Last November's coup was to stop Mugabe from booting out Mnangagwa and the rest top brass in the secrocrats out of power. There is no doubt that some in the security services will feel left out but there are not that many. If there is any discontent in the security service it will be because Zanu PF is imploding!
What must be remember here is that the last coup did not change the economic situation in the country.
The worsening economic situation is the biggest driving force for political change.
Professor Douglas Mpondi of African Studies Association, Atlanta defines “Chinhu chedu” as, ” an opinion by a specific group of people in a political party or in a country’s political battlefield that ‘them’ or an individual they want has the absolute right to lead the party or the Country. After being in power for 38 years, it is little wonder that Zanu PF now believes the party has the right “to rig elections”. The party will never reform itself out of power as Professor Jonathan Moyo rightly pointed out. “You can’t expect us to reform ourselves out of power,’ said the Professor. Having rigged the elections the party has seized the levers of political power and would not step down. And so the country has found itself caught between the rock and the deep blue sea, like Homer’s hero Odysseus. Zanu PF will neither give up power nor implement the reform necessary to stop it rigging power and thus perpetuating its stay in power. As we now know, letting Zanu PF rig the elections and stay in power has been a costly mistake because this has allowed mismanagement and corruption to grow and spread to the point we are today with the economy in total ruins and the nation at the edge of the precipice. Zanu PF is itself imploding because the party thugs are fighting amongst themselves, the party is doomed to sink into the abyss. The choice before us is to force Zanu PF to let go its strangle hold on the nation is thus stop the party dragging the nation into the abyss with it.
To huge cheers, Cde Mnangagwa — who is the Head of State and Government, and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Forces — said: “Here is the message from Esigodini. Those who have ears listen, those with eyes see: Zanu-PF is boldly on the move.” Can anyone remember even one occasion in the last 38 years when Zanu PF supporters have failed to cheer and applaud the party and its leaders? I cannot remember. Some of the so called “big ideas, big projects” such as the Batoka Gorge Dam have been on the cards for the last 40 years, Smith was planning to build the dam and would have done so if the civil war had not intervened. All Zanu PF has ever done is talk about the project, the country is in such a political and economic mess it is impossible to see how this regime will ever get such a project done! “Zanu PF is boldly on the move!” There is only direction the country is going, deeper and deeper into the economic and political hell-on-earth Zanu PF has dragged the nation into. The country has had crippling shortages of cash, forex, fuel, food, medicine, etc., etc., warning signs that the economic meltdown is getting worse not better, but yet instead of doing something to stop the rot the idiots are celebrating disaster as success! Cry, the beloved country for your already heart-breaking suffering is set to get even worse! The tragedy is the majority are totally helpless to do anything themselves to stop the rot because they have never bothered to understand what is going on. Ignorance is curse and the price for being ignorant can be very high – human misery and death!
An interesting and thought provoking piece, Tawanda. I would have given three cheers but will give it two instead because of one piece. “It (Zanu PF) has just won a two-thirds majority in parliament and it would take a miracle to upset that in the next elections. So, there is a big possibility that it will still be in power after 2023. It was always going to be an absurdity to start endorsing ED as the Zanu PF presidential candidate for 2023 now,” you said.
Zanu PF did not “win” two-thirds majority in parliament!
These elections were flawed and illegal, the party denied 3 million Zimbabweans in the diaspora a vote, ZEC failed to produce a verified voters roll and failed to produce the V11 forms so people could verified where its figures came from, etc. Zimbabwe government’s own appointed Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission said Chiefs, traditional leaders and Zanu PF operatives abused the state provided food aid and agricultural inputs to turn rural voters into nothing short of medieval serfs beholden to their overbearing landlords, Zanu PF.
The elections were certainly not free, fair and credible and Zanu PF rigged the elections. I do agree with you that if Zanu PF remains in office till 2023 then we can be 100% certain the party will rig those elections too and extend its corrupt and tyrannical rule. The only such way to stop this is by demanding that Zanu PF step down.
Zanu PF rigged the 1980 elections. The party did not withdraw all its freedom fighters into assembly points as agreed in the Lancaster House talks and these individuals make it impossible for Zanu PF opponents to campaign freely in some areas and they warned voters the war would continue is Zanu PF lost the elections. The 1980 vote was a vote to end the war and therefore not a free, fair and credible elections.
The greatest mistake the nation made was to reward Zanu PF with high office after rigging the elections. It was a dangerous precedence and one Zanu PF has exploited for the last 38 years. If we are serious about getting Zimbabwe our of this political and economic hell-on-earth Zanu PF has landed us into then we must demand free, fair and credible elections and mean it.
Zanu PF blatantly rigged the recent elections and to pretend otherwise is not helping our cause - fight for free, fair and credible elections!
"We should further entrench the rule of law and constitutionalism in the party and the country,” said Mnangagwa.
Well that is rich coming from someone who has just rigged the elections to perpetuate Zanu PF’s 38 years in power.
Mnangagwa and his junta are illegitimate and the only way out if for them to step down. Anyone who believes that Zanu PF will ever implement meaningful democratic reform to guarantee free, fair and credible elections is very naive. If Zanu PF is still in power in 2023 the party will blatantly rig those elections, of that we can be 100% certain!
Yeah, right! What was new in MDC in participating in elections knowing Zanu PF would rig the elections? What changes did the party deliver in participating in rigged elections?
To take the country out of the present economic mess; Zanu PF rigged the elections and therefore it must step down as the party has no mandate to govern. Zanu PF will never implement any reforms to ensure free, fair and credible elections.
As for MDC Alliance, stop mudding the muddy water with your clamouring for a share of the gravy train spoils. MDC will never get any democratic reforms implemented, the party failed to get this done during the 2008 GNU it is naive to believe they will do so now. MDC Alliance must step aside.
What Zimbabwe needs is an interim administration that will be tasked to implement the democratic reforms to guarantee free, fair and credible election. Neither Zanu PF leaders nor MDC leaders can be appointed into this administration.
"I'm differentiating that from an IMF financial programme which, of course, discussion of that, as we've said here before, would require the clearance of arrears by Zimbabwe to the other international financial institutions as well as an agreement with official bilateral creditors,” said Gerry Rice IMF official.
"So, we are looking at a staff monitored programme, but not at this point, the full financial programme for the reasons I just mentioned. …” Zimbabwe is failing to get enough foreign currency to buy basic necessities such as fuel, medicine, etc. So where is the country going to get the money to buy these basic necessities and pay off its $2 billion debt arrears too!
We have a regime that is refusing to deal with real issues and preferring to deal with wishful thinking. It is refusing to accept that it blatantly rigged the elections and that consequences of its actions was confirming Zimbabwe as a pariah state that no one wants to deal with. The party is insist that it won free and fair elections and that there is a flood of investors pouring into the country and the country’s economy is booming!
Sadly, the people need fuel, real fuel and not imaginary fuel, to fill their cars. They need medicine, real medicine and not imaginary medicine, or they will not get better and, no doubt, many are dying!
10:07
Last November's coup was to stop Mugabe from booting out Mnangagwa and the rest top brass in the secrocrats out of power. There is no doubt that some in the security services will feel left out but there are not that many. If there is any discontent in the security service it will be because Zanu PF is imploding!
ReplyDeleteWhat must be remember here is that the last coup did not change the economic situation in the country.
The worsening economic situation is the biggest driving force for political change.
Professor Douglas Mpondi of African Studies Association, Atlanta defines “Chinhu chedu” as, ” an opinion by a specific group of people in a political party or in a country’s political battlefield that ‘them’ or an individual they want has the absolute right to lead the party or the Country.
ReplyDeleteAfter being in power for 38 years, it is little wonder that Zanu PF now believes the party has the right “to rig elections”. The party will never reform itself out of power as Professor Jonathan Moyo rightly pointed out. “You can’t expect us to reform ourselves out of power,’ said the Professor. Having rigged the elections the party has seized the levers of political power and would not step down. And so the country has found itself caught between the rock and the deep blue sea, like Homer’s hero Odysseus. Zanu PF will neither give up power nor implement the reform necessary to stop it rigging power and thus perpetuating its stay in power.
As we now know, letting Zanu PF rig the elections and stay in power has been a costly mistake because this has allowed mismanagement and corruption to grow and spread to the point we are today with the economy in total ruins and the nation at the edge of the precipice. Zanu PF is itself imploding because the party thugs are fighting amongst themselves, the party is doomed to sink into the abyss. The choice before us is to force Zanu PF to let go its strangle hold on the nation is thus stop the party dragging the nation into the abyss with it.
To huge cheers, Cde Mnangagwa — who is the Head of State and Government, and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Forces — said: “Here is the message from Esigodini. Those who have ears listen, those with eyes see: Zanu-PF is boldly on the move.”
ReplyDeleteCan anyone remember even one occasion in the last 38 years when Zanu PF supporters have failed to cheer and applaud the party and its leaders? I cannot remember. Some of the so called “big ideas, big projects” such as the Batoka Gorge Dam have been on the cards for the last 40 years, Smith was planning to build the dam and would have done so if the civil war had not intervened. All Zanu PF has ever done is talk about the project, the country is in such a political and economic mess it is impossible to see how this regime will ever get such a project done!
“Zanu PF is boldly on the move!” There is only direction the country is going, deeper and deeper into the economic and political hell-on-earth Zanu PF has dragged the nation into. The country has had crippling shortages of cash, forex, fuel, food, medicine, etc., etc., warning signs that the economic meltdown is getting worse not better, but yet instead of doing something to stop the rot the idiots are celebrating disaster as success!
Cry, the beloved country for your already heart-breaking suffering is set to get even worse! The tragedy is the majority are totally helpless to do anything themselves to stop the rot because they have never bothered to understand what is going on. Ignorance is curse and the price for being ignorant can be very high – human misery and death!
An interesting and thought provoking piece, Tawanda. I would have given three cheers but will give it two instead because of one piece. “It (Zanu PF) has just won a two-thirds majority in parliament and it would take a miracle to upset that in the next elections. So, there is a big possibility that it will still be in power after 2023. It was always going to be an absurdity to start endorsing ED as the Zanu PF presidential candidate for 2023 now,” you said.
ReplyDeleteZanu PF did not “win” two-thirds majority in parliament!
These elections were flawed and illegal, the party denied 3 million Zimbabweans in the diaspora a vote, ZEC failed to produce a verified voters roll and failed to produce the V11 forms so people could verified where its figures came from, etc. Zimbabwe government’s own appointed Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission said Chiefs, traditional leaders and Zanu PF operatives abused the state provided food aid and agricultural inputs to turn rural voters into nothing short of medieval serfs beholden to their overbearing landlords, Zanu PF.
The elections were certainly not free, fair and credible and Zanu PF rigged the elections.
I do agree with you that if Zanu PF remains in office till 2023 then we can be 100% certain the party will rig those elections too and extend its corrupt and tyrannical rule. The only such way to stop this is by demanding that Zanu PF step down.
Zanu PF rigged the 1980 elections. The party did not withdraw all its freedom fighters into assembly points as agreed in the Lancaster House talks and these individuals make it impossible for Zanu PF opponents to campaign freely in some areas and they warned voters the war would continue is Zanu PF lost the elections. The 1980 vote was a vote to end the war and therefore not a free, fair and credible elections.
The greatest mistake the nation made was to reward Zanu PF with high office after rigging the elections. It was a dangerous precedence and one Zanu PF has exploited for the last 38 years. If we are serious about getting Zimbabwe our of this political and economic hell-on-earth Zanu PF has landed us into then we must demand free, fair and credible elections and mean it.
Zanu PF blatantly rigged the recent elections and to pretend otherwise is not helping our cause - fight for free, fair and credible elections!
"We should further entrench the rule of law and constitutionalism in the party and the country,” said Mnangagwa.
ReplyDeleteWell that is rich coming from someone who has just rigged the elections to perpetuate Zanu PF’s 38 years in power.
Mnangagwa and his junta are illegitimate and the only way out if for them to step down. Anyone who believes that Zanu PF will ever implement meaningful democratic reform to guarantee free, fair and credible elections is very naive. If Zanu PF is still in power in 2023 the party will blatantly rig those elections, of that we can be 100% certain!
"Behold the New. Change that Delivers!"
ReplyDeleteYeah, right! What was new in MDC in participating in elections knowing Zanu PF would rig the elections? What changes did the party deliver in participating in rigged elections?
To take the country out of the present economic mess; Zanu PF rigged the elections and therefore it must step down as the party has no mandate to govern. Zanu PF will never implement any reforms to ensure free, fair and credible elections.
As for MDC Alliance, stop mudding the muddy water with your clamouring for a share of the gravy train spoils. MDC will never get any democratic reforms implemented, the party failed to get this done during the 2008 GNU it is naive to believe they will do so now. MDC Alliance must step aside.
What Zimbabwe needs is an interim administration that will be tasked to implement the democratic reforms to guarantee free, fair and credible election. Neither Zanu PF leaders nor MDC leaders can be appointed into this administration.
"I'm differentiating that from an IMF financial programme which, of course, discussion of that, as we've said here before, would require the clearance of arrears by Zimbabwe to the other international financial institutions as well as an agreement with official bilateral creditors,” said Gerry Rice IMF official.
ReplyDelete"So, we are looking at a staff monitored programme, but not at this point, the full financial programme for the reasons I just mentioned. …”
Zimbabwe is failing to get enough foreign currency to buy basic necessities such as fuel, medicine, etc. So where is the country going to get the money to buy these basic necessities and pay off its $2 billion debt arrears too!
We have a regime that is refusing to deal with real issues and preferring to deal with wishful thinking. It is refusing to accept that it blatantly rigged the elections and that consequences of its actions was confirming Zimbabwe as a pariah state that no one wants to deal with. The party is insist that it won free and fair elections and that there is a flood of investors pouring into the country and the country’s economy is booming!
Sadly, the people need fuel, real fuel and not imaginary fuel, to fill their cars. They need medicine, real medicine and not imaginary medicine, or they will not get better and, no doubt, many are dying!
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride!