News / Local
'I am not a violent man,' says Jabulani Sibanda
16 Jun 2013 at 11:20hrs | Views
WAR veterans leader Jabulani Sibanda has fervently dismissed accusations that he and war veterans aligned to Zanu-PF have unleashed a reign of terror in the country and said he is not a violent man but a man of peace who is just "politically aggressive" in his crusade to defend the sovereignty of Zimbabwe.
Sections of the media have accused Sibanda of embarking on a violent whirlwind tour of the country's 10 provinces. He is alleged to be out to crush communities and people believed to be supporters of MDC-T.
In an interview, Sibanda said he was not on a crusade of intimidation and violence but was peacefully trying to wean people from MDC-T, a party which he feels will betray the gains of the liberation struggle if it gets into power.
"As war veterans we go out to teach our people about the truth not to campaign per se but to tell them as it is. We took this decision five years ago after the 2008 elections. We realised that our people were being led astray. We meet the chiefs and his people, the businesspeople of the community, the church leaders and everyone else to discuss.
"We don't force anyone to our meetings; there has never been an instance where we beat anyone for not attending our meetings. People attend out of their free will, the meetings are not compulsory. All what we are doing is to show our people how gullible they were to vote for MDC," he said.
Sibanda challenged those who have accused him of embarking on a tour of violence to produce the evidence.
He said: "If I am a violent man then let my accusers show me the police dockets from all the provinces that I visited. Let them parade the people I beat or the corpses of the dead that I killed. They can't because they know that their accusations are false. The violence that I am doing is to share ideas, ideas that destroy the lies of the MDC and that is what they define as violence."
Sibanda said he was by his very nature a man of peace who abhors any form of violence.
"One thing I won't shy away from is that I am a war veteran. Yes I am a freedom fighter. Yes I am a revolutionary. Yes I am a liberator. Yes I am a Zanu-PF member. I don't shy away from all that because I am all that because I did it for the sake of peace. Peace in the mind, peace in social life, peace in homes, peace in schools, peace in work, peace in our hospitals and peace in everything that we do. We want that as war veterans and I personally want that as well and that's the peace we want to maintain.
"You can accuse me of being politically aggressive not of being a violent man because that I am not. We are all Zimbabwean and we have a right to have different political opinions. Being different is not a crime and no one should be punished for that. I am being punished for being a war veteran and for being Zanu-PF. But I am not surprised that the West is funding the private media and hiring young boys armed with pen and notebook to assassinate my character, they are doing so because my work is bearing results," said Sibanda.
Sibanda believes it would be foolhardy for Zanu-PF not to go to the rural areas when the MDC is distributing solar powered radios that air channels that are anti-Zanu-PF.
"It's a fact that the MDC is distributing radios in rural areas. Those radios attack Zanu-PF and seek to influence people to turn against Zanu-PF and if we do nothing the people will be swayed. It's a must that we fight back that onslaught by reaching out to the people and that's what war veterans are doing. We cannot sit and watch our people being lied to, we have to act and we are acting," he said.
Sibanda believes the work the war veterans have been doing will only be seen when election results are announced in August.
He said: "On 1 August you will see the damage we have done to their mission. They will lose the elections dismally. They will lose because we want to fight for democracy; they went to Swaziland to fight for power. We will fight to wholly own our natural resources, they went to Swaziland to fight to give our minerals to imperialists. They did not go to war so they have nothing to lose, we have more to lose but it doesn't mean that we have to be violent in protecting what is ours. War veterans are not violent and I am not violent."
Sections of the media have accused Sibanda of embarking on a violent whirlwind tour of the country's 10 provinces. He is alleged to be out to crush communities and people believed to be supporters of MDC-T.
In an interview, Sibanda said he was not on a crusade of intimidation and violence but was peacefully trying to wean people from MDC-T, a party which he feels will betray the gains of the liberation struggle if it gets into power.
"As war veterans we go out to teach our people about the truth not to campaign per se but to tell them as it is. We took this decision five years ago after the 2008 elections. We realised that our people were being led astray. We meet the chiefs and his people, the businesspeople of the community, the church leaders and everyone else to discuss.
"We don't force anyone to our meetings; there has never been an instance where we beat anyone for not attending our meetings. People attend out of their free will, the meetings are not compulsory. All what we are doing is to show our people how gullible they were to vote for MDC," he said.
Sibanda challenged those who have accused him of embarking on a tour of violence to produce the evidence.
He said: "If I am a violent man then let my accusers show me the police dockets from all the provinces that I visited. Let them parade the people I beat or the corpses of the dead that I killed. They can't because they know that their accusations are false. The violence that I am doing is to share ideas, ideas that destroy the lies of the MDC and that is what they define as violence."
Sibanda said he was by his very nature a man of peace who abhors any form of violence.
"One thing I won't shy away from is that I am a war veteran. Yes I am a freedom fighter. Yes I am a revolutionary. Yes I am a liberator. Yes I am a Zanu-PF member. I don't shy away from all that because I am all that because I did it for the sake of peace. Peace in the mind, peace in social life, peace in homes, peace in schools, peace in work, peace in our hospitals and peace in everything that we do. We want that as war veterans and I personally want that as well and that's the peace we want to maintain.
"You can accuse me of being politically aggressive not of being a violent man because that I am not. We are all Zimbabwean and we have a right to have different political opinions. Being different is not a crime and no one should be punished for that. I am being punished for being a war veteran and for being Zanu-PF. But I am not surprised that the West is funding the private media and hiring young boys armed with pen and notebook to assassinate my character, they are doing so because my work is bearing results," said Sibanda.
Sibanda believes it would be foolhardy for Zanu-PF not to go to the rural areas when the MDC is distributing solar powered radios that air channels that are anti-Zanu-PF.
"It's a fact that the MDC is distributing radios in rural areas. Those radios attack Zanu-PF and seek to influence people to turn against Zanu-PF and if we do nothing the people will be swayed. It's a must that we fight back that onslaught by reaching out to the people and that's what war veterans are doing. We cannot sit and watch our people being lied to, we have to act and we are acting," he said.
Sibanda believes the work the war veterans have been doing will only be seen when election results are announced in August.
He said: "On 1 August you will see the damage we have done to their mission. They will lose the elections dismally. They will lose because we want to fight for democracy; they went to Swaziland to fight for power. We will fight to wholly own our natural resources, they went to Swaziland to fight to give our minerals to imperialists. They did not go to war so they have nothing to lose, we have more to lose but it doesn't mean that we have to be violent in protecting what is ours. War veterans are not violent and I am not violent."
Source - Sunday News
