ED says USA is ill informed and making irrational decision - be informed, implement reforms or ship out N Garikai

“The United States should make decisions on Zimbabwe from an informed position and stop reading only the text of opposition political parties that are afraid of elections, President Mnangagwa has said,” reported the Herald.

“He said the US, which last week proposed multiple prescriptive reforms as a precondition for re-engagement with Zimbabwe, should have an appreciation of the situation on the ground to make rational decisions.”

What the Americans are saying is if you, President Mnangagwa, are serious about holding free, fair and credible elections then you and your government must make sure you have a free media, you keep the Army out of the election process, etc., etc. Of course, the American are very well informed because these are the same reforms that SADC spelt at the beginning of the GNU and many Zimbabweans have been demanding for years.

The Americans certainly have a great “appreciation of the situation on the ground”. They appreciate that Zimbabwe will never get out of the economic mess and political paralysis the nearly four decades of Zanu PF corrupt and tyrannical rule have landed the nation into. Implementing the reforms to allow for the holding of free, fair and credible elections is the cure to Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown and sickness of bad governance.

No one is being fooled by President Mnangagwa’s double talk. He has been promising free and fair elections and yet has refused to implement the reforms to make this possible.

Indeed, he has paid the Chiefs their traditional bribe so they can carry out their usual task of intimidating and harassing rural voters to make sure they vote for Zanu PF. He has appointed a well-known thug, Engelbert Rugeje, Zanu PF Political Commissar, deployed the war veterans and 2 000 to 5 000 to work with the Chiefs for the same purpose, etc.

If President Mnangagwa was not afraid of holding free, fair and credible elections then why has not implemented the reforms?

The attempts by President Mnangagwa and his apologist to link the lifting of Western imposed sanctions to implementing the democratic reforms and holding free and fair elections is an insult to every thinking Zimbabwean for four reasons:

a)    Zanu PF has always dismissed MDC leaders as “puppets of the West”. Zanu PF must stop cherry; why is it when it comes to imposing the sanctions the puppet is now accused of pulling the strings.

b)    When it comes to demanding the democratic reforms, it is not what the opposition say that matters but what ordinary Zimbabweans have been demanding but ignored by the regime for the last 38 years. The opposition, especially the corrupt and incompetent MDC politicians do not represent the common people; not since they sold-out on implementing regime during the GNU. The only reason many Zimbabweans are not aware that MDC leaders are sell-outs is because there is no freedom of expression and a free media.

c)    Implementing the democratic reforms will restore the people’s basic freedoms and human rights including the right to free and fair elections and the right to life itself.

d)    The right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country is the key to ending the Zanu PF dictatorship and getting a democratic and competent government. It is intolerable that Zanu PF has resisted all demands for reforms on the foolish notion that the regime “cannot reform itself out of office” as if it has a right to deny the people their freedoms and rights. The linkage of democratic reforms to sanctions is an insult; our human freedoms and right are inalienable rights not to be bargained over like mangoes!

No, President Mnangagwa it is you and your Zanu PF Junta who must understand that Zimbabwe is your personal property to do with as you please, just as Mugabe has done these last 37 years.

All those who hold public office are and must always be democratically accountable to the public, the people. The holding of free, fair and credible elections; in which the people have their say on who hold public office and, if they should wish it, have regime change; is the ultimate expression of that democratic accountability.

Mr Mnangagwa, if you and your Junta, fail to implement the democratic reforms to guarantee free, fair and credible elections; it will be because you want to hold on to the dictatorial power of the Mugabe years and thus hang on to the Zanu PF dictatorship. We the silent majority, the voiceless povo, demand an end to dictatorial rule.

If you do not implement the reforms to end dictatorial rule, then the elections will be declared null and void and some other administration appointed to implement the reforms. Be informed, President Mnangagwa, Zimbabwe is not going to accept another rigged election and that is not negotiable!

"Chamisa will win if elections are free," predict Mandaza - but you know, they are not P Guramatunhu

In 2008, Zanu PF showed the world the full extend of its capacity to rig elections. The party forced ZEC to recount the March vote and after six weeks of cooking up the figures; Tsvangirai’s 73%, by Mugabe’s own inadvertent admission, was whittled down to 47%. Enough to force the run-off.

During the run-off Zanu PF unleashed its party militia and war veterans assisted and directed by the Army, Police and CIO onto the defenceless civilians, like wolves in penned sheep. The civilians were harassed, beaten, raped and over 500 were murdered; they were being punished for having rejected Mugabe and Zanu PF in the first vote.

“What was accomplished by the bullet cannot be undone by the ballot!” Mugabe barked. Encouraging his thugs in their barbaric work.

Mugabe overturned his 27% or so defeat in the March vote into a massive 84% landslide victory.

The 2008 elections have become a bench mark in that one could honestly say that Zanu PF was unbeatable which is why SADC leaders proposed a raft of democratic reforms which the GNU was tasked to implemented to stop the repeat of the 2008 elections. When the SADC leaders realised that not even one reform had been implemented during the GNU the advised that the elections must be postponed.

“In 2013 the Maputo Summit, in June 2013, before the elections, the Maputo Summit was all about having the elections postponed – the SADC summit. I went there,” Dr Ibbo Mandaza explained to Violet Gonda

“I was there at the Summit and Mugabe pretended to agree to a postponement of the elections. If you recall, the postponement was based on the need to reform at least electoral laws.

“And after that Summit, Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti, Welshman Ncube, all of them were called to a separate meeting by the Heads of State of SADC in the absence of Mugabe, that same evening. And they were told; I was sitting there outside the room with Mac Maharaj; they were told ‘if you go into elections next month, you are going to lose; the elections are done’.”

It is easy to see why SADC leaders were so cocksure taking part in the elections with no reforms was a futile exercise; if you can blatant cheat the count turning 73% into 47% and use violence to boast 27% to 84% you are unbeatable.

MDC leaders did not listen to SADC leaders’ advice and contested the flawed 2013 elections. Zanu PF, as SADC leaders had rightly predicted, rigged the elections.

  

It is therefore disconcerting that he should be the one talking of MDC winning this year’s elections!

The local Daily News reports that Mandaza has predicted a Chamisa victory in the elections as long as the polls are held in a free, fair and credible manner.

“Zanu PF is wounded and it’s unlikely to win a free and fair election. The new kid on the block is Chamisa who has captured the imagination of youths, and I see nothing stopping him,” he said.

Zanu PF has been unelectable for decades. Indeed, many people would argue that President Mnangagwa’s takeover, with all the baggage of the military coup, has made Zanu PF more electable that it was in 2008 and 2013, for example. And yet the party went on to win regardless but only because the elections were not free and fair.

Of all the people, Dr Ibbo Mandaza, knows that not even one democratic reform has been implemented since the 2013 elections. These elections are therefore NOT going to be free and fair. If Nelson Chamisa cannot win even if he was to poll 73% then it is utterly pointless of talking of him winning.

If Chamisa cannot win with 73% then he has as much chance of winning a lottery without buying a ticket!  

"Give Mnangagwa enough time," argue US Ambassador - to do what, could have implemented reforms N Garikai

“Chokwadi hachipudzi hukana, nhama dzinogura hukana!” (True friendship is born out tell someone what they need to hear and not what they want to hear!) so goes the Shona adage. Of course, we all want our egos messaged to no end and what better way than hearing what we want to hear. Still, when someone tells you what you NEED to hear they are doing you and your ego an even greater favour – saving you the expense of the mistake and knock to one’s pride that comes with every fall!

“The out-going US Ambassador to Zimbabwe Harry K. Thomas Jr says President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government needs enough time to deal with political and socio-economic challenges affecting the country,” said a report in New Zimbabwe.

“Speaking to journalists in Harare on Thursday, the ambassador said he was happy with the positive stance that has been taken by the new leader to turn around the economy and work towards achieving a free and fair 2018 election.”

Ambassador Thomas was certainly telling President Mnangagwa and his Junta what they WANTED to hear and not what they NEEDED to hear.

What Ambassador Thomas should be telling President Mnangagwa and his Junta is that time is running out for the regime. The country is facing very serious and urgent political and economic challenges emanating from the country’s economic meltdown. With the country’s unemployment rates sitting at a nauseating 90%, with ¾ of the population living on US$1.00 or less a day, etc. it was pleasing to hear President Mnangagwa underline the importance of doing everything in his power to revive the country’s economy.

He promised in his inauguration speech to “hit the ground running!” Well after three months in office he is running out of steam!

His “Zimbabwe is open for business!” clarion call; has had no takers. The flood of foreign investors he had hoped for have not materialised. It is obvious why.

“He (Mnangagwa) has promised to make some electoral and economic reforms and has set some provisional dates for the elections according to the constitution, something that our government has applauded and hope to see happening,” said Ambassador Thomas.

But that is just it; President Mnangagwa has promised free and fair elections and yet has done nothing to implement the democratic reforms necessary for free elections. Indeed, he has continued to pursue the same vote rigging activities of the past such as bribing Chiefs with new vehicles; they have a history of frog marching villagers to vote for Zanu PF.

Everyone can see, particularly the hawk-eyed foreign investors, the Zanu PF regime has no intention of holding free and fair elections. The election observers will only confirm what the world already know, Zanu PF is a party of thugs who cannot be trusted to hold free and fair elections.
Investors do not do business in a country ruled by thugs! Period!

“Let us give Mnangagwa enough time to turn around the country’s economy and making sure that the elections are held peacefully in a fair and free environment,” Ambassador Thomas argued.

Time is the one thing President Mnangagwa does not have. If the elections are not free, fair and credible then President Mnangagwa and his Junta regime are in serious trouble. President Mnangagwa got away easily with last November’s military coup but that was only because the coup removed a greater evil in the form of Robert Mugabe. Failing to hold free and fair elections will only confirm what many had feared; the coup remove one dictator but only for him to be replace with another dictator and so the dictatorship itself is alive and thriving!

What the people of Zimbabwe need to hear is that President Mnangagwa’s Junta regime is the same corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship of the bad old Mugabe days; the regime’s stubborn refusal to implement reforms designed to dismantle the dictatorship is all the proof the nation needs of this. If the people made the mistake of voting for the regime in the coming elections they regret this for the coming five years!

The single most important task for the nation for the last 20 years, at least, has been to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship and thus ensure the country held free, fair and credible elections.

Zimbabwe is in this political and economic mess because for the last 38 years the nation was stuck with an incompetent and corrupt regime that rigged elections to stay in power!

If President Mnangagwa is not going to give up Zanu PF’s carte blanche powers to rig elections, then he and his Junta regime must be removed from office a.s.a.p.!

If he fails to implement the reforms and restore the people’s freedoms and basic human rights including the right to free and fair elections then the people will be fools to entrust their future in the hands of another Zanu PF dictator!

If President Mnangagwa was serious about holding free and fair elections he has had plenty of time to implement the democratic reforms. He has not even implemented one reforms! “Let us give Mnangagwa enough time!” As we gave Mugabe 37 years???!