Zimbabwe is caught in a catch 22! We a stuck in a political and economic mess and those who have landed us here are the ones profiting from our suffering and misery and, worst of all, they have the power to keep us here!
Zimbabwe’s serious economic and political mess is a man-made situation, a result from decades of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption. We have sunk deeper and deeper into the abyss because we, the ordinary people have been powerless to remove those in positions of power and authority to stop the rot. They have instituted a political systems to ensure they remain in power no matter what.
One way the ruling elite have exercise their tyrannical control over us is making sure the national political discourse never rise above the mundane and trivia of shouting and throwing stones at each other. Every time the political discussions soared into the more constructive phase to discuss such matters what are the real causes of the economic and political mess, what should be done, etc. the ruling elite have stepped in to disrupt the discussion.
Each time the nation has tries to drag itself out of the live of mindless political shouting, slogans, rhetoric and verbal and physical violence; the ruling elite have let lose the political thugs, like wolves among sheep, to reimposed the chaos and violence back on the national agenda, especially during elections.
It was no accident, for example, that the violent farm invasions of 2000 to 2013 always flared up towards and during national elections. The gratuitous violence that accompanied the farm invasion were to make sure the farm invasions pushed corruption, mismanagement, etc. off the national agenda - corruption, etc. become trivial matters compared to television imagines of farm houses ablaze and farmer owners and the workers being attacked by mobs.
Zanu PF has used the brainwashed war veterans and the party’s youth militia, the green bombers, to carry out the dirty work of intimidating, harassing, beating and raping the party’s critics and opponents. The heavy stuff of abducting, arrest and murdering has been left to the partisan Police, Army, CIO and Prison Services personal. The judiciary and other state institutions provided the legal cover and backup. Zanu PF has corrupted the Police, etc. rendering them party organs in all but name whose number priority is to keep Zanu PF in power at all cost.
The country has had many opportunities to implement the democratic reforms and thus dismantle the de facto Zanu PF one-party state, the best opportunity was during the 2008 to 2013 GNU.
SADC leaders refused to grant Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF legitimacy following the party’s blatant cheating and use of wanton violence in the 2008 elections. The regional body forced Zanu PF to accept the need to implement a raft of democratic reforms to to agree to the implementation of a raft of democratic reforms to restore the individual freedoms and rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections.
A Government of National Unity (GNU) was formed comprising Zanu PF and the two MDC factions. The task of implementing the democratic reforms was entrusted to Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends.
Sadly, the MDC leaders turned out to be corrupt and breathtakingly incompetent; they failed to implement even one token reform in five years of the GNU.
However, the MDC supporters have remained as faithful as dogs to the party leaders regardless of the later’s repeated blatant betray; first, failing to implement reforms and then participating in flawed elections to give vote rigging Zanu PF legitimacy. The supporters have failed to understand, even now with the benefit of hindsight, what the GNU was about much less comprehend the betrayals.
Both Zanu PF and MDC have relied on their respective pool of supporters being very naive and gullible to keep the nation stuck in the mindless squabbling, empty slogan and fighting mode. The attack on Nelson Chamisa and his entourage on Monday has galvanised both Zanu PF and MDC supporters more than anything either party could have said or done.
Both Zanu PF and MDC would have no clue what to do to dig the nation out of the economic and political mess the country is in; if they had they would have articulated the plan and, better still, implemented it. And yet to listen to the passionate support of their respective supporters, one would be forgiven to think Chamisa/ Mnangagwa are the Albert Einstein of political science! The reality is these supporters are nothing but the simple minded Apple Trees in the Wizard of Oz!
Dorothy : [Reaches to pick an apple from the apple tree, the tree grabs the apple and slaps her hand] Ouch!
Angry Apple Tree : What do you think you're doing?
Dorothy : We've been walking a long ways and I was hungry and... did you say something?
Angry Apple Tree : She was hungry!
Apple Tree : [Repeating after The Angry Apple Tree] She was hungry!
Angry Apple Tree : Well, how would you like to have someone come along and pick something off of you?
Dorothy : Oh, dear! I keep forgetting I'm not in Kansas!
The Scarecrow : [disparagingly] Come along, Dorothy. You don't want any of *those* apples! Hmph!
Angry Apple Tree : Are you hinting my apples aren't what they ought to be?
The Scarecrow : [sarcastically] Oh no! It's just that she doesn't like little green worms!
Angry Apple Tree : Oh you!
[the trees start shaking their branches angrily]
The Scarecrow : [in Dorothy's ear] I'll show you how to get apples!
[taunts the trees by making a face; the first tree throws an apple that knocks him down]
Dorothy : [concerned] Oh!
[the trees continue throwing apples]
The Scarecrow : Hooray! I guess that did it! Help yourself!
The rational thing to do is for MDC and the rest in the opposition camp would be to demand the implementation of the democratic reforms so the elections are free, fair and credible. Zanu PF has ignored calls for reforms because the party knows that MDC and the rest in the opposition camp will participate in the flawed elections as long as Zanu PF offers them a few gravy train seats - which Zanu PF has done since the 2013 elections.
Both Zanu PF and MDC know what they have to do to get their own supporters to participate in the flawed and illegal elections. The result will be another landslide victory for Zanu PF and Chamisa and his fellow MDC leaders will get their consolation price of a few gravy train seats.
The loser, as usual, are the ordinary people; they will be stuck with the corrupt, incompetent and vote rigging Zanu PF regime for five more years. There is no doubt that the Angry Apple Tree was not going to be so easily fool again next time. It is shocking that even after 41 years of rigged Zimbabweans are still conned by “Scarecrow” Chamisa into giving up their right to free, fair and credible elections because he has “Winning In Rigged Elections (WIRE) strategies!
Zanu PF and MDC leaders have landed the nation into this mess and they have doing their uttermost to keep us there. They have no clue what to do and it is no surprise they are determined to keep the nation is a panic mode and will never allow the people to think for themselves.
ReplyDeleteBy implementing the democratic reforms, state institutions like Police will be freed to do their duty of keeping law and order and thus allow the nation to settle down and have rational debate and political discourse. Both Zanu PF and MDC leaders have had the opportunity to implement the reforms but have done nothing because they all do not want free debate.
Both Zanu PF and MDC will go through the motions of producing political manifestos but they both know they can ill afford the luxury to have the documents cross examined because the manifestos are all froth no beer! Of course, both parties would rather have the nation preoccupied with the mindless verbal and physical violence of the supporters than talking about froth.
The naive and gullible electorate, drunk on froth, are venting their frustration by beating each other. After the elections Zimbabweans will all go home empty handed to lick their self-inflicted wounds whilst they wait for the next elections to be taken for fools once again.
@ Muama Fidel Hosini
ReplyDelete“Ngapinde (take over) Advocate Chamisa, Zimbabweans have had more than enough torture time in their daily lively hoods from the side of the failures who currently run the country since 1980. Enough is enough!!”
It is all very well to say “enough is enough” but that has no meaning when you have no clue what it is exactly you have had enough of! It is none other than Zimbabweans themselves who are our own worst enemy.
Zanu PF has managed to stay in power for 41 years and counting because the party has been rigging elections. We, the people, in our ignorance, have allowed the party to get away with rigged elections again and again.
People risked life and limb to elect MDC leaders to implement the democratic reforms and Morgan Tsvangirai and company have wasted one opportunity after another. Of course, MDC leaders sold-out and yet the nation still continue to follow them blindly like sheep to the slaughter.
As long as the people remain naive and gullible, so naive they have fallen for the same Scarecrow “Winning In Rigged Elections (WIRE)” trickery, Zimbabwe will never get out of the economic and political mess we are in. Never ever!
Former MDC-A official Shewu Meda has been hospitalised after being brutalised by MDC-A supporters for dumping their party and joining ZANU-PF where he was rewarded with the most senior post in Chiweshe ward 8 as chairman of the district.
ReplyDeleteMeda is currently nursing injuries at Parirenyatwa hospital and party members have since implored their leadership to act on the matter.
The nation is being sucked into yet another cycle of inter party violence which is drawing attention away from the serious debate of how to get the nation out of this economic and political hell-hole. Both Zanu PF and MDC are feeding off each other to keep the culture of political violence boiling.
Without insisting on the democratic reforms designed to free the Police and all the other state institutions to do their duty of maintaining law and order it is hard to see how else the political violence will be stamped out. Whilst SADC, EU, Commonwealth and everybody else has been calling for reforms before elections it is none other than Zimbabwe’s corrupt and opportunistic opposition that has insisted on elections with no reforms.
Sadly, for Zimbabwe, we have a very naive and gullible electorate who have failed to see how the MDC leaders have sold-out on free, fair and credible elections and are now giving vote rigging Zanu PF legitimacy by participating in flawed elections.
@ Chamisa
ReplyDeleteThe MDC Alliance leader described the attack on party members as stone age hooliganism.
He wrote on Twitter:
THE RISE OF VIGILANTISM IN ZIMBABWE..Zpf vigilante groups have immunity & impunity.They’re state assisted & protected in their acts of terrorism & unlawful operations.The stoning of cars, violence &barricading of roads is criminal, stone-age & primitive hooliganism.Peace is fragile!
How is this possible in an ‘independent country’ with a ‘liberated people?
Below an MDC Alliance official relates how Zanu PF hooligans attacked him…
We need to free the Police and other State organs to focus on their set task of keeping law and order without political bias if we are ever going to end this political hooliganism. And to free the Police we must first implement the democratic reforms to cut Zanu PF’s influence.
It must be noted that MDC leaders, including Nelson Chamisa, had the golden opportunity to implement the democratic reforms during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. They failed to get even one token reform implemented.
Whilst many have argued for reforms before elections; it is Chamisa and his opposition opportunists who have insisted on elections without reforms. It is sheer hypocrisy that Chamisa should be calling for an end in hooliganism when he is one of the people who are undermining the efforts of those trying to get reforms implemented - the prerequisite to ending hooliganism.
Ramaphosa told residents that on November 1 “we will see which party will govern Tshwane. Will it be a Mickey Mouse party or a party that knows that it is boss?”
ReplyDeleteHe reminded the crowd — which gave him a warm welcome — that in 2016 people did not go out to vote, which led to the DA-led coalition government.
“If we tell the truth, we are in this trouble in Tshwane because we did not go out and vote. We will accept that in the ANC there was infighting and no one was listening to anybody,” he said.
SA has always had free, fair and credible elections and the same cannot be said of Zimbabwe. What is annoying to every thinking Zimbabwean is how SA has pretended Zimbabwe elections are free, fair and credible when they are not as if to say Zimbabwe dos not deserve free and fair elections!
@ Muama Fidel Hosini
ReplyDelete"Zanu PF and MDC leaders have landed the nation into this mess and they have doing their uttermost to keep us there" It looks you are mixing up things here, to put the record straight, MDC has never ruled Zimbabwe or landed the nation into a bad economic shape, for a example during 2008-2013 the country was on prosperous road economically, MDC being main drivers of that economic stability. Please excuse MDC, especially MDC Alliance, instead Zimbabweans should applaud to Giants like Tendai Biti in MDC Alliance who have an economic sense of Know How and was proven beyond doubt.”
For your own information, MDC’s single most important task in the 2008 to 2013 GNU was to implement the democratic reforms to ensure the debacle of the blatant cheating and wanton violence of the 2008 elections will never be repeated. They did not implement even one democratic reform in five years. Not one!
We are in this economic and political mess precisely because MDC failed to implement the democratic reforms and stop Zanu PF rigging elections.
Worse still, MDC leaders have insisted in participating in these flawed and illegal elections and all they have done is give credibility to the flawed process and legitimacy to the vote rigging Zanu PF.
MDC leaders failed to implement even one reform during the GNU for the same reason they keep participating in these flawed elections - greed.
Zanu PF has resisted all calls to implement and knew that as long as the opposition participated in the elections. Zanu PF also knew that if the party dangled a few of the gravy train seats in the face of the MDC leaders, they will participate in the elections no matter how flawed and illegal the process got. It is these bribes that MDC leaders are after.
MDC leaders are corrupt, incompetent and are sell-outs. How people like you have failed to see this even now with the benefit of hindsight is a real tragedy because it underlines not only why the country is in this mess but worse still why the chances of getting out are so remote. Democracy demands an informed and diligent electorate and not a naive and gullible one.
@ Nobukhosi Moyo
ReplyDelete“The hooligan turned and poverty stricken mob which only want nothing better than to please their savage masters. They went on to stone the motorcade, cars, and barricaded roads with burning logs, assaulted members of Chamisa's team leaving some hospitalised. The incident is not going down well in the Chamisa camp and ZANU might brace up by further violent attacks. The young and energetic are now seeking for instant justice in both camps. The much awaited dialogue between the two warring parties MDCA and ZANU-PF is null and void. Chamisa resorted to bush paths to reach Masvingo town to save his dear life.
An uprising is eminent anytime if ED does not address or treat his opponents with equal respect. Its high time ZANU pf is stopped from spilling more blood as we head towards elections. Their plan to instil fear to voters will not work this time as the youth have learnt valuable lessons from next door in Zambia. It is high time for Zimbabweans to come together and castigate the state-sponsored violence and fight back peacefully or otherwise. ZANU should be shown the red card. Let's fight fire with fire. Wake up Zimbabweans. An injury to one is an injury to all. They won't kill and it is better to die facing the enemy than cowering like cowards. ZANU is now a toothless dog whose bark is worse than his bite.”
“It is high time for Zimbabweans to come together and castigate the state-sponsored violence and fight back peacefully or otherwise. ZANU should be shown the red card. Let's fight fire with fire!”
This is the salve rattling foolish that must be slammed down!
We all know the root cause of the country’s pervasive culture of politically motivated violence is the failure by the Police, judiciary, Army and other state institution to carry out their statutory duties of maintain law and order without fear or favour. These state institution have been corrupted by Zanu PF so that they are Zanu PF departments in all but name whose primary function is to keep the party in power at all cost.
Zimbabwe has had many golden opportunities, the best chances coming during the 2008 to 2013 GNU, to implement the democratic reforms and end the undemocratic influence of Zanu PF in the nation. These opportunities were all wasted.
The MDC leaders failed to implement even one token reform in five years of the GNU. Not one!
SADC, the EU, the Commonwealth, etc. have all advised that Zimbabwe should focus on implementing the democratic reforms first before holding elections. Guess who has been insisting on having the elections without reforms - the MDC leaders!
After 41 years of rigged elections, political violence and blood shed; surely we must now finally realise the madness of it all; and finally demand the full implementation of the democratic reforms so we can finally have free, fair and credible elections.
It’s High Time We Assemble Dockets To Prosecute UN Officials Who Aid And Abet War Crimes in Zimbabwe.
ReplyDeleteThere is no doubt that the UN Officials are more interested in pleasing those in positions of power and authority in a country like Zimbabwe than in upholding the rights and freedoms of the ordinary people.
Antony Taruvinga
ReplyDeleteI am at our home in Chivi South.
Our growth point Ngundu is a total eye-sore. All the pavements have been eroded and the little infrastructure dilapidated.
Unchecked soil erosion has occurred at the business centre, litter and thick dirty water flows everywhere.
The same is happening everywhere across the country.
@ Antony Taruvinga
ReplyDelete“I am at our home in Chivi South.
Our growth point Ngundu is a total eye-sore. All the pavements have been eroded and the little infrastructure dilapidated.
Unchecked soil erosion has occurred at the business centre, litter and thick dirty water flows everywhere.
The same is happening everywhere across the country.”
Zimbabwe's economic decline has been relentless ever since the country attain her independence in 1980. The white supremacists said blacks are incapable of self-rule; well Zimbabwe has certainly become the quintessential from riches to poverty in the blink of an eye failed state!
Just to underline our total helplessness; those responsible for dragging us into this mess are resolutely determined to stay in power - they keep talking of imaginary economic recovery and boom. The ordinary people know this is just a mirage but are helpless to do anything else.
"The attack on, our president, Advocate Nelson Chamisa is irrevocable proof beyond any reasonable doubt that Zanu-PF is a bloody, violent, fascist, illegitimate, tired and exhausted liberation movement," Biti said.
ReplyDelete"This is the message we have been trying to make to President Ramaphosa and to SADC that Zimbabwe is a lawless country run by a tired, exhausted liberation movement that has no respect to constitutionalism, the rule of law, and the rights of citizens."
However, Zanu-PF has accused Chamisa of fanning the violence that took place in Masvingo last week. The ruling party claims Chamisa's security details fired gunshots into the air to force villagers to attend his meeting.
Zanu PF is a party of violence and what is happening is to be expected and, without reforms, will be happening again and again. What is infuriating here is that not only did MDC have the chance to implement the reforms during the GNU but worse still are the ones giving vote rigging Zanu PF legitimacy by participating in flawed elections.
SADC leaders have, literally, begged MDC leaders not to participate in elections without implementing reforms first and so Tendai Biti should wag his accusing finger at himself and his sell-out MDC friends and not at SADC.
SADC have judged the flawed 2013 and 2018 Zimbabwe elections “substantially free and fair” to punish MDC. It must be said they punished not only MDC leaders but the ordinary Zimbabweans too. We want SADC to judge future elections on the basis of the facts before them and this nonsense of collective punishment must stop.
However, a programme gleaned by NewZimbabwe.com only shows her appointments are with government ministers, Chief Justice Luke Malaba, Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor John Mangudya, and Speaker of the National Assembly Jacob Mudenda.speaker of parliament.
ReplyDeleteDouhan's visit ends on October 28 and she will present a public report on her visit to Zimbabwe to the UN Human Rights Council during the 51st session in September 2022.
Next Monday, Zimbabwe will commemorate the thirds SADC Anti-Sanctions Day. The day is a public holiday in Zimbabwe.
Zanu PF knows that it has made a mountain out of a sanction molehill and by inviting a UN special rapporteur to look into the matter, the party has shot itself in the leg! Ms Douhan will have no choice but to say the truth - Zanu PF’s sanctions stories are all hot air to hide the true causes!
These SADC leaders will be blushing when it finally emerges Zanu PF has been taking them for the fools they are!