one reform in five years. MDC leaders including Morgan Tsvangirai even had the chutzpah to blame SADC for their own incompetence.

Zimbabweans have yet to come up with a workable way out that SADC and the UN can support. The two solutions Zimbabweans are supporting in numbers right now are both unworkable. No outsiders will support ever support the call by a number of Zimbabwe's opposition parties for electoral reforms. None of those parties have ever produced any convincing argument to show that these reforms would change anything because these reforms will change nothing.

Indeed, the call for electoral reforms is nothing but MDC leaders hiding behind their fingers, a carry on from their pathetic performance during the GNU.

Some Zimbabweans have taken to the street protest with zeal. This is an effective way forward when the protesters have a clear view of what is wrong and what should be done to put things to right. The people's call for 2.2 million jobs Zanu PF promised before the 2013 elections, for example, is too general. After 36 years of corrupt and tyrannical rule the world expects the people’s call for free and fair elections to be as clear as the bell in the morning air.

SADC and the UN would be tempted to support the proposed National Transitional Authority (NTA) but not in the format proposed by Ibbo Mandaza and his friends. The NTA will not deliver any meaningful democratic changes whilst it subject to the authority of parliament and other Zanu PF control institutions, which is what Mandaza is proposing.

Zimbabwe is in this economic mess in which unemployment has soared to the world record levels of 90% and 76% of the population are so poor they cannot afford one decent meal a day. Zimbabwe’s economic mess is at odds with one would have expected given the nation’s rich wealth of national resources of agricultural lands, minerals and a hardworking people. This national tragedy has come to pass because we have had the great misfortune of being stuck with a corrupt and incompetent regime for 36 years, unable to remove it from office regardless of all the evidence of the regime’s disastrous failures.

When the nation attained its independence in 1980 we should not have paid attention only to removing the white colonial regime but also to what kind of government we wanted to replace it. We are in this mess because we did not take the necessary steps to ensure post-independent Zimbabwe was ruling by competent leaders democratically accountable to the people.

After 36 years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption that has dragged the nation into the depths of economic despair, we have still not learnt the critical importance of good governance, free and fair elections to demand it for ourselves. The truth is we are not getting out of this economic mess until we take the task of ensuring we have an accountable government with the seriousness and urgency the matter demands. Zimbabweans have to make a conscious decision to democratic change; SADC and the UN will, at best, play a supporting role but never the lead role.

Mugabe is to blame for the street protest but the gratuitous violence must be condemned.

There is one thing to be said about Zimbabwe's economic meltdown; which has resulted in unemployment soaring to 90%, forced 76% of the population into a life of abject poverty, left government without cash to pay civil servants, etc.; it is socially and politically unsustainable. Being unsustainable means things cannot continue as they are and yet as long as Zanu PF remains in office things have got even worse and thus increasing the pressure for meaningful change to revive the economy.

Zimbabwe is a de facto one-party cum one-man dictatorship which has been ruthlessly imposed and retained. Sadly the dictatorship has turned out to be incompetent, corrupt and lawless; the three cancers that are killing the economy. There will be no meaningful economic recovery in Zimbabwe until we cure ourselves of these three economic cancers and the only viable way to do that is by ending the political system – the dictatorship - that has spawned these problems and allowed them grow and spread for all these last 36 years.

So the cure to Zimbabwe’s socially and politically unsustainable economic meltdown is meaningful political change designed to dismantle the failed de facto dictatorship as exemplified by the holding of free, fair and credible elections.

Change is nature. Mugabe and his cronies may be tempted to think they cheated nature by resisting change these last 36 years. They are fooling themselves!

Change comes in small incremental, peaceful and orderly evolutionary changes. In being small people can adjust and adopt. By stifling public debate, abolishing multi-party democracy, banishing peaceful demonstrations, rigging elections, etc.; Mugabe blocked all the natural avenues for small evolutionary change. He has successful retain power for the last 36 years but at the cost of destroying Zimbabwe politically and economically.

It was the lack of meaningful democratic accountability that has allowed Mugabe and Zanu PF to remain in power for the last 36 years but it was the lack of democratic accountability too that has allowed the regime to be so breathtakingly corrupt, incompetent, arrogance and tyrannical. It is Zanu PF’s unchecked criminal waste of the nation’s human and material resources that is behind the unsustainable economic meltdown we are facing today.

By rigging elections Mugabe was resisting peaceful evolutionary regime change and per se opted for violent revolutionary change. The last few months Zimbabwe has been shaken to the core by violent street protests and, until there are meaningful political changes leading to meaningful economic recovery, there will be more street protests.

We have seen the Police try to silence people demanding change by tear-gassing and brutally bashing them. The people have responded by shouting even louder for change, by burning and looting. Until there is meaningful change there will be more tear-gas, burning and looting.  

Many people have warned of the need for free and fair elections and other peaceful changes in Zimbabwe just to avoid the dangers of social unrest or worse violent revolutionary change would bring. The violent revolutionary change we feared is now upon us. Pray it does not going to last long. Pray it is not going to cause a lot of destruction of property and human injury and lives.

The tragedy here is that social upheaval and economic misery we are facing in Zimbabwe today are man-made and therefore could have been avoided. We would not be in this hell-hole if Mugabe had not imposed this corrupt and tyrannical dictatorship on the nation. We would have dismantled the dictatorship during the GNU if Tsvangirai and his MDC friends had not sold-out and failed to get even one reform implemented in five years!

How quickly the nation emerges from this violent revolution and in what form will depend on whether the ordinary people themselves have learnt anything from the past. In the end, people always get the government they deserve; like it or not we deserve this Zanu PF dictatorship complete with its coterie of corrupt and incompetent opposition parties.

History has the habit to repeat itself, especially amongst those who fail to learn from the past. Mugabe and Zanu PF are a product of the war of independence; as war veterans they felt they knew best, they are “stockholders of Zanu PF and Zimbabwe” whilst everyone else was merely “stakeholder who can come and go”. The hawkish zeal and the gratuitous looting by some of the street protesters is a worrying sign a new generation of know-it-all war veterans.

Indeed MDC-T’s, “the government in waiting” the party claims, VP Nelson Chamisa has been wooing the rogue war veterans who have impose Mugabe on the nation all these years; a clear sign that MDC-T, at least, has learnt nothing from the past.

If all Zimbabwe achieve at the end of the current violent revolution is remove one tyrant but only to replace him with another because we failed to dismantle the dictatorship then this revolution would be a failure just like the revolution leading to the 1980 independence was a failure!

Zim will not get SA help by wagging a blaming finger at Zuma for our own GNU failures.

Zimbabwe’s situation with its economy in total meltdown and political paralysis as the ruling party implode and there is total confusion in the opposition camp is “worrisome”, as my brother Tendai Ruben Mbofana rightly said in his article “South Africa's naïvety towards Zimbabwean crisis worrisome”. What makes our situation so desperate is that we are stuck. Indeed we would have never sunk this deep in this hell-hole if we were free to change course. We have been forced down this ruinous route because Zimbabwe is a de facto one-party cum one-man dictatorship ruled by a corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyranny we have tried in vain to remove from office.

We have new elections coming up in 2018 and all signs are that Zanu PF will rig those elections as before and, without outside help, there is nothing Zimbabweans themselves can do to stop Zanu PF. We definitely need help.

However, if we are going to get help from SADC we must stop blaming those from whom we asking for help for Zimbabwe’s problems.

“Recent comments by South Africa's International Relations and Cooperation Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, to the effect that her government would not intervene in the Zimbabwean crisis, as the people of that country could sort out their own problems through the 2018 elections, exhibits the most worrisome height of naivety and disingenuity, not to be expected of a regional power, as it is a very serious abrogation of its responsibility,” wrote Mbofana.

“So the question to both Zuma and Nkoana-Mashabane is: as this crisis has happened before in Zimbabwe, and SA responded in the same passive manner that you are responding today, have you not learnt anything from the previous blunders made by Mbeki?”

This line of question can only be adopted by one who has himself/herself learnt nothing from history. The simple most important lesson many Zimbabweans have failed to learn from the GNU of 2008 to 2013 is that it provided a golden opportunity for the country to implement the far reaching democratic reforms the country needed to finally end the Zanu PF no-regime-change mantra. It was MDC leaders’ fault, in the first instance, that not even one reform was implemented in five years.

We, the people, are not walking Scott-free because if we should have never elected corrupt and incompetent people like Tsvangirai and then failed to properly supervise them. We failed on both counts because we have never taken the trouble to understand what our role is in a healthy, functional democracy. We say we want democratic change but have never bothered to find out what must change starting with us changing from being naïve and gullible electorate to an informed and diligent one.

There are many things Zimbabweans can complain about the role SADC leaders played during the GNU but we cannot, in all honest, blame them for that fact that no meaningful reforms were implemented because they did their best to remind Tsvangirai and company to implement the reforms but were ignore. Soon after the results of the Zanu PF rigged July 2013 elections were out SADC leaders issued a statement criticizing MDC leaders for “enjoying themselves and forgetting why they were in the GNU” is sheer exasperation.

The second point is if we, Zimbabweans, are going to ask others to help us get out of this mess then it is imperative that we know exactly what we want them to do. Given that this is the second time we are calling for help soon over the same issue, one would expect us to have a clear view of what we want!

“The suffering people of Zimbabwe are merely requesting SA to use its leverage on the Zimbabwe government to respect and uphold its own Constitution,” started Mbofana.

“On Friday, 26th August 2016, a coalition of opposition parties will be holding a mega peaceful protest against the current flawed electoral and political landscape, which should tell the SA government something - that if the current situation prevails till the 2018 General Elections, the results will be disputed, leading to a repeat of 2008.”

SADC leaders must heave a sigh of hopelessness and despair to read this! They heaved the same sigh of despair when the GNU partners released Zimbabwe’s the draft new constitution in 2012 because anyone with half a brain could see immediately that this was not a democratic constitution that will deliver free and fair elections. MP Paul Mangwana, the Zanu PF co-chairperson on the committee tasked to write the new constitution, boosted that Mugabe “dictated” the new constitution and it showed.

Tsvangirai claimed the new constitution was an “MDC child” and promised that it would deliver free, fair and credible elections. If failed to do so as Mugabe went on to blatantly rig the July 2013 elections.

Since the rigged July 2013 elections, Tsvangirai and his MDC friends have been demanding “the alignment of existing laws to the new constitution”. They insist the alignment will stop vote rigging although many experts in the field have said otherwise.

“Out of the 299 Statutes in our books, we have so far aligned 159 statutes. We have identified about 200 Statutes requiring alignment and out of that number, 159 have been completed and processed through this House, through the General Laws Amendment Bill (GLAB) and other independent Statutes," VP Emmerson Mnangagwa, who is also the Minister of Justice, Legal and parliamentary Affairs, told the Senate in June this year.

Tsvangirai and his opposition friends have not produced any comments on the GLAB or details of any additional re-alignment they want to see. MDC have been advised that the country needs to implement all the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA as the only way forward but, reminiscent, of the GNU days has ignore the advice.  

One can understand why SA or any other outsider will be worried about the chaos ensuing in Zimbabwe and how it could easily spill over and affect the whole SADC region and yet be loathed to be involved. It is bad enough to be involved in other nation’s affairs but it to do so knowing from the word go nothing will be accomplished is downright stupid.

If Zimbabweans are demanding the realignment of the existing laws to the new constitution as the solution to ending vote rigging then they can expect no outsiders to joining in because this is a wild-goose chase – outsiders have better things to do than wasting time hunting something they know does not exist! It was our fault that the 2008 to 2013 GNU failed to deliver free, fair and credible elections, the least we should do is admit it and stop pointing the blaming finger at the innocent and expect them to help us again.

MDC-T admits 2018 will not be free and flip-flops to boycott - in the end they will take part.

The stage is set for yet another MDC-T election boycott flip-flop. Since Mugabe blatantly rigged the July 2013 elections all the country’s main opposition parties including Tsvangirai’s MDC-T, PDP and MDC led by Tendai Biti and Welshman Ncube respectively vowed not to take part in any future elections until democratic reforms are implemented to ensure the next elections are free, fair and credible. MDC-T has since flipped!

Last year MDC-T Secretary General, Douglas Mwonzora, told New Zimbabwe that the party had figured ways of forcing Zanu PF, “kicking and screaming”, to implement the reforms. The party was so sure of getting the reforms implemented it was calling off its threat to boycott the elections.

Mwonzora promised all the reforms will be implemented by the end of 2015 and we are getting to the tail end of 2016 and still not even one meaningful reform has been implemented. MDC-T is now admitting that no reforms are going to be implemented and the so the threat of the party boycotting the next election is back.

“As President Morgan Tsvangirai has lucidly pointed out to the media, it would be utter and complete folly for the MDC to blindly go into an election without reforms. We have learnt the bitter lesson that the Zanu PF regime will always rig any election that is conducted without electoral reforms. Once beaten, twice shy,” wrote MDC-T spokesman Obert Gutu.

MDC has foolishly take part in elections “without reforms” on numerous occasions in the past and will do so again in the next elections. True the party will flip-flop, even go into oscillation, on this but in the end MDC-T will take part in the elections with or without any reforms implemented.

MDC has been elected on a ticket to deliver democratic change resulting in free and fair elections. The truth is MDC leaders have no clue that these democratic changes are and who is supposed to implement them.

“As Election 2018 fast approaches, it is critical for the Parliament of Zimbabwe to play a leading role in setting out a well –defined and precise roadmap to the next election,” wrote Gutu, for example.

He does not say what exactly Parliament is supposed to do but whatever it is; it is absurd to expect a Zanu PF controlled parliament to implement meaningful reforms designed to end the party’s iron grip on power.

It was for MDC during the GNU to implement the reforms; MDC had the majority in parliament then and, more significantly, Mugabe had his hands tied by the GPA which SADC, as the guarantor, would have insisted that he honoured. Since July 2013, when the GPA expired, the only way to get the reforms implemented is by entrusting an independent body to carry out the task; Zanu PF was to be pressured to accept the formation of this body.

MDC leaders failed to get even one reform implemented in five years of the GNU because they sold-out; Mugabe offered them the gravy train lifestyle plus the $4 million Highlands mansion for Tsvangirai and in return MDC kicked the reforms into the tall grass. MDC would not listen even to the repeated pleas by SADC Heads of State for them to take part in the elections without reforms.

MDC leaders have paid dearly for selling-out during the GNU; they have lost all political credibility, especially with SADC and the world at large. Having lost their parliamentary majority in the rigged elections and lost the sympathy of SADC, MDC lost all meaningful leverage with which to pressure Mugabe to implement any reforms. By pretending they would ever get Mugabe to implement any meaningful reforms MDC were playing into the tyrant’s hands, he will happily string the nation along forever on this.

In their usual eagerness, but inattentive to detail, to remove Mugabe from office the people have made the fatal mistake of assuming anyone can be trusted to remove the tyrant. Tsvangirai has had 16 years to implement the necessary democratic reforms required to stop the tyrant rigging the elections and has failed to get even one reform implemented. It is now for the people to wise up to the political reality that Tsvangirai will never ever implement any reforms, he has settled for the crumbs falling of Zanu PF’s table.

Zanu PF know that they will never have to implement any meaningful reforms as long as the they leave some seats, crumbs, for the opposition to fight over they will never boycott elections. So Zanu PF can rig elections to secure its landslide victory and allow opposition some seats to give the process the veneer of democratic competition and thus legitimacy.  

It is for the people to realize that not everyone who promises change can deliver it and, after 16 years of repeated failures, Tsvangirai will never implement any meaningful reforms to stop Zanu PF rigging elections. If the people want free, fair and credible elections it is for them to understand what the democratic reforms required are and how they are to be implemented because it is only can they be 100% sure of electing someone up to the task!  

Kofi Annan Elders pressure SADC to help Zimbabwe "transition" - ALL reforms will be implemented this time. By P Guramatunhu

Group of Elders has appealed to SADC leaders ahead of the regional meeting next week to once again intervene in Zimbabwe. SADC played a major role in the formation of Zimbabwe’s 2008 to 2013 GNU. Sadly not even one democratic reform was implement during the GNU in spite SADC’s repeated warning to do so. The failure allowed President Mugabe to blatantly rig the 2013 elections and SADC had no choice but to accept the result and wash its hands of Zimbabwe.

Since the rigged 2013 elections Zimbabwe’s economy has gone into total meltdown; President Mugabe rigged the elections but could not rig economic recovery. The economic meltdown has now reached dangerous level with unemployment now at 90%; looting has now reaching nauseating height of $15 billion by looted by one or two individuals in six years; government is failing to pay its workers let alone pay for anything else; etc.

Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown is unsustainable and yet, without meaningful political reform, it is set to get worse. The country is staring down the abyss and if it is left to fall, it will drag the whole region with it.

Political reform is the one thing the country was supposed to achieve during the GNU but failed to do. Having bamboozled Tsvangirai and his MDC friends to kick reforms into the tall grass during the GNU President Mugabe now feels he has the right to resist any political reforms; which is why the Group of Elders is right to call on SADC leaders to pressure Mugabe to accept meaningful political reform.

“A group of former pre-eminent persons including former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan and wife of the late Nelson Mandela Graca Machel known as the Elders has called on the leaders of the Southern African Development Community to consider supporting a smooth transition in Zimbabwe,” reported Spotlight Zimbabwe.

“It is not clear what prompted the Elders to make the appeal but they said they firmly believed that a successful transition was not only vital for Zimbabwe but for the region as a whole.”

As a Zimbabwean who has followed the goings on in the country I have to put my hands up and admit that SADC leaders did their best, notably President Ian Khama of Botswana, to help Zimbabwe end the Zanu PF dictatorship throughout the 2008 to 2013 GNU. It was Tsvangirai, his fellow MDC leaders and the people of Zimbabwe themselves’ fault that not even one democratic reform was implemented in five years.


However I would like to assure SADC heads of State and the international community that a few, but the finest and brightest, Zimbabweans have learnt the lessons of the blundering incompetence during the last GNU. Give the country another chance and this time ALL the democratic reforms will be implemented fully and timeously. Just give Zimbabwe another chance, please!

Gutu acknowledge 2018 elections will NOT be free - how will coalition stop vote rigging.

Politics is like marriage, it is not to be entered into lightly because once the vote has been, like the tying the marriage knot, it will take years to withdraw the vote/ to divorce. The consequences of having had a corrupt and incompetent representative decide the nation’s destiny in the intervening years are far worse than the consequence of having married a wrong partner in that the later affects a few individuals whereas the form affects a whole nation.

I confess that I was one of the millions of Zimbabweans who voted for or tried to vote for Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends since the party’s formation in 1999. It was not until the rigged July 2013 election that I finally realized just how corrupt and incompetent MDC leaders are; I have regretted my folly on having entrusted the nation’s destiny in such irresponsible hands.

“The Movement for Democratic Change led by Morgan Tsvangirai is arguably Zimbabwe's most popular and largest political party in terms of membership,” boosted Obert Gutu, MDC-T spokesman.

I am ashamed to say my vote helped put MDC into that position and now it will take another five years, at least, to bring down these useless men and women! I will do my best to argue Zimbabweans NOT to vote for MDC ever again because they are breathtakingly corrupt and incompetent.

Like millions of other Zimbabweans out there, I too have supported and voted for MDC because I want to see regime change and Tsvangirai and company were elected on a ticket to deliver democratic change. The truth is MDC has had many chances to deliver the changes, with the best chance ever coming during the GNU. They had five years to implement the democratic reforms but failed to get even one reforms implemented. Not one!

The only logical reason why MDC failed to implement any reform is that the MDC leaders are corrupt and incompetent. President Mugabe bribed them with the gravy train lifestyle plus the $4 million Highlands Mansion for Tsvangirai; MDC leaders took the bait and kicked reforms into the tall grass. Worse still, MDC leaders will never implement any reforms because they have clearly learnt nothing from the past.

“The rigging machinery went into overdrive on July 31, 2013 when even some Zanu PF Parliamentary candidates were totally surprised how they had managed to win in certain constituencies that are traditionally MDC strongholds,” acknowledged Obert Gutu.

“ … As currently constituted, there is a snowball's chance in hell that the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC),will be able to conduct a free and fair election in 2018. ….. This, therefore, speaks to the urgent need for having a powerful coalition of opposition political parties to take Zanu PF head on in Election 2018.”

In other words Gutu acknowledges three basic realities:

a)      That MDC had mass support in the 2013 elections but the party still lost even in its strongholds because

b)      Zanu PF has a well-oiled vote rigging machinery and when it went into “overdrive” MDC did not have a chance

c)       And most important of all, as things stand, with Zanu PF still having its well-oiled vote rigging machinery still firmly in place there is no chance of the next elections been free, fair and credible.

d)      The opposition must form a strong coalition, concluded Gutu!

Of course Obert Gutu’s conclusion does not make any sense; MDC did not lose the July 2013 elections because the party did not have popular support, it did. It lost because Zanu PF had a well-oiled vote rigging machinery rendering MDC’s popular support useless. The logical conclusion here is and can only be to mobilize all resources to ensure the democratic reforms designed to dismantle Zanu PF’s vote rigging juggernaut are implemented.

Frankly we should not be surprised that MDC-T has done nothing to implement the reforms since the rigged July 2013 elections; these MDC leaders did not implement any reforms during the GNU because they were breathtakingly incompetent and corrupt. They are still breathtakingly corrupt and incompetent today and hence will never implement any reform.

Many Zimbabweans have continued to support MDC post July 2013 because they cannot see Tsvangirai and his fellow MDC leaders for the corrupt and incompetent leaders they are. Yes the failure to implement even one reform provided a mountain of evidence proving beyond doubt that Tsvangirai et al are corrupt and incompetent. But what is the good of presenting someone with the majestic view of Mount Kilimanjaro when they cannot ever comprehend the anthill because everything beyond their few metres bubble of vision is blurred and black.

Then there are some Zimbabweans who acknowledge that MDC are corrupt and incompetent they still nonetheless continue to support the party hoping against hope that they will one day deliver the regime change we nation has been dying for. Their attention is now focused on removing Mugabe from power Tsvangirai’s antics are nothing in comparison. What these people are forgetting is the elected Tsvangirai to remove Mugabe and therefore his repeated failure to do this are now more important than removing Mugabe in that the removal of the tyrant is now dependent on replacing Tsvangirai with someone competent.

We have not found anyone competent to implement the democratic reforms and thus finally deliver the free, fair and credible elections we need to get out of this hell-hole not because there are no such competent Zimbabweans but because we have never looked. Whilst we still hold hope that the failed Tsvangirai will deliver change we will never look for anyone else.

‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result,’ said the great Physicist Albert Einstein.

Tsvangirai et al have already proven beyond all reasonable doubt that they are corrupt and incompetent for any Zimbabwean to vote for them in future is not just an act of folly but sheer insanity.

Professor Mufuka, the simpleton Mujuru and simplistic #ThisFlag are problem and not the solution Nomusa Garikai

One of the reasons why we are in this economic and political mess is that we are a confused nation. And very often the confusion comes from none other than the intellectuals, the very people the nation would be looking up to to come up with the gems of wisdom!  

“A transitional authority should not include any members of the present political parties. They are too naïve and can be manipulated with gifts of gold and diamonds to return the same outcome,” wrote Professor Ken Mufuka in Nehanda Radio.

The Professor was adding his voice to the many who have called for the formation of a transition authority which will be tasked to implement all the democratic reforms necessary to ensure free, fair and credible elections.

MDC should have implemented the reforms during the GNU but failed to get even one reform implemented because Tsvangirai et al are incompetent and corrupt. Of course they sold-out! As for President Mugabe and his Zanu PF cronies, it is naïve to expect them to implement the reforms; they are the ones who have systematically corrupted the political system and have an invested interest in maintaining the status quo.

So Professor Mufuka’s call for the exclusion of all the GNU political leaders in the proposed transition authority made sense, at least until he shot himself in the leg.

“In my opinion, Sister Joice Mujuru is in a very unique place to save our nation,” he argued.

He is talking about the same Joice Mujuru who has been at the very heart of the Zanu PF government for 34 years and has done nothing to stop the corruption and murderous political oppression by Zanu PF. She has benefited from the de facto one party state, how else would she have retained her political power given she is a simpleton with nothing to offer.

She and her late husband have been very busy looting. According to Minister Kasukuwere the Mujurus are responsible for a “chunk” of the $15 billion of looted diamonds President Mugabe said was stolen between 2010 to 2015.

How anyone can entrust the destiny of a nation in the hands of a corrupt and incompetent simpleton like Joice Mujuru beggars belief!

“ZANU-PF has been accused of not having won any election since 2000 and will therefore have to be dragged into such an arrangement.

“No government ever gives up power until there is a real possibility of popular retribution that includes public hanging. That is why the popular #ThisFlag power must be entertained. The possibility that those who trampled on human rights may face the noose must not be hidden away from them,” continued Mufuka.

#ThisFlag, #Tajamuka/Sesijikile and many other social media based campaign groups that have emerged all had one thing in common a simple message. Typically they called for “Mugabe must fire corrupt ministers!” “Give us our $15 billion back!” “Give us the 2.2 million jobs”, etc.

Indeed it was the simplicity of their message that has made #ThisFlag, etc. so popular.

If the truth be told, and it must be told, we are in this political and economic mess because, as a nation we have been very naïve and gullible. Going for a simplistic solution to a complex problem is one sign of being naïve. Corruption in Zimbabwe was grown in leaps and bounds for the last 36 years to the point where even a simpleton like Joice Mujuru is able to loot $15 billion!

Surely it is too simplistic for anyone to be calling for Mugabe to fire corrupt minister; that is call one made in the 1980s. In the 1990s the call was to fire the corrupt ministers and President himself – the whole regime. Sure the call since 2000 was for meaningful democratic reforms to stop Zanu PF rigging elections!

Many followers of #ThisFlag have supported and voted for Tsvangirai and his MDC party since 2000. They have joined in the call for change but without ever understanding what changes they wanted. When MDC failed to implement any changes during the GNU none of them held Tsvangirai to account; how can they hold MDC to account over something they never understood.

Many of these #ThisFlag followers have latched on to the simplistic message of ”Mugabe fire corrupt ministers!” because they still have no clue what the democratic reforms the transition authority is supposed to implement are about.

The very suggestion that #ThisFlag supporters are now so sophisticated they    hold “the noose” to those guilty of past serious human rights violations is absurd.

President Mugabe never doubted for one minute that he would deliver mass prosperity with his simplistic “Scientific Socialism” which in everyday language meant reckless spending to prosperity. Sadly life is not that simple, Zimbabwe is subject to the same laws of physics and economics as the rest of the world. The nation was naïve and gullible to allow him to take us down this ruinous path.

People like Professor Mufuka are not helping us get out of the mess by encouraging us to look to simpleton like Mujuru and the dangerously simplistic #ThisFlag for answers! 

Mujuru did not stop Mugabe because 'puppy does not open its eyes same day' - mongrel took 34 years. By P Guramatunhu

Joice Mujuru admits that Zim PF members are dying like flies in a glass trap.

“This is the history we are writing today but let me tell you this; there were many of us in People First but some are no longer with us because they passed away,” Mujuru said last week in Gweru.

“We had provincial leaders who were expelled from the party, they got sick because of the way they were treated and they died.

“If those who are alive begin to tell you about our lives, they will tell you that we are living on drugs because of high blood pressure and stress caused by the treatment we got from Zanu PF and its leader.”

Madam, please you are no longer in Zanu PF so you can say the truth! If you were all kicked out of Zanu PF and you all had the means to maintain the same luxurious lifestyles you had all become accustomed to, not one of you would be complaining of stress. You have presided over Zimbabwe’s economic collapse, you were warned of this but you have done nothing for all your 34 years at the heart of government because you thought you were insulated from the economic hardship. Well you were whilst you remained in Zanu PF. The day President Mugabe kicked you out of Zanu PF you knew grinding poverty awaited you.

After decades three course meal and worrying about piling up the weight, a new Mercedes Benz car every three years, multiple farms, etc., etc.; it is very hard to see all the looted wealth disappear like mist under the African morning sun and having to worry about having nothing to eat for the whole day. You people are dying like flies in a glass trap because you cannot cope with the hardships!

“One of the crimes that I was said to have committed when I was in Zanu PF was failing to condemn Tsvangirai and say the slogan ‘Pasi naTsvangirai’. People First and MDC can be compared to puppies of a dog which do not open their eyes and see on the same day.

“Tsvangirai was the first to see what I didn’t see then and now l have opened my eyes and I also see,” said Mujuru.

Nonsense! No puppy in the world takes more than a couple of weeks, at most, after birth to open its eyes. We are to believe that mongrel Zanu PF puppies take 34 years!

For 34 years Mai Mujuru and her Zim PF friends would not see Zanu PF mismanagement, corruption and tyranny much less the tragic economic and human consequences. It was only reality of poverty knocking at their doors, it is now killing them, which finally opened their puppy-eyes.

 Whilst you remained a member of Zanu PF and enjoyed your share of the spoils of absolute power you saw nothing wrong with the party’s corrupt and tyrannical rule or the human misery and deaths it brought. It was only after you were booted out of the party and you were exposed to the reality of the economic meltdown, that you opened your eyes and criticized Zanu PF.

 Mai Mujuru et al now claim that they are committed to rebuilding the country’s economy from the ruins destruction they helped cause as Zanu PF members. They are not builders, never were, they only claim to do so because they are desperate to get back on the gravy train to escape the poverty. If elected, they will be taking off with the corruption from where they left off when they were booted out of Zanu PF. We would be foolish to elect the same corrupt and incompetent Zanu PF; ZimPF are Zanu PF in all but name.