“Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was a South African
anti-apartheid revolutionary, statesman and philanthropist who served as
President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. He was the country's first black
head of state and the first elected in a fully representative democratic
election,” states Wikipedia.
Wikipedia does not do justice to the man, Nelson Mandela was
above all else a visionary leader and, as befitting all visionary leaders, his
influence was felt during his lifetime and will echo for many, many more
generations to come.
What makes Nelson Mandela such a colossus is that visionary
leaders are rare, one in a dynast if you luck, one in a generation if you are
very, very luck. In Africa, it is no exaggeration to say visionary leaders are
so rare one was given to believed they are extinct. Mount Everest stands
majestic as the highest peak in the Himalayas Mountain range. How much more
majestic Mount Everest would be if all round it was land as flat as a pancake
with a few anthill and rock outcrops a few metres high; such is the standing of
Nelson Mandela amongst his fellow Africans.
Some people have criticized Nelson Mandela for failing to
lift his fellow blacks out of poverty, “as President Paul Kagame of Rwanda, has
done!”.
Full kudos to Paul Kagame for he has indeed managed to stamp
out corruption and implement very progressive economic and social policies
which have improve the qualitative and quantitative standards of living of Rwandans.
Paul Kagame has had the time to implement his transformative agenda; he has
been president for the last 20 years and before that, 1994 to 2000, he was VP;
Mandela was president for 5 years.
Paul Kagame has created a political system that has allowed
him to stay in power regardless of the democratic wishes of the people. It has
been ok whilst he remained in power because he has clearly shown that he has
very sound economic and social policies to take the nation forward. The problem
arises with those who will come after him they will all want to enjoy the same
carte blanche powers that has allowed Kagame to stay in power all these years,
regardless of their leadership abilities.
All living things will seek power and dominance over others,
Charles Darwin called it survival of the fittest or natural selection; it is
the most primeval and dominant force on planet earth and will rule supreme to
the end of time. What has taken Kagame nearly three decades to accomplish will
take a corrupt, incompetent and murderous tyrant - the overwhelming majority of
African leaders fit the bill – will destroy in a matter of months! And there
lies the distinction between Paul Kagame and Nelson Mandela.
Mandela’s legacy is one of a healthy and functioning
democratic system of government enabling society to elect the most competent competitive
individuals into power and, just as important, to remove them from office
before their primeval instinct to dominate kicks in. There is nothing Paul
Kagame has done in Rwanda to stop that country being stuck with just another mediocre
leader or, worse, a murderous tyrant.
All Kagame’s achievements are just sandcastles, easily
washed away in the next tide or wave. Mandela laid a solid foundation on which
a stable and prosperous SA can be built.
True, none of Nelson Mandela’s successors, Thabo Mbeki, Jacob
Zuma and now Cyril Ramaphosa, have accomplished anything of note in their years
in office. If the truth be told the ordinary South Africans themselves are to
blame for failing to take advantage of the country’s democratic institutions to
ensure the elected leaders with some common sense. One hopes that the last 25
years of mediocre to downright corrupt governance under Zuma has a steep
learning curve for all South Africans.
Of course, it is very frustrating to every South African
that the country has not made any significant inroads into ending poverty in
that country; however, no one can deny that the country’s next elections will
be free, fair and credible and thus there is hope the nation will be more
careful and elect leaders with some common sense, at least.
South Africans are better off than other nations like
Zimbabwe in which the individuals who fought to end white colonial rule turned
the guns on the ordinary people to impose themselves as the nation’s next
rulers; for 41 years and counting the nation has been stuck with corrupt,
incompetent and murderous thugs. Zimbabwe’s economy is in total ruins; the
nation has sunk from a upper middle income nation in 1980 to one of the poorest
in Africa.
Zimbabwe is due to hold elections in 2023 and already it is
clear that Zanu PF will rig the elections, the party has already said it will,
once again, deny 3 million plus Zimbabweans in the diaspora the vote. Mnangagwa
reportedly won the 2018 presidency with 2.4 million vote constituting 50.8% of
the cast votes! How can an election in which 30% of the eligible voters are
denied the vote be a legal, free, fair and credible elections!
The last few weeks have stress tasted SA’s democratic system
of government. Former SA President Jacob Zuma and his supporters triggered some
of the worst looting, burning and lawlessness since the country’s independence
to protest the imprisonment of Zuma. They believe Zuma is above the law and the
looting and burning was not going to stop until Zuma was released!
The looting and burning has largely stopped and the lunatics
who inspired it are now condemning. They have had the chance to sober up, look
down the precipitous fall into the abyss and turn back. They are now agreeing on
the need for rule of law, that no one should be above the law, and are ready to
embrace Nelson Mandela’s legacy of democracy as SA’s system of government.
In 2016 the American made the mistake of electing Donald
Trump President and his four years in office was to tress-test that country’s
democratic institutions like nothing since that country’s civil war. The institutions
held and in 2020 the nation replace Trump and the country and most of the free
world heaved a big sigh of relief!
South Africa and most African nations heaved a big sigh of
relief when the looting and burning in SA stopped and Zuma was still in prison
where he belongs!
If rule of law and democracy, Nelson Mandela’s greatest
legacy to SA, SA will thrive and, in good time elect competent and accountable
leaders who will finally address the nation’s economic and social challenges to
create a more just, free and prosperous nation in which no one is left behind.
If democracy and good governance is proven to work in SA, the pressure for the
other African countries to adopt it as a tried and tested system of government
will be irresistible. And so Mandela’s legacy to SA will sweep the continent,
especially Sub-Saharan Africa, like the life giving rain storm after a
prolonged drought!
Zimbabweans have never ever participated in a legal, free,
fair and credible elections; a right many the world-over take for granted but
one which we have been promised but cheated of again and again. As a child I
used to dance for joy in the first rain to mark the end of the dry season I
know many Zimbabweans will cry for joy the day Zimbabwe holds its first ever
free, fair and credible elections given how long the nation has had to wait for
that day!
INJEJE DECLARES CYRIL RAMAPHOSA AND RAYMOND ZONDO PERSONA NON-GRATA IN 8 PROVINCES EXCEPT THE WESTERN CAPE
ReplyDeleteINJEJE yabeNGUNI Council has with immediate effect declared Mr. Cyril Rannaphosa and Mr. Raymond Zondo persona non grata in all 8 provinces of South Africa except the Western Cape until the release of former President Jacob Zuma.
It has become abundantly clear that the current President is aloof and divorced from the realities on the ground in a country in which he claims to lead. His nonsensical statements that the current revolutionary activities gripping the country are ethnic criminality and mobilization is a shallow, desperate and pathetic attempt to divide the people of the country on ethnic cleavages, which for us was the final straw that precipitated this declaration.
With the announcement that the SANDF will once again be deployed domestically just as was done by the Apartheid state that brutalized our mothers and fathers whenever they voiced their dissatisfaction, we would like to issue this free warning to Cyril Ramaphosa, that any violent attacks from the SANDF meted out to our people will be met with the most unprecedented reciprocation that will commensurate the provocation in perfection. There will be rivers of blood, of which family members of SANDF members that reside among our people will be no means be spared. Local Magistrates courts, Magistrates and their families will by no means by spared.
Zuma is in prison because he refused to comply with a court order and the principle that no one is above the law is central to good governance and to give in to those demanding that he be released will be to undermine democracy and rule of law.
If Ramaphosa’s deployment of the Army is unconstitutional then challenge it in the court of law. The idea that these chiefs can be the accusers, the prosecutors, the jury, the judge and the executioners all rolled into one is absurd.
The chiefs are just traditional leaders whose authority is confined to local and low level matters. To be declared “persona non grata” must have committed very serious crimes, crimes way above the chiefs to handle. It is therefore foolish and arrogant for the chiefs to presume to act way above their authority. In being a chief they now think they are above the law or are a law unto themselves! Enough of this nonsense.
Deputy sports minister Tinomudaishe Machakaire has splashed US$770,000 on a Rolls Royce Phantom - the latest illustration of the gulf between Zimbabwe's poor and super rich political elites.
ReplyDeleteThe 39-year-old paid GVE London £330,000 for the luxury car and £30,000 for shipping - about US$495,800 in total, ZimLive understands.
GVE London posted videos on social media confirming that it had shipped the car to a Zimbabwean minister, but the company did not name Machakaire. Multiple sources have identified Machakaire as the owner of the expensive motor.
A source at the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority estimated duty on the vehicle would be in the region of U$275,000, pushing Machakaire's total bill to just over US$770,000.
Machakaire's transport and logistics company, TinMac Motors, according to sources, also recently acquired a new fleet of haulage trucks.
MDC Alliance spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere said: "We continue to demand radical transparency and a far-reaching international audit of the offshore networks that enable looting by Zimbabwean ministers and political elites. They launder the loot by buying supercars while the masses starve. Corruption is killing us."
As a deputy minister, he is entitled to a posh car and it will no surprised that a very significant proportion of the US$770 000 is paid by the taxpayer and he does not pay the duty!
Mahere is just a hypocrite parroting the same “Corruption is killing us!” nonsense whilst fighting the damn hardest for a seat on the gravy train. MDC leaders have continued to participate in these flawed and illegal elections giving the vote rigging Zanu PF legitimacy because they are after the generous MP salary, the US$50 000 car loan (everyone knows they never pay back) etc.
“Corruption is killing us!” say Mahere and her fellow MDC friends and yet are gearing to participate in the 2023 elections to give corruption legitimacy! MDC leaders are taking Zimbabweans for fools and we the people must open our eyes!
The people the world over held Uganda's Yoweri Museveni in very high regard when he took over from the buffoon Idi Amin but all his good deeds have all been undone in his desperate effort to hang on to power. He has banned other political parties and has just blatantly rigged the recent elections to extend his stay in office, in power since 1986. He has just appointed a cabinet of 81 ministers for a nation of 44 million!
ReplyDeletePaul Kagame is going down the same disastrous route of Museveni; he does not have the intellect to know that a nation's system of government must be designed to last the good times and the bad time; the competent leader, the so-so leader and most important of all the tyrant like Donald Trump!
Rwanda's political system is built round an individual having absolute power, the nation has no future; it is a house built on a soft-earth foundation, the next heavy rain and it will sink.
South Africa, thanks to Nelson Mandela, has a healthy and functioning democratic system of government; it has managed to survive the so-so leadership of Mbeki and Ramaphosa and the corruption ridden years of Jacob Zuma. The country is not out of the woods yet, it needs a competent leader who will deliver economic growth and get many people out of poverty. For the sake of all South Africans and for the sake of all Africans, it will be great to have an African country to set a good example to the rest; one hopes and prays that such a leader will emerge one of these fine days!
Mugabe, wherever he is but it certainly would not be in heaven, like Mnangagwa and the rest of the Zanu PF thugs; would have been thrilled to bits to see the looting and burning taking place in SA these last two weeks. He is kicking himself, as are his Zanu PF friends, that the looting and burning has stopped because Mugabe and company have waited for donkey years to see SA become a Banana Republic like Zimbabwe and they are very angry that so far they have waited in vain.
ReplyDeleteMillions of Zimbabweans have left the country to go to SA, Botswana and other SADC countries and beyond because Zimbabwe, 41 years ago a middle income nation, is now an impoverished Banana Republic. SA has had its problems but one thing all those who know what they are talking about agree on is that it is not a Banana Republic. By the 1990s, 20 years after independence Zimbabwe's economy was already in shambles the dictatorship had taken root and thriving.