ZIMBABWE - HARARE - Important lies were told this week while it is increasingly becoming more difficult to be optimistic about Zimbabwe again.

 

 

Especially when you hear that armed police, under military supervision, raided MDC residence over the weekend.

 

 

Subsequently, Jonathan Moyo’s dire warning that war veterans will set Zimbabwe ‘on fire’ if Bennett is sworn was another shocker.

 

 

 

Instead of recanting such contemptible incitements, Mugabe was quick to vow that Bennett will never be sworn. He obtusely told MDC and SADC that Zanu PF has ‘fulfilled’ every obligation stipulated under GPA terms.

 

TEven more debilitating was yet another lie from Jonathan Moyo. He recently told the nation that only Zanu PF can win free elections.

 

“MDC cannot win a free and fair election as was shown in March 2008,” he said.

 

 

What an oxymoron! Moyo is doing exactly what he does best – spin. On his website he admits that “the dictator” has been stealing elections.

 

“The voters rejected Mugabe on March 29”, wrote Moyo on his website - http://prof-jonathan-moyo.com/?itemid=55 .

 

In another article entitled “Reject Mugabe’s ploy to rule forever” - http://prof-jonathan-moyo.com/?itemid=32, Moyo called for massive resitance against Mugabe. Similarly, last year Mugabe showed his total contempt for democracy declaring that he will "never allow an event like an election to reverse our independence…only God who appointed me will remove me.”

 

LOOKING FOR PROFESSIONAL ZIMBABWEAN MEN TO DATE? CLICK HERE!

 

Just last week Moyo said, “Given that the late three Vice-Presidents (Nkomo, Msika, Mzenda) all died in office… why should the only remaining founding father, that is President Mugabe, be treated differently from the three who have left us while in office and with the dignity of the office even when they were no longer discharging the responsibilities of their office?”

 

Call him schizophrenic, delusional or suffering from selective amnesia, but what we have here is a case of a political deceiver and trickster.

 

Moyo is always ready to disown his entire legacy for political expediency. As his application for readmission to Zanu PF was still pending, Moyo conveniently apologized.

 

He recently pleaded for clemency saying, “I regret some of the things I have said”. Never mind that the statements he made were statements of fact and not speculation.

 

Zimbabweans must prepare for the unknown and be aware of old political manipulations by Jonathan Moyo in the pursuit of damnable personal ambitions.

 

Moyo wrote “Mugabe is a fatal danger to the public interest of Zimbabweans at home and in the diaspora that each day that goes by with him in office leaves the nation’s survival at great risk while seriously compromising national sovereignty”-.

 

But now the people of Zimbabwe know that Moyo and Mugabe are both fatal dangers!

 

Moyo knows pretty well that what is called the Government of Zimbabwe is a real illusion. At face value, it looks like a well-organized and robust criminal entity.

 

But intrinsically it is Mugabe and a few evil men strategically placed to do his dirty work. Moyo knows how state machinery works.

 

There is a huge political price to be paid for not heeding such doomsday ‘prophecies’ from Moyo.

 

After all, it was Moyo who breathed life into an otherwise imploding dictatorship beginning the year 2000 with a botched constitutional re-writing exercise which he presided over.

 

Following that he animated the land-grab exercise. He literally composed lousy jingoistic anthems pandering to chauvinistic patriotism.

 

He played them non-stop on state television and radio having successfully created a state monopoly of press after muscling his way to upper echelons of power in Government.

 

War veterans and Zanu PF thugs (also masquerading as war veterans) overwhelmingly responded to Moyo’s incitement causing cold-blooded deaths and destruction on the farms throughout Zimbabwe even to this present day.

 

Moyo is the sole architect of draconian laws that gagged free press. He essentially ordered the bombing of the independent Daily News and the nation will never forget how its printing press was bombed military-style on January 28, 2001.

 

48 hours before the Daily news was bombed, Moyo had gone on a frenzied verbal assault of the paper on national state television describing it as a “threat to national security” that needed to be dealt with “once and for all”

 

Moyo went on to mastermind the sham election of 2002 which was stolen by Mugabe. That violent presidential campaign of 2002 left hundreds of MDC supporters murdered.

 

The political calculus of Moyo rejoining Zanu PF is already taking shape. He is back, thrusting himself at the top, even though most of his former comrades in Zanu PF publicly expressed their desire to see Moyo organically growing in the party.

 

“He will have to start at cell level and rise through the ranks like everyone else.

 

He is not going to start at the top; that is for sure,” said party insiders.

 

They were wrong. Little did they know that in less than a month Moyo would have taken over, as he has done before.

 

Moyo has skillfully mastered the concept that power is not given but taken. “Zanu PF must rise from the dead if it is to remain in power”, he said.

 

We know fully well that Zanu PF can only rise through political deviousness.

 

In spite of his evil intentions and animalistic callousness, I think there are few important lessons to be learnt from this man especially the courage, the unapologetic approach to politics, hard work and his zealousness.

 

Regrettably, these are some of the qualities that make him a very dangerous person. If MDC had many men and women with that kind of passion, political gravitas and stamina fighting for the people, things would be different today.

 

With the power of the media on his side, he warned MDC that “they haven’t seen anything yet” as he made his grant re-entry into Zanu PF having invented a great lie that MDC is being funded by USA and EU to effect regime change.

 

He has taken over the Herald bombarding MDC left, right and center, writing as himself and using several pseudonyms. Moyo is Joseph Goebbels (Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda) reincarnated who during the Nazi era once said “A lie, repeated often enough, will end up as truth.”

 

Turning to the Roy Bennett debacle, it does not only make a mockery of national healing and reconciliation but raises questions about Zanu PF’s selective application of racism.

 

David Coltart served alongside Roy Bennett in the British South African Police. But he was sworn-in. Was it because he belongs to a friendlier (dubious at best) opposition party (MDC-M) led by Mutambara?

 

In 1980 didn’t Mugabe say to the whites “stay with us, please remain in this country and constitute a nation based on national unity.”

 

What message are they sending people like Nick Price who have served Zimbabwe with so much pride and honor, carrying the Zimbabwe flag and unashamedly proclaiming that Zimbabwe is their motherland given all the shame surrounding Zimbabwe?

 

He bore the burden of carrying a stinking Zimbabwe brand. Will Moyo and Mugabe disown him because he once served in the Rhodesian Army? What about Mugabe’s own crimes which killed 20 000 people including Moyo’s father?

 

Just for intellectual curiosity, here are some miscellaneous questions never asked before: Is Moyo therefore seeking revenge for his late father by inciting Mugabe into genocide?

 

How genuine is Jonathan Moyo this time around? What is really behind the Moyo facade? What is Moyo’s real agenda? What are the unintended consequences of re-admitting Moyo? How does burning Zimbabwe benefit Moyo? Why is Moyo so close to Chinamasa -a former Zapu die-hard, a Tsholotsho co-conspirator and a ruthless Zanu PF hardliner?

 

Apart from jostling for his power, is Moyo working hard to incite Mugabe to ‘Gukurahundi’ the Shonas? Mugabe ‘don’t’ care, he can kill as long as it benefits his throne!

 

Zimbabweans must wake up to the political realities of the country. Moyo and Chinamasa alongside the military and so called security apparatus know very well that Mugabe’s days are numbered.

 

They are fighting for a post-Mugabe era. "I worked well with him (Moyo), as you know, and he made an immense contribution to our fight against imperialism and neocolonialism.

 

He ranks among the patriots in the party,” said Chinamasa. Of course as minister of (in)Justice, Chinamasa wants Roy Bennett dead just like Jonathan Moyo. Remember that Chinamasa-Roy Bennett fist-fight in Parliament?

 

In a series of articles written last year, Moyo succinctly reveals his anger towards Mugabe’s “crude tribal bigotry and the evils of Gukurahundi”, as he described it.

 

He wrote, “Mugabe’s Bantustan ideology bred the Gukurahundi atrocities between 1980 and 1987 and the Murambatsvina atrocities in 2005... These atrocities were a product of hallucinations of ethnic challenges to Mugabe’s power.

 

“ In the case of Gukurahundi, Mugabe’s tribal hallucination led to the massacre of over 20,000 people in the Midlands and Matabeleland provinces and the destruction of homes and livelihood of many more” - http://prof-jonathan-moyo.com/?itemid=15 In another article he wrote: ”Robert Mugabe is an ethnic bigot masquerading as a nationalist” Isn’t it fascinating that all of a sudden, Moyo sees a noble leader in Mugabe?

 

In the meantime, our leadership ‘disengaged’ or ‘withdrew’ or ‘boycotted’ (whatever they ended up calling it) and wasted no time escalating the sticking issues back to SADC and AU, the very embodiments and conduits of Mugabe’s dictatorial entrenchment.

 

Some of us - the loyal opposition of the opposition (MDC), were quick to provide reality checks in form of self-criticism arguing that the strategy which our party was pursuing had not been carefully thought out.

 

Of course in MDC, there exists the civility of respectful disagreement and accommodation of opposing views as we believe that no-one possesses monopoly of political thought.

 

To my followers on facebook, tweeter and elsewhere in the blogosphere, I described the strategy as an antithesis of a political masterstroke, devoid of wisdom, contrary to how others in the party viewed it.

 

Given Mugabe’s scorched earth politics, it’s almost as if MDC will have to renegotiate its way back into the inclusive agreement no matter how one looks at it (with or without spin)especially considering the fact that MDC has been in office but not in power all along.

 

Some of us believed that the strategy would open doors for all kinds of distractions and vitriolic attacks, humiliation and ridicule at a time when some progress is being made on the economic front and somewhat political.

 

In the process, it depleted MDC’s political capital, to a certain extent. In retrospect, some might argue that it was a necessary public relations offensive to show the world the kind of animals we are dealing with in Zanu PF.

 

But again who doesn’t know that and how does it benefit the nation at this stage given the fact that the outcome (of nothing) was almost guaranteed?

We took our eyes off the ball and provided breathing space for Zanu PF to the extent that they are threatening to appoint acting ministers to replace MDC ministers. Sounds vain, but that is Zanu PF game plan!

 

Just like his predecessor Mbeki, Zuma dithered and so did that useless Mozambican chap, what’s his name? PM went to Angola but Angola is a waste of time. When that Chinese ship suffocating with weapons to kill Zimbabwean opposition members, was barricaded from entering South Africa, didn’t Dos Santos volunteer to sneak them in?

 

In spite of the tokenism, going to DRC was the ultimate joke. It’s like going to seek help from Afghanistan. DRC is burning!

 

Outside of our brothers Ian Khama and Raila Odinga, MDC is alone on the continent. Even though SADC and AU are the guarantors of the GPA, their profound lack of urgency and compassion for the Zimbabwean crisis has always been consistent.

 

But it is gratifying to note that the people of Zimbabwe are solidly behind us, that’s what really matters at the end of the day.

 

The rule of thumb therefore is for MDC to consult the people especially before making such huge decisions of destiny even though the leadership is entrusted with the authority to lead the people.

 

Disengagement played to Mugabe’s strategy of trying to frustrate us until we cut and run. Mugabe mockingly said “"I do not read that they would want to leave the inclusive government. I think they will come back to it soon”.

 

As previously stated, the solution lies within Zimbabwe. The political reality is to fight for change from within: taking media wars head-on, pushing unyieldingly for a new constitution, influencing SADC and AU in a strong way, and pressing for economic and political reform day by day no matter how painstakingly slow the process might be as well planning for new elections and rebuilding alliances with other civic bodies.

 

At the same time Zanu PF is manipulating a basic fallacy that sanctions were indirectly imposed by the MDC. There is a fundamental disconnect in this argument because sanctions were a response to daylight murders, abductions and torture of ordinary citizens.

 

It is absurd to lump it as MDC’s responsibility. Not to mention that violence is on the increase in Zimbabwe.

 

After all, the sanctions are targeted at those responsible for violence. Somewhere in Zimbabwe a rapist or a murderer is laughing instead of languishing in prison for crimes against humanity.

 

If Zimbabwe’s justice system had not been successfully privatized, Mugabe and his men would be answering for crimes against humanity. Instead they continue to use violence to silence the people of Zimbabwe.

 

In any case didn’t they say Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans and bombarded us with the gospel of their version of newfound friends in the East. Now they realize that their policies represented a dangerous lack of knowledge of the rudiments of the international economy.

 

By now I sound as if I am really fawning for Mr Biti, but ‘give it up to’ the Minister. He is doing a terrific job under the most trying of circumstances.

 

As they raided the MDC residence Mr Biti delivered this:, “"We will look the dictatorship in the eyes (and) we will not blink. We want to see who will blink first and it will not be us, I tell you," Thank you Tendai!

 

Mr Biti’s most recent courage and candor are stupendous, especially considering last week’s inconvenient truth where he revealed that Jongwe was indeed murdered by Mugabe and his thugs. Zimbabweans already knew that but someone with real political clout like Biti had to say it (on our behalf).

 

Even though I previously ridiculed Mr Biti for calling the late Msika a true hero”untainted by corruption” the very same week he (Biti) got a bullet in the mail, I have since seen the best of him so far.

 

My central argument in the article, probably one of my best, “Msika’s Botched Legacy” (www.nationalvisiom.wordpress.com) was that how can Msika be a national hero given the fact that he co-authored Zimbabwe’s miseries especially the violence against many MDC supporters who were murdered by the regime.

 

While at a rally in Zaka last year, Msika declared: “Voting for the MDC in the runoff will be like voting for Rhodesia and the British and that means voting for war”.

 

As a direct beneficiary of Mugabe’s overstay in power and rape on democracy, Msika’s infamous statement that “there was someone who wanted to bring up that issue (of succession) here, we were going to deal with him. Mugabe cannot go”, lingers on.

 

His sole pre-occupation since becoming Vice President in 1999 was all about promoting the selfish interests of Zanu PF hegemony.

 

Likewise, Mutsekwa needed to be told that he is an incompetent especially considering how he bungled the Meikles saga.

 

Similarly as our co-Home Affairs Minister he needs to explain what he knows about the recent raid of MDC residence by the police or at least get an apology from Mohadi and demand a thorough investigation of such lawlessness.

 

There is no vendetta against the Minister, it’s just that life or death issues are at the doorstep of many Zimbabweans!

 

There are ominous signs that Zimbabwe is inching closer to yet another dark episode of mass torture and mass murders.

 

The word ‘genocide’ is no longer a remote possibility especially considering that militia camps have been sprouting across Zimbabwe against a backdrop of growing incitements by Mugabe and his newly rehired propaganda chief, Jonathan Moyo.

 

Janjaweed militias were a bunch of rented thugs on government payroll hired to systematically exterminate and butcher innocent civilians as ordered by the Islamic government of Sudan.

 

In 2008, Zimbabwe’s militia tortured, raped and murdered hundreds of opposition supporters, real or perceived, with the government’s unconcealed approval and guaranteed immunity from prosecution.

 

MDC cannot afford to mismatch Jonathan Moyo’s negative energy. If necessary let every Ministry be a battleground for change and not just maintaining the status quo.

 

We have got to weather these troubling times. For every Kasukuwere who is corrupting our youths, there must be deliberate campaigns by MDC Ministers to engage youths in entrepreneurship programs and human rights fundamentals, for example.

 

At the same time I am also sensitive to the difficulties faced by MDC leadership in the homeland especially our Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai who is steadfastly seeking to improve livelihoods of fellow Zimbabweans.

 

At a time millions of Zimbabweans are haunted by the regime, we appreciate the Prime Minister’s efforts and courage. It is never easy dealing with geriatric dictators in the mold of Mugabe.

 

But all hope is not lost, it’s time to gather ourselves with the people of Zimbabwe who gave us the mandate to lead and build a united front, reaching across the isles even to an iota of progressive Zanu PF men and women.

 

That’s not conceding defeat but seeking to build a nation.

 

The people of Zimbabwe must devote to end the crisis before aspiring dictators, virulent polarizers and rabid opportunists like Jonathan Moyo entrap Zimbabwe again to recede to the perils of yesteryear as they pursue selfish agenda.

 

Dr Paul Mutuzu

 

For Feedback email nvinstitute@aol.com

 

 

 

JOKE OF THE DAY - "How was your game, dear?" asked Jack's wife Tracy.

 

"Well, I was hitting pretty well, but my eyesight's gotten so bad I couldn't see where the ball went," he answered.

 

"But you're 75 years old, Jack!" admonished his wife, "Why don't you take my brother Scott along?"

 

and doesn't play golf anymore," protested Jack.

 

"But he's got perfect eyesight. He would watch the ball for you," Tracy pointed out.

 

The next day Jack teed off with Scott looking on. Jack swung and the ball disappeared down the middle of the fairway. "Do you see it?" asked Jack.

 

"Yup," Scott answered.

 

"Well, where is it?" yelled Jack, peering off into the distance. "I forgot."

 

Got a story, joke, quote, opinion or want your letter published, please e-mail Editor at editor@zimdaily.com