Opinion / Columnist
Mugabe robbed Zanu PF, now he wants to rob us all!
02 Sep 2015 at 10:28hrs | Views
When you have naïve and gullible followers there are no limits to the nonsense you can sell them and get away Scott-free! Mugabe is a corrupt and murderous tyrant with panache to distorting facts and reality so that what everyone would ordinarily agree is wrong is seen as right and desirable.
When it was announced that Zanu PF was going to hold its elective congress in December 2014, members focused their minds on what position in the party they would want to hold and canvassed for support. How else would you expect to win an election without canvassing for support?
It was Mugabe himself who said every position in the party would up for grabs but no one was foolish enough to think Mugabe would tolerate anyone challenging him for the top job of first secretary of the party and state president. So province after province across the land dutifully endorsed him as their only preferred candidate for the top post. Still Mugabe was not content with that.
In the past he had unilaterally chosen the individuals who filled the next level of leaders, the two VPs and party chairperson. He had always managed to so in the past although the party's constitution said these were to be elected by congress. In 2004 he had the party's constitution change so that Mnangagwa, who had amassed support from 6 out of the 10 provinces, failed to secure the VP post left by the death of Simon Muzenda. Joice Mujuru was appointed VP instead; his last minute and none procedural constitutional amendment said one of the four top party positions must be filled by a woman.
How Mugabe was able to blatantly change the party's constitution and get away with it is a mystery? With a naïve and gullible membership he could change anything and get away with it.
Indeed some of the more idiotic members even justified it on the grounds that the move achieved gender equality. It is stupid enough to accept the breaking of the law to add the gender balance clause because that could still have been accomplished without breaking any law. Alarm bells of the sinister intention should have rung out when the members where denied a say on who that female candidate was to be.
In 2014 Mugabe faced a different problem the candidate who had garnered popular support was a woman, Joice Mujuru, with backing from 8 out of 10 provinces. Whereas in 2004 she had owed her promotion to President Mugabe this time she was going to boost of having the popular support of the party members. She was going to demand that she is given more meaningful political power and not be treated as some overpaid office messenger, whom Mugabe never ever trusted with any real power.
In all the 35 years in power, Mugabe has never allowed any of his deputies or any other senior cabinet member to chair cabinet meetings. If he is not there to chair the meeting then there would be no meeting, period! Mugabe is just a control freak but paranoid about it. An elected VP, even one as passive and slow witted as Mai Mujuru, will demand they be granted meaningful power and authority. Indeed with such a strong mandate even Mai Mujuru may be emboldened to be the first challenge his decisions and his position too! Mugabe had to stop her being elected VP by hook or by crook!
Mugabe, through his power hungry wife, accused Mai Mujuru of causing divisions in the party, factionalism, amongst other things. The fact that she had managed to get the backing of 8 out of the 10 provinces was now her crime. Her main challenger, Emmerson Mnangagwa only managed to get the backing of two provinces was never accused of factionalism. Of course the charge is an absurd and nonsensical one.
Mugabe went on to change the party's constitution yet again, without bothering to follow laid down procedure, to take away congress delegates' power to elect the two VPs to assume these powers himself all done in the name of ensuring "there was only one centre of power in the party – Mugabe". So the very last vestige of party members having some meaningful say in the running of the power was dually lost because Mugabe appointed all the politburo members for the party and all the ministerial position in government and all other senior positions such as Police Commissioner, Army Generals, Judges, etc., etc.
Mugabe is not just the centre of all political power, like the sun he is the centre and source of all political power. He has absolute power and, not surprisingly, he has been corrupted by it absolutely. The root cause why Zanu PF has become such a rotten, corrupt and ruthless oppressive regime is it has been led by an incompetent, corrupt and murderous tyrant who has enjoyed absolute power and accountable to no one.
Mugabe went on to appoint two men VPs and no woman. There was a deafening silence from gender balance cheer leaders of 2004! They were no better than George Orwell's Animal Farm sheep who were vociferous in their supported of one sentiment buy were easily swayed to were just as vociferous in their support of the exact opposite sentiment!
Mugabe has stifled all meaningful debate and competition in his own party just as he had done outside it at national level. In 1980 we started with a multiparty democratic system but within months he transformed it into a de facto one-party, Zanu PF, dictatorship cum one-man, Mugabe, dictatorship.
Just as Mugabe rigged Zanu PF party elections to end "factionalism" he rigged national elections to "stop the Western countries' regime change agenda". 35 years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption under his tyrannical rule has destroyed Zimbabwe's once vibrant economy forcing millions into a life of abject poverty. And, without regime change, the economic meltdown is set to get worse.
We, the people of Zimbabwe, and not the West need regime change to get out of this political and economic mess. We need our basic and fundamental right to free, fair and credible vote restored, we need to hold those holding public office to account and if need be remove them from office. We have gained nothing from Mugabe's imposed dictatorship, we certainly never voted for the de facto one-man dictatorship, but have lost right to hold him to account for what he has done to destroy our hopes and dreams of freedom, liberty, justice, pursuit of happiness and all the other niceties of life other people take for granted!
Mugabe may have tricked his naïve and gullible Zanu PF members into giving up their vote, their only democratic means to hold him to account, believing his hen's teeth lies that exercising that right was causing "factionalism and divisions in the party". It Zanu PF members chose to be simpletons who are so easily conned, even now with the benefit of hindsight of his sinister selfish intention to abrogate absolute power to himself, it is their own business!
Mugabe must make the mistake of assuming that all Zimbabweans are just as naïve and gullible as his Zanu PF party members because many Zimbabwe are not buying his bullshit of denying them a meaningful vote understand the pretext of stopping the West's regime change agenda. We want regime change, why should we want to retain a regime that has done nothing but deny us our basic rights and human dignity including the right to life itself!
Mr Mugabe we demand that you step down so that all the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA can be finally implemented followed by the holding of the nation's very first free, fair and credible elections. Regime change is coming and there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop it happening! Nothing!
When it was announced that Zanu PF was going to hold its elective congress in December 2014, members focused their minds on what position in the party they would want to hold and canvassed for support. How else would you expect to win an election without canvassing for support?
It was Mugabe himself who said every position in the party would up for grabs but no one was foolish enough to think Mugabe would tolerate anyone challenging him for the top job of first secretary of the party and state president. So province after province across the land dutifully endorsed him as their only preferred candidate for the top post. Still Mugabe was not content with that.
In the past he had unilaterally chosen the individuals who filled the next level of leaders, the two VPs and party chairperson. He had always managed to so in the past although the party's constitution said these were to be elected by congress. In 2004 he had the party's constitution change so that Mnangagwa, who had amassed support from 6 out of the 10 provinces, failed to secure the VP post left by the death of Simon Muzenda. Joice Mujuru was appointed VP instead; his last minute and none procedural constitutional amendment said one of the four top party positions must be filled by a woman.
How Mugabe was able to blatantly change the party's constitution and get away with it is a mystery? With a naïve and gullible membership he could change anything and get away with it.
Indeed some of the more idiotic members even justified it on the grounds that the move achieved gender equality. It is stupid enough to accept the breaking of the law to add the gender balance clause because that could still have been accomplished without breaking any law. Alarm bells of the sinister intention should have rung out when the members where denied a say on who that female candidate was to be.
In 2014 Mugabe faced a different problem the candidate who had garnered popular support was a woman, Joice Mujuru, with backing from 8 out of 10 provinces. Whereas in 2004 she had owed her promotion to President Mugabe this time she was going to boost of having the popular support of the party members. She was going to demand that she is given more meaningful political power and not be treated as some overpaid office messenger, whom Mugabe never ever trusted with any real power.
In all the 35 years in power, Mugabe has never allowed any of his deputies or any other senior cabinet member to chair cabinet meetings. If he is not there to chair the meeting then there would be no meeting, period! Mugabe is just a control freak but paranoid about it. An elected VP, even one as passive and slow witted as Mai Mujuru, will demand they be granted meaningful power and authority. Indeed with such a strong mandate even Mai Mujuru may be emboldened to be the first challenge his decisions and his position too! Mugabe had to stop her being elected VP by hook or by crook!
Mugabe went on to change the party's constitution yet again, without bothering to follow laid down procedure, to take away congress delegates' power to elect the two VPs to assume these powers himself all done in the name of ensuring "there was only one centre of power in the party – Mugabe". So the very last vestige of party members having some meaningful say in the running of the power was dually lost because Mugabe appointed all the politburo members for the party and all the ministerial position in government and all other senior positions such as Police Commissioner, Army Generals, Judges, etc., etc.
Mugabe is not just the centre of all political power, like the sun he is the centre and source of all political power. He has absolute power and, not surprisingly, he has been corrupted by it absolutely. The root cause why Zanu PF has become such a rotten, corrupt and ruthless oppressive regime is it has been led by an incompetent, corrupt and murderous tyrant who has enjoyed absolute power and accountable to no one.
Mugabe went on to appoint two men VPs and no woman. There was a deafening silence from gender balance cheer leaders of 2004! They were no better than George Orwell's Animal Farm sheep who were vociferous in their supported of one sentiment buy were easily swayed to were just as vociferous in their support of the exact opposite sentiment!
Mugabe has stifled all meaningful debate and competition in his own party just as he had done outside it at national level. In 1980 we started with a multiparty democratic system but within months he transformed it into a de facto one-party, Zanu PF, dictatorship cum one-man, Mugabe, dictatorship.
Just as Mugabe rigged Zanu PF party elections to end "factionalism" he rigged national elections to "stop the Western countries' regime change agenda". 35 years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption under his tyrannical rule has destroyed Zimbabwe's once vibrant economy forcing millions into a life of abject poverty. And, without regime change, the economic meltdown is set to get worse.
We, the people of Zimbabwe, and not the West need regime change to get out of this political and economic mess. We need our basic and fundamental right to free, fair and credible vote restored, we need to hold those holding public office to account and if need be remove them from office. We have gained nothing from Mugabe's imposed dictatorship, we certainly never voted for the de facto one-man dictatorship, but have lost right to hold him to account for what he has done to destroy our hopes and dreams of freedom, liberty, justice, pursuit of happiness and all the other niceties of life other people take for granted!
Mugabe may have tricked his naïve and gullible Zanu PF members into giving up their vote, their only democratic means to hold him to account, believing his hen's teeth lies that exercising that right was causing "factionalism and divisions in the party". It Zanu PF members chose to be simpletons who are so easily conned, even now with the benefit of hindsight of his sinister selfish intention to abrogate absolute power to himself, it is their own business!
Mugabe must make the mistake of assuming that all Zimbabweans are just as naïve and gullible as his Zanu PF party members because many Zimbabwe are not buying his bullshit of denying them a meaningful vote understand the pretext of stopping the West's regime change agenda. We want regime change, why should we want to retain a regime that has done nothing but deny us our basic rights and human dignity including the right to life itself!
Mr Mugabe we demand that you step down so that all the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA can be finally implemented followed by the holding of the nation's very first free, fair and credible elections. Regime change is coming and there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop it happening! Nothing!
Source - Wilbert Mukori
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