'Doctors are negotiating in bad faith' says Chiwenga - have you ever done anything otherwise

"Following a series of meetings involving striking Health Workers and their employer, the Health Services Board, Government is gravely concerned that the situation in our country continues to deteriorate to the detriment of patients who need and deserve medical attention as a human right in line with our constitution," said VP Chiwenga.

The sheer hypocrisy of that statement has a stench worse than that of a skunk!

It is no secret that Zimbabwe's ruling elite have been going to SA, Singapore and some such places for all their health needs because the country's health care services have all but collapsed a long time ago.

VP Chiwenga, yes am I talking to you Sir! A few months ago you were in hospital; it was not a hospital in Zimbabwe. None of the junior doctors you are blaming now for ignoring the patients' needs were on strike then.

It is the 38 years of poor funding that caused the collapse of our health care service. And it is you Sir and your fellow Zanu PF leaders who are to blame for these years of neglect!

"Government is disturbed by the fact that in spite of many concessions it made to the striking doctors, and the broad agreement reached on all but two issues, the striking Health Personnel continue to withhold their labour and negotiate in bad faith even though they are designated as an essential service under the Labour Act, and even though Government has bent over backwards to accommodate them," he said.

You are begrudging the striking junior doctors a living wage and yet you and your family live in unparalleled comfort and luxury. These doctors are being paid a misery $385 per month in a country where the poverty datum line is $650 per month! You, Sir live in your C&M palatial mansion, have a fleet of posh cars, many business interests, farms, have 45 gold watches, etc. And, lest we forget, each time you and your family needs health service you seek it outside Zimbabwe - at tax payers' expense, no doubt!

The government has already "fired" the striking doctors following a hurried Court Order that declared the strike unlawful. The whole legal process was so hurried, doctors' lawyers did not have a chance to represent them in Court. Not that it would have made any difference to the Court's decision, of course.

The reader will remember that this is the same Judiciary that judged the infamous 2017 military coup as "legal, constitutional and justified"! The coup was led by none other than VP Chiwenga and President Mnangagwa themselves. Zimbabwe is the only nation on earth where a military coup is constitutional! (No doubt if Mnangagwa was ever to catch anyone staging a coup on him, he/she will be lynched! Meanwhile he has reportedly doubled his security details following bomb threat on him last June!)

Following a Con-Court challenge of last July's elections results, the same "wise" Judges rejected all the evidence submitted by plaintiff, Nelson Chamisa, and the chief defendant, ZEC. The evidence confirmed what EU and other election observers stated in their reports.

"Further, the electoral commission (ZEC) lacked full independence and appeared to not always act in an impartial manner," stated the EU Zimbabwe Election Mission final report.

"The final results as announced by the Electoral Commission contained numerous errors and lacked adequate traceability, transparency and verifiability. Finally, the restrictions on political freedoms, the excessive use of force by security forces and abuses of human rights in the post-election period undermined the corresponding positive aspects during the pre-election campaign. As such, many aspects of the 2018 elections in Zimbabwe failed to meet international standards."

Signed affidavits from both Chamisa and ZEC confirmed there was no verified voters and that some of the V11 forms (summary of the vote count for each polling station) were missing, although these are legal requirements, for example. Hence, substantiating the EU report that results could not be verified or traced.

The  Con-Court decided to disregard the evidence before it reportedly because it was not supported by "primary source evidence in the sealed ballot boxes"! The judges ASSUMED primary source evidence would prove all the missing V11 forms would be in the sealed boxes although they did not demand that the boxes be opened and prove it.

ZEC had three difference tallies of Mnangagwa's winning votes. Even if the missing V11 were all accounted for - how this could produce three different results, no one dared to ask the bench.

As for the failure to produce a verified voters' roll; no doubt the Judges also assumed the rolls in the seal boxes were all verified. By whom, again, no one dared to ask the "wise" Judges!

Doctors are "negotiate in bad faith!" Is government negotiating in good faith? Government maintains there will be economy recovery, price stability, etc. and therefore workers must accept the wages on offer as stable although all signs are that the economic meltdown is getting worse.

Indeed, when has this Zanu PF regime ever done anything in "good faith" in all its 38 years in power? The root cause of the nation's worsening economic meltdown is because the nation has been stuck with a corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical regime that rigged elections to stay in power.

VP Chiwenga, you and your fellow Zanu PF thugs rigged the July 2018 elections but what you cannot rig in the economic recovery! Zimbabwe's health care collapsed a long time ago and it is not the striking doctors who did that - Zanu PF did!

The Zimbabwe economy will never register any meaningful recovery, as long as the nation remains under this corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship. Zanu PF is holding the nation to ransom!