'Dictators never voluntarily leave office,' Musewe finally admit - pity he sees monochrome

I would like to welcome my brother Vince Musewe who, until now, was arguing that we should continue to appease this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF regime. Now he wants them kicked out of office!

"Continually shouting at Zanu-PF to change, as we are all doing now, may not result in the change we want to see," argued Musewe in February 2016.

"In my opinion, Zanu-PF, especially its leaders, fear to lose power through free and fair elections. Understandably so, because that loss of power may result in personal criminal persecution, loss of income and status. This fear is the same which is causing succession battles as Mugabe holds onto power. It is clear that the more we demand for political reforms, the more resistance to change we are getting."

Musewe proposed a political settlement of an interim administration to address the country's worsening economic situation. President Mugabe and his cronies will be allowed to stay in power throughout the life of the interim administration and the latter will not be tasked to implement any reforms of ZEC, the Police and all the other state institutions leading to free and fair elections.

"We have to be honest with each other and admit that it is really Mugabe's mentality of "none but myself" that has got us where we are. Unless we address that, there will be no change as long as he is around," Musewe now argues in his lasted article, Dictators never voluntarily leave office, Bulawayo 24 opinion.

"Societies which are oppressed cannot expect to attain their freedom gradually or by negotiation at the pleasure of the oppressor, there has to be some sort of radical rapture from the past."

So Musewe is no longer interested in appeasing President Mugabe and his cronies but now wants the tyrant booted out; great!

"Fourth, the commissioner of police and its leadership must resign immediately and be replaced by a safety and security commission made up a team of credible individuals with legal and policing experience," continued Musewe in his five point plan.

"Fifth, the ZEC must be disbanded and the current team dismissed including the Registrar General. In its place an inclusive body representing political parties and civic organisations must be established and given the mandate to prepare the country for new elections by July 2018."

Last time Musewe was bending over backwards to assure Zanu PF thugs that ZEC, the Police, Security Sectors, etc. will not be reformed and the dictatorship watered down; now he wants these institutions disbanded!

I would like to draw Mr Musewe's attention to the fact that the disbanding of ZEC and all the other corrupted state institutions is not a new and novel idea; this was the essence of the democratic reforms proposed in the 2008 GPA. The reforms Tendai Biti, Morgan Tsvangirai, Welshman Ncube and the other MDC leaders were tasked to implementing but failed to get even one reform implemented in the five years of GNU. Not even one reform!

Vince Musewe is the Secretary for Finance and Economic Affairs of the People's Democratic Party (PDP) a party led by none other than Tendai Biti, a senior GNU MDC leader. Vince Musewe is on record praising Biti and the other corrupt and incompetent MDC leaders who failed to get even one democratic reform implemented during the GNU.

It has clearly been a torturous political journey for Vince Musewe to move from blind loyalty to Mugabe, appeasing the tyrant regardless to finally admitting the tyrant must go; no if no but! It seems Musewe has yet to accept that it was not only President Mugabe and his cronies who landed us in this mess others like Biti and his equally corrupt and incompetent MDC friendly played their part too.

"The crux of the matter is that Zimbabwe has been bankrupted by Mugabe and the Zanu-PF politburo and its thieving ministers. We have a failed state and those who manufactured that failure cannot be architects of a new Zimbabwe. It our duty to rebuild and reinvent our country without them," wrote Musewe.

The crux of the matter is that amateur political analysts like Musewe have taken forever to see what has been there for the whole world to see. And even then, they only see in monochrome, black and white, right and wrong, Zanu PF and MDC. Musewe can only see Mugabe and his cronies as corrupt and incompetent but because he must have MDC as the good guys to counter weigh the Zanu-PF bad guys, he filters out the reality that they are in fact corrupt and incompetent.

Leaders like Biti have already proven beyond all doubt that they are corrupt and incompetent a thousand times but none so convincingly than by failing to implement even one reform in five years of the GNU. And yet Musewe has refused to count MDC leaders amongst "those who manufacture that (Zimbabwe) failure (and) cannot be architects of a new Zimbabwe". He still wants them to be the chief architects of his new Zimbabwe.

Corrupt and incompetent leaders, who are we kidding with all this frantic recycling of deadwood in MDC, ZimPF, etc., will never build a strong democratic and prosperous Zimbabwe we are looking for.

What we need to do is to implement all the democratic reforms agreed in the 2008 GPA designed to dismantle the Zanu PF autocracy that has stifled all meaningful debate and democratic completion to create a political system in which corrupt and incompetent leaders, scum, rise to the top. The reformed system will encourage and nurture debate and democratic competition and allow competent and visionary leaders, crème de crème, to rise to the top.

What we need is to create a democratic system of government and the quality leaders and architects will follow and day follows night! If we fail to completely dismantle the present autocratic political infrastructure then we run the danger of removing one dictator only to replace him with another, which is what Chris Mutsvangwa and his misguided war veterans are seeking to do right now!  

-----------
Patrick Guramatunhu <patguramatunhu@gmail.com