Zimbabwean people must be saluted

By Tanonoka Joseph Whande

There is no doubt about the problems Zimbabwe, as a country, continues to face. There is no doubt about how the people in Zimbabwe, mindful of a desire to maintain stability at least within their families, have withstood the abuse from those into whom they put so much trust over the decades.

There is no doubt how Robert Mugabe has frustrated the advancement of Zimbabweans in education, industry, health and social services.

Mugabe offered war weary Zimbabweans another battle to fight against their own liberators.

Since so-called independence, Mugabe has been challenging the masses that his party purportedly liberated.

Mugabe is uncomfortable with any other person’s success; it always has to be him.

The people of Zimbabwe have sacrificed more than the politicians who claim to have liberated them.

The people of Zimbabwe should not be in this miserable situation at all because Zimbabwe is the best country in Africa and ranks among the top countries of this world, not because of Robert Mugabe and ZANU-PF but in spite of them.

It is all because of the people and their country; not because of the government and its people.

I am most impressed by the Zimbabwean people’s resilience and how they claw their way to compete with the best of the world yet still overburdened with the yoke of oppression from their own government.

I, for one, feel proud about the medical breakthrough undertaken by our own medical professionals at Harare Central Hospital. Separating those children is no small feat, one which very few countries can perform yet our own people, burdened by a government that does not pay them, a government that does not give our doctors medicines to cure our afflicted, a government that takes politics into surgical theatres, and a government that takes credit for things it did not do, did just that.

It was disgusting to see Mugabe, an authentically-certified Singapori patient, camping at Harare Central Hospital where the operation was performed.

Mugabe had the gall to heap praises on Harare Central Hospital staff that separated the two conjoined twins and attempted to gain political mileage out of a situation he and his government had absolutely nothing to do with.

Indeed, Mugabe’s underperforming Minister of Health, David Parerenyatwa, announced at the same time that Zimbabwe had just “secured an $89 million health loan facility from China’s Exim Bank”.

“You have done us real proud” Mugabe gushed. “The world will be talking about us.”

Who is “us”, I wonder?

What really has Mugabe got to do with what these doctors and nurses did?

A UNICEF report says that Zimbabwe’s health sector faces numerous challenges: a shortage of skilled professionals and health-care staff; an eroded infrastructure with ill-equipped hospitals, many lacking functional laundry machines, kitchen equipment and boilers; and a lack of essential medicines and commodities yet “stakeholders in the health sector who included Health Minister David Parerenyatwa, Acting Permanent Secretary, Dr Timothy Tapfumaneyi, Harare Hospital board chairperson Dr Douglas Gwatidzo , Dr Bothwell Mbuwayesango, the leader of the 50-member team that performed the landmark surgery, anesthetist Dr Chifamba, head of the Harare Children’s Hospital Dr Luiza Chikara and the matron Catherine Charumbira, all paid tribute to the commitment shown by President Mugabe in uplifting the health sector”.

I mean, are they serious? It sounds like Webster Shamu’s utterances.

The medical personnel did a wonderful job and this is their moment to shine. We are overjoyed by this their professional success but they should keep cool and not start endorsing politicians who have hindered and destroyed the health sector.

Mugabe has destroyed both the education and health infrastructure of our country and this distinguished operation was successfully undertaken in spite of the roadblocks thrown in their way by politicians, particularly Mugabe himself.

Mugabe has always headed for Singapore for what he said were eye-related medical attention trips, leaving our own world-renowned eye doctor, Solomon Guramatunhu right here at home.

What good is it for Mugabe to return from Singapore only to praise the wonderful work done by our own doctors in Zimbabwe?

Well, he knows that he did not create them and that they do not owe any of their education to him.

Mugabe should be ashamed of himself and must leave our sons and daughters to perform their professional obligations without taking credit.

No amount of stolen comfort will appease Mugabe; he deserves all the misery available.

He might be comfortable but he is never at peace because he does not deserve even the shirt on his back. He has never worked in his life.

He always insults his own people. I have never known a president who hates his own country and people like Robert Mugabe.

Gushing with self-interest over an accomplishment that he had nothing to do with,    Mugabe said that it doesn’t matter where Zimbabweans are because “our people distinguish themselves”.

This is the man who always tells the world that those in the Diaspora are only good at wiping white people’s behinds in nursing homes.

The heart of the matter is that Zimbabweans must be saluted, whether they are at home or abroad. Unlike Mugabe, Zimbabweans are a special species.

There has never been any doubt about the acumen of the Zimbabwean people at home or abroad. Zimbabweans are just too enterprising and that is why we are hated by our own president at home and abroad.

I still have to find a country where a Zimbabwean has not made residence or positive impact.

If all Zimbabweans went home today, many countries would collapse. We are appreciated by those who are not our own and that suits Mugabe just fine, just like a hyena that has cornered prey.

Mugabe is a moron who does not even appreciate the bees he gassed to get the honey.

He is an arrogant chump who has never known decency in family or in life.

He is our president; we salute him yet the most serious he can get is to fart into our faces.

Mugabe has never appreciated Zimbabweans and that is why he hates our people and makes them suffer.

We are not morons who accept accolades of bravery from one who continues to torture us. Those doctors must be left alone. All Mugabe’s government has to do is to make sure they get paid as all civil servants must. He should not take credit for their bravery and professional acumen.

However, Mugabe was right about one thing on this health milestone in our country. He called it a mystery. It indeed is a mystery for something like this to have been performed successfully in the middle of a government that not only pays cursory attention to the health services in the country but one that puts useless organisations such as the CIO and ZANU-PF youth brigades above education and health.

I only hope that Mugabe’s invitation of the medical team to State House is not in lieu of pay. I hope these government health professionals were all paid their monthly wages.

Mugabe now relieves himself in the same plate in which he was served his meals; a senile, deranged, insensitive, greedy murderer we can no longer describe in proper terms without insulting our tradition of revering the elderly. Yet it baffles me how a murderer loves to be a healer of his victim.

With the destabilizing effects of farm seizures still smoldering, Mugabe has the audacity to pump up more racial hatred against sections of our nation. It is not about them being white, it is about a president who motivates violence against one section of the country’s citizenry. It is about intolerance.

It is a diversion away from failed policies and bankrupt governance.

It is time to get rid of Robert Mugabe and for that, I offer no apologies. Our country cannot continue to suffer to maintain a horrible lifestyle of a mad man who has no feeling for our citizens.

We take it or we leave it.