Political crowd funding: A new fleece

When author and Irish nationalist, Jonathan Swift, established the first recognised crowd funding in the early 1700s as a way of providing loans to the poor, but creditworthy people in Dublin, little did he know that some unscrupulous political activists would later emerge and use the initiative to fleece unassuming people of their hard-earned cash.

The idea of crowd funding was noble as it was centred on assisting less privileged members of the community. Those who started crowd funding in the early 1700s wanted to use it to empower people and rally support for personal and charitable causes.

For the benefit of the readers, the modern crowd funding harnesses the power of social networks and the internet to give people the means to raise funds, help others overcome hardship, and meet aspirational goals.

The core principle behind the crowd funding is that one can help a friend or help an entire community. As much as crowd funding is noble, lately it has been abused by political activists to fund-raise for their nefarious activities.

MDC Alliance (MDC-A) activist, Freeman Chari, is one of the people who have been abusing the crowd funding concept to finance their opposition political nefarious activities in Zimbabwe.

Recently, Chari, who is based in the United States, urged people to crowd fund so that all MDC-A members who would be arrested for what he termed "political crimes," would be given a token of appreciation.

Chari said, "If I had my way, everyone who is in jail for political reasons would be salaried. We have to get to a point where it becomes a badge of honour."

In urging people to crowd-fund for the MDC-A activists, Chari said the money that would be raised would sponsor the activists and some of it used to send them outside the country for educational purposes.

It does not need a rocket a scientist to see that Chari is sowing the seeds of mercenary activities in the head of an excitable MDC-A youth. The danger with mercenaries is that they fight for money or other forms of payment rather than for political interests.

So in dangling dollars in front of the youths, Chari is actually enticing people to defy lawful orders so that they can be paid something if they get arrested.

The most dangerous people in the world are not the tiny minority who commit crimes, but those who pay and instigate them to do such acts.

Chari should, therefore, be viewed as a person of security interest as he is indirectly hiring thugs to cause mayhem in the country in exchange for some greenbacks.

I foresee volatile characters within the MDC-A becoming more violent and militant so that they can get the small bread crumbs promised by Chari.

It is now clear that the crowd funding platform is being used to reward societal malcontents, who are bent on causing mayhem in the country. Moreover, Chari is abusing the crowd funding concept to cause regime change in Zimbabwe. Instead of crowd funding for other noble activities such as youths' business start-ups, Chari is fundraising for chaos and eventually regime change in Zimbabwe.

It should be known that Chari is a core member of the notorious Team Pachedu, which is sponsored by America and is, therefore, being used by the same as a pawn to push Americans' regime change agenda. One's worst fear is that the crowd funding initiative might go out of hand and create or promote terrorism in the country.

Even the Bible said that the love of money is the root of all evil and with money, the uncultured MDC-A youths can be used to promote terror in the country. One wishes that the authorities devise strategies to stop Chari from fundraising to sponsor terrorism.

Given the propensity of the MDC-A youths to commit crimes, the crowd funding initiative has the potential to create militant groups like Boko Haram.

If some of the MDC-A youths could fake their own abduction for some monetary gains, what would stop others from engaging in terrorism acts so that they can get a pay cheque?

Many will remember how the party created a militia group called the Democratic Resistance Committees (DRCs), which went on a rampage in March 2007 petrol-bombing police stations in Harare, Chitungwiza, Gweru and Mutare. The party also has another violent militia outfit named the Vanguard.

If the violent groups have been used to target public property and internal "enemies" of the party, what can stop the US from hiding behind the crowd funding initiative to fund fully-fledged terrorism in Zimbabwe?

The crowd funding initiative, on the other hand, could be the final nail in the MDC-A's political coffin. Where money is involved, the MDC-A has a tendency of fighting for it.

In 2018, the MDC-A supporters launched a fundraising campaign for party leader Nelson Chamisa's legal bills for his failed electoral challenge at the Constitutional Court.

Soon after the court case, there were reports that the raised funds were squandered by Chamisa and his close lieutenants and that some of it was invested in a transport business in Namibia. It seems the MDC-A leadership has found an easy way of fleecing the general public of their money by urging them to crowd fund for certain political "causes."

The question is, why is Chari not urging people to crowd fund for some developmental activities? Why not crowd fund for the construction of a bridge or the purchase of Covid-19 vaccines? Why only crowd funding to sponsor mercenary activities?

Instead of raising funds to reward some political thugs, Chari should actually raise funds to empower the idle youths to start some income generating projects.

Chari should teach the youths to behave and be responsible citizens instead of recruiting them into committing crimes for a few dirty dollars. He should not mislead the youths.

Chari should instead tell the youths the truth that crime does not pay and whoever commits crimes would be prosecuted and incarcerated without fear or favour.