Opinion / Columnist
Those agog about Mujuru joining the opposition are wrong, she will never outfox the fox Mugabe
22 Dec 2014 at 06:05hrs | Views
The Zimbabwe community has been agog with excitement at the prospect of Joice Mujuru, Rugare Gumbo, Didymus Mutasa and all the other bigwigs recently sacked from Zanu PF joining the opposition camp. Sadly it is all much ado about nothing as their addition to the MDC, Zapu, Mavambo, etc. will add quantity when it is not quantity the opposition has lacked but quality.
Mai Mujuru and other would not have been elbow out of the way with such great ease if they had not been so naïve and incompetent. Surely, surely they should have known that Mugabe and Mnangagwa fight dirty and therefore they should have come up with plans of their own counter the cheating or at the very least made a concerted effort to bolster the party's constitution and electoral system to ensure the elections were free, fair and credible.
And yet the dirty trickery started the Mujuru faction was caught completely by surprise. From the day Grace Mugabe launch her thank the people rallies which were in fact nothing but relentless attack of Mai Mujuru; the later and her supporters never mounted any fight back but instead scatter in all direction in panic and confusion.
The way Mugabe and Mnangagwa completely outwitted the Mujuru faction to force them out of the party although they constituted the majority in the party is reminiscent of the way the two outwitted Tsvangirai and his MDC majority to "win" last year's elections. MDC had five years to implement the democratic reforms identified for them in the GPA as necessary for free, fair and credible elections. They failed to get even one reform implemented.
All the MDC leaders were out campaigning for a yes vote in the March 2013 referendum on the Copac constitution convinced it would deliver free and fair elections. Of course it did not such thing because it was a weak and feeble constitution Zanu PF's MP on the Copac committee, Paul Mangwana, boosted the whole document had been 'dictated' by Mugabe.
Mugabe, a corrupt and murderous tyrant hell-bend on rigging the elections to stay in power dictating a democratic constitution to deliver the very thing he did not want – give me a break!
Tsvangirai and his MDC friends went into the election bushed tailed with enthusiasm, confident they will win. By noon on elections-day, 31 July 2013, Tsvangirai made a public appearance, crest fallen, to complain of the "stolen election". Like Mai Mujuru and her supporters, Tsvangirai and his MDC colleagues had been taken completely by surprise by Mugabe's vote rigging trickery.
So Dr Joice Mujuru and her supporters teaming up with Dr Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti, Professor Welshman Ncube, Dr Dumiso Dabengwa, Dr Simba Makoni, etc. will only mean adding a few more names of corrupt and incompetent politician to a telephone directory size volume of equally corrupt and equally incompetent opposition politicians; a much of a muchness. What is the excitement about then?
In fact the same people agog with excitement today were agog with excitement ever since MDC appeared on Zimbabwe's political stage. These people never stopped to scrutinise what MDC was offering, whether they could deliver it, etc. They were working on the simple basis that anyone else other than Mugabe was bound to be better than the tyrant. They could see that Tsvangirai was NOT Mugabe that was more than enough for them.
What this over simplistic approach failed to appreciate is that a careful assessment of Tsvangirai's competence was in fact very important. The only reason the nation is still stuck with Mugabe is because Tsvangirai has proven to be corrupt and breathtakingly incompetent; the tyrant has outwitted him again and again.
So the motion that anyone is bound to be better than Mugabe has turned out to be a nonsensical one and not the bolt of wisdom many thought it to be because that "anyone" must outsmart the cunning fox Mugabe first. The corrupt and incompetent Dr Richard Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends have failed to outfox the fox even when they had parliamentary majority the backing of SADC and a whole coterie of advisers and well-wishers. The later have since deserted MDC in droves after being repeatedly ignored; when MDC went ahead and took part in last year's rigged election that was the last straw.
"Yes, Tsvangirai was corrupt in accepting the $ 4 million Highlands mansion; it was a bribe to stop him implementing the reforms," admitted one diehard MDC-T supporters. "But what of it? You too would have accepted the bribe if you were in his shoes!" That is true.
Tsvangirai was not the only one who accepted the bribe and sealed his lips on the democratic reforms, all the other MDC leaders did the same thing. Mugabe saw to it that they all had all the creature comforts political power and influence and when has their snout in the feeding trough one does not criticise the gravy train culture much less bring up unpleasant subjects like democratic reforms everyone knew Mugabe detested.
"Vanhu veMDC vadzidza kudya vanyerere!" (MDC people have learnt to enjoy the gravy train good-life and not rock the boat with talk of reforms!) Was the pithy explanation from one Zanu PF as to why MDC had completely forgotten about implementing the reforms. He should know!
People like Mai Mujuru, Rugare Gumbo and all the others recently dumped from Zanu PF have all sat there like cabbages and said or done nothing to stop the corruption, brutal oppression, vote rigging and even mass murders by the party because they too had learnt to enjoy the gravy train spoils of power and not rock the boat. When it comes to being corrupt people like Mai Mujuru are not privates but five star generals in this army with decades of looting experience under her belt.
To shrug one's shoulders to corruption with a "But so what!" is not completely miss the point.
The reason why Zimbabwe is in this political and economic hell is precisely because leaders like Mugabe are corrupt, they tasted power and all the gravy train attractions it brought and they forgot about freedom, human rights, justice, everything. He was hooked and all he wanted then was absolute power and he did not care how much the nation suffered or how many people he crashed under foot to get it.
Mugabe offered some of the political power to the likes of Mai Mujuru, Regare Gumbo, Mnangagwa and all the others in Zanu PF and they have helped him to intimidate, harass, rig elections and even murder the over 30 000 Zimbabweans to establish and to retain the Zanu PF dictatorship.
When Tsvangirai and his MDC came along on an electoral mandate from the people to end the dictatorship and bring about democratic change, they too soon forgot their promises to the nation after Mugabe offered them a taste of the gravy train delights.
Surely it is self-evident that if we are ever going to have freedom, liberty, justice, etc. we must elect leaders who are not corrupt and will not forget their commitment to the people in pursuit of power and gravy train delights. To elect leaders who have already proven to be so wicked and corrupt they would betray the whole nation for the sake of owning half of Bindura as Mai Mujuru has done or for the sake of $ 4 million Highlands mansion like Tsvangirai is folly.
Electing a corrupt and incompetent leader is careless and we, as a nation have been reckless in this regard. But to elect a corrupt and incompetent leader again and again shows that we are idiots totally incapable of learning from our past mistakes.
If we are serious about ending this corrupt and oppressive Zanu PF dictatorship then we must search for leaders smart enough to outsmart the cunning foxes in Mugabe, Mnangagwa, Professor Moyo, etc. Corrupt and incompetent leaders like Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti even worse the corrupt and simple minded Mai Mujuru have already tried and they were all completely outwitted.
Mai Mujuru and other would not have been elbow out of the way with such great ease if they had not been so naïve and incompetent. Surely, surely they should have known that Mugabe and Mnangagwa fight dirty and therefore they should have come up with plans of their own counter the cheating or at the very least made a concerted effort to bolster the party's constitution and electoral system to ensure the elections were free, fair and credible.
And yet the dirty trickery started the Mujuru faction was caught completely by surprise. From the day Grace Mugabe launch her thank the people rallies which were in fact nothing but relentless attack of Mai Mujuru; the later and her supporters never mounted any fight back but instead scatter in all direction in panic and confusion.
The way Mugabe and Mnangagwa completely outwitted the Mujuru faction to force them out of the party although they constituted the majority in the party is reminiscent of the way the two outwitted Tsvangirai and his MDC majority to "win" last year's elections. MDC had five years to implement the democratic reforms identified for them in the GPA as necessary for free, fair and credible elections. They failed to get even one reform implemented.
All the MDC leaders were out campaigning for a yes vote in the March 2013 referendum on the Copac constitution convinced it would deliver free and fair elections. Of course it did not such thing because it was a weak and feeble constitution Zanu PF's MP on the Copac committee, Paul Mangwana, boosted the whole document had been 'dictated' by Mugabe.
Mugabe, a corrupt and murderous tyrant hell-bend on rigging the elections to stay in power dictating a democratic constitution to deliver the very thing he did not want – give me a break!
Tsvangirai and his MDC friends went into the election bushed tailed with enthusiasm, confident they will win. By noon on elections-day, 31 July 2013, Tsvangirai made a public appearance, crest fallen, to complain of the "stolen election". Like Mai Mujuru and her supporters, Tsvangirai and his MDC colleagues had been taken completely by surprise by Mugabe's vote rigging trickery.
So Dr Joice Mujuru and her supporters teaming up with Dr Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti, Professor Welshman Ncube, Dr Dumiso Dabengwa, Dr Simba Makoni, etc. will only mean adding a few more names of corrupt and incompetent politician to a telephone directory size volume of equally corrupt and equally incompetent opposition politicians; a much of a muchness. What is the excitement about then?
In fact the same people agog with excitement today were agog with excitement ever since MDC appeared on Zimbabwe's political stage. These people never stopped to scrutinise what MDC was offering, whether they could deliver it, etc. They were working on the simple basis that anyone else other than Mugabe was bound to be better than the tyrant. They could see that Tsvangirai was NOT Mugabe that was more than enough for them.
What this over simplistic approach failed to appreciate is that a careful assessment of Tsvangirai's competence was in fact very important. The only reason the nation is still stuck with Mugabe is because Tsvangirai has proven to be corrupt and breathtakingly incompetent; the tyrant has outwitted him again and again.
So the motion that anyone is bound to be better than Mugabe has turned out to be a nonsensical one and not the bolt of wisdom many thought it to be because that "anyone" must outsmart the cunning fox Mugabe first. The corrupt and incompetent Dr Richard Morgan Tsvangirai and his MDC friends have failed to outfox the fox even when they had parliamentary majority the backing of SADC and a whole coterie of advisers and well-wishers. The later have since deserted MDC in droves after being repeatedly ignored; when MDC went ahead and took part in last year's rigged election that was the last straw.
"Yes, Tsvangirai was corrupt in accepting the $ 4 million Highlands mansion; it was a bribe to stop him implementing the reforms," admitted one diehard MDC-T supporters. "But what of it? You too would have accepted the bribe if you were in his shoes!" That is true.
Tsvangirai was not the only one who accepted the bribe and sealed his lips on the democratic reforms, all the other MDC leaders did the same thing. Mugabe saw to it that they all had all the creature comforts political power and influence and when has their snout in the feeding trough one does not criticise the gravy train culture much less bring up unpleasant subjects like democratic reforms everyone knew Mugabe detested.
"Vanhu veMDC vadzidza kudya vanyerere!" (MDC people have learnt to enjoy the gravy train good-life and not rock the boat with talk of reforms!) Was the pithy explanation from one Zanu PF as to why MDC had completely forgotten about implementing the reforms. He should know!
People like Mai Mujuru, Rugare Gumbo and all the others recently dumped from Zanu PF have all sat there like cabbages and said or done nothing to stop the corruption, brutal oppression, vote rigging and even mass murders by the party because they too had learnt to enjoy the gravy train spoils of power and not rock the boat. When it comes to being corrupt people like Mai Mujuru are not privates but five star generals in this army with decades of looting experience under her belt.
To shrug one's shoulders to corruption with a "But so what!" is not completely miss the point.
The reason why Zimbabwe is in this political and economic hell is precisely because leaders like Mugabe are corrupt, they tasted power and all the gravy train attractions it brought and they forgot about freedom, human rights, justice, everything. He was hooked and all he wanted then was absolute power and he did not care how much the nation suffered or how many people he crashed under foot to get it.
Mugabe offered some of the political power to the likes of Mai Mujuru, Regare Gumbo, Mnangagwa and all the others in Zanu PF and they have helped him to intimidate, harass, rig elections and even murder the over 30 000 Zimbabweans to establish and to retain the Zanu PF dictatorship.
When Tsvangirai and his MDC came along on an electoral mandate from the people to end the dictatorship and bring about democratic change, they too soon forgot their promises to the nation after Mugabe offered them a taste of the gravy train delights.
Surely it is self-evident that if we are ever going to have freedom, liberty, justice, etc. we must elect leaders who are not corrupt and will not forget their commitment to the people in pursuit of power and gravy train delights. To elect leaders who have already proven to be so wicked and corrupt they would betray the whole nation for the sake of owning half of Bindura as Mai Mujuru has done or for the sake of $ 4 million Highlands mansion like Tsvangirai is folly.
Electing a corrupt and incompetent leader is careless and we, as a nation have been reckless in this regard. But to elect a corrupt and incompetent leader again and again shows that we are idiots totally incapable of learning from our past mistakes.
If we are serious about ending this corrupt and oppressive Zanu PF dictatorship then we must search for leaders smart enough to outsmart the cunning foxes in Mugabe, Mnangagwa, Professor Moyo, etc. Corrupt and incompetent leaders like Morgan Tsvangirai, Tendai Biti even worse the corrupt and simple minded Mai Mujuru have already tried and they were all completely outwitted.
Source - Wilbert Mukori
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