"We left behind bad thing," say ED - leopard rolls in dung to mask its scent not lose its spots P Guramatunhu

Things are bad enough when tyrants bombard the people with their propaganda and brainwash them with falsehoods. Hell breaks loose when the tyrants begin to believe their own propaganda and lies. In Zimbabwe hell has broken loose and the country is sinking deeper and deeper into the abyss!

"I was part of the (old) administration, but the good things we have brought forward and the bad things we have left behind.”

There are lies and then there are damned lies; President Mnangagwa and his junta did NOT leave behind the bad things from the old administration, that is a damned lie!

President Mnangagwa has promised to end corruption and it is now eight months since the coup and he has done nothing. Frankly only the naïve and gullible believed he could ever deal with this problem since he himself and many of those in his regime included VP Chiwenga are amassed great fortunes from looting.

President Mnangagwa has also promised to hold free, fair and credible elections; another promise he clearly had no intention of honouring. Zanu PF has never ever held free, fair and credible elections ever since it got into power in 1980 and this was one bad habit Mnangagwa and his coup cabal has no intention of leaving behind after the coup. The regime had promised free elections to take the sting out of the reality that it was illegitimate since it was born out of the coup.

The coup plotters insisted the coup was not a coup but “a military assisted transition”. What was shocking is that they actually believed this nonsense themselves because the regime launched its “Zimbabwe is open for business!” on basis the coup was legal.

The last two decades, investors had shied away from Zimbabwe because the country was a pariah state ruled by thugs. Zanu PF thugs have been fighting amongst themselves like hyenas fighting over scraps and last November’s coup was just one event in that saga. To see the coup as a Damascene transformative event, transforming seasoned thugs into democrats, was wishful thinking, to say the least.

Indeed, by stubbornly refusing to implement even one democratic reform to unsure free and fair elections, President Mnangagwa could not have made it any clearer that Zimbabwe is still a pariah state ruled by thugs!

"I am finishing the term of our former President (Cde) Mugabe) up to July. But of course, on the 30th of July, I am going to win the elections and start my own mandate,” said President Mnangagwa.

"I can start my own mandate from August 1, then I (will) have more power to implement the vision I have for a new Zimbabwe, a prosperous Zimbabwe.”

No Mr President; Robert Mugabe has never earned the mandate to rule Zimbabwe because he rigged elections. With not even one democratic reform in place, you are gearing to rig these elections just as you have always done.

Zimbabwe is a pariah state; the coup, last Saturday’s bomb, the rigged elections, etc. all these events prove Zimbabwe is an unstable nation ruled by thugs; the economic meltdown will only get worse as investors continue to shy away.  

"We have everything we need in Zimbabwe in terms of manpower, educated population and we have identified the enablers to reach where we want to go,” said President Mnangagwa.

Zanu PF has not changed; it is still a party of ruthless thugs for whom the coup was about consolidating their own strangle hold on power and not transforming the party into a democratic one. Zimbabwe is going to sink deeper and deeper into the political and economic abyss 38 years of corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF rule has dragged us into.

President Mnangagwa, you are a corrupt, vote-rigging and murderous thug; this nation will never know peace, justice and economic prosperity under Zanu PF autocratic rule. A leopard rolls in elephant dung to mask its scent; it will still have its spots and killer instincts. You are rigging this year’s elections; there is no free public media, there is no clean and verified voters’ roll, Zanu PF continues to rob the nation blind to bankroll its vote rigging schemes, etc., etc.; prove you still have your seasoned political thug mentality! 

Those who refuse to see Lacoste and G40 as one and the same devil are making false choice P Guramatunhu

Some people cannot resist the temptation of judging the book by its cover instead of its contents. Having made the initial blunder, they always go on to make complete fools of themselves as they desperately try to rationalise their initial blunder.

“Those of us who breathed a collective breath of relief when a peaceful revolution ousted Mugabe from power in November should now be very concerned that he and his wife, Grace, have a tangible and concerted plan to return to power in Zimbabwe,” wrote Innocent Dube in Bulawayo 24.

Many people did, indeed, “breathe a collective breath of relief” last November when Mugabe was finally booted out of office; but the relief was not because they believed the coup was “peaceful revolution”. Only the naïve and gullible fools like you believed the coup plotters’ nonsense that the coup was a “military assisted transition”. 

Soldiers were deployed armed to the teeth during the coup; guns were fired, and many people were injured, and some killed. There was nothing peaceful in that!

The coup was not about dismantling the corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship, another falsehood peddled as the “new dispensation” to entrap the naïve and gullible. The coup was wrestling power from Mugabe, who wanted to give it to his wife and her G40 faction, back to Mnangagwa and his Lacoste faction members who had been the heart and soul of the Zanu PF dictatorship that had kept Zanu PF and Mugabe in power for 37 years. 

The coup was about removing the dictator, Mugabe, but not dismantling the dictatorship itself hence the reason the junta called the coup “operation restore legacy”. 

People heaved a huge sigh of relief that only a few people were killed as the situation could have very easily escalated leading to an all-out war. The coup as a warning of similar or worse things to follow if Zimbabwe did not do something to end the country’s corrupt and tyrannical political system which made the coup necessary. 

Of course, the coup or some such violent method was the only way to remove Mugabe from power, that is why many people turned a blind eye to last November’s coup. But unless we dismantle the dictatorship itself and stop the vote rigging then the next dictator too will need to be removed by a coup or bomb. You only break the cycle of regime change by violence by making sure there are peaceful means of bring about change! 

By pointedly refusing to implement the democratic reforms without which it is impossible to have free and fair elections, President Mnangagwa confirmed that Zimbabwe was still a pariah state whose next political change will only come from some violent act. Lo behold, the 23^rd June bomb was one such act!

Those like Dube who have condemned the June bomb, an act by the Zanu PF G40 faction, but condoned last November’s military coup, by Zanu PF Lacoste faction; have blundered in see the two events as separate when they are both evil and deserve to be condemned unreservedly.

Mnangagwa was Mugabe’s chief enforcer, he carried out most of the looting, vote rigging and cold-blooded murder of thousands of innocent Zimbabweans to establish and retain the de facto one-party autocracy. Worse still, since the November coup, he has pointedly refused to dismantle the dictatorship and is blatantly rigging this year’s elections just as he blatantly rigged past elections. 

The November coup removed Mugabe, the dictator, but the dictatorship itself has remained and it is alive and thriving.  

“The Mugabes' twin strategy of return to power is starting to reveal itself, slowly but surely,” argued Dube.

“On the one hand they will try and use violence to kill or hurt their opponents currently in power, on the other, their growing relationship with Chamisa means that he could also serve as their ticket back to power.”

“Voting Chamisa is playing into Grace and Bob's hand, because it is clear if you vote for one you will get all three as a package deal. After seven months of a Mugabe-free Zimbabwe, we could only be one month away from their swift and vengeful return.”

Poor Dube, he has not only swallowed the new dispensation nonsense, but his shallow brain has now been stirred up into mud. The only difference between Zanu PF dictatorship led by Mugabe and that by Mnangagwa is in the trivial details in the more substantive areas such as rigging the elections, corruption and the belief that Zanu PF has the divine right to rule Zimbabwe they are of one accord. 

The fear of Mugabe coming back into power has made people like Dube panic he cannot see that either outcome of the present election is totally unacceptable as one or the other Zanu PF factions will be back in power – which faction is better is as meaningless as choosing to have an arm or leg cut-off. 

What people like Dube have failed to see all along, is that these elections should not be taking place without first implementing the democratic reforms necessary for free, fair and credible elections. SADC leaders made this point abundantly clear in 2013 when they advised the elections to be postponed until the reforms are implemented.

Implementing the reforms BEFORE the elections will not only guarantee the elections are free, fair and credible but, most important of all, guarantee open debate and democratic competition – the fertile ground from which quality leaders will emerge. 

We are where we are, these flawed and illegal elections cannot be stop now. The most logical reaction now is to focus attention on all the glaring irregularities; no free public media, no clean and verified voters’ roll, Zanu PF’s robbing the nation blind to bankroll its vote rigging schemes, etc. proving beyond all reasonable doubt that these elections are not free, fair and credible. The only logical outcome is for these flawed elections to be declared null and void! 

Zimbabwe must revisit the raft of democratic reforms agreed in 2008 and make sure they are implemented. Since President Mnangagwa has refused to implement the reforms since last November’s coup then he and his junta must step aside and allow others who will do it!

"Zimbabwe is stable and prosperous!" is ED's interminable gabble - reality is emerging out of the web of lies N Garikai

“A lie told once remains a lie, but a lie told a thousand times becomes the truth,” said Joseph Goebbels, Adolf Hitler’s minister of propaganda.

Goebbels has had many disciples who have subscribed to ethos that repeating a lie a thousand time will turn it into a historic fact and truth; in Zanu PF it not just a few individuals but the whole regime. For the first two decades after independence Robert Mugabe and his minister talked of “Gutsva ruzhinji!” (Mass prosperity!) and would not allow the reality of growing poverty get in the way.

In the last two decades, with unemployment at 80% plus, basic services such as education and health all but collapsed, millions of ordinary Zimbabweans living in abject poverty, etc. the regime changed tac. It could not sustain its mass prosperity mantra in the face of growing mass poverty.

Zanu PF did not acknowledge gross mismanagement and rampant corruption as the root causes of the economic meltdown which are themselves a consequences of incompetent and corrupt Zanu PF leadership. The regime weaved a new lie; it blamed “the British imperialists and their western allies and their illegal sanctions” for all Zimbabwe’s ill!

As the country’s economic situation got worse and worse the people have become more and more restless, desperate for democratic change and economic recovery. Zanu PF has responded by adopting more and more tyrannical measures including blatant cheating and the use of wanton violence to retain power at all cost.

Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown born out of the mass prosperity mirage has not spare the Zanu PF ruling elite. Many Zanu PF grandees like the last Nathan Shamuyarira, Mugabe’s minister of propaganda for donkey years, died a pauper. Mugabe, in typical George Orwell Animal farm cynicism, painted Shamunyarira’s house the day he died – to hide the decades on rot and decay, a reflection of sorry state of those living there. As for the lesser mortals like the war veterans most of them number amongst the ¾ living on US$1.00 or less a day.

Zanu PF has been torn apart by the dog-eat-dog in fighting that has ranged on none-stop for the last five years. Zanu PF members are not just fighting for political power, they are fighting for economic survival because only those wielding power have access to the ever-shrinking national cake. Zanu PF’s dog-eat-dog fight is fuelled by the fear of poverty!

Without doubt Joseph Goebbels’ biggest lie was; “Germany is winning the war!” Zanu PF’s greatest lie has to be: “Zanu PF will deliver mass prosperity!”

When President Mnangagwa strolled onto the political stage with his broad smile and colourful scarf eight months ago he was cocky and cocksure he was going to finally deliver the mass prosperity the nation has been waiting for. His “Zimbabwe is open for business!” has failed to attract the flood of foreign investors he was cocksure would follow. This was just another Zanu PF lie, Zimbabwe is still an unstable pariah state ruled by thugs; investors do not do business with thugs.

“Is this country stable when you have an attempt of the life of the President?” asked BBC's Fergal Keane. He was referring to last Saturday’s bomb blast; he should have also included the military coup of last November, in which President Mnangagwa, by his own admission, played a key role.

By condoning, with their deafening silence, last November’s military coup the international community have not done Zimbabwe any favours. The world condoned the coup because they were relieved to finally see the vote rigging tyrant removed. By failing to fulfil his promise to hold free and fair elections President Mnangagwa has, per se, confirmed himself to be just another vote rigging tyrant. If the world accepted the removal of Mugabe with a coup they will also accept the removal of Mnangagwa with a bomb or some such violent means.

How can a country whose next change of president or government can only be through a coup, a bomb or some such undemocratic way be stable!

“Let me assure you that in the region Zimbabwe is the most stable nation!” replied President Mnangagwa. The web of Zanu PF lies knows no limit!

Even with the Germans being routed at all the fronts and German’s archenemy Joseph Stalin’s Red Army inside Berlin’s the city gates and the noose pulling tight, Goebbels continued his interminable gabble, “Germany is winning the war!”

Mnangagwa’s interminable gabble will be “Zimbabwe is stable and prosperous!” even as the nation sinks deeper and deeper into the abyss!

It does not matter how complex the web of lies may become or how many times the lie is repeated; sooner or later the truth, the reality, will always emerge. “Rene manyanga, hariputirwi!” as one would say in Shona.

When reality, denied for so long, finally emerge; it can be unbearable.

Adolf Hitler committed suicide on 30 April 1945. In accordance with Hitler's will, Goebbels succeeded him as Chancellor of Germany; he served one day in this post. The following day, Goebbels and his wife committed suicide, after poisoning their six children with cyanide.

Robert Gabriel Mugabe was booted out of office by his own henchmen after 37 years of corrupt and tyrannical rule. The tyrant’s chief enforcer, Emerson Mnangagwa, with the support of a gaggle of other thugs took over. Mnangagwa was nearly killed in bomb blast after less than 37 weeks in power! He can witter all he wants about Zimbabwe being stable, we all know that it is not. There will be another coup or bomb of that we can be certain, it is just a matter of when.