Mnangaghwa squanders US$2.75m on new cars for chefs whilst hospitals have no medicine - a consequence of povo's demigod mentality. W Mukori

 Yet, as we celebrate this small victory, the larger picture remains grim. Parirenyatwa, the country's largest referral hospital, still lacks essential cancer treatment equipment. The same is true for United Bulawayo Hospitals and Mpilo Central Hospital. Across the country, public hospitals are missing even the most basic supplies: bandages, gloves, functioning beds, medicines, and diagnostic tools. Families wait hours at private pharmacies for drugs that should be readily available in hospital dispensaries. Doctors and nurses perform daily miracles under conditions that would shock anyone outside the healthcare trenches.

And this is where the moral bankruptcy becomes starkly clear. While the Health Ministry struggles to fill decades-old gaps, the nation's political leadership is busy flaunting priorities in full display. Just yesterday, President Emmerson Mnangagwa handed out a fleet of brand-new vehicles to top Zanu-PF women's league executives, MPs, and members of Young Women for ED. The convoy included six Toyota Land Cruiser LC300s at roughly US$180 000 each, 21 Toyota Hilux double cabs at US$70 000 apiece, and five single-cab Hiluxes at US$40 000 each - a total of approximately US$2,75 million spent on cars for political actors.

The gap between what Zimbabweans need and what leaders choose to prioritise is not merely a matter of budgeting - it is a moral indictment. The country's top officials rarely step foot in public hospitals, instead flying abroad for check-ups, scans, and surgeries. They do not wait in Parirenyatwa queues, nor are their relatives turned away when radiotherapy machines break down. Insulated from the collapse of the system they oversee, urgency is absent. Cars come first. Patients, if they come at all, are secondary.”

You have hit the nail on the head right there: Mnangagwa and his ruling elite are squandering billions of dollars of the nation’s wealth (paid as tax or screamed off from the wholesale looting of the nation’s resources that gone into overdrive) on cars and other luxuries whilst our health care has all but collapsed because they “rarely step foot in public hospitals”.

So the pertinent question one should ask is: Why are the millions of ordinary Zimbabweans whose have as much right to a share of the nation’s wealth as the ruling elite and the ones who are suffering the consequences of the collapsed health care services saying nothing about this madness of misplaced priorities? 

The simple and short answer to that is, the millions of ordinary Zimbabweans are second class citizens whose needs and rights come a poor second after those of the the first class ruling elite citizens. What is more the masses have accept this political reality, whether they admit it or not is irrelevant. 

Indeed, the ruling elite have devised ways to make the masses believe the illusion that they too are first class citizens with the same freedoms and rights  including the meaningful say in the governance of the country and sharing of its wealth and resources. Every five years since independence the nation has gone through the ritual of elections where the people have a say on who will govern the nation and manage the distribution of resources. The elections have never ever been free, fair and credible. Never ever!

The ruling elite have got away with rigged elections because the people have never bothered to understand what constitute free and fair elections. It took nearly 20 years before the penny finally dropped that Zanu PF was rigging the elections and the nation called for democratic changes to stop Zanu PF rigging elections. 

Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends step forward promising to deliver the democratic changes the nation was dying for if they were elected into office. They named the party the Movement for Democratic Change, to underline the primary purpose of the party was to deliver change.

MDC leaders had their best chance ever to believe the democratic changes during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. They failed to implement even one reform. Not one!

Mugabe bribed the MDC leaders with the trapping of high office and they forgot about implementing reforms. 

Ever since the GNU debacle, MDC/CCC leaders have participated in flawed elections to give Zanu PF legitimacy for a share of the trappings of high office. MDC/CCC leaders have conned the people to participate in the flawed elections with idiotic lies like “I have plugged all vote rigging loop holes.” 

Why millions of Zimbabweans have failed to understand what constitute free and fair elections or to be so easily conned with idiotic lies is at the heart of why they have readily accept being a second class citizen. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to realise that Chamisa was lying about plugging vote rigging loop holes. Even now with Chamisa acknowledging Zanu PF rigged the elections, the very thing he said would not happen, there are many who still refuse that he lied to them. They believe Chamisa is a demigod who can do no wrong and accepting that he is a liar is simply a bridge too far. 

When you are that ignorant, naive and gullible to think a mere mortal a demigod accepting the demigods’ need for new cars and other luxuries is more important than you need for medicine and clean drinking water!