"Seek ye first the political kingdom" advised Nkrumah - after 38 years of blundering, the penny has finally dropped W Mukori

There is a growing hunger by an ever increasing pool Zimbabweans to engage in serious debate and search for the country’s way out of this hell-on-earth mess the nation finds itself in. This is just what the doctor ordered!

Last week Terence Simbi, wrote a first class article entitled “Zidera 2018 amendments Act, What does this mean for Zimbabwe?” in Bulawayo 24. Today there is another first class article by Vivid Gwede “Mnangagwa’s new political project”, again in Bulawayo 24. In the article Gwede makes it as plain as the nose on your face why Mnangagwa will never ever bring about democratic change, a just and prosperous Zimbabwe that has eluded us for the last 38 years – Mnangagwa is a corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyrant who thinks he can deliver democracy and yet still hold on to the dictatorship.

“The hunger for power and its subsequent misuse, even above national interest and institutions, is what has been at the centre of Zimbabwe's decline,” writes Gwede.

“Yet, there appears to be some belief that change can occur without addressing this fault.

“Events since November through to the July election can testify to how the "new" ruling circle represents that rule-less politics.”

Actually the Zanu PF leaders’ love of absolute power and the blind pursuit of power regardless of the consequences goes back to the formative days of the party itself. It is no secret that Mugabe and his fellow nationalist have always wanted to impose a one-party state for no other reason than that it was the only political system that would guarantee absolute power for themselves.

Yes, Mugabe and the rest in Zanu PF started off, in the fight to end white colonial rule, with “One person, one vote!” Of course, they knew that they could not have their one-party state and still have “One person, one vote!” They ditched the latter!

When the Lancaster House Constitution imposed the multi-party democratic system on the country, Mugabe and his Zanu PF cronies set out to achieve the de facto one-party dictatorship by foul means; the systematic undermining of the democratic institutions, Gukurahundi massacre which force PF Zapu to join Zanu PF, etc.

The country has had many golden opportunities to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship the best of which was during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. The late Morgan Tsvangirai and his fellow MDC leaders were tasked to implement a raft of democratic reforms designed to end Zanu PF’s dictatorial control over the corrupted state institutions, etc. They had five years to implement the reforms and yet failed to get even one reform implemented. Not one!

Yes, of course, MDC leaders are corrupt and incompetent and the sold-out during the GNU and on numerous other occasions. But one has to look deeper!

“Zimbabwe has been sailing shy of that orbit of democratic conduct and contestation, preferring rather a continuation of unfair tactics and political entitlement by a few people,” wrote Gwede.

“Ruling political elites assume themselves to have an infinite and inexhaustible anointment to rule the country by virtue of (an otherwise heroic national contribution of) being former liberation war fighters.”

Beside the reasons of being corrupt, etc. given above there was also one more reason Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends, many of whom did not fight in the war of liberation, failed to implement the democratic reforms – deep down they all believed Zanu PF leaders are entitled to rule. MDC leaders were not interested in dismantling the Zanu PF dictatorship but in getting Zanu PF to accept them into this exclusive ruling elite club!

“Morgan Tsvangirai was stupid to agree to take part in the 2013 elections with no voters’ roll. I will not repeat the same mistake!” said Nelson Chamisa before this year’s elections.

Of course Tsvangirai was stupid, but not that stupid not to have known that Zanu PF was legally obliged to release the voters’ roll and that without the voters’ roll Zanu PF will blatantly rig the elections. The voters’ roll was the smoking gun. Tsvangirai and his MDC friends knowingly agreed to let Zanu PF rig the elections and have no smoking gun to prove the rigging because MDC was not interested in democratic change, free and fair elections, etc.

MDC leaders were after the few gravy train seats they knew Zanu PF would give away to entice the opposition to take party in the elections regardless how flawed and illegal the election process happened to be.

Nelson Chamisa and his MDC Alliance participated in this year’s elections, knowingly repeating the same stupid mistake they made in 2013!

“The people will never be thankful that they are fed abundantly from the same hand that seeks to disempower, disenfranchise, dehumanise and delimit their freedom,” concluded Gwede

“If the political project of producing a happy and well-fed oppressed subject failed in Rhodesia, or elsewhere in colonial Africa, it should be even more awkward in Zimbabwe now. People want freedom and food.

“Not freedom or food. This is why the so-called New Dispensation's political project of food minus votes is unacceptable.”

I would argue that those who believe that Zimbabwe can achieve economic prosperity without freedom and naïve and insane. Zimbabwe is in this economic and political mess because for 38 years we have allowed Zanu PF to deny us a meaningful say in the governance of the country in the vain hope the regime will deliver economic prosperity. Of course, it is insane to still hold on to the foolish notion that corrupt, vote rigging and murderous tyrants like Mnangagwa will bring economic prosperity even after 38 years of failing to do so!

As long as the people cannot hold those governing them to democratic account the latter will, more often than not, always act in their selfish interest.

 “Seek ye first the political kingdom and all things shall be added unto you,” said Dr Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of independent Ghana.

The second point is that Zimbabweans must develop the political sophistication to jangle with two balls, ideas. It is not only enough to realise that Zanu PF is a party of corrupt and voting rigging thugs but also to realise that the party has managed to stay in power these last two decades thanks to MDC leaders who too, like Zanu PF, have sold-out on the national struggle of freedom, liberty and justice for all.

It is now official, Zanu PF rigged the 2018 elections - ED's world is falling apart Wilbert Mukori

The electoral victory of the rigged elections has been but a hollow pyrrhic victory for Mnangagwa.

Here is the man who had executed all Zanu PF’s vote rigging activities and Mnangagwa knows better than anyone else that this year’s elections have been very peaceful and the vote rigging very subtle compared other elections he has managed for the party. If Mugabe and Zanu PF had got away with those violent and messy elections; he simply cannot understand why he is having such a tough time getting away with this year’s rigged elections.

He was so cocksure the British would stand by him but now even they are telling him the elections were rigged.

Without the British, his chance of getting any funding from the IMF, WB, etc. have now just evaporated.

He was cocksure the Chinese would never treat him the way they treated Mugabe. He expected them to bankroll his many development projects. They have started to drag their feet on funding the mega deal projects they signed with him. They are demanding that Zimbabwe must first pay back the outstanding loans they advanced to Mugabe.

Pay back with what? The country is broke!

President Mnangagwa and his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sibusiso Moyo, turned on their charm offensive in their effort for Zimbabwe to re-join the Commonwealth a.s.a.p. It was all for nothing as the door has now been slammed the door in their faces, all because Zanu PF is accused of rigging the recent elections.

Poor, poor Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa his instinct is to hang on to power but deep down he knows he is fighting a lost battle. The world has just lost patience with Zanu PF’s elections rigging shenanigans. He took over from Mugabe at a time when ordinary Zimbabweans have suffered so much for all these years the ill effects of serious economic meltdown cause by Zanu PF misrule; their patience too has been stretched to breaking point. Everyone wants real change and they do not even want to know his plea that he was to hang on because it is his turn to rule! 

When Mnangagwa seized power after last November’s coup, he must have thought it was going to be plain sailing from there on. Now he can see Zanu PF’s days in power are numbered and so too are his days as President of Zimbabwe!  

President Mnangagwa’s world is falling apart.

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;” W B Yeats

The real challenge before us is to make sure that President Mnangagwa step down a.s.a.p. in a peaceful orderly fashion. The longer he hangs on, the greater the risk of a violence revolutionary change to force him and the junta out of office. If Mnangagwa and others do not accept peaceful change then the nation will pay the dear price that comes with revolutionary change with the Zanu PF leaders paying the highest price!

"Election field was NOT level" British tell Zanu PF - final nail in junta's coffin N Garikai

“This is my final departure call and I am happy to say we had a useful discussion reflecting on the last four years and changes that we have seen; many positive changes but, still some huge challenges ahead,” said Ambassador Laing.

“We talked about the elections and the positive steps around peaceful elections and very high turnout but, also some concerns that the playing field was not completely level.”

The British were the one ally Zanu PF has had in its corner worth the salt. The Chinese have the big bucks but they are like the rich uncle who will happily buy you beer instead of school books, as Mugabe has since learned. The Chinese helped Mnangagwa rig the elections and they have since demanded their pay back – they back in Chiadzwa picking up the looting from where they left off after Mugabe booted them out two or so years ago.

The British have now confirmed Zanu PF rigged the elections; they have shied away from saying it for nearly two months hoping for a redeeming event, none such event happened. Ambassador Laing, had put so much effort in getting everyone to believe the Mnangagwa regime was worth trusting and supporting has now had to eat humble pie and admit she was wrong. The Mnangagwa junta is still a bunch of corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and ruthless thugs.

The blatant vote rigging was bad enough but when the regime issued its shoot to kill order on the 1^st August even the British knew Zanu PF was a party of thugs and nothing had changed.

The British had tried to help Zimbabwe find ways to pay off its debts with the IMF, WB, etc. All these efforts have come to naught now Zimbabwe was viewed, rightly, as a pariah state – it old status under Mugabe.

“This has made the prospects of the multi-billion-dollar financial package needed to stave off economic collapse unlikely, which has in turn discouraged private investors,” reported The Guardian.

With the British finally admitting that Zanu PF rig the recent elections, the Americans gave their thumbs down soon after the elections and confirmed the sanction imposed on Zanu PF leaders will remain, there is real no one of note left  in Zanu PF’s corner. Zimbabwe’s economic collapse is now a certainty.

With unemployment already at 90% and 75% of the population living on US$1.00 or less a day it is tempting to think the country has already hit rock bottom it cannot sink any further. The economists may not be able to quantify the economic collapse in US$ terms a health care can in terms of soaring numbers of the severely malnourished or deaths from poverty related diseases.

Zimbabwe’s economic collapse has unemployment mount Everest high already, at 90% plus; it is now killing off people.

The only way out of this mess is for Zimbabwe to remove this corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical regime that has earned the country its pariah status and replace it with a competent and democratically accountable government. President Mnangagwa and his junta must step down or be forced to one way or the other; there is no other way out!

By rigging the recent elections President Mnangagwa confirm that Zanu PF is still a party of thugs. The regime is illegitimate and the only way to correct legitimacy issues is holding fresh free, fair and credible elections. Zanu PF has held Zimbabwe to ransom for the last 38 years, this must now stop!