"Key to stopping covid-19 is ITTIT and civic collaborative effort" - come to naught if keep corrupt government N Garikai

“Writing on his popular Facebook blog following his appointment by the African Union as a Special Envoy to Coordinate the Africa Private Sector Initiative for the Procurement of Personal Protective Equipment and other Essential Supplies, Masiyiwa says the key to stopping the disease in its tracks is to adopt the formula #ITTIT; inform, test, trace, isolate and treatment as a collaborative effort among the private sector, NGOs, businesses and faith-based organizations,” reported Bulawayo 24.

What is the point of talking about testing, tracing, etc. when we all know that those in positions of power and authority to do these things and not doing anything about it. Zimbabwe has 42 confirmed cases but only because the country has not been testing aggressively and, when it has been testing it is the wrong people.

Two weeks ago government gave a directive that workers must be tested before they are allowed to go back to work and so the limited test kits, human resources and time are been being wasted testing workers instead of who are suspected to have covid-19.

One of the simplest and cheapest to implement WHO advice is: “Wash your hands thoroughly and often!” And yet we all know many African countries have done very little to make sure the people have clean running water. In Zimbabwe most cities, towns including hospitals and clinic do not have running water. The situation is even worse in rural areas!

One of the reasons why Africa has bad governance is that civic society, NGOs and private sector have all shied away from holding those in position of power and authority to account. They have stepped in to assist the victims of bad governance as if to say the ruling elite can continue their victims are being taken care of.

If Masiyiwa and his team of private sector and NGOs going to aggressively test, track and, most important of all, make test result public, for example. So far, only government officials are allowed to release information on covid-19 confirmed cases, deaths, etc. The regime has already passed a law with a 20-year jail term for reporting on anything other than the government censored data.

Besides African government have very deep pockets from the nation’s budgetary allocation and from donors. Last week the Zimbabwe government received US$ 7 million from the WB to help fight covid-19 and AfDB has just approved a US$13.7 million grant for the same purpose. Whatever Masiyiwa and his friends can raise in cash, material and human resources government’s contribution in kind will be significant.

My greatest concern with this initiative is that it is not doing enough to hold the errant governments like our own to account. Government has vast national plus donated resources in cash, material and human resources, which if employed to the good of the nation will go a long way to alleviate the economic hardships and the health suffering and reduce the death toll. 

We should therefore be demanding to know why our government has not been testing aggressively. There are certainly many more covid-19 cases than the 42 government has reported.

We should be demanding to know why 80% plus of our people will have no clean running water for a day or more in this day and age?

Covid-19 constitutes the greatest existential threat of our generation victory will be measured in terms of how well we mobilised all the resources available and made the most of everyone of them. Having corrupt, incompetent and wasteful government, the biggest and most influential player, is a luxury we can ill afford.

A corrupt, incompetent and wasteful government, in this covid-19 era, will cost hundreds if not thousands of human lives!

In Africa we have tolerated bad governance and it is no wonder the continent has always remained poor and destitute. It is naïve, day-dreaming, indeed insane, to believe we can keep our corrupt and wasteful leaders and still have a fighting chance against covid-19.       

"Sekeramayi is presidential material" said Moyo - political prostitute is now senile, "Mudzimu dzoka" President P Guramatunhu

"When I worked with Mnangagwa, he wasn't a president & he had no presidential qualities. I worked with Mugabe, a great nationalist but weak policy implementer," former Zanu PF chief strategist Professor Jonathan Moyo said on twitter.

Jonathan Moyo is a political prostitute. He now tells us that he did not find Robert Mugabe, Emmerson Mnangagwa and Grace Mugabe to be “presidential material” and yet he grovelled before each one of them in turn.

The truth is Robert Mugabe, Emmerson Mnangagwa and Grace Mugabe found Moyo to be a useful prostitute but knew they would be very foolish to trusted him.

Jonathan Moyo put his neck on the chopping block to secure the presidency for Emmerson Mnangagwa in the now infamous Tstholotsho debacle. Mnangagwa chicken out and left Moyo hold the bag. Judging from Mugabe’s treatment of Mnangagwa on the matter, it would be no surprise if it was Mnangagwa himself who warned Mugabe of the plot!

Jonathan Moyo has always wanted to be the kingmaker and he has certainly done a lot to keep Mugabe in power and yet again and again when he expected his hard work to be appreciated, he was again and again pushed aside. Of course, Moyo is bitter and for good reason too; he was used by all those he worked hard for and, in the end, discarded like used toilet paper.

"I was not in a position to stop military coup beyond alerting President Mugabe, who was the Commander in Chief of the Defence Forces that a coup was brewing up, even that alert was not much because I was not a security minister and I had never been part of the JOC circle," confessed Jonathan Moyo.

Frankly Moyo was not even part of the people in Tsholotsho. The way he has cosied up to both Mugabe and Mnangagwa after all these two did during Gukurahundi massacre showed for the snake in the grass he is. Here is a man who would sell his own mother for a price and be proud he had a mother to sell!

"And, I never saw her (Grace Mugabe) as presidential material. My public choice was Sydney Sekeramayi." If that was a joke, I am not laughing.

Ever since the November 2017 military coup that toppled Mugabe, Jonathan Moyo has lived in exile. The two and half years of living in a fox-hole; he is fearful of being forced back to Zimbabwe and face justice for all the hundreds of thousands of dollars he looted from the ministry under his watch, for a start; has pushed Zimbabwe’s most prolific political turn-coat over the edge. He is now senile!

How can Sydney Sekeramayi be presidential material! The man has done nothing, said nothing and head nothing all his four decades in high office! He was nothing but Mugabe’s poodle!

Australopithecus Afarensis would take it as a personal insulted to be compared to Sekeramayi! Sekeramayi President! “Mudzimu dzoka!”

Mnangagwa must extend lockdown, there more than 42 covid-19 cases, but no one must starve W Mukori

As of today, Friday 15 May 2020, Zimbabwe has 42 confirmed covid-19 cases, 13 have recovered, 4 deaths and 25 active cases, none of whom are in hospital.

The country imposed a 3-week total nationwide lockdown 30 March 2020 with 7 confirmed cases. The lockdown was eased to level 2 and extended by 2 weeks. The 2-week end 17 May and authorities will now have to decide whether to extend the lockdown or end it.

If we assume that the government has been testing aggressively as it should and it promised to then imposing a nationwide lockdown does not make any sense when the number of new cases has gone from 34 to 42 in two weeks in a country with a population of 16 million and the majority of the cases have a history of having travelled outside the country.

It would make a lot of sense to restrict movement of people in those provinces with reported covid-19 and also in and out of those provinces. Those provinces which have had no reported cases should be allowed to carry on as normal.

The level 2 lockdown allows most economic activity to go ahead but not the informal sector activities. It is clear that there has been no meaningful adherence to the physical distancing in the shops and people queuing to get on the buses, in the buses, etc. It is therefore unfair that vendors have been singled out when everyone else is allowed to operate violating the physical distancing rules.

The vendors are generally the poorest of the poor and they have no political voice and hence are the easiest to pick upon!

No one should have to face the impossible choice of starving or violate the lockdown restrictions and face the brutality of the state! If Mnangagwa is going to extend the lockdown on 17 May 2020, then government must have a demonstrative plan to make sure all those who need such basic needs as food, water and medicine are all going to get it!

There is growing evidence to suggest that this government is not testing for covid-19 as aggressively as it should. Some provinces such as Midlands and Masvingo had 3 and 0 tests carried out in 15 May report and have consistently reported low tests. It is inconceivable that there have been no reported deaths with covid-19 like symptoms in these provinces.

It seems Zimbabwe has not been testing aggressively to keep the covid-19 cases and deaths as low as possible. The low covid-19 figures will give the impression the country has the virus under control when in reality the virus is spreading even faster than it should otherwise. If people knew that malaria patients are in fact covid-19 patients, for example, then they will be a lot cautious than otherwise.

Covid-19 is a virus just like flu and winter is flu season. Watch out!

The tragedy for Zimbabwe is the country has imposed a nationwide lockdown too early and, because the lockdown was poorly planned, it failed to stop the virus spreading. By failing to test and track covid-19 cases aggressively nation has failed react and stop the virus spreading far and wide.

Covid-19 has wreaked economic and humanitarian havoc the world over. Even those nations with vast economic wealth and five-star health care services have been hit hard economically and their health care services have been stretched to the limit and many people have died of the virus.

40 years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption meant Zimbabwe was an impoverished nation whose health care had all but collapse. The country does not even have clean running water even in urban centres so people can wash their hands regularly, a basic covid-19 hygiene requirement. So, we know the country is going to be hit particularly hard.

The worst case scenario projected covid-19 death toll in the developed countries is 0.1% of the population. In most developing countries the figure will be ten times that, 1%. Given Zimbabwe’s sorry economic state and Zanu PF’s continued blundering incompetence in the handling of this pandemic, the country will be very lucky to get away with 2% or 320 000 death rate! 

Chamisa in a tit for tat after ED deny him quid pro quo for participating in rigged elections P Guramatunhu

During the 2008 to 2013 GNU, Morgan Tsvangirai shameless used his political position as Prime Minister to promote his selfish interests at the expense of the commonwealth. Nelson Chamisa is doing the same thing today!

“Things are moving from bad to worse for Nelson Chamisa after more MDC legislators defied his decree to withdraw their services from Parliament,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“The 3 parliamentarians elected on the MDC-Alliance ticket yesterday defied a boycott and attended a sitting of the Portfolio Committee on Lands, Agriculture, Water and Rural Resettlement. The three are Ms Virginia Mafuta (Proportional Representative), David Tekeshe (Makoni Central) and Ms Joyce Makonya (Proportional Representative).”

Morgan Tsvangirai withdrew MDC leaders from attending cabinet meetings, the first and last time he ever did this, to pressure Mugabe to let Tsvangirai stay in Zimbabwe House. Tsvangirai relented after he was given the US$4 million Highlands mansion. He was so content, he and his MDC friends never lifted a finger to implement the democratic reforms, the primary purpose of the GNU.

MDC leaders knew implementing the reforms were the key to ending the curse of rigged elections and good governance; the thing the nation was dying for. They also knew that Mugabe did not want to lose his dictatorial powers and so they throw all reforms out of the window to please the dictator.

MDC MPs, senators and councillors should have never taken their seats following the July 2018 elections because the whole election process was a farce. Zanu PF blatantly rigged those elections.

Indeed, MDC and the rest of the opposition candidates should have never participated in July 2018 elections without first implementing the reforms to ensure the elections were free, fair and credible. They participated out of greed; they knew Zanu PF would give away a few gravy-train seats as bait.

What is more shocking is that the opposition candidates knew that by participating in the flawed and illegal elections they will give credibility to the process and thus give some modicum of legitimacy to the result as David Coltart readily admitted in his book.

In his Book, The Struggle Continues 50 years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe, David Coltart, former MDC – Ncube Senator and Minister of Education in the 2008 GNU, gave details of how Zanu PF was flouting the electoral rules in the upcoming 2013 elections. It was clear the elections would not be free, fair and credible.

“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,” wrote Senator Coltart.

“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.”

So, Nelson Chamisa and his MDC friends participated in the July 2018 elections knowing fully well that doing so gave the rigged elections credibility and Mnangagwa and his Zanu PF regime legitimacy. The MDC winning candidates took up the allotted seats and Chamisa banked the MDC’s share of the Political Party Finance (Act) pay out.

Chamisa did not care that the elections were rigged denying the ordinary Zimbabweans their right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country and, most important of all, denying them any hope of having a competent government that will address their worsening economic situation.

However, when the Supreme Court confirmed the High Court judgement that Chamisa’s seizure of power following Tsvangirai’s death had indeed violated the MDC’s own constitution; all hell broke loose. Chamisa’s hold on power is being threatened and now he wanted maximum pressure brought to bear on Mnangagwa and his Zanu PF regime. Now Mnangagwa and his regime are illegitimate and MDC MPs, senators, councillors, ambassadors, everybody must stop engaging with the regime!

Chamisa knows that what he did in seizing power was unconstitutional just as he has known all along that participating in these flawed and illegal elections gave the process credibility and Zanu PF legitimacy. He is angry that Mnangagwa did not instruct Supreme Court to overlook his transgression, in a quid pro quo. If the judiciary was instructed to judge the November 2017 military coup “justified, legal and constitutional”; this was nothing!

So, Chamisa is calling for a belated boycott of the Zanu PF regime to underline its illegitimacy as a tit for tat!

How ironic that Morgan Tsvangirai did not hesitate piling the pressure on Mugabe to get his US$4 million mansion but could not be even bothered to lift a finger to implemented the reforms to end Zanu PF dictatorship.

Similarly, Chamisa participated in flawed and illegal elections to give the vote rigging and per se illegitimate Zanu PF regime legitimacy but only now wants to boycott participating in government because Mnangagwa would grant legitimacy to Chamisa’s unconstitutional seizure of MDC leadership.

Both Tsvangirai and Chamisa have bargained the right of the people of Zimbabwe to free, fair and credible elections, like mangoes at the market, for their selfish individual gain! Shame on these MDC leaders and shame on us the people to be so shamefully abused again and again and again! 

"Tsvangirai was bruised in quest for democracy" says Hakata - Sure, and US$4m mansion knocked him out cold N Garikai

Dear Knowledge Hakata

“Dictatorship is a political system characterized by a single ruler, the dictator, or a group of governors (e.g. a party, a junta or a family) whose power is unlimited. Unlike democracy, a dictator does not justify his claim to rule (literally: the right to gain power) by free elections. The condition of the notion dictatorship is its illegitimacy,” you said.

You are spot on there and in characterising Mnangagwa as one such dictator and Zanu PF as a dictatorship. Sadly you took the wrong turn in the next paragraph!

“The only way left to kick out this anti human and evil system called Zanu PF is through massive and sleepless demonstrations country wide, without that Zanu PF will continue taking a ride on us until we all die either of hunger or common diseases such as cholera and typhoid,” you continued.

Massive country wide demonstrations is certainly one way of kicking the Zanu PF dictatorship out of office but it is not the only way. One can escalate the civilian uprising into a fully-fledged armed struggle. After all it was the armed struggle that force Ian Smith and his white minority colonial regime to give up power.

Needless to same it was none other than the late Robert Mugabe, Emmerson Mnangagwa and the rest of the Zanu PF entourage who waged the war of liberation against colonial oppression and exploitation who have become today’s dictator and the dictatorship.

Yesterday’s liberating heroes have transformed into today’s ruthless oppressors! This is indeed the curse of Zimbabwe and, must say, many other African nations.

In other words, even if your call for mass demonstrations was answered and Mnangagwa and his Zanu PF dictatorship were finally booted out of office, after 40 years of corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical rule. What guarantee is there the next government will not be an equally corrupt and incompetent mediocre regime, at best, or yet another dictatorship!

Indeed, since the people of Zimbabwe has clearly failed to learn from the past and therefore have yet to understand why yesterday’s heroes have metamorphosed into dictators. It is a certainty Zimbabwe’s next government will be a mediocre regime or a dictatorship.

“There is a very primitive narrative and mob psychology in Zanu PF that says we will not reform ourselves out of power,” you said.

You can call it what you please but the narrative that Zanu PF would never reform itself out of office is common sense. The real surprise is just how many Zimbabweans out there still, even to this day with all the benefit of hindsight, expected Zanu PF to implement the democratic reforms during the 2008 to 2013 GNU.

“The late Morgan Tsvangirai was bruised left, right and centre, all in the quest for democracy while thousands of MDC supporters lost their lives for denouncing Robert Mugabe in the ballot box but with all said and done elections have failed to bring a desired government in Zimbabwe and preparing for future elections will be a serious waste of time and resources.”

Let us just say you where getting carried away there!

Whatever bruising Tsvangirai and his fellow MDC leaders received before the 2008 they certainly received none throughout the GNU. When Tsvangirai and friends were sworn in as Prime Minister, Ministers, Deputy Ministers, etc. they were transformed from the champions fighting for democratic change into Zanu PF acolytes.

Mugabe saw to it that MDC leaders enjoyed the trappings of high office; the ministerial limos, the generous salaries, a US$4 million mansion for Tsvangirai, etc. And in return MDC kick democratic reforms out of the window.

“Mazivanhu eMDC adzidza kudya anyerere!” (MDC leaders have learned to enjoy the gravy train highlife, they will never rock the boat!) Zanu PF cronies boasted, when asked why MDC leaders were no implementing any reforms during the GNU!

Ever since the 2008 GNU MDC leaders have participated in Zimbabwe’s flawed and illegal elections knowing fully well that Zanu PF was rigging the elections for the sake of a few gravy train seats Zanu PF was giving away as bait. MDC leaders have been running with the hare, kept up the pretence the party is still fighting for free and fair elections, but hunting with the hounds, share the spoils of the rigged elections with Zanu PF.

There are Zimbabweans out there who are refusing to acknowledge the political reality that MDC leaders have already gone through their metamorphic transformation, the same that transformed Mnangagwa from a hero into a dictator per excellence!

“The late Morgan Tsvangirai was bruised left, right and centre!” Sure! And the US$ 4 million mansion knocked him out cold! Just as the Blue Roof palatial mansion, the 13 farmers, the extravagant highflier lifestyle, etc., knocked the late liberation war hero, Robert Gabriel Mugabe, out cold too!

Knowledge, you need to wake-up from this nationwide 40-year sloth-like slumber. Unless we break the cycle of yesterday’s liberator becoming today’s dictator, Zimbabwe is not going to get out of this economic and political hell-on-earth Zanu PF and MDC have landed us into.

"Zimbabwe's financial system is risky: to money laundering" - rotten to core: to institutionalized corruption N Garikai

“Zimbabwe is among 12 countries put under the spotlight by the European Union because it has deficiencies under its Anti-Money Laundering/ Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) measures,” reported Bulawayo 24.

“The EU wants a new system to tackle money laundering and financial crime and it is considering creating a new authority to police financial crime and monitor banks more strictly. According to a document authored by the commission obtained by NewsDay Business last week, Zimbabwe's financial system is risky.”

This is no surprise!

A few weeks ago, Zimbabwe’s Minister of Finance, Professor Mthuli Ncube, surprise everyone by reporting that country had $3 billion budgetary deficit! The Zimbabwe economy has been in total meltdown for decades and things have got significantly worse these last two years, inflation has soared to over 500%, unemployment has remained stubbornly high at 90% plus, the country has had up to 18 hours per day electricity power cuts, etc., etc.

 So, where the Dickens is the government revenue coming from let alone the conjured surplus!

The truth is Zimbabwe has always had two political systems with two parallel governments. There is the conventional government, more public face, with the executive, cabinet, parliament, Police, civil servant, etc. and then the more shadowy Joint Operations Command (JOC) junta comprising of the top brass in the Police, Army, CIO and Prison Services plus a few select others headed by Mnangagwa and Chiwenga. The junta is the one wielding the real political power.

The junta has had its own secure source of funds, it has creamed off as much cash as it wished from all the conventional government institutions and private sector. JOC has become the Mafia in Zimbabwe to who everyone has had to pay protection money. But by far the greatest source of money for the JOC and the country’s ruling elite is the institutionalised looting.

For example, cabinet has approved the granting of diamond mining concessions to syndicates knowing there will be no records kept of the quantity and quality of diamonds mined, to whom they are sold and for how much and most important of all, who the beneficiaries are. Since no one knows who the beneficiaries of this institutionalised looting are, they in turn do not pay any income tax on their loot.

The real big challenge for the looters has been how to sell their looted wealth and how to spend their ill-got money without raising too suspicion. Senior government leaders like the late Robert Mugabe had no problem using the state institutions including the Minister of Finance and the Banking institutions to help with the cleaning up of their loot.

The US$ 500 million to buy the Hong Kong apartment late Robert Mugabe bought for his daughter Bona when she lived there as a student, was all paid for by the Minister of Finance, for example. On paper, the money was used to pay embassy officials; in reality the money for that came out Mugabe’s account. Job done!

The lesser mortals like Joice Mujuru and her late husband struggled to get rid of their looted wealth. According to media reports, the Mujurus used their daughter and her husband in Spain to try to off load their looted diamonds. The daughter was forced to take back her loot because she failed to explain where the diamonds came from!

When Joice Mujuru and a number of other Zanu PF leaders were booted out of the party in 2014, they formed their own political party. When Mugabe feared the new party was a threat to his own iron grip on power he revealed that the country had been “swindled out of US$15 billion in diamond revenue alone”! He had documentary evidence of how the Mujurus had swindled the nation and was going to release it if she did not back off. Of course, she backed off!

Mnangagwa, just like Mugabe before him, is the Godfather of institutionalised corruption in Zimbabwe. There is a river of dirty money flowing into the country and since the regime controls every facet of Zimbabwean economic activity both the public and private sector are all working in cahoots to filter and clean it up.

Still since we all know the source of the dirty money is the looted Marange and Chiadzwa diamonds it does not need a Sherlock Holmes to uncover who the individual player are; the miners, the syndicate owners, the dealers, mules, etc., etc.

It has become near impossible to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship because the ruling elite have become filthy rich and powerful. Countries like China and Russia have not only turned a blind eye to the wholesale corruption but joined in the looting. They have helped to rig elections and other clandestine activities to keep the ruling elite stay in power.

Zimbabwe’s financial system is not just risky, it is rotten to the core. The country’s hopes of dismantling the Zanu PF dictatorship and building a healthy and functioning democratic system of government is dependent on dismantling the institutionalised corruption and the rotten financial system bankrolling the dictatorship.

"Covid-19 donations must be audited" says Tendai Biti - a hypocrite does not mean what he says P Guramatunhu

Former Finance Minister Tendai Biti says government should audit all donations made towards curbing the spread of coronavirus to ensure that all those who abused the contributions are brought to book,” reported Daily News.

“This comes amid fears that several people with connections to the government are siphoning off the donations for their personal gain.”

This is just Tendai Biti blubbering to get attention!

Tendai Biti, of all people, should know that Zanu PF is accountable to no one. How many millions of dollars are being looted every month from Marange and Chiadzwa Diamonds Fields. He, as the Minister of Finance 2008 to 2013, knew about the looting and also knew this was a closed book.

Even when the regime has allowed the auditors to go through the regime’s books and large sums of money have disappeared; no one has ever been held to account.  
If Zimbabwe is serious about having a democratically accountable government then the starting point has to be with elections. We must implement the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections.

Tendai Biti and his MDC friends had the golden opportunity to implement the reforms during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. They were busy enjoying the trappings of high office; the ministerial limos, the generous salaries, a US$4 million mansion for Tsvangirai, etc.; they forgot about implementing the reforms.

Not content with having sold-out during the 2008 GNU, Tendai Biti and his fellow MDC leaders have gone on to participate in the flawed and illegitimate elections knowing fully well that Zanu PF was rigging the elections and, worse still, that by participating they were giving credibility to the illegal process and some modicum of legitimacy to the Zanu PF regime.

In his Book, The Struggle Continues 50 years of tyranny in Zimbabwe, David Coltart, former MDC – Ncube Senator and Minister of Education in the GNU, gave details of how Zanu PF was flouted the electoral rules in the upcoming 2013 elections. It was clear the elections would not be free, fair and credible and yet he and his fellow MDC friends did not withdraw out of selfish greed.

“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,” wrote Senator Coltart.

“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.”

In short Tendai Biti not only knows that this Zanu PF regime is illegitimate and is not democratically accountable to the people but, worst of all, he knows that he and his MDC friends are the ones giving the regime legitimacy. His call for transparency and accountability with covid-19 aid is just hot air from the seasoned hypocrite who does not mean a word he says!