Joice Mujuru in good company

Love him or hate him, one of the endearing and enduring traits of President Mugabe is his consistency. Listening to his interviews over the years, one finds the same themes running through: Holistic independence, sovereignty, indigenisation and economic empowerment, self-determination and territorial integrity etc.

The response he gave to a reporter's question in 1980 when he was asked how he, the "psychopathic killer, the ogre, the terrorist of yesterday" had become the pragmatic and moderate statesman of the day was not amiss.

Said President Mugabe: "The change is not in me, I am not the one who has undergone a metamorphosis. The transformation is taking place in the minds of those who once upon a time regarded me as an extremist, a murderer, a psychopathic killer . . . they are the ones who have had to adjust to the change. I have remained my constant self, what I was I still am.''

Indeed President Mugabe has remained true to his calling which is why his constant refrain, "Zimbabwe shall never be a colony again,'' is a source of inspiration to millions of Zimbabweans who defiantly pump their clenched fists to send a strong message to would be aggressors that they would never betray his legacy.

This cannot be said for the woman President Mugabe plucked from relative obscurity, encouraged to go to school, appointed to his Cabinet for 34 of the country's 37 years of independence, before greed and unbridled ambition saw her get expelled for seeking to punch above her weight.

We are talking of Dr Joice Mujuru who now fronts an outfit called the National People's Party. Despite her flirtation with the liberation struggle, Dr Mujuru has since repudiated the revolution in both word and deed, including even her late husband's memory.

In the interviews she has given since her public foray into opposition politics, Dr Mujuru has denounced all progressive Government policies for which our country has been punished by the erstwhile coloniser since the turn of the millennium. She has embraced MDC-T leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, for a joint ticket to challenge President Mugabe and Zanu-PF in 2018.

Dr Mujuru had no qualms showing she lived a lie over the past 34 years, but appeared lost to the fact that through that repudiation she effectively reduced herself to the non-entity she was before President Mugabe plucked her from obscurity.

She thus approaches Tsvangirai's bed as Runaida Mugari having divested herself of the giant robes of a liberation fighter, a cause for which her late husband dedicated his life.

In so doing Dr Mujuru has also done Zanu-PF a huge favour as those of the revolutionary party's supporters who may have sympathised with her or been hoodwinked now see her for what she really is, a Trojan horse that Zanu-PF did well to expel.

We wish Dr Mujuru well as she joins Morgan Tsvangirai on the road to perdition, she is in good company.