Unpacking Mugabe's own lack of confidence in his 'leadership' abilities

The widely publicised recent utterances as reportedly from President Mugabe which have been aptly paraphrased as saying that "l never wanted to be the president of Zimbabwe" have once again started another new conversation worth discussing now and into the future. Volumes of books can be written out of such a statement, which then explains this article alone as not enough at all but must just be the beginning. Even in retrospect these utterances are in no way defining lack of ambition back then to challenge for top office, but are a reminder to all of us of what we have always known.

No amount of spin-doctoring is necessary to convince the nation of Zimbabwe, and the world at large that he meant something different from such a claim. We can only have a simplified version which explains clearly that President Mugabe knew better than anyone else that his leadership qualities were non-existent especially at a grand scale. That is the main reason why it took a lot of convincing by others to make him believe in a trial and error leadership method which has taken the country to as far as we know it now. He might have tried to conceal it for too long, but the very office had already found its own way to expose such a "reluctant leader", hence such "revelations" are not really anything knew but a mere confirmation.

In a way the people have worked hard trying to make a leader out of him, yet leaders are not made but are born. In trying to make a leader from an individual who was never born to be one, the huge risk is definitely making someone far from the expected leader. The desirable qualities will be glaringly absent as the "artificial" leader will never give what they never had, and will never have, especially those traits which must come naturally. The converse is true that a bad system that strives to make a "terrorist" out of a born-leader will completely fail in such a mammoth task. Such a leader will stand all the tests of the evil systems, and not forget to change the evil system in place to perfectly complement such natural leadership traits after prevailing over it.

Another illustrative perspective is to suppose that if President Mugabe was such a good English Literature teacher in his professional days, producing 100% pass rate results at subject level, it did not mean if he were to be the headmaster even of the same school he was going to produce a 100% pass rate at school level. It definitely does not work like that at all. Most people especially those not born to be leaders reach their full potential under the inspiration of a good leader who knows how best to derive maximum benefit from such critical skills or rare talents of their subordinates.

Moreso, good leaders are not produced from even the best universities of the world as there is no institution with such capacity to reproduce the natural traits and qualities desirable in a true leader. Best institutions can only quicken a born-leader to also reach their full potential, the most desirable trait being servanthood. They may only provide useful techniques and skills-set for the born-leader to deliver and satisfy such needs and wants of the whole nation or the world, which in itself is a natural phenomenon to be able to identify and prioritise such needs of the people.

Otherwise if such a trait and ability is not there, then corruption substitutes it because an individual will even fail to identify any people's pressing needs, with plenty resources at his management, for people in a sea of poverty. Such a desirable quality is not really learnt from any school or university, just like a wealthy father whose own children live like beggars. As we all know that to be a good and responsible father, you don't necessarily need to have such a high academic qualification as fatherhood is a natural process. A leader easily exhibits father figure traits as used in the context of being gender inclusive! He will not even have to instil fear in the hearts of his children to earn their respect.

Therefore, if President Mugabe was a shining star as "secretary" under the leadership of the late Dr. Joshua M Nkomo within ZAPU, in no way did it mean he would still be a star when he was to be a top leader even of the same or similar organisation. Moreso, if Mr Tsvangirai was a capable and fearless "secretary" under the leadership of the late Mr Gibson Sibanda at ZCTU then it did not mean he would exhibit similar qualities, or need same competencies as outright leader of an almost similar organisation, worse still a nation of diverse needs.

Neither does it mean that if Grace Mugabe was a suitable "secretary" in the Presidency Office then she is a suitable potential leader of the whole nation. Unless if the majority of Zimbabweans just have a weakness for promoting former "secretaries" to the highest leadership levels! God forbid if that was to be the most key criteria or experience that we as Zimbabweans consider as suitability for higher public office.

So methinks President Mugabe probably just wanted to be a Minister of Education at the time of attaining political independence of the country, and maybe some Zimbabweans can now then imagine how far that sector could have gone with all his passion having being directed and dedicated towards such a public office position. Mind you, it is never a struggle to appropriately identify a born-leader, and the world still has enough of them in every country and nation including Zimbabwe.

We strongly hope Zimbabweans will finally make a better choice in forthcoming elections especially in 2018 and get to taste the joys of having correct leadership who are naturally confident in their abilities to lead. Salute to all ZIM-ID leaders, firebrands, cadres and foot-soldiers.

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This article has been written by Fbr Mthokozisi Ndiweni in his own personal capacity, but he is also the Firebrand-in-Chief of ZIM-ID Firebrand Youth. He can be contacted on ndixam@gmail.com or visit our website at www.zim-id.org