I would like to thank
Vivid Gwede for summing up so precisely what our political leaders from all
sides of the political divide are doing here; asking Zimbabweans to “democratise
within a dictatorship straitjacket” (Nehanda Radio Opinion). These leaders have been doing this all the
time for the last 36 years!
When power is not
restrained by the principles of moral justice and reason it has the tendency of
transforming a sheep into a wolf. This is what has been happening in our
beloved Zimbabwe and the challenge here is to break this cycle.
It is our liberators from
white colonial oppression who, as soon as they got into power, abandoned all
the pre-independence promises of freedom, justice, one-man-one-vote and even
the sanctity of human life. It is President Mugabe and his Zanu PF cabal who
have fashioned this dictatorship straitjacket and, for the last 36 years, have
forced us to wear it or be damned (as if a sane man forced to wear a
straitjacket is not damned already).
Tsvangirai and his MDC friends promised to end the dictatorship but as soon as they got on the gravy train they too forgot their promise to the people. Now that they have tasted the sweetness of absolute power and the economic benefits it brings, they are more determined than ever to get back on the gravy train. They know they must promise the people something to win back their confidence and vote and so they are telling the people removing Mugabe is the only thing the nation needs to do; which is nonsense.
Tsvangirai and his MDC friends promised to end the dictatorship but as soon as they got on the gravy train they too forgot their promise to the people. Now that they have tasted the sweetness of absolute power and the economic benefits it brings, they are more determined than ever to get back on the gravy train. They know they must promise the people something to win back their confidence and vote and so they are telling the people removing Mugabe is the only thing the nation needs to do; which is nonsense.
When the people elected
Mugabe back in 1980 they did not know he would turn out to be a corrupt and
murderous tyrant because there was no stamp “dictator” on his forehead to warn
them. He has gone on to corrupt the nation’s Police, Judiciary, ZEC, etc. so
they serve him and his no-regime-change mantra instead of the nation. Removing
Mugabe and replacing him with someone who will then inherit a ready-made dictatorship
in the hope that he/she will become a benevolent dictator in folly because
there is no such thing as a benevolent dictator.
What these politicians
are doing is keeping the dictatorship intact because they want the dictatorial
powers for themselves when they replace Mugabe. Even with his track record of
economic ruin, rigged elections and over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans murdered
to establish and maintain his de facto one-party dictatorship, President Mugabe
will never admit he is a dictator.
If we do not dismantle
the Zanu PF dictatorship and instead settle for removing the dictator we know,
Mugabe, we will be leaving the door wide open for the next president to be a
dictator too! Our goal should therefore be to end the dictatorial system of
government and with that we are guaranteed to remove current dictators and stop
any ever emerging in the future.
The only sure way to force the nation's political leaders to adopt the basic principles of moral justice and reason and to adhere to these values throughout their time in office is for the people to have the power to remove from office any leader found wanting or who falls foul of these principles. The people’s right to free, fair and credible elections is therefore not just another political skirmish, it is the battle royal.
Zimbabwe is in this political and economic hell-hole because the people have never had the power to remove from office corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical leaders like President Mugabe. As long as leaders retain the power to rig elections, inherent in the dictatorship, then this nation is going nowhere, we will remain stuck in this hell-hole.
No nation in human history has ever enjoyed peace, freedom and economic prosperity when with one half free and the other slave or, as is the case here, the sane majority in straitjackets ruled by a tiny minority whose insatiable greed for power and wealth has robbed them of moral compass and reason. The fight to have all the GPA reforms implemented and finally secure for ourselves and for posterity the right to free, fair and credible elections is therefore the battle royal, we must win it at all cost!
The failure by Zimbabweans to appreciate the importance of implementing the reforms as the only way out of the political and economic mess means the opportunity will be missed. Even now with the economy is total meltdown and people starving to death, the situation has not forced many people to snap out of their sloth-like sleep.
ReplyDeleteGetting the people to wear the dictatorship straitjacket is easy given they are half asleep!
There are many reasons why Zanu PF was able to impose the one-party state on the nation with such easy. One of the reasons has to be the people's failure to have a clear idea what they wanted, beyond the simplistic freedom and prosperity, and more significantly, appreciate that their had a duty to the nation to safe guard the freedoms and rights granted at independence.
DeleteBy 2000the people understood that the Zanu PF rule was not working and that they needed regime change. They accepted they needed democratic change to get regime change but again they failed to understand what these democratic changes are, even after the GPA which spelt them out, and, again, they failed to understand that it was their duty to ensure the changes are implemented. It was easy for MDC to sell-out on reforms so not even one reform was implemented because they knew the people would be none the wise even if they sold-out.
This time there has been a concerted effort to explain to the people what they need to do to get free, fair and credible elections and all the other freedoms and rights. It is now up to the people themselves to take the advice or ignore it. Or as one would say in Shona "Zvikwavari kufuka kana kuwaridza!"
One of the greatest disappointments of Zimbabwe society is that people so many man-hours arguing over what everyone else would consider established fact. The need for free, fair and credible election as the starting base of democratic government and nation not even be debatable and yet here we are, it is the issue that divide us! The loudest voices are even coming from those who want the status quo of rigged and meaningless elections maintained!
DeleteAfter 36 years it is clear that the present system has not worked but instead of accepting this reality and change the system some people want to shuffle the leaders and continue with the failed system. The leaders have benefited from all the corruption and absolute power but only at the expense of the majority who have suffered.
It is not so much that some people do not accept that free, fair and credible elections are the basis of good government, they do. What is paramount in their minds is not the good governance but that this is their opportunity benefit from the system. Just as President Mugabe had argued soon after independence that a one-party state was for the public good and would never concede that it only good then because he was positioned to be the one benefiting from it. He would have never agreed to it if Joshua Nkomo was the one set to impose the one-party state, for example.
Our debates and discussion are inherently phony because many of the players are totally dis-honest. What should be established and agreed points are thrown back on the table only be-cause some people are pushing a hidden agenda.
These people are taking full advantage of an electorate who have struggle to understand what is in their own best interest, what is achievable and what is not, etc. Many people will be tempted to go along with the argument of forget the reforms and concentrate on removing Mugabe from power which is being push by the Mujuru supporters, for example. Little do they know that implementing the reforms is in fact the surest means of removing Mugabe, of ending all future possibility of yet another dictator emerging and, most important of all secur-ing their right to free and fair elections and the other freedoms and rights.
DeleteThese opportunist and dishonest politicians always twist the truth to present the people with false choices. It takes a well informed and vigilant electorate to know when someone is taking advantage of them; the Zimbabwe electorate is far from being the discerning voter they should be.
@ tomorrow11
ReplyDeleteI agree with most of what you say but cannot agree that Mugabe is favouring one tribe over the other. Zimbabwe's political and economic demise affect us all, no one has been spared from the 90% unemployment rate and poverty is everywhere.
No one would be more pleased than Mugabe to hear there is a tribal divide, he is the master of divide and rule!
Implementing all the GPA reforms is not about free, fair and credible elections alone; the reforms will free the media, the Police, Judiciary, etc. to carry out their democratic duties of educating the nation, keeping law and order, etc.
Implement the reforms and the real work of rebuilding this nation can start in earnest! The most important and critical task right now is to implement the reforms, keep your eyes on that ball.
So you do admit that Tsvangirai and Mujuru are corrupt and incompetent. Well that is defi-nitely a feather in the cap of all those who have been hammering in this point, even the hard-ened and most myopic Tsvangirai and Mujuru supporters, have finally opened their eyes to this basic truth.
ReplyDeleteYou accept Tsvangirai is corrupt and incompetent and yet you still want the nation to elect these same failed leaders because "who is not corrupt and incompetent"! Now you see why Wilbert said you are mentally challenged.
If Tsvangirai has failed to get ever one reform implemented during the GNU when President Mugabe had his hands tied by the GPA because he is corrupt and incompetent (which you have since grudgingly accepted is the case). What makes you think he will get any of the re-forms implemented this time given Mugabe now has the tramp cards, knowing as we do that he (Tsvangirai) is corrupt and incompetent.
Of course Tsvangirai will not get even one reform implemented now that is obvious. So to elect Tsvangirai back into office is to tacitly acknowledge that no reforms will be implement-ed and thus accept Zimbabweans will never have free, fair and credible elections.
I accept that of the current crop of political leaders it is fair to say there is no one who is not corrupt and incompetent”. What you, Mukanya, and all the other mentally challenged minions out there have failed to understand is that the problem is not with the people but with the political system.
All the politicians on the stage are corrupt and incompetent not because there are no compe-tent and visionary Zimbabweans out there; they are there millions of them. They have shied away from politics because the de facto one party dictatorship Mugabe created has stifled all meaningful debate and democratic competition creating an environment where scum, not cream, will rise to the top. Corrupt and incompetent scum like Tsvangirai, Mujuru, Biti, Mnangagwa and, of course, Mugabe himself all thrive in Zimbabwe’s stiflingly oppressive political environment.
So if you want competent and visionary leaders instead of the run-of-the-mill corrupt and in-competent leaders, change the political system and that is where the need to implement all the GPA democratic reforms comes in!
We wasted the golden opportunity to get the reforms implemented during the GNU, the dear price we have had to pay for having elected corrupt and incompetent MDC village idiots in the first place. Still Mugabe is feeling the ill effects of the pincer squeeze from Zanu PF im-ploding and, most significant of all, the worsening economic meltdown; he knows the only way out is accepting political reform.
The only reason why he has not already capitulated and accepted reform is that he can see there is total confusion and chaos in the opposition camp. As long as people continue to fol-low corrupt and incompetent leaders like Tsvangirai and Mujuru like sheep to the slaughter, there will always be chaos and confusion in the opposition camp. I am talking about mentally challenged village idiots like you Mukanya, you are the ones who are holding dragging the whole nation down with your foolishness of following a leader that you accept is corrupt and incompetent! Wakeup you nincompoop!
@Mbanje
ReplyDeleteWe have a situation here were millions are suffering and denied of hope in a country with so much to offer us all because there are some people who have their head stuck in the backsides of leaders like Mugabe and Tsvangirai. These idiots admit these leaders a corrupt and incompetent (grudgingly at that) and yet they still follow these failed leaders. The only way to force these idiots to get their heads out of the backsides is to kick them hard and repeatedly as long as it takes. There is no politeness in that!
@ Manheru
ReplyDelete"When the hyena vomits grey hair!" A hyena vomiting?
We are talking about the “hoover” of the animal world here; a hyena will eat the steak, the entrails, bone, hair, horns, everything and ravenously too. It must be because of all those chemicals turning the chalk white grey hair of a 91 year old jet-black that tasted so awful that even the stomach of ravenous hyena found it so disagreeable it send the offending stuff straight out!
Could it be that these strong chemicals has gone from the hair into the brain and that is why someone is now the murderous tyrant we know? Just a thought!