(Last Updated on February 11, 2016 by Editor)
ZIMBABWE – For the past 35 years, the proponents of the People First (PF) project, led by Joice Mujuru, the former Vice-President of Zimbabwe, were in government enjoying the benefits that come with one being in top echelons of the ruling elite. They enjoyed their stay in government without problems.
They saw nothing wrong with anything that the government in general and Zanu PF in particular was doing. From their point of view, being in government was the best chance ever that had happened in their lives. Enjoying government perks and driving state-of-the-art vehicles made the Mujuru cabal see nothing sinister about anything in government until the December 2014 Zanu PF congress that resulted in the cabal being thrown out of Zanu PF and government altogether.
Surprisingly, the same individuals, especially Mujuru, want to make people believe that her PF project will be a blessing to the relatives and friends of those who perished during the Gukurahundi era. She wants to seek political relevance by bringing the issue of the Gukurahundi atrocities to the people as a campaign tool. Her thrust that the Gukurahundi era should be revisited and solutions sought is an expedient effort by her to seek the Matabeleland and Midlands regions’ votes.
Mujuru wants the public to take her as a saint yet everything happened in her full view doing nothing to avert that. She was there enjoying herself in government and also celebrating during that unfortunate era of Gukurahundi.
Addressing some alleged PF leadership from Matabeleland North in Harare recently, Mujuru told them that the Gukurahundi victims should be compensated and those who lost their parents should be assisted to get identity documents. Mujuru sought again to put herself in good standing with the Matabeleland regions by going against President Robert Mugabe’s assertion in 1999 that the Gukurahundi era was “a moment of madness”, saying that it was wrong to refer to that period as such. Mujuru wanted to appear good to her Matabeleland North audience by disowning what she actually supported during her time in government that Gukurahundi was “a moment of madness” as espoused by Mugabe.
In fact, Mujuru needs to realise that the issue of Gukurahundi is something which cannot bring her votes as she failed to denounce that when she was still in government.
Mujuru is not qualified to tell the nation that Gukurahundi can only be solved by letting people talk about it nearly more than three decades of her silence over that calamity. The PF leadership should be aware that cheap politicking has no room in modern-day Zimbabwe and people want bread and butter issues that can sustain their livelihood.
People should not be misled by mischievous politicians who always want to gain political mileage by abusing the status of other people. The reality is that Mujuru does not have people at heart, but she is now trying to come back into the political limelight by bringing into the agenda the Gukurahundi issue. She knows quite well that for her to get sympathy from people in the Matabeleland region, she must bring forward the issue of Gukurahundi into the political agenda.