“We are fighting against a system,
it is that system which is unjust,” said Joice Mujuru at the Press Conference
on 1 st March 2016. She was quoting the late General Josiah Tongogara. “This
system has stolen any hope for the people of Zimbabwe!”
By the time Zimbabwe gained her
independence in 1980 many people had heard that repeated many, many times by
Tongogara, President Mugabe, Hebert Chitepo and many other liberation war
leaders as well as other nationalist leaders. It was the standard answer
repeated over and over again, especially to allay white fears that the
liberation struggle was a race war and the blacks were hot intent on driving
all the white out of the country.
It was only at Zanu PF members only
meetings or “off the record” one to one discussions that many of these leaders
would tell you in no uncertain terms that the struggle was to replace white
domination with black domination and take back all the white had stolen from
the blacks.
The reason why the violent white
farm invasions of 2000 onward had such a strong appeal to many blacks
especially the war vets is this was fulfilling the pre-independence promise
that blacks will have their revenge and settle old scores with the whites.
After independence, President Mugabe
has reaped huge political capital by upholding the “on the record” position
that Zanu PF was fighting “the system” and not a racial war. He was knighted by
the British, a singular honour bestowed on very few nationalist leaders who fought
to end British colonial rule. Mugabe reverse his position to the “off the record”
position of going out of one’s to punish the whites. There is no doubt that
Zanu PF leaders and their thugs on the ground derived a lot of gratuitous pleasure
from the harassment and wanton violence and mental stress that inflicted on the
white farmers and their friends.
Mai Mujuru and her Zimbabwe People
First (ZPF) party followers know Zanu PF is an incompetent, corrupt and
murderous regime that lost the support of the ordinary people years ago. But
since she and many of her ZPF party members like Didymus Mutasa, Rugare Gumbo,
Kudakwashe Bhasikiti, Jabulani Sibanda and many others were Zanu PF members
until 2014, the new party desperately needs to convince the Zimbabwe public that
it is as different from Zanu PF as chalk and cheese. And what better way of
underlining the difference between Zanu PF and ZPF than evoking the same
pre-independence sentiment of fighting an “unjust system”!
How ironic that people like Mai Mujuru and many
other ex-Zanu PF members now calling the dictatorship an “unjust system” and undertaking
to “fight” to end it have spent the last 34 years creating it and then ramming
it down the nation’s throat. Are they just playing the old game again of “on
the record” fighting the unjust system and “off the record” making sure the dictatorship
is not dismantled?
@ Dumisani
ReplyDeleteIf all we want is to end Zanu PF rule then yes a grand coalition of ZPF and the MDC will probable deliver the demise of Zanu PF. I think we should aim for delivering a democratic Zimbabwe with free, fair and credible elections; ZPF cannot be part of that solution because all Mujuru wants is to get back into power and establish a ZPF dictatorship!
Game-changer is one thing but unless we are clear what game we want at the end of the day, we could end up with the wrong game!
Thomas Mapfumo tells Mugabe to go.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear! After rigging the 2013 elections President Mugabe thought he would rig economic recovery and has since failed to do so. The vote rigging tyrant must go!
As for Mukanya welcoming Joice Mujuru, he is wrong there. Mai Mujuru has been in the Zanu PF regimes for 34 years for Pete's sake and she has played a major part in creating and imposing this corrupt and tyrannical regime on the nation. She has proven that she is incompetent and corrupt; we cannot sweep all that under the carpet!
We want a democratic Zimbabwe and we are not going to achieve until we start taking the business of electing competent and responsible leaders with the seriousness and urgency the matter demands. We cannot keep on electing incompetent and corrupt leaders and expect them to get us out of this mess. Electing and praising leaders who have already proven that they are incompetent, corrupt and vote rigging tyrants is clear proof we are not yet ready for democracy, good governance and to get out of the economic hell we now find ourselves in.
Mai Mujuru is going to fight the system she helped create? I think she is fighting to take ownership of the dictatorship. She has not had anything against the Zanu PF dictatorship and would be leading it if she had not been kicked out. What she is fighting for now is for ZPF to inherit the dictatorship she helped create.
ReplyDeleteWe are our own worst enemy. We messed up in allowing Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs so much rope even when it was clear he was incompetent, corrupt and a murderous tyrant.
ReplyDeleteWe then had many real good chances to end the Zanu PF dictatorship with the best chance coming during the GNU when all MDC had to do was implement the democratic reforms. Not even one reform was implemented in five years. We messed first by electing corrupt and incompetent MDC leaders and secondly by failing to ensure they implemented the reforms.
We have learned nothing after messing up with Zanu PF and MDC because we still electing corrupt and incompetent individuals, even those who have already proved to be corrupt and incompetent!