Of gladiator gloves and dimwits

THE lead article, "Mujuru takes off her gloves", as she launches her 2018 election campaign with a star rally in Bulawayo published by a certain private owned daily made interesting reading on two counts.

Firstly with reference to former Vice-President Joice Mujuru's purported gladiator gloves or lack of them and secondly for her choice of the City of Kings as the venue to launch her campaign.

Many will remember the verve and fanfare generated by the private media that accompanied her entry into opposition politics, which turned out to be justifiably empty and lent credence to the adage that those with the least wit are the greatest babblers.

Even the most condescending of her supporters had begun to query her pedigree as a result of her political hibernation amid internecine bickering and jostling for positions within that party, which did less to endear her association to the electorate as 2018 beckons.

As such, Mujuru and the Zimbabwe People First have been too busy pursuing shadows and shapes in the form of perceived infiltration by other political parties whereas the private media mouthpieces have had their hands full trying to piece the patchworks together and, therefore, have no brief talking about their mare fighting steeds and stallions bare knuckle when she did not put on her fighting gloves in the first place.

Bulawayo is a nemesis to her. It is a city where the late Joshua Nkomo's statue towers above any other piece of sculptor.

A city where Father Zimbabwe owned his first property in an urban centre in Pelandaba suburb.

This is the city that glorifies and celebrates its heroes and heroines but disdains villains and God knows in which category she fits because certainly she isn't a heroine!

She dared ridicule the good name of Father Zimbabwe by dismissing him as senile just because the late Vice President had spoken in favour of giving Mr Strive Masiiwa's Econet the second mobile phone licence whereas she favoured Telecel.

General Josh knew what indigenisation entailed, which is more than I can vouch for her.

Her political hangers-on such as Gift Nyandoro and Jealous Mawarire have also tried to elevate her to some undeserved status of "Mother of the nation," this and that in a vain attempt to equate here popular appeal to that of the late VP Joshua Nkomo.

I mean, the woman is unrelenting and wants to hound the late VP in his hitherto stronghold and even his grave (MHSRIP).

Now with her amnesia conveniently tucked safely elsewhere, she has the temerity to approach that city of long memories canvassing for support!

Hopefully she is not going to Stanley Square in Makokoba, which is the ceremonial home of political activism, to shed crocodile tears about purported omissions and commissions of Zanu-PF and beg for forgiveness because people know her for who she is, an uncouth, unrepentant and manipulative person ready to sacrifice her children to achieve her goals.

And talking about children, one wonders what has become of the late General Solomon Mujuru's illegitimate offspring that stood on the brink of being prejudiced of a share of their father's wealth in the disputed estate.

I have noted previously that the most afflicted among the ill is one who will not admit his or her affliction.

Picture this: Zim People First has alleged that one Jim Kunaka (a political prostitute if you ask me who until his recent return to Zanu- PF had been in that party's ranks, was being treated by that party for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) allegedly for horrors he visited on others as a Zanu-PF member and was receiving anti-psychotic therapy) is a nut case that had been planted by the revolutionary party.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I note with great trepidation that the Zim PF project appears constituted by people gone bonkers for Mujuru was in Zanu-PF until her unceremonious expulsion for entertaining equally crazy ideas.

Elliot Pfebve, a self-exiled MDC-T activist once accused Joice Mujuru of attempting to assassinate him and if indeed Zanu-PF visited horrors as she and her opposition acolytes are wont to regurgitate, then her body and soul is indelibly etched in that ignoble register.

A senior official of the ZimPF project, Didymus Mutasa, was once indicted by local courts for political violence in his former constituency, Headlands.

He defied President Mugabe's calls for political tolerance and procured catapults for his henchmen who then used these to persecute his foes, within and outside Zanu-PF.

As for Rugare Gumbo, his transgressions began in the bush and no amount of city lights exposure could compel the leopard to change its spots.
Mawarire is a former member of the ruling party. I could go on and on. So, if we pursue Zim PF's logic to the end, all these office bearers and revered elders brimming with wisdom and inspiration yet blighted by self-eulogising do require hospitalisation after all.

Nyandoro's attempted equivocation falls flat on its face as it fails to convince people about what value Mutasa and Gumbo will add to an association of disgruntled and politically spent forces.

"We value our elders so much for their wisdom and they are the ones who give the party inspiration."

My foot! If these two chaps had any discernible wits, they would have advised Mujuru to skip Bulawayo and maybe start with Mt Darwin for I honestly believe that in Zimbabwe's politics, a prophet of a little stature like her might command some modicum of honour and respect if not among his or her community at least among relatives.

Lest I be deemed too harsh and unkind, I will give her credit for her nerve to hoodwink two former high ranking members of Zanu-PF into believing that she was the panacea to the country's challenges in the same manner she duped historians into believing that she downed some chopper in a fire fight somewhere somehow. Such talent ought not to go unnoticed.

So, as she prepares for her rallies countrywide, the country will not wait with bated breath for she is bound to stumble into another mistake that will surely send her whimpering to her hibernation.