Zimbabwe is in serious, serious trouble. For the last 40 years, the country has been in decline morally, economically and, worst of all, intellectually.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” Wrote the great English novelist, Charles Dickens.
Zimbabwe has had the great misfortune of 40 years of the worst of times, age of foolishness, epoch of incredulity, etc.; all the negative stuff without an iota of the positive; and it shows!
“As corona virus ravages the world and its ugly head makes upwards strides in Zimbabwe, we feel a great comfort in knowing that this world will never end by sickness,” wrote one of Zimbabwe’s intellectuals, such as he is, Dr Masimba Mavaza.
“The world has hit over sixteen million people found to be COVID 19 positive. Of these millions only half a million has died. This gives the world hope that not all who are positive will die. A large number will go on to recover. All hope is not lost CORONA is not the final thing before we die.”
Dr Mavaza’s article in Bulawayo 24 was entitled “Hope for Zimbabwe as coronavirus Covid-19 is not the end of the world!”
Well, for a start; for all those who die of this deadly virus, corona virus IS the final thing before they die! Death is final. “Seri kwaguva hakuna muteuro!” (There is no pleading or appeasing beyond the grave!) as one would say in Shona.
As a member of the human race, our life-long challenge therefore is to promote and preserve, qualitatively and quantitatively, human life; one’s own life and the lives of others.
The outbreak of corona virus constitutes the greatest threat to human lives of our generation. A direct threat, as many of those who get the virus infection suffer great health discomfort needing medical help and many even with the best medical assistance have died, the death toll has been even higher where even the most basic health care was not available.
Corona virus has posed an equally serious indirect threat to human lives in that in our efforts to contain the virus we have also disrupted many life sustaining activities.
Most developed countries will suffer a 20% plus contraction in their economy and the situation will be much, much worse in the poor developing countries. Corona virus has triggered a world economic depression which could last a decade or more.
There is a real chance that mankind will come up with a effective vaccine and/or an effective cure against corona virus. Repairing the economic damage to the economy will take a decade or more. All the gains mankind had made in the last 20 years to pull billions humanity out of poverty and despair has been undone as billions of people are thrown back into poverty.
As a nation, Zimbabwe had good reasons to be worried sick at the onset of the corona virus outbreak. For a start, the country’s economy was already in total meltdown before the outbreak which meant the country will have very few resources to deal with the pandemic. It is no secret the country’s health care service had long collapsed due to decades of under investment. But worst of all, the country was being governed by corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging thugs who only cared about retaining their vice grip on power and did not care about public good or the sanctity of human lives.
Zanu PF’s blundering incompetence has failed to contain the corona virus outbreak. Instead of enforcing the quarantine measures, for example, it was Zanu PF leaders who reportedly allowed Zororo Makamba to mix with the public even though he had the corona virus symptoms. He was the first official corona virus death.
Against World Health Organisation advice to test, trace and track corona virus cases aggressively; Zanu PF has stubbornly refused to test. The regime is deliberately sweeping the true corona virus cases and deaths under the carpet and so claim the accolades as one of the countries that contained the corona virus.
We have often heard of “a neighbour from hell!” Well in Zanu PF the country has the government from hell! By under stating the corona virus statistics this Zanu PF government is deliberately misleading the nation into believing the country has been spared the ravages of corona virus not knowing that their ignorance is only helping the virus spread far and wide.
Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans will die of covid-19 because their government deliberately kept them ignorant, they have continued to blissfully spread the virus when they should have taken the common-sense action of self-isolation, washing hands, etc.
Even countries like New Zealand that have managed to contain the corona virus; so far, the country has 1 562 confirmed cases, 22 deaths and a population of 5 million; they will still say it was one too many cases/deaths! Zimbabwe’s corona virus deaths will soar to hundreds of thousands, certainly one of the worst per capita death toll in the world, thousands of times higher than the official figure.
All told, as many as 5 to 10% of the Zimbabwe population will succumb to corona virus with many, many more to follow during the economic depression to follow.
Zimbabwe is facing a real prospect of 5% or 800 000 plus corona virus deaths, largely because government has deliberately kept the people in the dark of the danger, and Dr Mavaza argues that we take “great comfort and hope in that, after all covid-19 is not the end of the world!”
The Charles Dickens of this world force the leaders and the populous to look at themselves objectively and inspire them to reach for the sky! The Dr Masimba Mavaza of this world praise mediocrity because it is better than Armageddon doom’s day!
No wonder the Zimbabwe is stuck in this hell-on-earth; with a corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical ruling party and an equally corrupt and useless opposition on the one hand and an all but brain-dead intelligentsia on the other. With people like Dr Mavaza brainwashing the nation, the country has no chance of ever getting out of this hell-hole.
Zimbabwe is one of the countries that is going to have one of the highest covid-19 deaths in the world because of Zanu PF's blundering incompetence. We should be furious that so many lives are being lost and yet Dr Mavaza is arguing us to be happy about it just because not everyone is going to die from the virus!
ReplyDeleteZIMBABWE Saturday recorded its highest number of new Covid-19 infections when 490 people, mostly local transmissions, tested positive.
ReplyDeleteThe Health Ministry announced that 485 of the cases recorded on the day were local cases, while five are returning residents from South Africa.
This is the highest reported figure since the pandemic was recorded in Zimbabwe in March this year bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 3 659, including 69 deaths.
The ministry confirmed the death of two people Saturday.
Zimbabwe is not testing enough to keep track of how the virus is spreading in Zimbabwe. The regime is doing just over 2 000 tests a day and with nearly 500 positive it is clear it can only do a maximum of 4 contact test per case without testing new suspect cases of retesting historic cases such as those in quarantine. Without accurate covid-19 data it is impossible to contain the virus. Impossible!
Testing aggressively is the one thing this regime could have done to give the nation a fighting chance to keep the corona virus death toll as low as we can. We have failed to do this for no good reason other than Zanu PF wanting to sweep the corona virus bad news under the carpet to keep up the appearance it is a competent regime!
THE ACTING Midlands provincial deputy registrar, Andrew Mpambo who succumbed to Covid-19 Thursday, was buried Friday in Gweru.
ReplyDeleteMpambo died at the Gweru provincial hospital where he was admitted. According to health officials, he had just returned to Gweru after attending a funeral at his rural Bikita home in Masvingo province. His burial was in line with World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines and Mpambo becomes the fourth Covid-19 victim in the Midlands province.
One of the contributary factors to the spread of the corona virus in Zimbabwe is the naivety of the people of Zimbabwe. It is shocking just how many Zimbabweans out there still believe the official lie that only 69 people in Zimbabwe have died of covid-19.
It is highly probable that Mpambo went to a funeral of a covid-19 victim whom everyone treated throughout as free of the virus even thou he/she had all the symptoms just because no one had tested the victim for the virus. Just as many people would believe their own eyes of Zanu PF's blatant vote rigging of the July 2018 elections now they are doing the same with the covid-19 deaths. Of course, this time the people are paying a heavy price for their naivety - they are catching the virus and dying like flies.
The insiders said the politburo meeting was meant to checkmate Chiwenga who allegedly leads a faction that is dissatisfied with Mnangagwa's leadership.
ReplyDeleteZanu-PF's security chief Lovemore Matuke submitted a report that was allegedly meant to prove that there was a plot to topple Mnangagwa from within.
His submissions were corroborated by Central Intelligence Organisation boss Isaac Moyo.
Chizema said she suspected that her long-time maid was involved in the plot as she left immediately after the posters were dumped in her yard.
A few months later reports started surfacing that the two had fallen out as Mnangagwa insisted on running for a second term in 2023 despite an alleged pact that he would make way for his deputy.
Zanu PF is a party of ruthless thugs whose only loyalty is to number one – oneself! Any factional loyalties are just a temporary arrangement to be broken as soon as honouring it gets in the way of individual ambition.
The one thing that help hold Zanu PF together is the abundance of loot. When Mugabe gave away the last white-owned farms, he had nothing left to give away and the party started to fall apart.
@ Ken Mufuka
ReplyDeleteTo declare brother Shiri a hero will make his mausoleum a memorial that spits in the eyes of the Ndebele nationality forever.
I offer a simple solution. We can say that due to his controversial life his tribesmen have decided that he be interned in his village where they can mourn his passing away in peace.
If there is any criticism of our president, it is that he has not followed his instinct, which was displayed during the coup, with bold actions that break away from the past.
Shiri's life is an example of loyalty to the end, but to whom and to what end? Obviously, he was a decent man to his family and friends, but his name will forever be tainted by his acquaintance with a shameful period in our history. He led a tribal army (contrary to the march of time), which denied its opponents decency and dignity even in death. His cause was none other than pure.
If Mnangagwa was to take your advice and accept that Shiri was a thug through and through he does not deserve the honour of being declared national hero then, to be consistent, Mnangagwa will have to accept he must never be declared a national hero because he too is murderous thug!
It is a pity that many people gave a lot of credence to Mnangagwa’s “new dispensation, Second Republic, etc.” nonsense following the November 2017 coup. Believe that and you are no different from the goat who believed the crocodile was a vegetarian!
Zanu PF leaders have all mastered the art of telling people what they, the naïve and gullible people, want to hear. Even when the economy was in total meltdown that did not stop Mugabe promise the people 2 million new jobs in the party’s 2013 manifesto, for example. Mnangagwa did the same and there were many out there who said, “Give him a chance!”
Of course, it is foolish to believe a corrupt and murderous thug like Mnangagwa, Shiri, Chiwenga, etc. can repent and transform especially when such transformation is done at their own convenience!
@ Tawanda Majoni
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the meeting, they announced that they had suspended a politburo member, Cleveria Chizema, who reportedly kept at her home, placards denouncing Mnangagwa and supporting his deputy, Constantino Chiwenga, ahead of the national protests that the opposition and civil society had called for July 31. Things are still murky, but it seems the reason why they brought in Moyo and Tapfumaneyi was to get their say and findings on the alleged factional developments apparently pitting Mnangagwa against Chiwenga.
Zanu PF is a party of ruthless thugs and the members know it. Factional fighting is the expected norm as the party divide and divide again like amoeba. What the people of Zimbabwe should be concerned with is reclaiming their right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country; so far Zanu PF thugs ridden roughshod over our freedoms and rights!
Government's decision to pay white former commercial farmers Us$3.5 billion compensation came after protracted negotiations starting from the late Robert Mugabe's time, it has been revealed.
ReplyDeletePresident Emmerson Mnangagwa has described the deal signed last week as a breakthrough in mending broken relationships with the west.
It has since emerged that negotiations started in 2016 after the world bank seconded Maxwell Mutema at the request of the Zimbabwean government.
Mutema is a Zimbabwean valuation, real estate, land and agriculture expert, who facilitated the delicate and sensitive early stages of the process through convening an oversubscribed all-stakeholders consultative workshop on march 31, 2016. The workshop was conducted with the support of the European Union, the United Nations Development Programme and other international development partners.
The idea that the taxpayer should pay the compensation when the individuals who benefited from the looting are there is an outrage. Worse still, the individuals who benefited from the looting are now holding the nation to ransom in that they now claim to be the new owners of the land even when they have clearly failed to use it productively.
Every year the government has come up with different schemes to encourage farmers to be productive. The schemes have only become new looting schemes where the farmers get paid for doing nothing.
The land issue is outstanding and urgent business. Asking povo to pay the US$3.5 billion to the white farmers is an insult to povo, piling one injustice upon another! It is disappointing that EU, UN and other international organisations were aware of this deal and approved this unjust settlement. The white farmers deserve the compensation but why should the poor people in Zimbabwe be the ones to pay it just because they have no political voice?
So people will support Zanu PF no matter what and Dr Masimba Mavaza is one of those people. Zimbabwe is stuck in this man-made hell-on-earth for the simple reason that we have a regime that has no respect for the rule of law, of the people's freedoms and rights, of right and wrong, of truth and reason and of even the sanctity of human life.
ReplyDeleteInstead of the country agreeing on the rule of law and thus move on to other things we have been stuck with this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship because the party has no respect for what constitute free, fair and credible elections. 40 years after independence and the regime still pretends not to know what constitutes free and fair elections. It is the party in government and abuse its power to corrupt the state institutions for its selfish purposes.
Official, Zimbabwe has 3 921 confirmed covid-19 cases and 70 deaths failed this is because the country has not been testing, tracing and tracking as diligently as it should. SA has done a better job in testing and tracking and it has 511 485 cases and 8 366 deaths. SA has the economic resources and its health care service is stronger than that of Zimbabwe and therefore one would expect SA to do far better than us. Zimbabwe’s cover 19 cases should be 1/4 of those of SA, give our population is roughly 1/4 that of SA, at the very least.
So instead of the official 70 deaths Zimbabwe has over 2 000 cases, 30 times as many. And by the time the virus finally blow over, the real death toll will be thousands of times higher than the official figure.
The number one priority of any government should be contain the corona virus and save human lives but that is clearly not the case with the Zanu PF regime. The regime has expended a lot of time and resources in making sure Zimbabwe emerges out of this will one of the lowest per capita covid-19 death rates. The regime was warned repeatedly that failing to test and track the virus will help spread it far and wide. And that is exactly what has happened.
Many, many Zimbabweans are going to get the corona virus infection and many will die all because those entrusted with the responsibility to test, track and inform the people of the virus deliberately kept them in the dark for political expedience. Of course, every thinking people would be furious at such callous dereliction of duty. Everyone, that is, except Dr Masimba Mavaza, who thinks we should all take great comfort in the knowledge that covid-19 is not going to kill everyone. How anyone can be so shallow, thick and slow is a complete mystery.
Sadly for Zimbabwe, we do have more than our fair share of dimwits like Dr Mavaza and hence the reason the country is stuck in this man-made hell-on-earth. What a mess!
Briefing the media yesterday, the Minister of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Monica Mutsvangwa said the cumulative number of confirmed cases had risen by 56 percent in the past week from 1611 to 2704 while the cumulative number of confirmed local cases has risen by over 80 percent from 791 to 1 615.
ReplyDeleteIn response to the surge in numbers, government announced the establishment of rapid response teams in Harare and Bulawayo, regarded as the hotspots of the pandemic.
“In order to expand testing and contact tracing in hotspot areas, the Ministry of Health and Child Care has established 32 Rapid Response Teams in Harare and Bulawayo,” said Mutsvangwa.
Zimbabwe has not been test enough to keep track with the spread of corona virus. The government has been warned of the need to test aggressively but ignored the warnings.
The four things to be said about Zanu PF’s handling of the corona virus are:
1) the regime has handled the pandemic with the usual blundering incompetence
2) the regime has sort to hide its incompetence with the usual ruthlessness and disregard for the consequence to everyone else.
3) Zanu PF has helped spread the corona virus far and wide by failing to test, track and inform the people.
4) Officially, Zimbabwe will have one of the lowest confirm covid-19 cases and deaths, in practice it will have one of the highest numbers. Zanu PF will claim credit for having competently handled the pandemic and the ordinary Zimbabweans will pay dearly with their lives for this lie!
As at August 3 2020, Zimbabwe had 4 075 confirmed cases including 1 057 recoveries and 80 deaths. Today 154 more people tested positive and these are local transmissions who are isolated," read the statement from the ministry.
ReplyDelete"Today we regret to report 10 facility deaths which include four males and four females from Harare province, one male from Mashonaland West and one male from Matabeleland South Province."
Bulawayo province has a cumulative total of 996 cases and 20 deaths, Matabeleland South has 430 cases with two deaths while Matabeleland North has 60 cases and two deaths.
Mpilo Central Hospital acting chief executive officer Professor Solwayo Ngwenya recently said the confirmed Covid-19 cases will continue to rise as long as people do not comply with lockdown regulations. He said people should desist from visiting the city centre and all public places.
"The best way for us to beat this virus is to prevent it. "Our resources are really stretched and we will not be able to cope with huge numbers of Covid-19 cases.
"We will definitely record more cases as long as people violate lockdown regulations," said Prof Ngwenya.
Yes of course, complying with the lockdown regulations will help slow down the spread of the virus but even he cannot deny that by testing all those with covid-19 symptoms and carrying out the tracing and tracking and making sure those with the virus were isolated would have gone a long way in containing the virus. He should know that even big hospitals like Mpilo were not testing, tracing and tracking!
Professor Ngwenya would not even say how many people have covid-19 at the hospital. “I am not at liberty to say!” he commented!
One of the most shameful things to happen in Zimbabwe is that hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans will get the virus because those in positions of power and authority would not even do the most human think and tell those who had the virus they so they could go on isolation. If there is justice, then some of these buffoons must be held to account!
TWENTY nurses at Maphisa District Hospital in Matabeleland South province tested positive for coronavirus this week, sending the settlement, predominantly occupied by civil servants, gold miners and panners into a panic mode as some residents had contact with the affected health workers.
ReplyDeleteProvincial medical officer Rudo Chikodzore yesterday had not responded to questions sent to her before going to print.
However, a source in the health sector confirmed that 20 nurses tested positive, with one of them infecting her husband who works for a non-governmental organisation in Gwanda.
"Over 20 nurses are in self-isolation after the tests. The district is now a health time bomb because of the presence of a high number of gold panners who patronise the business centre," he said.
No doubt this is the first time that health care workers have been tested and yet government promised to test regularly all frontline workers including health care workers.
None of the patients have yet been tested much less all the other conducts of the 20 nurses. All health care workers should have been testing all those with covid-19 like symptoms.
But when the country is only doing 1 000 or less tests a day it is clear why so many people who should have been tested were not. This Zanu PF government, just like the Chinese government, is super sensitive about being criticised for failing to contain the virus and so one sure way of silencing the critics is to make sure the official covid-19 figures are kept very low - if you do not test the number of cases is certain to remain low.
The price of not testing, tracing and tracking as vigorously as the WHO recommenced and common sense dictated is that many people who should have been in isolation, if they had know, have been out spreading the virus far and wide. There is no doubt that many, many lives will be lost! If this is not criminal negligence; what is!