“The discovery of huge deposits of diamonds in Marange, eastern Zimbabwe, in the mid-2000s came at a time when Zimbabwe was facing crises on multiple fronts,” said Global Witness in its recent report.
“However, rather than injecting much-needed life into an economy in severe decline, Zimbabwe’s diamonds were ruthlessly exploited by the elite under the Mugabe-led government and came to be far better known for their association with human rights abuses, corruption and looting.”
This is very true, the discovery of diamonds has enabled Zanu PF to bankroll extensive and very expensive vote rigging and vote buying schemes that have help the regime remain in power. So instead of the bounty from diamonds being a blessing, povo’s salvation, it has become the people’s curse as it paid well those keeping them in servitude!
In a less guarded moment in 2016, the then President Mugabe admitted the country had been “swindled” of $15 billion worth of diamond revenue. He never arrested any of the swindlers.
"As we focus on recovering our economy, we must shed misbehaviours and acts of ill-discipline which have characterised the past. Acts of corruption must stop,” said the incoming President Mnangagwa after seizing power from Mugabe in November 2017 coup.
Mnangagwa has been in power for over a year now and has yet to arrest even one of the swindlers and recover the first dollar of the looted fortune. Indeed, the looting has never stopped as former Minister of Finance, Patrick Chinamasa, told parliament government continue to receive 1/6th of expected diamond revenue an year after Mugabe’s confession. The new Minister has never reported of any significant change.
Global Witness is well aware of the continued looting in Marange and has ventured to recommend steps to end the looting.
“To help to achieve a transparent, accountable and well-governed diamond sector,” concluded Global Witness, “we are urging the Zimbabwean government to take much-needed steps including:
- Making all beneficial owners of diamond companies, and any private investors, public;
- Publishing detailed information about all diamond mining related revenue flows, disaggregated by company, year, and type of revenue stream;
- Publication of any joint venture contracts signed with private investors;
- Requiring risk based supply chain due diligence by companies trading in Marange diamonds;
- Preventing the risk of the security sector receiving off-budget funding through control or ownership positions in diamond companies that is free from parliamentary oversight.”
Global Witness’ report is available at www.globalwitness.org or via Spotlight Zimbabwe.
As noted above, President Mnangagwa has done nothing stamp out corruption not because he did not know what to do ‘to achieve a transparent, accountable and well-governed diamond sector”. He has been at the heart of the Mugabe administration for the last 37 years; he knows the swindlers, how they were swindling the diamonds, how much, etc. etc.; and would have rounded them all up within days, if he had so wished. He did not because he lacked the political will to do it.
“You can’t expect us to reform ourselves out of power,” boasted Professor Jonathan Moyo, Mugabe’s most prolific propagandist and strategist and Zanu PF Minister and Politburo member.
As we know, Mugabe, Moyo and a few others Zanu PF G40 faction members were forced out of power on 15 November 2017 military coup. So they were “reformed” out of power by the gun, so to speak!
The wholesale looting of Zimbabwe’s resources, especially of the Marange and Chiadzwa diamonds, have bankrolled Zanu PF’s vote rigging and vote buying schemes. “You can’t expect Zanu PF to stop looting, to achieve a well-governed diamond sector and, most significantly, thus to reform itself out of power!” to paraphrase Professor Moyo.
By blatantly rigging the recent elections, President Mnangagwa and his junta regime have nailed their colours for all to see. The looting continues. Saques continuar! Vote rigging continues! Voto fraudulento continua!
This nation has waited for the last 38 years for Zanu PF thugs to do the right and honourable thing of stopping the looting; holding free, fair and credible elections; etc. Instead the looting, vote rigging, etc. have all continued and even got worse; dragging the nation deeper and deeper into this hell-on-earth we now find ourselves stuck in.
The only realistic hope of putting an end to these cursed Zanu PF cultures of looting and voto fraudulento is for the nation to finally grasp the nettle and demand that President Mnangagwa and his junta step down from high office. The regime rigged the recent elections, as all the respectable election observers have readily confirmed, and so the regime is illegitimate.
We have allowed Zanu PF to loot and rig elections and get away with it setting a dangerous precedence and one we must now put right. No one who rigs elections and is, per se, illegitimate will be allowed to govern.
Those who rig elections are committing high treason and instead of being rewarded with high office they will from henceforth be punished! This is the new precedence we want to set and one worthy of our resolve to make Zimbabwe a democratic nation governed by competent and accountable leaders!
4 comments:
With the majority of the citizenry getting poorer by the day owing to the biting economic crisis, the cash-strapped government of President Emmerson Mnangagwa has splurged over $2 million on top-of-the-range Land Rover Discovery vehicles for Cabinet ministers.
The 'Daily News on Sunday' revealed that these fuel-guzzlers were acquired at an estimated cost of $107 000 each, translating to a combined total of over $2,14 million for the 20 full Cabinet ministers handpicked by Mnangagwa in September this year.
Dubbed in motoring circles as a monster car, the new Land Rover Discovery has many exclusive signature features that make it a preserve for the rich.
Mnangagwa’s continued stay in power depends on the continued support of the rich and powerful, the ordinary people have no political muscle of any kind. The Chiefs helped to corral the rural votes delivering the 60% or so votes for the party. Last week the Chiefs met in Kadoma to make they demands for a job well-done. Mnangagwa has promised them land and better homesteads fit for Chiefs.
Zanu PF parliamentary candidates received more votes that Mnangagwa, the party’s presidential candidate, proof some Zanu PF leaders instructed their supporters to vote for some one else, proof there are Zanu PF leaders out there who are not happy with him. So he has to go the extra mile to try to win them over by buying them cars, etc. - the only way these Zanu PF thugs understand.
The Zanu PF MPs and other senior party leaders will be very pleased to hear Mnangagwa has splashed millions buying posh cars for cabinet members they know he will not dare to be stingy with them!
Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown is has the ruling elite is a panic because many of them are now live in abject poverty just like the 75% of the population. Those who still consider themselves lucky enough to still have some political muscle are flexing the muscle to help number one - themselves and no one else. Hence the reason Zanu PF leaders are making unashamed demands for themselves and Mnangagwa has no choice but to pamper them even at the expense of making the poor even more poorer!
President Mnangagwa and his apologist have made a big song and dance about the "new dispensation, the Second Republic" and its "zero tolerance on corruption" and yet it has failed to arrest even one of the $15 billion diamond revenue swindlers. I agree with you that the wholesale looting, resulting in the $15 billion swindled, is still going on to this day.
It is no surprise that Global Witness wanted the security sector actors to have no extra income coming form the diamond mining, the watchdog organisation know the country's security sector top brass have been key players in the wholesale looting. The regime did not dare go after Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri for all the millions of dollars he made from the Police diamond looting because they knew he would reveal the names of those in the Army who too made a killing from the army's diamond concession.
The various Zanu PF factions are fighting each other for control of the party but each also know that they worse thing that can ever happen to them is for Zanu PF to lose power altogether. As much as the Lacoste faction of President Mnangagwa has gone after the G40, Mugabe faction; he has always know that they have a lot of dirty in common.
I totally agree, the only sure way to put an end to the wasteful looting of resource by the Zanu PF dictatorship is to force it to step down following the rigged elections. All hope of Zanu PF reforming itself out of power is a pipe dream because the party thugs have too much to lose to ever do that, especially given the country's serious economic problems!
@ Dr Masimba Mavaza
Dr Masimba Mavaza you do write a lot of trash and this was no exception, which explains why Zimpapers have given your nonsense a lot of column space.
“This where the losing party pushes an agenda of sabotaging the economy in a strong willed evil to force a GNU. After realising that they will not be able to win they make a ploy to cause an economic panic which will trigger unrest and force a unity of some sort,” you argue.
This is nonsense, as much as Chamisa and his MDC Alliance friends would be flattered to hear they are capable of causing “economic panic”; the truth is the economic meltdown the country is facing is all Zanu PF’s own doing. ED’s reckless spending throughout the election campaign period meant the country had no foreign currency soon there after triggering the shortage of cash, forex, food, fuel, medicine, etc.
Decades of living from hand to mouth meant the country had no forex reserves and hence the reason the shortages are not going away.
The worst mistake Zanu PF did by far was to rig the recent elections and thus confirm that Zimbabwe was still a pariah state ruled by corrupt and vote rigging thugs. So all the talk of Zimbabwe being “a new dispensation open for business” was all hot air. The much hoped for flood of investors has never materialised because investors do not do business in a pariah state.
By rigging the elections President Mnangagwa killed the country’s hopes of any meaningful recovery. Chamisa is only milking the situation for his only selfish advantage.
Even if Chamisa had acknowledge Mnangagwa as the winner of the rigged 30 July 2018 elections. And ED, for his part, had agreed to the formation of a GNU or conferred the leader of the opposition title on Chamisa complete with the ministerial limo, pay package, etc. The country’s economic meltdown would have taken place still because none of that would have change the political reality that Zanu PF blatantly rigged the elections!
Zanu PF rigged the elections and the only way out of this mess is for ED and the junta to step down, illegitimate regimes are a curse to any nation but especially one that has had one for 38 years and counting!
The government is considering requests by players in the oil industry who are seeking authority to sell fuel in foreign currency, the industry regulator has said.
Service stations do not seem to be coping and fuel queues are now a common sight countrywide.
This is just a case in which have moved on and government’s decision on the matter is now academic since a number of garages are already selling fuel to those with US$. Pharmacists, private hospitals, private schools and many other businesses are refusing payment in Bond Notes and RTGS and insisting on payment in US$. The tragedy is those with no economic muscle to demand payment in US$ are the ones who are suffering the most from this. The poorest of the poor are the ones who are being forced to accept Bond Notes at the official exchange rate - take it or leave it and end up being short change every time!
The only way out is for Zanu PF to step down so the country can have an interim administration task to implement the reforms and hold fresh elections. This economic mess is not going away but is getting worse by the day!
President Mnangagwa must step down now and not have to wait until people start to die for lack of medicine, hunger, etc. although they have the regime’s worthless Bond Notes in their pockets!
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