“Same shit …. different island!” A vintage
Caribbean Tourist T-shirt depicting a ganja smoking black Rasta with his trade
mark dreadlocks complete with red/yellow/green/black vest greeting a dumfounded
white tourist with the middle finger salute.
President Mnangagwa and his regime have wanted
the whole to know that 15 November 2017, the day of the military that deposed
Robert Mugabe from power after 37 years as Zanu PF top dog, was a day Zimbabwe
was completely transformed. Hence the reason the regime has called post
November coup period “new era, new
dispensation, new Zimbabwe, etc., etc.” President Mnangagwa has led from the
front in the singing of “Zimbabwe is open for business!” dawn and sunset
chorus, appropriately attired in the multi coloured scarf.
After a whole year of this ‘new dispensation’ one
can now confident go around Zimbabwe wearing a T-shirt with caricatures of
Mugabe dozing (his favourite occupation) and Mnangagwa appropriately attired in
the rainbow scarf stuffed with ballot paper with the caption “Same shit …. Different
thug!”
Chaos, looting, vote rigging, lawlessness, politically
motivated violence and murders, criminal waste of human and material resources,
tragic human suffering and deaths, medieval disease such as cholera, hunger, unemployment,
hyper-inflation, etc., etc.; these are all familiar Mugabe era problems. They
are all still here in Mnangagwa’s era. Nothing has changed. Nothing!
“PRESIDENT Emmerson Mnangagwa's bold
declarations that the currency exchange market operating in dark alleys driving
Zimbabweans into penury is a national security issue could not have come at any
better time,” News Day commented.
“We are heartened that Mnangagwa has finally broken his silence on an emotive issue that has the potential to dent the little goodwill the country still has.”
“We are heartened that Mnangagwa has finally broken his silence on an emotive issue that has the potential to dent the little goodwill the country still has.”
President Mnangagwa is doing what he has been
doing ever since he assumed office – blundering from pillar to post, as Mugabe
before him has done. Yes Zimbabweans are being fleeced by these foreign
currency dealers but when these people are given the choice of either deal with
the black-market traders or starve to death; it is easy to see why they are
frequenting the dark alleys.
If the truth be told, it is the Banks and the
regime itself that are fleecing the ordinary people by pretending the
individual income and bank balance is in US$ and yet will never pay-out in US$.
They pay-out in Bond Notes or RTGS at the
official 1;1 exchange rate knowing that no one else out in the real world
accept payment for their goods or services at the same rate.
If President Mnangagwa is serious about driving
the foreign currency black market dealers out of business then he should
instruct the Banks to pay people in US$ if they so wish at the official
exchange rate!
Zimbabwe is using multiple currencies and so it
is perfectly legal for anyone to have US$, Rand, Bond Notes, etc., to pay in
anyone or any mix of currency, trade the currency, etc., etc. There is no legal
basis for harassing or arresting anyone for carrying any transaction using the
any legal currency.
If President Mnangagwa wants to arrest people
for selling and buying US$ then he must first take the US$ out of the
multi-currency basket.
During the hyper-inflation years of 2000 to
2008 only the Z$ was legal tender and only the Banks were allowed to trade in
foreign currency. The Chefs got filthy rich – Gono printed money to buy foreign
currency from individuals at the official ridiculously low exchange rate from
the people gave the Chefs the forex who then sold it at ridiculously high black
market rate and breath-taking profits!
“Our place at the table of progressive nations
that we seek to claim after years in the wilderness rests on the actions we
take on issues like this one,” continued the News Day editorial.
Too late mate, after blatantly rigging the
recent elections President Mnangagwa has reaffirmed that Zimbabwe is still a
pariah state ruled by corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and ruthless thugs.
Indeed, expect for Mugabe and one or two others, it is the same corrupt, incompetent,
etc. thugs who ruled the roost before 15 November 2017 who are ruling the roost
still doing the same foolish things - same shit … same thugs …. different day!
9 comments:
Zimbabwe will never have any meaningful economic recovery and political stability until the country deals with the scourge of vote rigging!
LOCAL commercial banks and senior figures within the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) are either involved in fanning the black market activities that reached alarming levels last week or incompetent to the point of failing their mandate, it has emerged.
Reports yesterday showed that arrests of high-profile people were imminent after President Emmerson Mnangagwa convened a security cluster meeting to deal with the currency parallel market that wreaked havoc last week, with the United States dollar at some point trading at $1 to $6 with the surrogate bond note or electronic transfers.
In an update on the state of the economy, Mnangagwa yesterday warned the black market had become a threat to national security, which demands a “bold response”.
Any talk of meaningful economic recovery whilst the country remains a pariah state ruled by incompetent, corrupt and vote rigging thugs will remain a pipedream.
Zimbabwe has become a nation of consumers who have to buy most of their needs using foreign currency and has not been exporting enough to pay for the imports. The shortage of foreign currency is a consequence of the country’s skewed trading deficit. Instead of dealing with the problem of how to increase exports and reduce imports, especially for of food which the country has a net exporter once upon a time, Mnangagwa is looking for scapegoats, bank managers, foreign currency dealers, etc.
We need competent leaders not these arrogant vote rigging thugs who have imposed themselves on the nation for 38 years and counting!
Mnangagwa rigged the recent elections, he and his regime are illegitimate. They must step down and this is now the single most pressing matter on the national agenda. Whilst corrupt and incompetent leaders like Mnangagwa remain in power, nothing of any significance can ever be accomplished. Nothing!
“I call on all of us to tread back into the real economy, away from the current practice, where currencies become key commodities that transact in dark markets, controlled by shadowy figures,” said Mnangagwa.
No the worst “shadowy figure” controlling the nation today and for the last 38 years was none other than you and your Zanu PF cronies.
In 2014 then vice president Joice Mujuru and her acolytes in the so-called Gamatox faction were purged in brutal fashion, leaving Mnangagwa’s Team Lacoste locked in a bitter power tussle with Mugabe’s G40.
The latter boasted then First Lady Grace among its members before the November put paid to her ambitions to take over from her husband.
The war veterans warned those behind the current economic chaos such as street money traders, party provincial leaders that they would not be tolerated
These rogue war veterans should just confine themselves to fighting the unending Zanu PF factional wars and leave everyone else out of it. What do these morons know about the economy. Street money traders are not trading stolen money and are not forcing anyone to buy or sell money to them. They are no more guilty of a crime than any other street vendor. We are not going to have these Zanu PF thugs dictating who can do what and when.
The rogue war veterans are back following their deployment in the rural areas to intimidate the voters. For years they have done Mugabe’s dirty bidding and now they are doing Mnangagwa’s bidding all at our expense. We must stand up to these morons and never allow them to take over our lives!
“Now that the same things that we as ERC and others have said before, have now been repeated by credible election groups who watched the 2018 elections at the invitation of Zimbabwean authorities, it is expected that the new administration’s attitude towards electoral reforms must change,” Chimhini said in a statement.
“Sadly, attempts to compel election authorities to adopt the necessary changes to improve elections in the past have fallen on deaf ears and have largely been ignored.”
This is nauseating nonsense, when has ERC demanding meaningful democratic reforms?
People like Mnangagwa and Mugabe before him consider themselves as the Lord Almighty's gift to the nation and the world, what ever they do or say is divinely inspired and therefore can never be wrong. To even question what they say or do is sacrilege. The country is up to her eye-balls in the shit they have produced in their 38 years in power and still they believe they can do no wrong! How is that for arrogance and stupidity.
Zimbabwe is in this mess because for 38 years the country has been ruled by arrogant and stupid village idiots. This country is got getting out of the shit hole until we do something to remove the arrogant village idiots in power today and make sure it is hard for other village idiots to take their place.
I agree, the very fact that Mnangagwa is wasting time, resources and God knows what else pursuing the foreign currency dealers, Bank staff, etc. and not addressing the real underlying causes of the economic meltdown only service to underline just how arrogant and stupid he is! The sooner the nation can get rid of ED and his junta the sooner the country can start the work to ensure the next and all future elections are free, fair and credible!
It is also understood that President Mnangagwa last week summoned his security cluster and discussed the matter, paving way for the imminent arrests of high-profile figures who are suspected of masterminding black market activities.
In that meeting were Defence Minister Oppah Muchunguri-Kashiri, Home Affairs Minister Cain Mathema, State Security Minister Owen Ncube and Director-General of the Central Intelligence Organisation Ambassador Isaac Moyo. Also present were Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Dr Misheck Sibanda, and his deputy Mr George Charamba.
This followed a sudden spike in black market currency trading that saw the bond note trading as low as 1:6 to the US dollar at some point, a spike in prices of basic commodities at retail point, panic buying of fuel that resulted in long queues at service stations, and propagation of angst within the citizenry by opponents of President Mnangagwa's Government with a view to sparking street protests.
Talking of one barking up the wrong tree what we had is all these high ranking government leaders all howling like a pack of wild dogs at the moon. So all these individuals all agree that the fault is with those selling the foreign currency in the street. They all went out and issued instructions to their staff and soon the whole government machinery was on the hunt for street dealers.
Not only is government wasting time and resources chasing shadows they but worse still the real cause of the economic meltdown are being left untouched and things are getting worse than ever. With unemployment a nauseating 90% and all the other economic indicators showing the same dangerous high levels Zimbabwe cannot afford to waste time and resources chasing shadows!
Mnangagwa calls the forex dealers a security threat and his cabinet agrees with that nonsense! We are in serious trouble, is all I can say! It is Mnangagwa and his cabinet who are the real and immediate threat to Zimbabwe.
Thousands of job seekers broke a makeshift fence made of zinc sheets today when they tried to gain entrance to Egodini Contact Centre where development company Terracotta is beginning to recruit workers for the mall project.
"Give us jobs. We want jobs now," the desperate job seekers, who started camping at the site yesterday, shouted to authorities who tried to engage them from behind the locked gate of the centre
But today at least 5000 job seekers stampeded the centre until riot police with dogs had to be called contain the anxious crowds which swelled over the course of the morning. But without fear, some youths even screamed to tell police that they were ready to die for the jobs.
With unemployment standing at 90% plus one can see why the people are desperate to find a job, any job! The question this nation must answer is why did we allow Zanu PF to drag us into such a mess, so deep and for so long. Unemployment has been 80% plus for nearly 20 years now! 20 years!
A list with 26 names including some high profile people alleged to be black market foreign currency dealers and cash suppliers has surfaced on social media.
There are reports that local commercial banks and senior figures within the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) are either involved in fanning the black market activities that reached alarming levels last week or incompetent to the point of failing their mandate.
The regime needs scapegoats to blame and punish for its own failures. The tragic reality is that the dealers have not committed any criminal office because in a country using multi-currency it is not illegal sell one currency for another!
Worse still, the arrest of the dealers will do nothing to address the real underlying cause of the foreign currency shortage, our skewered balance of payment - our over dependence on imports without earning the foreign currency through exports.
Zimbabwe's economy was strong once upon a time and things have gone off the rail under Zanu PF. In the new dispensation people were told things would be different, the gross mismanagement, the corruption, the scapegoating, etc. are still there and so too is the economic meltdown.
Zimbabweans have yet to wake up to the economic reality of their situation and until we do there is no hope of any meaningful economic recovery. For example, Zimbabwe has just had elections which Zanu PF blatantly rigged and thus confirming the country is still a pariah state ruled by thugs. Many Zimbabweans have taken the rigged elections as if this is just water off a duck's back. It has yet to dawn on them that the foreign investors, many accept we need to help kickstart the economic recovery, will not invest in a pariah state.
So the nation is stuck in this hopeless situation in which they keep hoping the country can still have the desperately needed economic recovery without doing anything to end the Zanu PF dictatorship behind the economic meltdown.
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