Has Zimbabwe gone to the dogs?

By Tanonoka Joseph Whande

The boring annual meeting of the United Nations has once again come and gone but leaving us with a load of filth that we did not have before.

We heard useless speeches from “world leaders”, presidents of little countries that do not make any difference to the world’s standing except that there are people there who are being abused by a government or leader who is supported, in one way or other, by the Americans and Europeans.

We watched as the UN gave the microphone to murderers who thrive on the freedom of expression they deny their own people in their countries.

We were lectured by leaders who behead their own citizens and who still believe that women are a commodity of less value than men.

Robert Mugabe, as expected, ranted and raved against America and the European Union, never caring that he is given an opportunity to protest and give his views on issues concerning not necessarily the country of Zimbabwe but issues that concern himself and his family.

Indeed as the old bugger was spouting his nonsense, his daughter was forcibly evicting and seizing a farm just outside of Harare.

It was, of course, timed to happen at that time to draw attention to himself. A sorry and abnormal act to thumb his nose at both the international community and the rule of law.

The man has gone as bonkers as a drunken monkey.

It is outrageous arrogance that means nothing but whose sole purpose is to tell the people of Zimbabwe that he, Mugabe, does not think anything of them.

It just does not make any sense from whatever angle one looks at it. We cannot even classify it as greed since this family is among the richest in the world.

It is just malice. It is just a deliberate effort to punish both Zimbabweans and foreigners. Zimbabweans for turning their back on the old murderer and the foreigners as political hostages in attempts to get foreign governments to support his destructive policies.

We have now lost count of the number of farms his family has unilaterally acquired.

It is just unbelievable how a family, talented in absolutely nothing, not in government, agriculture, economics or anything we can imagine under the sun can recklessly do as they please with a nation with no one doing anything about it.

This family has destroyed the nation and the country of Zimbabwe and they are still not done yet.

At a time when the country is facing continued economic retardation due to bad policies, this family decides to spearhead renewed farm invasions with Mugabe’s recently married daughter grabbing a farm on the outskirts of Harare, sending the white farm owner packing in the presence of heavily-armed military personnel, secret service officers and police.

And this happened not very far away from Epworth and Chitungwiza were police engaged in running battles with citizens whose homes were being destroyed by the government.

Is it not miserable that Bona can legally steal a farm with the assistance of security officers while citizens in Epworth and Chitungwiza were having their homes and stands destroyed by the same security officers?

“I am embarrassed that our wage bill is some 76 percent of whatever revenue we receive,” Finance Minister, Patrick Chinamasa, told business leaders in Harare a few days earlier. “It’s not good, it’s not sustainable.”

At the UN and as expected, Mugabe lambasted both the US and EU governments for imposing sanctions on him and his cronies. He called the sanctions evil and illegal yet there is no reference to sanctions being evil in either the Bible or the Koran. As for illegality, whose law is Mugabe using to call the sanctions illegal?

Last week, the European Court of Justice threw out a complaint by Aguy Georgias, the foreigner businessman whose bootlicking prowess landed him an appointment as one of Mugabe’s Deputy Ministers. Georgias wanted his name removed from the sanctions list after being detained then deported from the UK while on his way to the US.

As a new wave of farm invasions spreads across the country, Chinamasa found himself with a yoke around his neck: how can you convince people to invest in Zimbabwe when properties are being illegally taken with no recourse to the courts?

“As to the solution… we have to create the necessary political climate, build consensus in order to tackle the issues,” Chinamasa said with no conviction. “I can assure you that we are working on this issue.”

This at a time when companies are retrenching people, closing down in record numbers and relocating to neighbouring countries.

And nothing is immune to the scavengers from Mugabe’s household.

Two weeks ago, the educational quality of degrees from the flagship University of Zimbabwe was thrown into disarray and is now under heavy scrutiny and serious doubt after Mugabe, the self-appointed Chancellor of the University and himself a beneficiary of a clump of donated degrees (all but one), capped his ridiculously ambitious lass, Grace Mugabe, with an academic doctorate degree in Sociology after only two months of enrollment.

This was, indeed, a miracle by any academic standards, made all the more miraculous by the fact that this is the same woman who was thrown out of the University of London for registering only two passes in eight years of study which she tried to undertake by correspondence with Mugabe himself as her tutor. Last we heard, she was studying for a degree in Chinese with, of course, a Chinese university and, again, by correspondence.

Meanwhile, the country is suffering because Mugabe is no longer in control of his own party. His underlings no longer listen to him as evidenced by the succession fights that continue to consume the attention of most cabinet ministers and Members of Parliament.

It is a free for all and those who want to ensure the safety of their ill-gotten monies are at the fore-front of the ZANU-PF succession civil war.

Emerson Mnangagwa, Vice President Joyce Mujuru and Grace Mugabe, who are known to be “filthy rich” are all scrambling to succeed Mugabe because all of them have amassed great wealth, businesses and properties that need to be protected after Mugabe either steps down or dies.

Grace Mugabe’s maneuvers should never be underestimated and poor Mnangagwa is already making another stupid mistake like he did with Mugabe in decades past.

Grace Mugabe’s arrival on the political scene has thrown a spanner into the ZANU-PF machine and Mnangagwa would be foolish to believe that Grace’s entry into politics is for his own advantage.

To make matters worse, just as there is no anointed successor to Mugabe in ZANU-PF, there is no viable opposition that can be courted to take over government.

There is absolutely no question that former Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai no longer has the appeal nor the ability to wound ZANU-PF. He has been disastrous in his leadership, failing to take firm positions against Mugabe and also exposing his weaknesses in personal life.

A number of his own lieutenants have abandoned him, demanding that he steps down from party leadership. Just last week, his own followers refused to grant him his demand to concentrate most powers in him at the expense of the party’s Secretary General.

Meanwhile, the so-called Renewal Team is getting older by the month without renewing anything that excites Zimbabweans.

The heart of the matter is that Zimbabwe continues to be in turmoil while Mugabe no longer really cares about the future of the country as he is trying to carve a niche for those he allowed to plunder and rape the nation and this includes most members of his close family.

I have heard people, at home and abroad, saying that Zimbabwe has gone to the dogs.

I take great exception to this insulting conclusion. It is totally unacceptable for anyone to say such demeaning and vulgar things because, you see, I know of no dogs that ever stooped as low as Mugabe and ZANU-PF have done.

Leave the dogs alone!