We are contented with our own Mugabe

The Zimbabwe Independent columnist, a Stewart Chabwinja this week had a piece in his candid comment column which I think should not go unchallenged. He headlined his piece- 'Zim crying out for Magufuli-type of leadership.'

A self professed candid writer was indeed this week candid in telling lies that sought to achieve an agenda. Chabwinja attempted to compare President Robert Mugabe to the newly elected Tanzanian leader, President John Magufuli. Of course, the Tanzanian leader has introduced a myriad of positive changes in the way Tanzanian government operates. The changes are set to reduce extravagance, government expenditure, public corruption, graft, inefficiency and other bad practices. We applaud that.

It is, however, not acceptable and very political, cheap for that matter, to try to juxtapose President Mugabe to President Magufuli with a view to portraying the former as someone who is tolerant to corrupt corporate governance. Chabwinja tried to pluralize his warped opinion. He seemed as if he conducted a research which ascertained that Zimbabweans are crying out for Magufuli-type of leadership. It is his own thinking, thus he must not authoritatively tell us that we are envious of Tanzanians.

The support that President Mugabe got in the 2013 elections and thereafter, attests to the fact that Zimbabweans are contented with their own Mugabe. Zimbabweans already have a more than the Magufuli-type of leadership.

Chabwinja portrayed President Mugabe as a leader who is extravagant. According to him, this extravagance is evidenced by the alleged $1.2 million that was supposedly spent at the President's birthday bash and the alleged $3m spent on the recent 15th Annual National People's Conference in Victoria Falls. He also viewed the foreign trips of the head of state and chairman of the African Union as profligacy.

What Chabwinja doesn't understand is that the money spent on the birthday celebrations and conferences did not and will always never come from the treasury. It is money that is mobilized from well-wishers who have their president and their party at heart. Zanu PF members are different from those of the MDC-T who at one time abandoned their leader wallowing in wretched penury to an extent that he could no longer afford to fuel his vehicle and buy airtime.

If Chabwinja wanted to lecture people on profligacy, Morgan Tsvangirai's lifestyle during his time as Prime Minister in the inclusive government would have been a befitting example. Even today, the fact that Tsvangirai took delivery of a $100 000 Mercedes Benz ML while his party workers have gone for months without salaries is an absolute show of profligacy.

He further spoilt his article by citing wrong examples of modesty. Elton Mangoma, David Coltart and Matenda Madzoke were cited as archetype of humble politicians who resisted the trappings of public office. Mangoma of all the people! The writer forgets that it is the same Mangoma who had become a permanent visitor at the court of law over abuse of public office during his time as minister of energy. If he was the epitome of meekness, he could have not been involved in the self enriching corrupt deals at Noczim.

Mangona's former body guard, Nelson Mukwena summed it up recently when he recently said: "Zanu PF is corrupt but he (Mangoma) is worse." He said he abandoned Mangoma because he just thought of fattening his pockets. He alleged that Mangoma embezzled property and money from the mainstream MDC-T. So what is Chabwinja talking about?

The writer must also draw a line between poverty and modesty. Some of his sung heroes of modesty have been pushed to behave as such because of poverty.

We know some people were rattled by the success of the Zanu PF conference. In the run up to that conference, the same media were celebrating under the delusion that Zanu PF had failed to raise enough funds for same. Now that the conference was a resounding success, they are refusing to eat a humble pie, resorting to draw useless parallel between leaders of Zimbabwe and Tanzania.

The thinly-veiled emotions in Chabwinja's article exposed him as a confused writer who was worked up by Zanu PF's continuous success stories in reviving the economy, which in a way is endearing it to the electorate. This is not good news to the MDC-T and its foot soldiers in the newsrooms.

There is really nothing out of this world that President Magufuli is doing that President Mugabe has not done. His 35 years of leadership was wholly committed to the improvement of his people's lives. He is not a rich president as the writer wants us to believe. We only know of his Gushungo Holdings where he was, like everybody else, empowered through the historic land reform programme. Chabwinja must tell us if he knows of any other affluenceof the President that we all don't know. But we know that the president is on record telling those who have been accusing him of having a vast of wealth off shore, to identify and donate it to charitable organizations. We therefore throw the same challenge to Chabwinja.

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John Sigauke <johnsigau@gmail.com