Musewe, it will take more than Street protest to deliver "Zimbabwe we want"! By Wilbert Mukori

Musewe, unless we stop and think through what we have done wrong in the past we will never “create the Zimbabwe we want” you keep talking about. You keep say one thing and doing the exact opposite, for example, showing a complete disconnect between one half of your brain from the other half.

“We must never again, as a society, put too much of a burden on individuals, instead we must begin to build institutions that survive personalities,” you argued.

“This has always been the challenge in Zimbabwe, in that our politics have indeed been too personalized and therefore too dependent on individual leadership failures of those we tend to put on a pedestal. Nobody is perfect and yet we have continually expected the impossible from those who lead whom we then blame when they fail to meet our expectations. That is a dependence mentality which disempowers us as individuals to be the change we want to see.”

At this point the reader would have been forgiven to think you have finally started to UNDERSTAND Zimbabwe’s political problem which can be split into two parts although each feeds on the other.

1. Poor leadership – we would not be in this political and economic mess if we did not have some of the most corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical leaders, on both sides of the political divide, in the world.
    
2.  A naïve and gullible electorate – only a naïve and gullible electorate will take corrupt and incompetent leaders and place them on a “pedestal” as you yourself have acknowledged above.
    

You have clearly acknowledged the failure of our current political leaders with one half of your brain only because by singing the praise of failed leaders like Morgan Tsvangirai, Joice Mujuru, Tendai Biti and all the other opposition leaders it shows the other half of your brain is yet to be convinced these are failed leaders. You, Mr Musewe are the secretary of Finance and Economic Affairs for PDP, the party led by Tendai Biti, one of the MDC leaders who failed to implement even one democratic reform during the GNU landing us in this mess.

In Japan if one is shown to be incompetent they “bow down low and resign from public life”, according to Ken Yamamoto. In failing to get even one reform implemented in five years MDC leaders have proven that they are not just incompetent but, worse still, that they are corruption. Of course they sold-out they knowingly kick the reforms into the tall grass to appease Mugabe who granted them the ministerial cars, generous salaries and allowances and for, Tsvangirai, the $4 million Highlands mansion.

After the rigged July 2013 elections, MDC leaders should have all grovelled in the dust, given up whatever car, farm, mansion, etc. bribe Mugabe had given them, resigned on mass from public life and be grateful not to face treason charges for having betrayed the nation over the reforms. It is therefore shocking that you Mr Musewe should be calling of the nation to re-elect the same failed leaders back into power and still claim these corrupt and incompetent leaders will deliver “the Zimbabwe we want”!

“The fundamental question we must now ask ourselves in whether the current on going public protests from all manner of circles will achieve the change which we seek?” continued Musewe, talking of the people.

“I do not think that there is any doubt in anyone's mind what needs to happen if we are to see fundamental political and economic reforms. Mugabe must simply step down and allow a new leadership to take the country on a new path.”

There is the disconnect again; Musewe we are talking here of an electorate that has shown again and again that it is very naïve and gullible, one half of your brain has acknowledged that; and yet you now tell us the same people now know what “needs to happen” to achieve the reforms we want. No, no, no, a thousand nos! The Zimbabwean people do NOT know anything about the reforms; that is exactly the point.

If the people had understood even the most basic concepts behind the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA then they would have seen to it that MDC implemented at least some of the key reform during the five years life of the GNU. Even with the benefit of hindsight of the rigged July 2013 elections most people still have no clue what reforms are about; for anyone for whom the penny on reforms final drop, the one thing they will do without failure is to politically lynch all the MDC leaders for selling-out.

MDC leaders still continue to enjoy some public support in Zimbabwe. I rest my case!

The country’s worsening economic meltdown has force the ordinary Zimbabweans to wake up to the reality that if they do not make a stand and demand change the situation will only get worse. However if anyone believes that joining in the street protest shouting “Tajamuka!” “Sesijikile!” “We are wiser!” “Hatichatya!” is all the nation has to do to get out of the political and economic mess we are in, then they have learnt nothing from the past. Shouting “Chinja maitiro!” “Change!” at MDC rallies failed to bring about any change.

If we are serious about end the economic meltdown and have a competent and accountable government then we must address the country problem of a naïve and gullible electorate. We will only have quality and competent leaders when we have a shrewd and diligent electorate – at least, shrewd enough not to elect the same corrupt and incompetent individuals again and again!