Mugabe was a murderous tyrant with no redeeming features, none - Biti, a sell-out, is airbrushing history P Guramatunhu

Tendai Biti and his fellow MDC friends have failed to explain why they failed to implement even one meaningful democratic reform during the party's 20 years existence, especially during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. The only logical explanation is that they are breathtakingly corrupt, incompetent and sell-outs. A bitter historic pill  to swallow but there it is!

The fact that the MDC leaders were conned by the late Robert Mugabe; a corrupt, vote rigging and murderous tyrant; into doing nothing about implementing the reforms has made the bitter pill even bitter and harder to swallow.

"We now appreciate that despite his (Mugabe) weaknesses, despite his commissions, despite his omissions there was an element of redemption in Robert Mugabe. There was an element of value in Robert Mugabe because now we have seen a valueless coterie of elites that are plundering our country into depths that we have not seen before," said Tendai Biti.

"My appreciation of Robert Mugabe now is bigger because of what I have been exposed to over the last 22 months. In fact during the government of national unity, after working closely with him, I suddenly realised that there were redeeming features and in 2012 I gave an interview to the country's major newspaper saying this man will be missed when he is gone because Zimbabweans will appreciate his value, and that's exactly what is happening."

Rubbish! Mugabe was a corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyrant whose greed for absolute power and the looted wealth to brought was insatiable. The suggestion that such a tyrant can ever be missed is utter nonsense!

Mugabe wormed his way to become the top dog in Zanu PF and to remain in that  position regardless his checked performance as a leader because he loved power was ruthless in his desire to get it and, having got it, to retain it. It was the love for power same ruthlessness enabled him to remain Zimbabwe's strong man for 37 years! 

One of Mugabe's prised political scalps has to be how he fooled Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends into doing nothing about the reforms during the GNU. This was the primary task of the GNU and not even the regular nagging by SADC leaders to focus on the reforms managed to get MDC leaders to implement even one reform.  

The MDC leaders' betrayal of the nation in failing to implement the democratic reforms has haunted this nation ever since the post GNU rigged elections of 2013. The failure has haunted MDC leaders themselves as they have lost all political credibility. They have called for reforms but without the authority of one competent to do anything to get even one reform implemented. 

Mugabe's crowning moment was to insist on holding the 2013 elections in total disregard of the SADC leaders advise to postpone the elections until reforms are implemented. If MDC leaders had boycotted the elections Mugabe and Zanu PF would found themselves back in the sin-bin as happened after the 2008 rigged elections. Mugabe gambled on greed and sheer stupidity getting the better of Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends, the same weakness that had stopped them implementing the reforms. Mugabe was proven right!

During the GNU MDC leaders, including Tendai Biti, David Coltart, Welshman Ncube and more so Morgan Tsvangirai were all falling over each other to sing praises of the late dictator. Mugabe "is the unflappable fountain of wisdom and father of the nation" said Tendai Biti. The dictator lapped up the praise but never took his eye off the ball for one second - kept the MDC leaders well supplied with all the trappings of high office, the ministerial limos, generous salaries and allowance, a US$4 million mansion for Tsvangirai, etc., etc. With their snout in the feeding trough, it is little wonder even the SADC leaders nagging fell on deaf ears! 

What Tendai Biti is doing now is airbrush the harsh historic facts about Mugabe so that MDC's treasonous selling out to the tyrant will be not be judged as harshly as it is otherwise. 

Of course, Zimbabwe's economic situation is worse today than when Mugabe was booted out of office in November 2017 but there is no denying that it was Mugabe who set the nation down this ruinous path. Any suggestion that things would not have been as bad if Mugabe had remained in office is mere speculation and conjecture. 

The truth is that both late Mugabe and Mnangagwa have proven beyond all doubt that they are corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyrants; two peas from the same pod. To compare one with the other is as meaningless as comparing a cobra to a black mamba - they are both deadly snakes! 

Both Mugabe and Mnangagwa have destroyed the nation’s hopes of a free, just and prosperous Zimbabwe by ruthlessly imposing the de facto one-party Zanu PF dictatorship. They nurtured the greedy and wasteful Zanu PF ruling elite whose love of wealth is only second to their love of absolute power. Mugabe presided over the cold blooded murder of over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans for the sole purpose of creating the de facto Zanu PF one-party dictatorship. 

It took a military coup to prise Robert Mugabe; like a binnacle, off a rock; from power. He was as unrepentant to the end as the robber on cross who demanded of Jesus, “Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!” 

The economic, social and political damage Robert Gabriel Mugabe has inflicted on Zimbabwe will take generations to heal. As for the tens of thousands of his political murder victims and the hundreds of thousands who have died unnecessarily because the country health care has collapse, etc.; there is nothing we, mortals, can say or do to comfort them much less bring them back to life!

History will judge Robert Gabriel Mugabe was a corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and murderous tyrant with no redeeming features. None! History will dismiss Tendai Biti's frivolous attempt to redeem the dictator and by proxy redeem himself for failing to end the Zanu PF dictatorship when he had the golden opportunity to do so.

"Zanu PF and MDC must form new GNU for betterment of all" - curse of the uneducated educator W Mukori

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result!” said the great physicist, Albert Einstein. The insanity becomes heart breaking when it is not just a minority who are insane but the overwhelming majority. And, to make matters worse, the insane mob is led by those who, by profession at least, claim to be informed.

“If the economic situation in the country could be stabilised during the era of the (2008) Global Political Agreement (GPA) that brought these very same political parties (Zanu PF and MDC) together, nothing should stop the current leaders from taking a similar route,” argued Newsday in the article ‘Chamisa dumps Mbeki mediation’.

“Leaders that are true and genuine should not have a problem with setting aside their personal ambitions and egos for the betterment of the population. In fact, that is a true mark of leadership.”

The primary purpose of the media is inform and educate the populous but that is only possible if the media practitioners themselves are informed and educated. Alas News Day reporter who penned the above article clearly has no clue what he/she is talking about. None!

The primary purpose of the 2008 GPA was to implement the democratic reforms to ensure the blatant cheating in the vote count of March 2008 and the wanton violence of the run-off that followed would never be repeated again. Not even one of the reforms were ever implemented in the five years of the GNU and hence the reason Zanu PF was able to blatantly rig the 2013 and 2018 elections! 

It beggars belief that even today with the benefit of hindsight anyone would still fail to see the 2008 to 2013 GNU of Zanu PF and MDC as complete failure. Only someone insane disregard the facts on the ground and call for a new GNU compose of the two parties, Zanu PF and MDC, who failed to implement even one reform in five years! 

“But it would appear some of our leaders are content with the chaos prevailing at the moment because it enables them to line their pockets with filthy lucre, while the rest of the population wallows in abject poverty,” continued the article.

“Zimbabwe has always had some much promise for political stability and economic prosperity, and it would be to the shame of the current leadership if they do not fix the current situation.”

In the first paragraph she/he blundered on the true reason why both Zanu PF and MDC leaders failed to implement even one democratic reform - greed. I say blundered because in the very next paragraph our reporter was once again off at a tangent. The same leaders will not implement the reforms for the same reason they did not do so in 2008 to 2013 - greed. 

“Given the fact that the Political Actors Dialogue has been discredited as none of the members - with the exception of Mnangagwa - has even a single member in Parliament, wisdom should compel the President to consider real dialogue that will have the buy-in of the majority of Zimbabweans, many of whom have long lost faith in his leadership qualities given how the situation in the country - which had stabilised somewhat under Mugabe - has continued to deteriorate,” argued the writer. 

The late Robert Mugabe and Mnangagwa are corrupt, incompetent and murderous thugs and it is nonsensical to even suggest they can ever be associated with wisdom and stability!

The majority of Zimbabweans, if they were not insane, should have lost faith in the leadership qualities of both Zanu PF and MDC leaders. Zimbabwe’s economic and political mess is a man-made crisis and Zanu PF and MDC leaders are the “man” responsible for the mess. They cannot be the problem and the solution too! 

Decades of being brainwashed, first by the white colonialists and then by Zanu PF, has left many Zimbabweans incapable of seeing beyond the tip of their nose. As much as they can see both Zanu PF and MDC leaders are corrupt, incompetent, sell-outs and tyrants who landed the nation in the mess. And yet they still look to the two parties for way out of the mess because they cannot think outside the box. 

As much as the nation needs a new GNU because the July 2018 elections were flawed and illegal, same as the 2008, and therefore failed to produce a legitimate government. Yes, we need to implement the democratic reforms to end the curse of rigged elections and bad governance. 

However it will be insane to entrust Zanu PF and MDC leaders with the critical task of implementing the reforms because they failed to get even one reform implemented in the last GNU! 

Garrison Shops get 2.5% civil servant slave wage subsidy - wafer-thin differential to fool poverty stricken soldiers P Guramatunhu

“Public Service Commission (PSC) Secretary Ambassador Jonathan Wutawunashe said that the scheme which is voluntary mobilises savings by Government employees for the purpose of wealth creation adding that Civil Servants can benefit through concessional loans to assist them with wealth creation projects and other requirements. He said that those who opt to join the scheme will contribute 2.5 percent of their basic salary,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“Wutawunashe said that members of the fund will withdraw the totality of their contribution with accrued interest upon termination of employment.”

This is just nonsense, the civil servants are on slave wages already and therefore are living from hand to mouth. These people should be receiving welfare support and not be expected to save. 

My gut feeling is the scheme will not be voluntary.

Unless the interest rate paid on the savings in variable and above the hyperinflation rate at all times. At present Bank interest rates are double digit and yet inflation is top end of the three digit, at least. The interest accrued is likely to be pegged on the Bank rates. In this case, it will be unwise to join the scheme because you will pay in a cow and get back a goat, a chicken, an egg or one single grain of maize; the long you stay in the scheme the worse you will be! 

The only reason why one would join the scheme is so that you borrow as much as possible up front and pay back as late as possible. The skewed interest rate charged on the loan and the bloated hyperinflation rate will work in your favour then. Be warned, everyone would want to do the same and in Zimbabwe’s corrupt system the ruling elite will benefit and the poor will lose big time!

“Wutawunashe said that Cabinet also initiated the operationalization of Garrison Shops for the Uniformed Services, namely Zimbabwe Defence Forces, Zimbabwe Police Service and the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service to ensure convenient access to reasonably priced commodities,” continued the report.

“He said that the Garrison Shops are based on a self-financing model as they entail selling of goods to customers.”

If these Garrison Shops source their goods from the same suppliers as the other shops then it hard to see where Garrison Shops will be making their savings to justify charging their uniformed service customers lower prices. Some reports said Garrison Shops prices will be subsidised by an addition 2.5% tax on civil servant wages. 

Most civil servants are on slave wages already and whilst they will feel the 2.5% additional tax it is doubtful uniformed service personal will note a great deal of price difference. 

The only advantage to having the Garrison Shop will be when there are shortages. The Garrison Shops will be well supplied!

The Garrison Shops are meant to make those in the uniformed service feel they are favoured about the rest of the civil servants who, by virtue of having a job, are luckier than the millions unemployed, pensioners, vendors and right at the bottom of the packing order the rural peasants. 

In a video that has gone viral, Hopewell Chinono rightly asked if there is going to be a Garrison School, Garrison Hospital, Garrison Bank, etc. for the uniformed services personal. Even if government was to added one or two of these things, there is a limit. Sooner or later the soldier, Police officer or whoever will have to step outside the Garrison bubble and come face to face the ever rising tide of abject poverty sweep the land. 

So the true purpose of the Garrison Shops is to all these in the uniformed services feel they are a cut above the masses or being it by this wafer-thin 2.5% differential. The most cynical part, cabinet is cocksure the soldiers, Police officers, etc. will not mind they are sliding down the greasy pole into abject same as everyone else as long as the wafer-thin differential is maintained! 

MDC launch PRICE promising 20 reforms by 2023 plebiscite - failed to implement even one last 20 years N Garikai

On 21 January 2020, Nelson Chamisa and his MDC Alliance launched the party’s Agenda 2020 programme of action. Yesterday, 27 February 2020, just a month later, the party launched its Principles for Reliable Inclusive and Credible Elections in Zimbabwe (PRICE) document.

The document proposes 20 key reforms that must be implemented how the party will push to have reforms implemented to ahead of the 2023 plebiscite.

Thank God it is only meaningless programmes of action and documents that MDC has been launching. In the 20 years of MDC A’s existence the party has launched so many programmes and documents; LOAD, RELOAD, START, RESTART, SMART, SMARTER, NERA, MDC A July 2018 election results ConCourt Challenge, AGENDA 2020 and now PRICE (AGENDA 2021 and PRICELESS coming soon). iI these had been rockets to the moon, there will be no space left and one would see the junk from earth!

Copies of PRICE were available after, I took a copy out of curiosity. I have browsed through the document and filed it in the bin! I will only retrieve it if Nelson Chamisa, Tendai Biti or anyone can give me satisfactory answers to the following:

1. The reforms listed in PRICE are at the heart of the democratic changes to ensure free, fair and credible elections, the nations has been dying for, literally, all these years. The democratic changes implied in the MDC A party’s name. The people of Zimbabwe have risked life and limb to elect MDC leaders into power so they bring about these changes. So why is it that after 20 years of MDC on the political stage we still have rigged elections and not even one meaningful reform has seen the light of day? Not one!

2. Without doubt, the nation had its best chance ever to implement the democratic reforms during the 2008 to 2013 GNU when Mugabe and his Zanu PF party had their hands tied by the signing of the 2008 Global Political Agreement. It was left to the MDC leaders to implement the reforms and in five years you lot failed to get even one reform implemented. The task of getting the reforms implement now is a lot tougher. If you were not up to the task during the GNU why should the nation believe you can do it this time?

3. The key to getting any reforms implemented is getting parliament to approve the reform, Zanu PF with its 2/3 majority will never approve any reforms taking away the party’s carte blanche powers to rig elections. What tricks does MDC A have to force Zanu PF will reform itself out of office?

4. PRICE does not say what MDC A will do if the Zanu PF controlled parliament refuse to implement the reforms. There is “No reform, no elections!” as was the case in the MDC’s 2014 party congress resolution. Was PRCIE silent on boycotting the elections if no reforms are implemented because the leaders know that position is a lead balloon that will never fly?

5. Why would Zanu PF implement even one reforms when they know MDC A will participate in the 2023 elections even if not one reform in PRICE sees the light of day? 

Zimbabwe is in a serious economic and political mess, our people are facing heartbreaking economic hardship and many are dying unnecessarily. The key to all the nation’s problems is implementing the democratic reforms and thus lift the curse of rigged elections and bad governance. 

Like it or not, Nelson Chamisa and his MDC friends have failed to implement even one democratic reform in 20 years because they are breathtakingly corrupt, incompetent and they are sell-outs. 

PRICE will not force Zanu PF to implement even one reform and we can be 100% certain that MDC A will participate in 2023 elections regardless! In short, PRICE is just a worthless document whose rightful place in the bin! 

"Our development stalled for lack of requisite external funding" admitted Mnangagwa - IMF does not fund pariah state W Mukori

The trouble with people like Mnangagwa is that they think they are smart, they can not only have their cake and eat it too and, better still, that no one would be the wiser! 

Soon after the November 2017 coup Mnangagwa promised, amongst many other things, to hold free, fair and credible elections. He was reminded of the need to implement the democratic reforms necessary for free and fair elections and the Americans, in particular, went to great length to spell out what exactly he needed to do. 

As we know, he ignored all the warning and went on to blatantly rig the July 2018 elections. ZEC failed to produce something as basic as a voters’ roll, a legal and common sense requirement. Just to rub insult to injury, he has insisted the July 2018 elections were free, fair and credible.  

"Sustainable development in Africa cannot be achieved without comprehensive socio-economic development. In the case of Zimbabwe, we remain committed to fully implement the political, economic and legislative reforms,” President Mnangagwa told delegates development conference. 

If Zimbabwe’s July 2018 elections elections were free, fair and credible, as he keeps insisting, then Zimbabwe does not need to implement any political reforms! 

If, by acknowledging the need to implement political reforms, he is also tacitly acknowledging that the July 2018 elections were not free, fair and credible. 

The consequences of failing to hold free and fair elections is that Zimbabwe does not have a legitimate government with the people’s democratic mandate to govern. Zimbabwe is a pariah state! 

"As one of our tools of engagement and re-engagement strategy, we are determined to see through the IMF Staff Monitored Programme which supports our Reform Agenda as well as the achievement of the associated reform targets. In doing this, it should be understood that we are undertaking the reforms without the requisite external financial support as is the norm,” continued Mugabe.

Well the IMF, WB and all the other international donors and investors did notice that the July 2018 elections were rigged and they have all kept away from Zimbabwe. No one wants to do business in a pariah state, it is notoriously difficult to do so. The IMF has just been to Zimbabwe and has told the regime why it has repeatedly refused to bankroll Zanu PF’s reform programme.

“The International Monetary Fund said on Wednesday that Zimbabwe’s economic reform agenda was off-track, and that without further donor support the risks of a deep humanitarian crisis in the country were high,” reported Spotlight Zimbabwe.

“The government that came to office following the 2018 elections adopted an agenda focused on macro stabilisation and reforms… but is now off-track as policy implementation has been mixed,” it said in a statement outlining the conclusion of its latest Article IV consultation with the country.

Zimbabwe’s economy collapse a 15 years ago sending unemployment into the dizzying height of 80% plus. 90% of our people poor with “34% of them living in extreme poverty”, according to a recent WB report. The country’s education and health care services have all but collapsed. The IMF is right, we are facing an existential humanitarian crisis.

The solution to the crisis is for the illegitimate Zanu PF regime to step down so the country can appoint an independent body to implement the democratic reforms, the pre-requisite for free, fair and credible elections. Zanu PF will never implement the reforms, we all know that now. 

Mnangagwa thought he could rig the July 2018 elections present the world with a fait accompli Zanu PF government which IMF, WB and investors will have no choice but to work with. As long as this illegitimate Zanu PF regime remain in power Zimbabwe will remain a pariah state and we will not receive a single dollar in international financial assistance, as Mnangagwa now acknowledge.  Not one single dollar!

If the pariah Zanu PF regime steps down and is replaced by independent body, there is no doubt the IMF, WB and the international community will step in and fund Zimbabwe’s economic recovery. Zimbabwe is stuck with this corrupt, incompetent and vote rigging Zanu PF dictatorship the independent body will implement the reforms end the curse of rigged elections and pariah state.

"Civil servant loan fund will save them from loan sharks" said Ncube - gvt, great white, has joined feeding frenzy P Guramatunhu

“Cabinet resolved that the government employs the Mutual Savings Fund and that it be established by March 2020, that government will immediately provide a lumpsum injection of $100 million from the budget to facilitate the expedited establishment of this fund,” Minister of Finance Professor Mthuli Ncube announced.

“A 2.5% of the total remuneration (will) be deducted from every government employee in consultation with the Public Service Commission (PSC).”

This is a regime whose greed knows no bounds! The overwhelming majority of these civil servant’s wages are already below the bread line. Teachers, nurses and doctors, these are better paid than the cleaners and general labourers, have been complaining that they wages do no cover their basic needs; a situation made a lot worse by the country’s hyperinflation.  

Given the hyperinflation there will be a scrum to borrow as much as possible as early as possible and pay back as late as possible when the money has lost its value. No doubt the chefs will be ahead of the queue and the poor worker at the bottom of the packing order will get a wheelbarrow full of worthless money! 

When government established NSSA many people feared that government was insisting on running the pension scheme for no other reason than to milk the cow. That is exactly what has happened, millions of dollars have been wasted in ill advised investments or looted. 

To make matters worse, hyperinflation has eroded the value of the pensions most retired workers receive from NSSA. It is not worth one’s while to travel 20 km plus, queue at the bank for a day, only find the pension is not enough to pay for bus fee back home!

“What we had done so far, is we had solved the pension issue. When they retire, they have a pension so that is ok,” boasted Minister Ncube oblivious of the countless scandals at NSSA and the sheer injustice of being paid a fraction of the true value of one’s original contribution. 

“They have needs now and they are borrowing from loan sharks at a very high interest rate and we want to solve that problem.” Yeah right!

Government is not saving the civil servants from the loan sharks, it is getting in on the act!

"US$ 7 billion was siphoned outside Zimbabwe" ZACC revealed - idiots still blame sanctions for economic meltdown P Guramatunhu

In 2016 Robert Mugabe confessed that the country had been swindled out of US$ 15 billion in diamond revenue alone. He let loose a cat amongst the pigeons since he had been at the front of those denying that corruption was a problem in Zimbabwe as he insisted that the sanction was the root cause of Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown. The admission silence him and his apologist!

When President Mnangagwa failed to revive the nation’s economy he has revive the old swan-song of blaming sanctions for the economic ills. This time it was ZACC chairperson Justice Loice Matanda-Moyo who has reminded the nation once again that corruption not sanctions is the root cause of the economic meltdown.

“Informally, we have now identified over US$7 billion worth of property and cash all over the world which were siphoned by our former leaders, current leaders, private sector and individuals. So this information we only got informally, so now we have to formalise the process so that we start the processes of repatriating the monies back home,” she told reporters.

“So the purpose of this training is to equip our officers with the techniques of repatriation of stolen funds. This workshop is sponsored by the World Bank and UNODC and its from Star, which is Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative. So they are going to teach us on the various jurisdictions, how we can interact with those various jurisdictions, who we can engage and who we can actually work with in order to ensure that all those monies are repatriated back to Zimbabwe for the benefit of Zimbabweans.”

Please note, the US$ 7 billion ZACC is talking about here is property and cash looted from Zimbabwe and starched outside the country. It does not included any of the palatial mansions; the fleet of posh cars; the walk wardrobes full of Gucci designer shoes, 45 gold watches, diamonds, etc.; business empires; the bundles of cash is the safe at home and in the local banks; etc. 

Mugabe’s Blue Roof palatial mansion alone has been valued at US$2 to 4 billion. So if we accounted for all the loot from the late dictator, his family right down to the small-time looters like Wicknell Chivayo who swindled ZESA out of US$5 million to buy designer shoes; the total haul will be well in excess of US$ 100 billion!

The nation will never know how many billions of dollars has been wasted over the last 40 years of the globe trotting, the extravagant lifestyle, failed business ventures, etc. My guesstimate is another US$ 100 billion. 

Just to put the US$7 billion siphoned outside the country into perspective. This would have paid for the design, build, equip and commissioning of Batoka Gorge Hydro Power Station, costing at US$3.5 billion; build and commission Hwange stage 7 and 8, costing at US$ 2.5 billion; upgrade Kariba South Hydro Power Station, costing at US$0.5 billion and still have US$0.5 left to upgrade the country’s three coal fired power stations in Bulawayo, Munyati and Harare. 

With the above power generating capacity, Zimbabwe would have met the country’s electricity power needs. Even with the serious drought of the last three years which has forced Kariba Dam Hydro Power Station to generate at 30% of its capacity; augment that with the 30% from Batoka Gorge plus the 100% from the thermal power stations the country would have avoided switching off power supply to any of the wealth producing sectors.

The 18 hours, across the board, load shedding regime instituted by ZESA these last three years has costed Zimbabwe US$10 billion per year, at least, in lost production in alone! If we fact in the cost of import substitutes, all paid in foreign currency, add the billions of siphoned out of the economy by the looting brigade, etc.; there is no deny that corruption is the root cause of Zimbabwe’s economic meltdown - not sanctions!

It is interesting to note that whilst the chairperson of ZACC Justice Loice Matanda-Moyo was publicly admitting the seriousness of corruption in Zimbabwe; her husband, Foreign Minister, Lt General (Rtd) Sibusiso Moyo, President Mnangagwa himself and the rest of the Zanu PF apologists have continued blame sanctions! 

Mnangagwa and his team have learned from the grandmaster of hypocrisy and meaningless double talk, Robert Mugabe. The real big surprise here is that the some AU and SADC leaders have been naive and gullible to believe the sanctions nonsense!

The last 40 years have been years of criminal waste of human and material resources through gross mismanagement and rampant corruptions the nation has paid dearly for this, the national economy has all but collapsed send unemployment soaring to 90% and forcing millions into abject poverty. 

The country must put an end to corrupt, vote rigging and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship, the root cause of all the economic and political madness of the last 40 years. We need to implement the democratic reforms designed to dismantle the dictatorship and replace it with a democratic system of government in which the freedoms and rights of all are respected and such evils as corruption are dealt with and not swept under the carpet to fester and grow. 

ZACC will never undercover the true looted amounts or recover most of the US$ 7 billion it has uncovered; not as long as Zanu PF remains in office. Zanu PF government leaders, to whom all ZACC officials are beholden and answerable to, are the Godfathers of corruption. 

The top brass in the army, for example, have earned thousands of dollar a month form its diamond concession and other commercial activities. As one of the senior army officers Lt General Sibusiso Moyo benefited of the army’s strictly off the record diamond mining activities. As stated above, ZACC chairperson Justice Loice Matanda-Moyo is the wife Foreign Minister, Lt General (Rtd) Sibusiso Moyo; she knows that a lifestyle audit of her family will show they have a lot more wealth than the family’s tax-returns suggest!

MDC ratchets up protest and Zanu PF ratchets up violence - rat race will not end economic meltdown N Garikai

It is heart breaking that Zimbabwe is in stuck in this man-made hell-on-earth with unemployment now a nauseating 90%, basic services such as education and health care all but collapsed, 34% of the population now living in abject poverty, etc. What makes the country’s situation so utterly hopeless is that both Zanu PF and MDC, those the nation would be looking up to chart the path out of this man-made hell-on-earth, are the ones landed the nation this mess and are dragging us all deeper and deeper into the abyss! 

“POLICE have increased their presence in and out of Harare in apparent readiness to quash attempts by restless opposition supporters and workers in the wake of threats of massive protests to pressure President Emmerson Mnangagwa to end the crisis bedevilling the country,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“Observers said the police presence had increased since last week's threats by opposition MDC leader Nelson Chamisa that he had dropped his dialogue calls with Mnangagwa and would be going all out to push for action to address the challenges in the country.”

The real tragedy here is that neither MDC’s street protests nor Zanu PF’s use of brute force to quash the protests will do anything to get the nation out of the worsening economic and political mess we are stuck in. 

40 years of Zanu PF corrupt and tyrannical rule has landed this country in this economic mess and earned the country the pariah state label and sealed its fate as a failed state. It is notoriously difficult to do business in a pariah state! 

When Mnangagwa took over from Mugabe following the November 2017 military coup, he was cocksure his inspirational ideas would revive the country’s economic fortunes. “Zimbabwe is open for business!” he announce; prematurely, it turned out.

Mnangagwa promise to stamp out corruption and to hold free, fair and credible elections. If he had delivered on these two key promises then he would have ended Zimbabwe’s pariah state curse and thrown the country’s doors wide open for business. Sadly, he failed to keep both his promises.

Two years after the coup, corruption is still rampant. And by blatantly rigging the July 2018 elections he made it emphatically clear that Zimbabwe was still a pariah state and, per se, Zimbabwe’s doors were still closed and locked to all wishing to do business. 

As long as Zimbabwe remains a pariah state, there will be no meaningful economic recovery. None! 

Having failed to stop the economic meltdown Mnangagwa is determined to silence all voices of dissent protesting the worsening economic hardships. He does not want to admit his own failures to end the people’s suffering and his solution is they must suffer and die in silence like sheep in a slaughter house. Of course, this is not socially and politically sustainable and morally unacceptable.  

Chamisa is hoping to the street protests will force Mnangagwa to share power with MDC by forming a National Transition Authority (NTA) in which Chamisa and a few other MDC leaders will be allocated cabinet positions. 

What matters the most for Zimbabwe is that the NTA will not end Zimbabwe’s pariah state status. The illegitimate Zanu PF cabinet and regime, illegitimate since they were born out of rigged July 2018 elections, will not become legitimate because a few MDC members are in the cabinet and it has been renamed NTA. 

Investors and lenders are a savvy lot, they will not be fooled by the presence of a few manikins in cabinet. They will still know Zimbabwe is a pariah state and stay away!

Worse still, the NTA will not implement the all important democratic reforms necessary for free, fair and credible elections. Parliament will be entrusted the task of implementing the reforms and this parliament with its 2/3 Zanu PF majority will never ever implement the reforms! Never ever!

Chamisa is not offering any solution to end pariah state. All he is after is a few seats on the gravy train for himself and his MDC mates!

What Zimbabwe needs is an independent body that can be trusted to implement the democratic reforms and guarantee free, fair and credible elections in 2023. Zanu PF must step down to create the political spare for the independent body. This is the only way out!

"Lift sanctions to end poverty" AU insist - polo are poor but not stupid, know Blue Roof opulence is mother of poverty P Guramatunhu

There are many reasons why Africa has remained the dark continent, forever doomed to blunder from one crisis to the next. 

Africa was at business-end of the slave trade, millions of Africans were sold like cattle at the market to suffer and die in damn anguish. All Africa got in payment for supplying the human cargo was a fist of shinny beards and a piece of calico cloth per head.

Within a few years of the abolish of the slave trade, there was the scramble for Africa. Africa was dolled out to the European, mostly, colonial powers for the explicit purpose of exploiting the continent’s resources for the benefit of the colonisers with scant regard for the wellbeing of the colonised people. 

Many Africans celebrated as each African country gained her independence but little did they know they were jumping from the frying pan into the fire and brimstone of hell-on-earth. All most nations have ever done was to replace the white colonial oppressors, with the common sense not to kill the goose that lays the golden egg, with black nationalist oppressors who killed every goose on sight! 

In Zimbabwe Mugabe and his fellow black nationalists leaders have ridden roughshod over the people denying them their freedoms and rights including the right to “One man, one vote!”, the clarion cry before independence, and even the right to life. Over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans have been murdered in cold blood by Zanu PF for the purpose of imposing and retain the de facto one-party, Zanu PF, dictatorship that has ruled the nation with an iron fist these last 40 years and still counting.

Mugabe and his cronies’ insatiable greed for power and wealth have completely destroyed the country’s once vibrant and promising economy. Not only has Mugabe and his Zanu PF regime failed to build on what the white colonialist bequeath at independence they have failed to maintain what the got. The hospitals, railway network, power system, roads, etc. we inherited in 1980 are all in varying stages of rot and decay!

The people of Zimbabwe have often look to SADC, the regional body, and AU, the continental body for help to end the Zanu PF dictatorship - in the spirit of African solutions to African problems. Sadly this has been a complete waste of time as these regional and continental bodies are composed entirely and exclusively of corrupt, incompetent and murderous despots, one of his members is the subject of the complain. Here is one example.

The Deputy Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Kwesi Quartey, speaking at the ongoing sixth African Regional Forum on Sustainable Development, has called for the immediate removal of sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the West and the US.

“For us to build the conducive conditions to achieve these lofty ambitions, the AU has called for all the sanctions on this country to be lifted immediately,” said Quartey.

“This is what will allow for more effective engagement of our women and our youth in the multifaceted process of accelerated development. It also means the recognition of the statistics and data, to enable evidence based policy making, based on facts on the ground.” 

This is just another AU braindead bureaucrat repeating the vomit of his AU leaders. There is overwhelming evidence to prove gross mismanagement and rampant corruption - not the sanctions - are root causes of Zimbabwe’s, seemingly unending, economic and political crisis. 

Ordinarily, the people of Zimbabwe would have remove the corrupt and incompetent Zanu PF regime from office long before mismanagement and corrupt grew and spread to the killer cancers they are today. The nation has been stuck with the Zanu PF regime for 40 years and counting because the party rigs elections!  

Whilst Mugabe has never lost one opportunity to denounce “the British Imperialists and their allies for imposing the illegal sanctions on mine Zimbabwe”. Ironically the sanctions have had no effect in stopping him and his cronies building palatial mansions, amassing vast wealth in Zimbabwe and outside and living lifestyles of unparalleled luxury and leisure! 

The people of Zimbabwe have seen with their own eyes Mugabe’s Palatial Blue Roof mansion and have compared it to the country’s dilapidated referral hospitals like Parerenyatwa and Mpilo where even routine operations have been cancelled for lack of something as basic as painkillers. 

The people are poor but they are not that stupid not to see they are being short changed by the ruling elite! And it is nothing short of an insult for bureaucratic idiots like Kwesi Quartey to keep repeating the discredited lie of blaming the west and sanctions. 

The AU is a club of despots and none of them will dare denounce, much less take decisive corrective action, against a fellow despot over such matters as denying the people their freedoms and rights when they are all equally guilty of the same tyrannical practices. 

It is Africa’s leaders themselves who have being insisting on “African solution to African problem!” They know a fellow African despot will never condemn a fellow despot!

Countries like China and Russia, left out in the 19 th century scramble for Africa have become the continent’s post independent Africa’s new colonial masters, the real power behind the black nationalist despotic government. In Russia can interfere in the democratic process in the USA and Europe what chance does a country like Zimbabwe have of ever holding free, fair and credible elections! 

The Chinese involvement in Zimbabwe’s electoral process is more insidious than in Hong Kong so much so that the Chinese are not only keeping Zanu PF in power but they are the ones deciding who is the party’s leader! 

The EU has recently dropped its demands of Zanu PF to hold free, fair and credible elections. They have decided to join the Chinese, Russians, Indians, Israelis and many others nations who have turned a blind eye to Africa’s despotic rulers’ checked human rights records and join in the looting of the continent’s national resources. 

With corrupt, incompetent and vote rigging national despots like Mnangagwa, backed by blind as a desert mole and utterly useless SADC and AU bureaucrats like Kwesi Quartey all willing tools in the hands of exploitative neo-colonialists like Chinese; Africa is in for yet another long spell of poverty, suffering and anguish!