Musewe calls for "death of moribund struggle politics" - death of opposition greed we want. P Guramatunhu

In this life timing is everything! I grew up in the rural areas and it was there I learnt timing is everything and I remember my hardest lesson as if it was yesterday.

The family had worked hard doing the winter-ploughing ferrying well-rotted cattle manure to the field. The good rains came on time, we planted on time and we had the most health field of maize I had ever seen. The good rains continued and the maize crop continue to flourish with dark green leaves and with steams so thick I had to use both my hands wrap round them.

The maize was just beginning to flower when the rains stopped and for the next two weeks the sun baked the land, the heat was so intense that by 10 in the morning the chickens were panting like dogs! The maize crop suffered from the heat and dehydration and their leaves drooped, as if they too were panting.

The rains did return and it rained cats and dogs for two or three days and nights, as if making up for the dry spell. Other crops like rapoko and sorghum able to produce multiple stems recovered; not so with maize, the crop was a complete write-off.

“Timing is everything,” said my late mother. “The rains failed when the maize was flowering and the torrent that came were all to late!”

My brother Vince Musewe says the right things but his timing is hopeless!

"The time for liberation struggle politics is over. As Zimbabweans, I think we have had enough of liberation rhetoric. For far too long we trusted our liberation struggle governments but one thing they have failed and are clearly unable to do, is to bring about economic freedom underpinned by inclusive transformational development," said Musewe.

He is right, it President Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs who have dragged the nation into this political and economic mess and they have used their liberation war credentials and rhetoric to justify the establishing and dogged retention of this corrupt and tyrannical de facto one party state. However, it is not President Mugabe, his murderous henchmen or their totalitarian rhetoric that has kept the nation in this hell-hole these last 17 years. It is Morgan Tsvangirai and his corrupt and incompetent opposition band of fools who have done that.

Zimbabwe has had many opportunities to end the Zanu PF dictatorship the best chance being during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. SADC spelt out the raft of democratic reforms the nation needed to implement to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship once and once for all. The task of implementing the reforms fall on Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends.

The GNU was initially chalked to last 18 months, it lasted 60 months – five long years. And in all those years MDC failed to get even one democratic reforms implemented. Not one!

Musewe, you, not even you, cannot blame Mugabe and his Zanu PF “liberation rhetoric” for the fact that not even one democratic reform was implemented during the GNU. The blame is with the corrupt and incompetent Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti, David Coltart, Welshman Ncube and all the other MDC leaders.

In all you many articles I have yet to read of you admitting that MDC leaders sold-out during the GNU. You have been hobnobbing with Tendai Biti, he being the president of the PDP, a political party of who are one of its leaders, and the rest in the opposition camp. Of course, it is your democratic right to hobnob with whoever you wish including corrupt, incompetent and treasonous sell-out as is the case here.

Former US Ambassador to Zimbabwe, described Morgan Tsvangirai as “flawed figure, not readily open to advice, indecisive and with questionable judgment.

"He is an indispensable element for opposition success … but possibly an albatross around their necks once in power.”

The Ambassador was spot on every point except one; Tsvangirai is not just a albatross around the opposition’s neck but the whole nation.

As if failing to implement even one reform during the GNU was not bad enough Tsvangirai and his band of MDC fools went on to contest the 2013 elections against repeated advice not to contest with no reforms in place. Worse still, the same village idiots are now preparing to contest next year’s elections although not even one reform has been implemented still. We know why Tsvangirai and friends are ignoring their own “No reform, no elections!” 2014 party congress resolution.

“The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn’t now do the obvious – withdraw from the elections,” explained David Coltart as to why MDC contested the 2013 elections.

“The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility.”

Zimbabwe has been held back this last 17 years and right now stands at the very edge of the abyss to be dragged over if next year’s elections go ahead. It is not the corrupt and tyrannical Mugabe and his Zanu PF thugs who are to blame for all these things but the corrupt, incompetent and greed Morgan Tsvangirai and the ever-growing army of equally corrupt and incompetent opposition opportunists.

"There surely must be a new dawn and that new dawn requires the death of moribund struggle politics and its archaic ideas and it's replacement by transformational inclusive politics which creates new developmental states," said Musewe.

That is a powerful statement designed to impress those in the opposition camp who have all taken the collective decision to contest next year’s election and pretend the problem of Zanu PF rigging the vote has never even existed. Who would ever believe there could be so many ostriches all fluffing their wings but with their heads buried in the sands of stupidity and greed.

If we are going to force Zanu PF to implement the democratic reforms, the pre-requisite for free, fair and credible elections, then we must stop Tsvangirai and company contesting flawed elections and thus giving the continued vote rigging the modicum of credibility! Yes, in the past Mugabe has used his liberation rhetoric to justify his continued corruption and tyrannical rule but that was in the past. The tyrant has since changed his strategy, he is now using the corrupt and incompetent opposition to give credibility to his continued vote rigging by allowing them to win a few seats.

If we want free, fair and credible elections then we must stop the opposition’s madness of contesting flawed elections. Musewe can harp on all day and night about Mugabe’s liberation rhetoric it is nothing more than a torrent of rain to a wilted maize crop. Timing is everything, my brother! 

"Make constitution a living document," says Veritas - but will it finally deliver free elections. W Mukori

“Must Laws be aligned to the Constitution? The answer is both “Yes” and “No”. We shall first look at why we say No, under the heading the Supremacy of the Constitution. We shall then examine the arguments for saying “Yes they do have to be aligned,” wrote Veritas.

“The reason why laws do not necessarily have to be aligned with the Constitution is that the Constitution is the supreme law.  Any statute or part of a statute [whether it is old or new] that is inconsistent with the Constitution is void and has no legal effect.  In other words it is not a law.”

Veritas went on to give three reasons why there is the need to realign the law to the new constitution:

1.     Alignment is part of the process of implementing the Constitution.

2.     Unaligned laws are difficult to apply

3.     Alignment involves enacting new laws as well as amending existing ones

The article is excellent and very informative, however it did not address the most important question as far as the nation is concerned.

Will the new constitution deliver and guarantee all our freedoms and basic human rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections and the right to life? This is a very relevant question in the light of National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) which Morgan Tsvangirai and many other have been calling for.

The argument here is that the new constitution is weak and feeble to deliver the freedoms and rights. And we know why, it was “dictated” by Mugabe as Zanu PF MP Paul Mangwana, who was the co-chairperson of the parliamentary committee that drafted the new constitution, boasted soon after the referendum approving the document.

If the supreme law of the land is weak and feeble, even if all existing and new laws are passed and diligently alignment to it, will never deliver the freedoms and rights by virtue of its inherent weakness.

In his book, The Struggle Continues 50 Years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe, David Coltart admits that the new constitution gives the State President “excessive powers without the usual democratic checks and balances”. When know we have a ruthless tyrant in State House right now who does not need any encouragement to abuse those excessive powers.

Whilst Section 206 of the new constitution gives the usual platitudes about protecting individual freedoms and rights these are all taken away sections 209, for example.

“206 National security.

1.     The national security objectives of Zimbabwe must reflect the resolve of Zimbabweans to live as equals in liberty, peace and harmony, free from fear, and in prosperity.

2.     The national security of Zimbabwe must be secured in compliance with this constitution and the law.

3.     In particular, the protection of the national security must be pursued with the utmost respect for –

a      The fundamental rights and freedoms and the democratic values and principles  enshrined in this constitution: and

b      The rule of law.”

“209 National Security Council

1      There is a National Security Council consisting of the President as chairperson, the VP and such Ministers and members of the security services and other persons as may be determined in an Act of Parliament.

2      The functions of the National Security Council are –

a      To develop the national security policy for Zimbabwe;

b      To inform and advise the President on matters relating to national security: and

c       Any other functions that may be prescribed in an Act of Parliament”

We know that one of the regime’s current security policy is that the Police must be advised in advance of all public gathering and they will not grant clearance if public security is likely to be compromised. President Mugabe has in the past accused his political opponents of working with the West as “regime change agents” and we know from Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri’s doctorate thesis that the Police have treated these opponents as criminals and not political opposition members in a multiparty democracy.

All these security policies will have been developed in accordance with Section 209, 2) and b) above and therefore are legal and lawful. The practical implementation of the policies would be to deny the opposition parties the right to protest or worse.

It is true that the opposition have often successfully challenged the Police ban in a Constitutional Court but because the judgement is on a case by case basis, the obnoxious security policies have remained. The new constitution does not give parliament or anyone other public body any power to challenge, much less discipline, the Police Commissioner’s blatant partisan application of the security policies.

“Perhaps the Speaker could issue a statement calling on the Government to carry out its duty towards the people of Zimbabwe by accelerating the alignment of our laws, thereby making the Constitution an effective, living document,” concluded Veritas.

“The Constitution took years of resources and manpower in its making.  If is not properly and timeously implemented all this effort will have been not only a waste of time but a deception and fraud perpetrated on the people of Zimbabwe and the international community.”

The people of Zimbabwe voted in droves to approve the new constitution in the March 2013 referendum on the basis of MDC leaders’ repeated assurance that it was the democratic constitution guaranteed to deliver all their freedoms and rights. It failed it very first test, it failed to deliver free, fair and credible elections in July 2013.

Morgan Tsvangirai & co. has since the rigged July 2013 elections that the nation will finally have all their freedoms and human rights including the right to free and fair elections if electoral reforms are implemented.

The accepted wisdom before the 2013 elections was that MDC should implement the wide ranging democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA as contrast to the wishy-wash NERA Tsvangirai is calling for.

Yes it is true that the new Constitution took years of resources and manpower in its making.  But before we waste even more resources and manpower in implementing it; are we 100% sure it will deliver the freedoms and human rights we want.

Morgan Tsvangirai lied to the people of Zimbabwe that the new constitution would deliver their freedom and basic human rights including free, fair and credible elections. We must not compound that lie by another lie that realigning existing laws and writing some new laws in line with this weak and feeble constitution will, somehow, take away the State President’s excessive powers, created the lacking democratic checks and balances, etc.

For the last 37 years Zimbabwe has blundered from pillar to post which is why Zimbabweans are today the poorest people in Africa. Nearly US$100 million and God knows how many man-years were spent writing the new constitution. The very least we can do now is to admit that it was just another criminal waste of resources and stop adding insult to injury by lying to the people and giving them false hope!