Mugabe has to be defeated while he is still alive

As 2012 comes to an end, political analysts are falling over each other to try and predict the kind of world that we are going to see in 2013. I am particularly interested in the situation in Zimbabwe where Robert Mugabe in typical fashion is threatening to call for an election by March 2013 as he says that the people are now tired of the inclusive government, as if he has ever cared about what the people want, that he was forced to form with his enemy Morgan Tsvangirai. No matter which way l look at it, the situation in Zimbabwe breaks my heart because l am totally convinced the democratic methods will never work in Zimbabwe as long as man like Robert Mugabe and the others in Zanu-PF are still in the picture.

Many people speak as if a new constitution will make a difference. I beg to differ. A constitution is just a piece of paper. It can only have meaning if those to whom it is directed make a conscious effort to respect it. Robert Mugabe and Zanu-PF have indicated that they will never play by the rules of the game. They play in a field that involves visiting opponents in the middle of the night and abducting them. They play by the rules that put people in prisons without trial for months. They also play by the rules that select police commissioners, army service chiefs and judges whose political allegiances are suspect. No matter what the constitution says on paper, where violence is the order of the day, that constitution may as well not be there.

Zanu-PF thugs have looted the country for so long that to them it has become a way of life and anyone who becomes a threat to that status quo will be eliminated without a second thought. Anyone therefore who thinks that democracy will be used to remove Zanu-PF is dreaming.

The unfortunate truth is that the people of Zimbabwe will soon realise that the war that ended in 1979 did not actually end. That war just took a breather and a new guard went into the seat of power in Harare. A new group of looters took over and only another war will remove that group from power. No matter how pessimistic we want to be there will be no way by which Zanu-PF will ever respect the popular vote. The only way the popular will will ever be respected is when the people of Zimbabwe themselves stop giving silly excuses and answer Robert Mugabe and Zanu-PF in the language that he knows best. All of us know that language.

Zimbabweans are proud that they are now used to living under harsh conditions where they do for themselves what they pay the government to do for them. They hide behind silly excuses when they do not go to vote. They live without electricity for half their lives and go without clean water for days on end and they still want people to think that they are doing this because they are clever. They argue that confrontation is counterproductive and they get themselves accustomed to a substandard way of living where the police and the Central Intelligence Organisation drags them out of their homes in the darkness of the night if they ever open their mouths against Zanu-PF. That is extremely pathetic and a big disservice to our children.

There is only one way out for Zimbabwe and that way is to confront Robert Mugabe while we still have time. If Robert Mugabe dies and Zanu-PF disintegrates into its various factions Zimbabwe will be thrown into anarchy as the remaining Zanu-PF big wigs fight for Mugabe's position. That will be the start of the war that l see as inevitable. The likes of MDC will then become irrelevant then. The diamond funds that are being stashed offshore will buy the very guns that the Zanu-PF big wigs will use to fight each other on the day of Robert Mugabe's demise. If Zanu-PF is going to be defeated, it will have to be defeated while it is still one piece and Robert Mugabe is still alive.

We Zimbabweans will need to rise above our cosy jobs and our air conditioned Mercedes Benzes in foreign capitals and come to the party to save our country. We may alternatively decide that we will only arrive back in Zimbabwe to pick the debris from the inevitable war that will be our present for our cowardice.  

This article also appears in my blog http://www.boosunmedia.dinstudio.com/