Wednesday 31 January 2018

Chamisa's USA $15 billion handout is a cynical crocodile sweet grass lure to wildebeest W Mukori


National elections are important in that they offer the nation a chance to decide which way to go; in that regard, this year’s elections are the most important in the country’s history because of what is at stake. Zimbabwe has fallen from its position in 1980 as one of the top five richest nations in Africa with promising prospects of becoming the South Korea of Africa. Today the country is the poorest nation in Africa with ¾ of its people living in heart-breaking abject poverty cheek in jowl with the filthy rich ruling elite. Depending on the outcome of the coming elections; the nation will either continue hurtling down this road of self-destruction it has travelled these last 38 years or finally put an end to this madness. A simple and yet grime choice!

There are those who would want to talk about Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs, how they are the ones who have destroyed the nation’s economy after four decades of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption. They will also point to how the nation has been stuck with the regime because it rigged the vote and used violence included cold blooded murder of its political critics and opponents. Whilst all these details are all true and of great historic importance they do not address the all-important and critical question: in all these years, was the nation ever offered any opportunity put an end to the Zanu PF madness and take a different road? If the nation was offered any such opportunity (ies); then why did the people fail to take it?

The coming elections are one golden opportunity for the people of Zimbabwe to end the madness that has landed us all in this hell-on-earth situation in which 72.3% of our people live on US$1.00 or less a day. If people sit-up and pay attention to how we have wasted many golden opportunities in the past to change from this disastrous course; learn from the lost past opportunities, we might have hope of getting it right this time!

Zimbabwe has had many golden opportunities to end Zanu PF’s corrupt and tyrannical rule, the best chance by a long mile was during the GNU, and has wasted them all.

Following the 2008 blatant vote rigging in which ZEC was ordered to recount the vote to reduce Tsvangirai’s 73% vote to 47% and the worst case of wanton violence in the run-off that followed SADC leaders stepped into Zimbabwe’s seemingly endless political chaos. The regional leaders forced Mugabe to agree to a raft of democratic to dismantle the de facto Zanu PF dictatorship, striping the regime of all its carte blanche powers to rig elections. This was a clearly defined roadmap, with the X showing where we were, Y where we should be plus a compass with which to navigate.

It was left to Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends to implement the reforms. to follow the roadmap. After five years, MDC failed to get even one reform implemented. The details of why MDC failed to implement even one democratic reform are there for all to read; if will suffice to say:

1)    MDC leaders are corrupt and incompetent; they sold-out, Mugabe bribed them to forget the reforms and they did.

2)    Implementing the democratic reforms still remains the only viable way out of the political mess; implement the reforms and the country put an end to the madness that has dragged us into this hell-on-earth.

3)    MDC leaders continue sell-out on implementing the reforms and if they are not stopped, they will drag the nation deeper into the hell-on-earth we are in.

When it was clear that MDC leaders had sold-out during the GNU, SADC leaders advised MDC leaders not to contest the 2013 elections. MDC leaders did not listen out of selfish greed as one of the MDC leaders, Senator David Coltart readily admitted in his book.

“The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn’t now do the obvious – withdraw from the elections,” he wrote.

“The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility.”

MDC leaders have been coming up with all manner of excuses why they are continuing on this ruinous path of contesting flawed and illegal elections whose consequence is a nightmare to the nation. Nelson Chamisa’s lie that the Americans promised to bankroll Zimbabwe’s economic recovery to the tune of $15 billion is an example of the sicken depth of depravity these MDC leaders have sunk in their selfish greed.

“When we met with President Trump in America alongside Biti, he asked us how much we needed to move the country forward and we told him that we needed $15 billion,” Chamisa told an MDC Alliance rally in Mutare.

He told his naïve and gullible audience that President Trump assured them the money will be dished out in the event of an MDC victory “since his government had faith in the MDC Alliance.”

To start with, the $15 billion funding was a lie as the US Embassy has been quick to point out.

“We do not support individuals or political parties,” said the US Embassy Official. “We do not take a position on who is going to be a political leader of a country. The outcome of an election is up to the people of that country to decide.

“We do not make such promises to individuals or political parties.”

But, most worrying of all, the lie was a deliberate and calculated ploy to draw the Zimbabwe voters away from the important and pressing matter of the elections going ahead with no reforms in place. The MDC does not want the people to talk about its intention to contest the elections with no reforms in place because the party knows that it has failed to provide an answer to that question.

After 38 years of being stuck with Zanu PF because the regime rigs elections we cannot ignore this problem, pretend this will not happen this year. We cannot talk of all the financial assistance the new MDC Alliance government will get to rebuild the economy when they have no chance of winning the election given Zanu PF’s unlimited power to rig the vote.

After 38 years of being systematically denied one of our most basis and fundament right – the right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country – with the disastrous consequences of the nation being dragged into this hell-hole. How can it be possible, in this day and age, that we cannot see that Zanu PF is rigging the elections?

It is unforgivable that MDC leaders have wasted the many chances to implement the democratic reforms that would have stopped Zanu PF rigging elections and got the nation out of this mess. MDC have the roadmap out of this hell it is unforgivable that they are now misdirecting the nation. What good is it to talk of a post Zanu PF era whilst doing nothing to stop Zanu PF rigging elections, the pre-requisite for regime change.

If there is one lesson we should have learned these last 38 years, then it must be that we will never change anything on the economic front until we stop Zanu PF rigging elections. We must stop behaving like the wildebeest whose focus is on the grass across the river it ignores, to its peril, the immediate danger of the flooded river, crocodiles, steep river banks, etc. It will take the death of hundreds even thousands of animals before it finally dawns on the herd of the folly of trying to cross at that point in time or place. How many more years and/or people out of work or dying in abject poverty will it take before the nation finally ask MDC to follow the roadmap and implement the reforms!


Nelson Chamisa's promise of $15 billion funding was to lure participate in yet another flawed election process. He is being as cynical as the crocodile luring the wildebeest to cross the river with promise of the sweetest grass on the other side! Now that the American have confirmed they never promised the cash, one hopes the nation will once again focus on the folly of participating in yet another election knowing they will be rigged! 

8 comments:

  1. @ Nomazulu

    "The politics of Zimbabwe today is not those values and principles we held so high in Zapu during the liberation days in Zambia. Zimbabwe's politics is the politics of the stomach. The stomach determines what to do in any given opportunity arising." Once again you have hit the nail on the head! "Kubaya gudo mukanwa!" as one would say in Shona.

    It is the "politics of the stomach" that allowed mismanagement and corruption to run riot. If you cannot beat them, join them! This culture has resulted in the criminal waste of the country's material and human resources turning the country from its position as one of the top five richest nations in Africa in 1980 with potential to become the South Korea of Africa to become the poorest nation in Africa today.

    The root cause of dog-eat-dog in fighting in Zanu PF of these last ten years is the fear of the growing poverty, the country's economic collapse has not spared the ruling elite. The chefs are fighting over the ever-shrinking national cake. Those who fail to keep their position on the high table are in serious trouble. Look at the late Nathan Shamuyarira and Enos Nkala; they lived their last years in S**t Street.

    We welcome Comrade Didymus Mutasa a few years ago to S**t Street. The shine of decades of good living in Ease Street wears off very quickly, he was a changed man in no time!

    No among of bootlicking will save these politicians from poverty; as the economy shrinks Zanu PF will have to continue "baby dump", as Grace Mugabe would so aptly put it, more and more chefs. The November coup has allowed more and more in the Army to be more assertive and there is going to be so many "babies dumped".

    The irony is, it is the bootlicking and politics of the stomach has is the root cause why we are starving, instead of filling our stomachs we are all hungry. The likes of Perrance Shiri, VP Chiwenga and even President Mnangagwa himself are just village thugs who should have never been allowed to be anything beyond village head! Now they have tasted absolute power and the spoils it brings removing them from power is not going to be a walk in the park! The country's economic mess has produce hundreds of thousands of bootlickers, who will do anything to stay in power! For the country to register any meaningful economic recovery we must wrestle power from that lot! Boy oh boy, are we in trouble!

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  2. @ kaitano

    It is now clear that President Mnangagwa is not going to implement any democratic reforms and therefore these elections are not going to be free, fair and credible. Our focus must now be on drawing the whole world's attention on his failure to hold free and fair elections and making sure the whole process is declared null and void.


    We must not dilute our message that the elections are not free and fair by including the failure to facilitate diaspora vote because not all nations have facilitated their nationals in every corner of the world to vote!

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  3. @ Ngara

    President Mnangagwa has promised free, fair and credible elections; this is not a privilege but a fundament right which he has systematically denied millions of Zimbabweans these last 38 years. It is the duty of every thinking Zimbabwean out there to make sure that he delivers free and fair elections and does not get away with it if he fails! Right now, it is clear the thug is up to his usual vote rigging dirty tricks again. Read my lips: HE IS NOT GOING TO GET AWAY WITH IT!

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  4. "Mwana asingachemi anofira mumbereko!" (The baby who does not cry will die on his mother's back!) so goes the Shona adage. The white farmers have never stopped crying ever since the farm invasions and now their cries have been heard and they will be fed. However, the suggestion that the impoverish povo of Zimbabwe should be the ones to pay the white farmers the compensation is certainly tantamount to collective punishment. The ordinary Zimbabwean is as much a victim of Mugabe and his Zanu PF's reign of terror and thuggery as the white farmers themselves.

    The chefs who benefited from the farm invasion and/or these who inherited the stolen farms are still living on the farm. The white farmers must go after the looters and no one else.

    Just because the ordinary Zimbabwean does not have a voice, never had, it is not right that she/he never pay for other people's sins. It is not a sin to have no voice and be the oppressed!

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  5. Jonathan Moyo did not deny that Mugabe had rigged elections in the past he dodged addressing that issue by asking a question; "Does that justify the coup?"

    The lady should have also have asked Jonathan to confirm that Zanu PF staged a coup to stop Tsvangirai and MDC taking over power in 2008 following the March 2008 elections in which Tsvangirai had gunned 73% of the vote. Of course, he would not have dodged that issue by asking the same stupid question: "Does that justify the coup?"

    The honest answer to Moyo's question is when you rig elections, stage coups, etc. you have per se elected to disregard the peaceful and democratic way of effecting regime change. By rejecting peaceful and evolutionary change you have not stop change happening - change will always happen those who think otherwise are deluding themselves - what you have stopped is peaceful and evolutionary and opened the door to the only other change violent and revolutionary change.

    Mugabe can mourn and bitch about the coup the truth is he invited it upon himself.

    In 2013 SADC leaders said Zimbabwe should postpone that year's elections to allow the democratic reforms necessary to ensure the elections are free, fair and credible to be implemented. It was none other than Mugabe himself who refuse and even threatened to take Zimbabwe out of the regional body if they insisted that the elections must be postponed.

    "You can't expect us to reform ourselves out of power," answered Professor Moyo during his happier Zanu PF days when he was pressured about implemented the reforms to ensure free and fair elections.

    It is ironic that he and his former boss, Mugabe, should now be the ones furious that SADC leaders, the international community and the people of Zimbabwe did not condemn the November coup. The truth is the people condemned the coup but tolerated it as the lesser of the two evils - the evil of the tyrant Mugabe who was in power by rigging elections and staging coups!

    Professor Jonathan Moyo and his G40 friends are dreaming that one day they will return to power again in Zimbabwe; that is one dream that will never come truth. As much as the nation is grappling with the challenge of how to force Mnangagwa and his Lacoste thugs out of office the nation has no appetite to have the G40 take their place!

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  6. "Please be informed that the Minister Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement has directed that all remaining white commercial farmers be issued 99-year leases instead of the five-year leases as per the previous arrangement," reads the statement.


    While the new administration has reiterated the need to compensate white former commercial farmers, it has also moved in to enforce a ban on new illegal farm occupations.

    Every thinking Zimbabwean welcome the end to the years of pure madness that caused so much suffering and hardship all round to please a greedy few! The white farms must seek out those who seized their farms and get compensation from them. The compensation bill must not be added on the overburdened and impoverish povo who gained nothing and suffered a lot from the farm seizures!

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  7. US President Donald Trump's local envoy has announced a massive influx of US business men and women flying into Zimbabwe to set up business here.

    In a statement, the embassy said even top US government officials are headed for Zimbabwe.

    There is overwhelming evidence that President Mnangagwa will not implemented any reforms necessary for free, fair and credible elections. Elections are due in four or five months and the regime has not implemented even one reform. There is simply no time left for any reform to be implemented. The question then arises: Are the "massive influx of US business men and women flying into Zimbabwe to set up business" aware the country will NOT be holding free, fair and credible elections?

    It is hard to believe they are not aware. So, the only logical explanation will be that they do not care that Zanu PF is going to rig the elections. Americans and many in the West have wringed their hands in sheer frustration to watch the Chinese, Russians looting Zimbabwe's resources for a song; they could not join in because of the targeted sanctions the West had imposed on Zanu PF leaders.

    It is the people of Zimbabwe's own fault that we did not make the most of the window of opportunity to implement the reforms all these last 16 years when the sanctions were in place. Although no democratic reforms have been implemented in the sanctions years, the West are now going to lift the sanctions for selfish business interests. If America lifts the sanctions the rest of the West will follow.

    Am I surprised? Hell no! This is what one would expect with President Trump's America first!

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  8. @ Bhebhe

    A USA official has since announced that many business men and women are flying into Zimbabwe "to set shop". President Trump does not care whether Zimbabwe's elections are NOT free and fair and will work with the vote rigging ZAnu PF regime just to get some of the action that the Chinese and Russians are getting.

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