'ED stepping up fight against graft' Mangwana praised - praise as contrived as fight itself

Nick Mangwana has worked hard as a Zanu-PF apologist and was recently rewarded with the appointment as Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Media, Publicity and Broadcasting Services. The post was held by none other than George Charamba cum columnist Nathaniel Manheru.

One of the reasons why Charamba was promoted upstairs to twiddle his thumbs and say nothing; as happened to many other former ministers, permanent secretaries, etc.; is after decades of praising Mugabe switching to praising Mnangagwa was sounding hollow. Sadly for Nick. he too had spent many decades praising Mugabe his sing-song praise of Mnangagwa is just as hollow and contrived as Charamba's!

"This week saw an unprecedented number of high-profile individuals appearing before our courts of law in connection with corruption, giving momentum to Government's fight against graft," wrote Mangwana in The Herald.

"Given the fact that the tolerance threshold for the malady of abuse of office and corruption had been so low in the country, this is a marked and significant shift, which must inspire confidence in the generality of our people.

"Admittedly, there has been cynicism in some quarters as to the sincerity of the exercise, but the nation should rest assured that the fight against corruption is real and that more cases of corruption will be dealt with in the courts, while some procedures and processes are underway to institute further cases that are within the radar.

"This will make the following weeks interesting to watch.

"His Excellency, President Emmerson Mnangangwa, has already declared zero tolerance to corruption and has used various fora to hammer this home: as the wheels of justice turn, Zimbabwe will see the actualisation of the anti-corruption governance paradigm espoused by President Mnangagwa."

There are five key points well worth noting here:

1. Nick, you have defended Robert Mugabe and Zanu-PF all these years and never ever acknowledged there was corruption and yet now you do with the casual air of one who has done so all along. Worse still, wittering on and on about how Mnangagwa is doing something to end corruption when he have done precious little and dismiss those saying so as cynics!

2. In a country in which corruption was so rampant that $15 billion in diamond revenue alone was "swindled" in just a few years, according to Robert Mugabe; it is shocking that a year after Mnangagwa took over from Mugabe still not even one swindler has been arrested and not even one dollar recovered. The diamond mining has continued since the ouster of Mugabe by the same players under the same secrecy - in short, the looting continues.

3. The factional war in Zanu-PF is not a secret and Mnangagwa is going after his political enemies in the name of fighting corruption just as ruthlessly as Mugabe had gone after Mai Mujuru and her supporters. If last November's coup had failed to ouster Mugabe it would be Mnangagwa and his supporters who would be in the dock today. No doubt, Nick Mangwana would be singing Mugabe's praises and how he is finally stamping out corruption!

4. If Mnangagwa was serious about ending corruption then he would have to start by arresting his own VP Chiwenga and himself - the two are certainly in the top ten most corrupt individuals in Zimbabwe. He is going after his political enemies and rivals in the guess that they are corrupt; he is no more than a cannibalising hyena pretending its victim smelt of goat and therefore is a goat!

5. The truth is Mnangagwa has promised to end corruption but has failed to honour his promise just as he promised to hold free, fair and credible elections only to rig the elections. As for you Nick, you are just a Zanu-PF apologist lying about Mnangagwa ending corruption just as readily as you have lied that there was no corruption in Zimbabwe.