Opinion / Columnist
'Zim prison, a crime against humanity' twittered Biti, prisoner - true all because selling out on reforms
04 Dec 2020 at 19:04hrs | Views
Tendai Biti, MDC A vice President, has been arrested and will spend Friday night in a Police Prison. He is charged with assault, after calling a Russian woman an idiot.
Biti has denied any wrong doing and claims the arrest is to stop him and the parliamentary committee he is heading investigating the illegal awarding of land during former Minister Ignatius Chombo's days.
"The Harare Airport Road project was a total stink where thousands of hectares of land where illegally and fraudulently transferred to Augur Investments and its shelf companies. That land must be returned to the city and its citizens. They want to detain me overnight, so be it," said Biti.
"Awaiting detention. In the absence of sanitizers, PPEs, running water, flushing toilets, repellents and decent food any detention in Zim prisons at the moment is cruel & degrading treatment. A crime against humanity
#ZimbabweanLivesMatter."
Zimbabwe's prison conditions are notoriously filthy and a real danger to life, especially these days with the added danger of getting the corona virus.
Still, one hopes that the night in the Police cell has forced Tendai Biti think about the 2008 to 2013 GNU golden opportunity Zimbabwe had to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections and thus end the de facto one-party dictatorship. It was none other than MP Tendai Biti and fellow MDC friends who wasted the golden opportunity and failed to get even one reform implemented in five years. Not even one!
President Robert Mugabe, Zanu PF leader and Zimbabwe's dictator at the time, bribed the MDC leaders with the trappings of high office and the rest is history. Instead of implementing the reforms MDC leaders were falling over each other praising the dictator to the high heaven.
"President Mugabe is the unflappable father of the nation, fountain of wisdom," sung Tendai Biti. He was the Minister of Finance in the GNU. Fancy that! A corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and murderous tyrant; seen through the rose tinted glass of the ministerial limo, had metamorphosed into the unflappable fountain of wisdom!
If Tendai Biti and company had kept their eyes on the ball and implemented the democratic reforms; the 2013 and 2018 elections would have been free, fair and credible. Zimbabwe would be a totally different country, a healthy and functioning democracy well on its way to meaningful economic recovery!
No reforms were implemented and so the country is still stuck with the corrupt and tyrannical Zanu PF dictatorship. The country's economy is still in ruins and sinking deeper and deeper into the abyss.
What is unforgivable is that Tendai Biti and his MDC friends have not only refused to admit they sold-out in failing implementing the reforms during the 2008 GNU but, worst of all, they have since then contrived to continue selling out on the fight for free, fair and credible elections!
The MDC leaders have known that with no democratic reforms in place Zanu PF will rig the elections and yet Biti and company have participated in the 2013 and then 2018 (all signs are they will do the same in 2023), regardless. Zanu PF has offered a few gravy train seats to entice the opposition to participate, bait MDC leaders found irresistible.
Of course, Tendai Biti and company knew the few gravy train seats were bait and that by participating they would give the flawed and illegal election process credibility; as David Coltart admitted in his book.
"The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn't now do the obvious – withdraw from the (2013) elections," wrote Senator Coltart in his book The Struggle Continues 50 years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe.
"The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility."
Senator Coltart was himself one of the MDC Ministers during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. He is now the Treasurer General of the MDC A, the coalition of three main MDC factions formed just before the 2018 election.
By continuing to participate in these flawed and illegal elections, MDC and the rest in the opposition camp are giving these elections credibility and, with it, giving the vote rigging Zanu PF government legitimacy.
So MP Tendai Biti should not just think about his time in prison as "cruel & degrading treatment, a crime against humanity" but most important of all that millions of Zimbabweans, inside and outside prison, are suffering the same or worse conditions.
And, most important of all, that the nation would have been saved from all this suffering and deaths if he and his MDC friends have not been selling-out on reforms and free, fair and credible elections. Food for thought; assuming he is not punch drunk on powers and his brain is now totally impermeable to reason and logic.
Biti has denied any wrong doing and claims the arrest is to stop him and the parliamentary committee he is heading investigating the illegal awarding of land during former Minister Ignatius Chombo's days.
"The Harare Airport Road project was a total stink where thousands of hectares of land where illegally and fraudulently transferred to Augur Investments and its shelf companies. That land must be returned to the city and its citizens. They want to detain me overnight, so be it," said Biti.
"Awaiting detention. In the absence of sanitizers, PPEs, running water, flushing toilets, repellents and decent food any detention in Zim prisons at the moment is cruel & degrading treatment. A crime against humanity
#ZimbabweanLivesMatter."
Zimbabwe's prison conditions are notoriously filthy and a real danger to life, especially these days with the added danger of getting the corona virus.
Still, one hopes that the night in the Police cell has forced Tendai Biti think about the 2008 to 2013 GNU golden opportunity Zimbabwe had to implement the democratic reforms designed to stop Zanu PF rigging the elections and thus end the de facto one-party dictatorship. It was none other than MP Tendai Biti and fellow MDC friends who wasted the golden opportunity and failed to get even one reform implemented in five years. Not even one!
President Robert Mugabe, Zanu PF leader and Zimbabwe's dictator at the time, bribed the MDC leaders with the trappings of high office and the rest is history. Instead of implementing the reforms MDC leaders were falling over each other praising the dictator to the high heaven.
"President Mugabe is the unflappable father of the nation, fountain of wisdom," sung Tendai Biti. He was the Minister of Finance in the GNU. Fancy that! A corrupt, incompetent, vote rigging and murderous tyrant; seen through the rose tinted glass of the ministerial limo, had metamorphosed into the unflappable fountain of wisdom!
If Tendai Biti and company had kept their eyes on the ball and implemented the democratic reforms; the 2013 and 2018 elections would have been free, fair and credible. Zimbabwe would be a totally different country, a healthy and functioning democracy well on its way to meaningful economic recovery!
What is unforgivable is that Tendai Biti and his MDC friends have not only refused to admit they sold-out in failing implementing the reforms during the 2008 GNU but, worst of all, they have since then contrived to continue selling out on the fight for free, fair and credible elections!
The MDC leaders have known that with no democratic reforms in place Zanu PF will rig the elections and yet Biti and company have participated in the 2013 and then 2018 (all signs are they will do the same in 2023), regardless. Zanu PF has offered a few gravy train seats to entice the opposition to participate, bait MDC leaders found irresistible.
Of course, Tendai Biti and company knew the few gravy train seats were bait and that by participating they would give the flawed and illegal election process credibility; as David Coltart admitted in his book.
"The worst aspect for me about the failure to agree a coalition was that both MDCs couldn't now do the obvious – withdraw from the (2013) elections," wrote Senator Coltart in his book The Struggle Continues 50 years of Tyranny in Zimbabwe.
"The electoral process was so flawed, so illegal, that the only logical step was to withdraw, which would compel SADC to hold Zanu PF to account. But such was the distrust between the MDC-T and MDC-N that neither could withdraw for fear that the other would remain in the elections, winning seats and giving the process credibility."
Senator Coltart was himself one of the MDC Ministers during the 2008 to 2013 GNU. He is now the Treasurer General of the MDC A, the coalition of three main MDC factions formed just before the 2018 election.
By continuing to participate in these flawed and illegal elections, MDC and the rest in the opposition camp are giving these elections credibility and, with it, giving the vote rigging Zanu PF government legitimacy.
So MP Tendai Biti should not just think about his time in prison as "cruel & degrading treatment, a crime against humanity" but most important of all that millions of Zimbabweans, inside and outside prison, are suffering the same or worse conditions.
And, most important of all, that the nation would have been saved from all this suffering and deaths if he and his MDC friends have not been selling-out on reforms and free, fair and credible elections. Food for thought; assuming he is not punch drunk on powers and his brain is now totally impermeable to reason and logic.
Source - zimbabwelight.blogspot.com
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