The root cause of Zimbabwe’s economic and political rot is that Zimbabweans have lost their work ethics, Dr Simba Makoni, former Zanu PF Minister of Finance during Mugabe’s days, told Trevor Ncube.
“We were very hard-working, we were very honest, we were very trustworthy, we were very caring and compassionate,” he said.
“We are not that anymore, not the majority of us anyway and certainly not those of us in leadership.
“We have changed because of our appetite for power and we have changed because of our love for material things.
“I think when we begin to associate a position of authority and responsibility with material wellbeing and acquisitions, that's when the rot settles.”
Rubbish!
The ordinary Zimbabwean out there is still a very hard-working, very honest, very trustworthy, very caring and compassionate human being. It is impossible to see these attributes in a country where unemployment has soared to 90%. What is the point of being hard working when there are no decent jobs to be had.
Where Zimbabweans have been able to get work; in SA, Botswana, UK, etc. they are held in high regard as hard working and honest.
Zimbabweans’ greatest weakness of their inability to think for themselves. We prefer to let others do the thinking for us and we then just follow the leader blindly like sheep. This is a forte the white colonialists, then Zanu PF and now MDC leaders have all exploited to their selfish benefit at great expense to us, the ordinary people.
Zanu PF leaders betrayed the people, for which many Zimbabweans had suffered and many lost their lives, by deny them their freedoms and rights including the right to a free vote, starting with the first vote in 1980, and even the right to life. Mugabe and now Mnangagwa and rest of the Zanu PF cronies have all turned out to be corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and murderous thugs. And the very fact they have managed to remain in power for 40 years and counting speaks volume of just how naive, gullible and thoughtless ordinary Zimbabweans are!
It took 20 years or so for most Zimbabweans to finally admit that Mugabe and his Zanu PF cronies were corrupt and murderous thugs and, to end the Zanu PF dictatorial strangle hold, the country needed to implement democratic changes. The people risked life and limb to elect Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends to deliver the democratic changes the nation was dying for.
MDC has been on the national political stage for the last 20 years, 5 of which in the 2008 to 2013 GNU, and yet has failed to implement even one reform. Mugabe bribe the MDC leaders with the trappings of high office and, as they say, the rest was history.
One would have thought after the nightmare of Zanu PF betrayal the people of Zimbabwe had learned the lesson and would be very careful and meticulous in their selection of the men and women the nation would entrust the important task of implementing the democratic reforms.
By electing Tsvangirai and company to champion the fight for free, fair and credible elections even after the MDC leaders had proven beyond all reasonable doubt during the 2008 GNU that they are breathtakingly corrupt, incompetent and sell-out; proved to the world that the people of Zimbabwe were not yet ready to end the curse of rigged elections and bad governance.
“How do we fix this?” asked Trevor Ncube.
“In this journey the first step is to acknowledge that we have a problem and unfortunately now in our country, certainly in our leadership, there is no acknowledgement that we have a problem or we have problems,” came the reply.
“In the few occasions we acknowledge that we have a problem, we pass the buck, it's not our fault, we didn't cause it, it was caused by somebody else. If it's in the country, it's our detractors from outside.
“So if you don't acknowledge, accept and recognise that you have a problem, you can't solve it.”
Gross mismanagement, rampant corruption and the crass lawlessness, which have earned Zimbabwe the pariah state status, are the root causes of Zimbabwe’s economic mess and political paralysis. But after 40 years of Zanu PF refusing to acknowledge these problems much less do something solve the problems; it should be obvious that Zanu PF itself is the number one problem.
Since Zanu PF has failed to solve the problems of mismanagement, etc. the nation should have found someone else who would. Indeed, the nation would have done so was it not for the fact that Zanu PF has rigged election to perpetuate its rule for the last 40 years. Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends were supposed to implement the reforms to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections.
Since MDC leaders have failed to get even one reform implemented in 20 years, the nation should be spending all its time, energy and treasure in getting the men and women who will get the reforms implemented.
Whilst Zimbabwe’s worsening economic meltdown left 90% of our people unemployed, the country’s basic services such as education and health care have all but totally collapsed after decades of under funding and millions of our people now live in abject poverty. The country’s ruling elite, from both sides of the political divide, are some of the wealthiest individuals on earth!
The poor are desperate to see an end to the economic meltdown, the ruling elite want the good times to continue!
Zanu PF will never implement the democratic reforms necessary for free and fair elections and risk losing the elections and it the absolute power, the wholesale looting and, worst of all, risk being held to account for all their past looting and murders.
No the solution to Zimbabwe’s economic mess and political paralysis not asking Zanu PF leaders to work hard much less to stop being corrupt. The solution is for the ordinary Zimbabweans themselves to put their thinking cap on and be masters of their own destiny. A thinking electorate will know what constitutes free, fair and credible elections and demand that the next elections are free and fair.
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In his world famous book, Animal Farm, George Orwell captured the very essence of why the Russian Revolution was a total failure. It started with the idealised utopia of "All animals are equal!" and ended with "All animals are equal and some are more equal than others!" And there were two forces that propelled the events: the insatiable greed of the pigs and the mind numbing stupidity of the rest of the animals!
One of the most stupid animals in Animal Farm was Boxer, the horse, he struggled to learn the first four letters of the alphabet. When he finally did and moved on to the next four, again he struggle to learn these. He persisted and learned them but only to discover he could not remember the first four letters. He gave up!
One of Boxer's maxims was "I will work harder!" A foolish maxim because the farm was doing badly not because he and the rest of the animals were not working hard. The farm was doing badly because the pigs were creaming off the wealth generated to feed their insatiable greed.
George Orwell will be turning in his grave to see there are other revolutions like the Zimbabwean revolution that took started with utopian "One man, one vote!" but have turned elections into an orgy of chaos and violence the ordinary people's greatest wish is if they could only be left alone.
Universal suffrage is often seen as a blessing, in Africa it is a curse! The same way diamond have become a curse because the wealth from diamonds have fuelled conflict in DRC and bankrolling the Zanu PF vote rigging juggernaut in Zimbabwe!
Orwell will be most upset to see that Boxer's maxim, we must all work very hard, is being proffered by someone like Dr Simba Makoni, a man with doctorate qualifications. And not one of those PhD awarded from a dodgy University to someone with no "O" level qualifications after 3 months works. But a PhD awarded by a renowned and well regarded Leicester Polytechnic in medicinal chemistry.
It is said you can take some people out of the ghetto but you cannot take the ghetto mentality out of them. Well not even a Leeds University first degree followed by a PhD from Leicester Polytechnic could take the Boxer mentality out of Simbarashe Herbert Stanley Makoni. The stupidity was in his DNA and it kept bubbling to the surface!
How someone so shallow, thick and slow ever got to be Minister of Finance is not surprise, after all Zimbabwe is a Banana Republic.
@ Ndlovu
“Nxe shit! How can Zanu acknowledge that they are the problem? They know they are the problem and they don't care. The same corruption that Simba is trying to peddle here is evidence. Simba u were a pillar in Zanu when they were starting, in the middle of it and to the end. How are they suddenly so evil only now. Some of us knew this in 1980! You Simba were in denial all those years. Even what u own now was built out the same rot! Right from 1980 u started persecuting Zapu. Don’t pretend you did not know. I was a school kid then and we all knew it. Just you shut up, you are equally filthy!”
Every thinking Zimbabwean out there who is poor and unemployed/ under employed must be fuming at Dr Makoni’s insulting insinuation that they are poor because they are stopped being a “very hard-working”! The country’s commerce and industry have all but totally collapsed. He himself admitted Zimbabwe is now importing even the most basic things we used to produce ourselves.
Of course, it is insulting to blame someone for not working hard when there is no gainful employment to offer them. It is decades of Zanu PF misrule that has left the nation in economic ruins and it is rich for a Zanu PF thug to therefore blame the victims of the regime’s misrule for the mess!
“We Were Fooled, Into Believing That “criminals” Around Mugabe Were Responsible For Our Misery”
This is true but after 40 years of being fooled again and again one has to asked; Are we being fooled or are we fools! One cannot fool a fool; it is as meaningless as filling a cup that is full already.
Those who believe the Zanu PF thugs who stage the November 2017 coup were doing the nation any favours were naive and gullible fools who refuse to open their eyes and see what is there before their own eyes. There is no one more blind than he who has eyes but refuse to open them.
For all his first class university education Dr Simba Makoni is a man of little intellectual talent. He left Zanu PF years ago but the Zanu PF mentality that Zanu PF ruling elite are special and that they are alone must rule the country is unshakable. Dr Makoni ready acknowledges that Zanu PF ruling elite are in denial of what the root causes of the nation's problems are and, the odd occasion they admit the problem, they blame some one else.
Dr Makoni's solution is that we must redouble our efforts, work very hard, in whatever we can work on to increase the wealth to mitigate the criminal waste through mismanagement and corruption, number one. And number two, we must work harder on getting Zanu PF leaders to acknowledge the problems.
Of course this is just a fool's errant! The country is in economic ruins because of the mismanagement and corruption and not because the ordinary people stopped working hard. Second, corrupt is a problem to us the ordinary people but not to the Zanu PF ruling elite who are filthy rich because there is corruption. They do not want corruption stopped and so they pretend there is no corruption.
Zanu PF thugs are taking us the ordinary people for fools and only a first class village idiot can still fail to see what is going on here even with the benefit of 40 years of hindsight.
The solution to Zimbabwe's economic and political crisis is for the nation to implement the democratic reforms and restore all the individual freedoms and rights including the right of every Zimbabwean to a meaningful say in the governance of the country.
Zimbabwe must debunk the country's dysfunctional political system, masquerading as a multi-party democracy, that has created a parasitic ruling elite. Both Zanu PF and MDC leaders cannot reform the present political system because they each have an invested interest in keeping it.
Dr Makoni is not hungry to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship but only rename and remodel it in his own image!
@ Mzila
“Outgoing United States (US) president, Donald Trump and Zimbabwe's opposition MDC Alliance leader, Nelson Chamisa both refused to concede defeat, in their separate elections. The world is surprised by Trump who has revealed his dictatorial tendencies and trying to force people to accept him as the winner of the just ended election in the United States of America.”
You forgot to mention that in America it was only Trump who disputed the elections and failed to provide the evidence. In Zimbabwe everyone with any democratic credentials disputed the process and he result. ZEC failed to produce a verified voters’ roll and so votes count could not be traced or verified.
In its own affidavit to the Constitutional Court ZEC admitted it vote count was based on V11 form figure from all the over 11 000 Polling Stations although only 90% were available and attached to their affidavit. Without the V11 forms it was impossible to verify the figures and hence the reason ZEC had three different totals vote counts.
Why the Constitutional Court did not demand a thorough investigation into why ZEC had failed to produce a verified voters’ roll, what happened to the missing V11 forms, etc. is not a mystery at all. The Constitutional Court judges knew the whole election process was flawed and full of glaring illegalities and so they chose not to notice anything was amiss.
It should be remember that justice George Chiweshe had ruled just months earlier that the November 2017 military coup was “legal, justified and constitutional”. Of course, Zimbabwe’s judiciary is corrupt and captured and there to save Zanu PF above the nation.
Zanu PF blatantly rigged the July 2018 elections, the party is illegitimate and all attempts to compare Zimbabwe’s rigged elections with America’s free, fair and credible elections is just plain foolish!
MDC A should have never participated in the July 2018 knowing the process was flawed. They did out of greed; they knew Zanu PF was giving away a few gravy train seats. Chamisa was making a farce over one trivial aspect of the election process just to pressure Mnangagwa to concede more of the spoils of power. Chamisa has been gunning for a new GNU arrangement in which he and a few other MDC A leaders get cabinet positions.
Chamisa his MDC A and the rest of the opposition are going to participate in the 2023 elections with no reforms in place for the same reason as before -greed. No stone will be left unturned to make sure the whole world knows that these opposition politicians are sell-outs. With the opposition discredited it will be plain as day that Zanu PF itself is illegitimate!
Zanu PF must not get away with rigging the 2023 elections. Mark my words!
@ Zimvigil
“We in the diaspora are glad that, despite the Covid crisis, remittances sent back home have risen sharply and now contribute some US$658 million a year to the economy.”
Zimbabweans in the diaspora have done a great job in helping their relatives back home. This is one area every Zimbabwean, wherever they are, has every reason to drum his/her chest with pride!
However one has to ask: Besides sending our relatives money, could we have done more? The answer has to be yes, we should have done more.
No one can deny that the economic situation in Zimbabwe is worse today than it was 20 years ago when the trickle of Zimbabweans leaving the country grew into a flood. What have Zimbabweans in the diaspora done these last 20 years to stop the political rot that forced them to leave the country? The rot has continued and so the answer is evidently precious little!
I have but total contempt for Zimbabweans in the diaspora who did not even lift a finger to protest Zanu PF ridding roughshod over the people, denying them their freedoms and rights. These people said nothing whilst they were in Zimbabwe because they feared the regime, they said. So what is the excuse now!
Then there are the Zimbabweans in the diaspora who have continued to give their blind support of Zanu PF. If they are so happy with what Zanu PF is doing why have they left the country?
MDC has enjoyed a lot of political support from Zimbabweans in the diaspora. Why these people have continued to support MDC even after the party’s leaders sold-out and failed to implement even one reform is a mystery. The people in the diaspora have access to all the information and there is no excuse why they do know what the 2008 GNU was about and that MDC leaders sold-out.
Zimbabwe is in a serious economic and political mess, a man-made mess, a Zanu PF - made mess. MDC leaders had the chance to stop Zanu PF misrule but failed because they sold-out.
And we Zimbabweans, in the diaspora and back in Zimbabwe, have played our party in this mess by blindly supporting these corrupt, incompetent and, in Zanu PF’s case, vote rigging and murderous thugs. If the country is ever to get out of this mess then we must snap out of our sloth-like mental slumber. A healthy and functioning democracy demands an informed and vigilant electorate and this naive and gullible one who hardly knows their left hand from their right!
Special thank you to all the members who sacrificed their services and attended to our PEC meeting today at Chinhoyi Party Office.
It’s thru such sacrifices that is taking our Provincial politics’ to a national political status level, great meeting, great minds.
God bless and hope you have all travelled well back to your bases.
This time five years ago MDC-T was going through the gears preparing for the 2018 elections but in parallel to these preparations the party was also involved in NERA.
The National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) was launch with the usual ceremony and fanfare and the nation was assure it was going to deliver the democratic reforms necessary to ensure the next elections were free, fair and credible. The country was not going into another election with out first implementing the reforms. It was all hot air, of course.
Zanu PF continue with its own preparations for the 2018 elections and completely ignore NERA. The party knew that MDC-T and all the other opposition parties calling for reforms will participate in the coming elections even without a single reform in place.
Through NERA, at least MDC-T and its opposition partners were paying lip service to reforms and free and fair elections. Not this time! MDC A is preparing for the 2023 elections and will participate with no reforms in place.
So Mnangagwa and company know they will have their usual carte blanche dictatorial powers to rig the 2023 elections. And by participating MDC A and the rest in the opposition camp will give credibility to the flawed process and legitimacy to the result.
After 40 years of rigged elections, the people of Zimbabwe deserve to see an end to this charade. Zimbabwe needs a good government and will never get it as long as Zanu PF is allowed to rig elections.
MDC leaders had the golden opportunity to stop Zanu PF rigging elections by implementing the democratic reforms during the 2008 GNU, They sold-out and failed to get even one reform implemented. And by participating in flawed elections MDC A and the other sell-out opposition politicians are giving Zanu PF the cover to continue rigging the elections.
Like it or not Zimbabwe will never ever have free, fair and credible elections as long as Zanu PF has partners will to play along for the sake of a few gravy train seats. It is incumbent on every thinking Zimbabwean out there to make sure those opposition parties that continue to participate in these flawed elections are exposed for what they really are - discredited sell-outs.
After 40 years of rigged elections, we must break this mould! Those participate in 2023 elections with no reforms must be discredited. A discredited opposition will not give Zanu PF legitimacy.
MDC Alliance Secretary General and MP for Kuwadzana East, Hon Charlton Hwende has embraced the One Million Voices Campaign.
With no democratic reforms in place we all know that Zanu PF will rig the 2023 elections just as the party has rigged other elections in the past. MDC A and the rest in the opposition camp have participated in these flawed elections because they also knew that Zanu PF gives away a few gravy train seat as bait to entice the opposition to participate.
MDC leaders like Charlton Hwende, Tendai Biti, etc. have fought hard to make sure they get to stand in the urban constituencies, the gravy train seats Zanu PF often give away. They all avoid, if they can, contesting rural seats where the Zanu PF vote rigging juggernaut has reduced the rural vote into nothing short of medieval serfs beholden to the overbearing Zanu PF landlords.
When we say we want free, fair and credible elections this should not only mean urban voters but rural voters too! It is totally unacceptable that Zanu PF is being allowed to rig elections and deny millions of rural voters their right to a meaningful vote. Rural voters must not be sacrificed on the later of greed!
People like Hwende, Biti, etc. have not complained of Zanu PF rigging the elections because as long as they win the few give away seats they don't care the elections were rigged. They don't even care that 3 million Zimbabweans are denied the vote, there is no verified voters' roll, etc. This nonsense must be stopped! We cannot keep on sacrificing the whole nation to feed the greed of the few!
“A cursory study of the land reform process shows massive and existence of leases of acquired land to former white farmers,” Biti said.
“Mashonaland West and the Midlands provinces have the highest number of white lessees. That being the case, the land reform is now a joke. The creation of black land-owning rentier class whose sole function is to extract rent from land is a negation of land reform programme.
“It is a true reflection of how lost and how vacuous Zanu PF under (President) Emmerson (Mnangagwa) has become. This parasitic class of landlords must be expunged.”
Getting the agricultural sector back to be as productive as it was before the farm seizure is key to getting Zimbabwe back on track a.s.a.p. Zanu PF with its command agriculture and now this chaotic lease arrangement will never get the sector back on track.
The number one task for Zimbabwe is to get the democratic reforms implemented and have the country hold its first ever free, fair and credible elections. Once this is done the country can finally move on and attend to other pressing matters like the land issue!
The MISA director argued the new broadcasting licences will entrench Zanu PF’s grip on the broadcasting sector in the country.
“So we are in a process of the widening of the stronghold of the ruling elitists in the industry and shutting down any prospects of those holding dissenting views ever having a chance to be licensed to express and broadcast in the country. This is a sad development in our country,” said Moyo.
He also accused the government of deliberately failing to amend the Broadcasting Services Act in order to protect the ruling party honchos.
“That is why the government is not eager to finalise the amendment of the Broadcasting Services Act. They are preferring to partially open the airwaves through government executive orders such as statutory instruments so that they can protect ruling party elitists’ interests in the industry rather than liberalise the sector,” he said.
Eight other applicants were rejected.
They included Heart and Soul TV owned by media mogul, Trevor Ncube, as well as AB Communications owned by another media entrepreneur Supa Mandiwanzira. The two are also former journalists.
If the country is going to carryout reforms piece-meal then nothing of substance will ever be accomplish for a generation or more. What the nation need to do is get Zanu PF to step down so that a new body is appointed and given the primary task of implementing the democratic reforms to ensure the full restoration of all the individual freedoms and rights. The reforms will then be followed up with the holding of free, fair and credible elections.
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