When singing for one’s supper gets soporific

By Moses Chamboko

Disgraceful professor, self-appointed presidential mouth-piece, ZANU PF de facto spokesman and gatekeeper, Jonathan Moyo, does not stop to astound some of us.

Recently, in The Sunday Mail, he penned an article titled “GPA mixes like oil and water”. As if insipidity and perfidy were not enough, the article, as usual, covered acres of space in the ZANU PF tabloid masquerading as a national weekly. One wonders when such newspapers shall be renamed “The People’s Voice” because that’s exactly what they have become and should be called.

Despite personally making significant effort to go through the entire article, I literally dosed off before reading the last pages. Monotony and lack of fact in the several paragraphs that I endured just got the better of me. Why a supposedly national newspaper should give so much space to an article without the thinnest thread of critical analysis or thinking, boggles the mind.

To imagine that this was a professorial treatise, is just inconceivable. Also, which primary school did Jonathan Moyo go to where basics of writing and punctuation such as full-stops and commas were not taught?  His lengthy but hollow sentences can easily put you to sleep! Without giving away names, one of his celebrated masters was my primary school teacher who must be wondering what the desperate professor is up to.

But I digress. Back to my point; the only truth that Jonathan Moyo wrote in his protracted and boring article which I totally agree with is encapsulated in the heading itself, being “GPA mixes like oil and water” Unsurprisingly, he deliberately but foolishly misinterpreted this antiquated idiom.

Indeed, ZANU PF and MDC are like oil and water. To borrow from Nelson Chamisa, it is like yoking a horse and a donkey then hope to get positive traction! In the two analogies, ZANU PF is the water as well as the donkey. We all know that oil will always settle at the top, which is what MDC has done in just under two years in the power-sharing (or is it power-grabbing) arrangement.

We also know that a horse is stronger than a donkey, which again is what MDC has proven to the nation by making fuel pumps at filling stations operational again, facilitating filling up of shelves in supermarkets and tuck shops, reopening schools and hospitals, sealing of potholes, most importantly, restoring our identity and pride.

On the other hand, ZANU PF works hard to retard such positive momentum. Before the GNU, we had literally become the laughing stock not only of the region but the whole world due to ZANU PF policies and systematic mismanagement. 

Coming to our aid was MDC which worked tirelessly to reverse the trend in the very short space of time they have been part of government. Talking to Zimbabweans at home and abroad, you get the same sentiment that “things are much better – zvinhu zvava nane”, all because of MDC. So Mr. Nutty Professor, you are damn right when you say “GPA mixes like oil and water”.

If you were to listen to the little Johnny inside your coconut head (kemusoro wedamba as Gushungo once observed), you will agree that not only are you very wrong when you mischievously argue that a new constitution has nothing to do with the timing of the next election as well the legitimacy of the office of president but idiotic.

As a reminder, for the first time in history, Zimbabwe went for weeks without a government when the party that you now fiercely defend was defeated by the MDC. Even more than five weeks of massaging the figures did not turn things around! Despite making numerous threats that he would go it alone, Gushungo never formed a government until Morgan Tsvangirai put his signature to the defective GPA document.

It is from that, that a government was formed. Hence, the re-establishment of the office of Prime Minister as head of government while the president practically heads the securocracy, ostensibly to protect personal and cronies’ interests. Another obvious reminder; ZANU PF needed the GPA better than MDC needed ZANU PF.

For somebody with the tag of professor to have such zany myopia or amnesia which does not go beyond merely two years, is preposterous, ridiculous or both. Without sounding like I’m having an unfair personal go at you, the benefit of the doubt you may get is that when things were happening, you were not part of ZANU PF or any other party so you may not be privy to a number of things that happened during that time.

Next time, before you open your big mouth to speak or get your pen to write, kindly ask those who were in the thick of things such as Welshman Ncube, Tendai Biti and Patrick Chinamasa (another clown) as they can refresh your memory regarding origins, purpose and destiny of the GPA.

It is this animal called the GPA, cunningly crafted by one Thabo Mbeki and at one point idiotically distorted by Chinamasa, which blocked Tsvangirai from being president. By the same token, Gushungo bounced back as a weakened president, a reality he has personally admitted at every serious party forum.

The COPAC process is a critical dimension of the GPA, disregard of which means the president automatically loses his borrowed legitimacy which makes the winner, Morgan Tsvangirai, the national president.

Next time when you sit down to write anything, Mr. Professor, remember that you are not addressing a group of zombies or morons. If anything, the ignoramuses that may be your intended target never read nor understand what you write. Chinotimba is one of them.

Having said that, if ZANU PF wants to call for an election tomorrow or yesterday, bring it on. Zimbabweans are ready to take the unfinished business to its logical conclusion and move our potentially great nation forward. May I also remind you that anybody who thinks like you needs not to look beyond Tunisia and Egypt. These countries are not on the moon!!!

Moses Chamboko can be reached on [email protected]