What's Behind US Wikileaks Cables

Sensational disclosures by whistle blower, WikiLeaks, that prominent Zanu-PF leaders joined a beeline of MDC-T officials, and others, in consorting with the US government through its successive ambassadors to Zimbabwe, will remain fresh in the minds of many Zimbabweans.

Even long, long after published stories on this controversial issue have been archived as rough drafts of history, Zimbabweans will still talk about it.

In this pen's humble opinion and opinion is not a religion that anyone opposing it should be where the gates of hell are that the Zimbabwe leaders met with the American diplomats is not really very much in contention here.

What is in question are the purposes of those meetings and their implications on this country's body politic.

It is therefore incumbent on Zimbabweans to put those political encounters between leaders from across the local political divide and their foreign interlocutors in order to apportion any indictment over the Nicodemus dealings to the relevant quarters.

Contextually, people engage others to either discuss common issues as a way of embellishing shared ideas and goals or they do so in surrender of their own stronghold and so become subservient to the thought tracks and action of the other person as an erstwhile foe. In the former case, meetings in which MDC-T officials variously took party president Morgan Tsvangirai to the cleaners, as it were, are no big deals as such.

Theirs was a family affair whereby the complainants either merely exposed the weaknesses of their brother to their godfather, America, or sought favours and consideration to replace the man whose political leadership they dressed up in muck.

MDC-T officials' complaints about Tsvangirai, unholy though they might be, certainly posed no threat to that party nor to the country either - and reports that the party would not act against those exposed in the diplomatic cables from the embassy in Harare to Washington is proof that the tete-a-tete can be classed into harmless gossips by family members about one another.

But Zanu-PF leaders what business on earth did they have flirting with representatives of a country that harbours pathological hate for their own President, their party and its Government against which they schemed up regime change?

What message did these people take to the Americans to win the enemy over, or was it to present themselves as instruments of regime change against their own country. In the former, did they bring any feedback to their principal, or do they hibernate within Zanu-PF and the Government all the while hunting with the hounds and running with the hares?

And anyway one would expect that Zanu-PF has in place an ethical code, silent or otherwise, which required that any rank-and-file member would require authority to engage any foreigner, particularly one representing a country that regards itself as Zimbabwe's sworn enemy or is that perception of this pen's wild imagination?

That most of those named by WikiLeaks have remained mum over their dealings with American diplomats can only make one smell a rat. What are they hiding behind their silence which they do not want Zimbabweans to know about the talks they had with the American envoys?

Zanu-PF has said it would investigate the top leaders' cloak-and-dagger meetings with the American diplomats a clear indication that the contacts were not sanctioned by the party. Now, when a party that liberated this country from foreign oppressive rule and touts itself as revolutionary harbours leaders who behave like unguided missiles in dealing with the former and continuing enemy of the country, Zimbabwe's independence and sovereignty are put at risk of reversal.

If the party, angry as it appears to be at what happened, fails to take decisive disciplinary action against these leaders who have clearly put its image into disrepute, the voters who stand to bear the brunt of unwarranted dealings with the enemy should take care of those misguided elements come general elections.

Of course, there are those leaders who kept both the party and country flags raised high during the meetings which the Americans might have wanted to end in their own victory. These are the unsung heroes of the struggle yesterday, today and tomorrow and this pen applauds and celebrates them.

And, of course, what the MDC leaders said to the Americans about President Mugabe and Zanu-PF and regime change were probably never to be known - kept as a family secret, one might suppose?

In the final analysis, a story is told with a moral that is particularly instructive to politicians of different ideological stripes in this country. It is the story of a large python, hungry for a kill and salivating at a herd of

sleek impala browsing nearby. Weary of his potential prey's speed and cunning, the python convinced a plan: "I will just stretch out here in the sun and let my beautiful colours go to work for me."

Sure enough, the beautiful spots radiated in the eyes of one impala and little by little she drew closer and closer, as the reptile bated its breath all the while gathering up his constrictive power.

Then, all of a sudden, the colours filled the impala's eyes and were soon all over her, crushing her body to pulp and endangering the rest of the herd.

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The author is the former Editor of The Chronicle.