Who will save Zimbabwe?

It is true that “the ultimate test of a political party is not winning an election but governing a nation”.

Indeed, the ZANU-PF government has failed and it is hoped that the government will at least correct its numerous flaws possibly by its introduction of the structural adjustment programme.

The failures are here with us. Are we going to continue raving and ranting like mentally derailed old men? Certainly we need to do something.

The biggest questions are, however:

• What will impel the ZANU-PF government to at least feel the sense of responsibility and accountability that it so much lacks?
• Are the pretentious and cowardly opposition parties and their surrogate “independent”, or rather opposition, prepared to assume the task?
• And lastly, are the “rebellious” ZANU-PF MPs genuine in their opposition or are they just window dressers panted to divert people’s attention on real issues and appease the people on the issue of genuine parliamentary debate?

The biggest difference between Western government and African governments is people relationship. People relationship is the issue of accountability.

In the West an elected representative is accountable to his or her constituents whether in his or her official duties or private life. That is the reason why an MP in the West can be forced to resign because of a family scandal or a petty theft.

In Africa, and indeed in Zimbabwe, such public responsibility and accountability is non-existent. The question is why?

The reasons are many, but of special note is the issue of people’s awareness of their rights as individuals, as an electorate and as a nation.

The Zimbabwean MP has theoretical knowledge of his constituents’ rights but has never been faced with the reality of mandatorily defending those rights in Parliament.

The MP is born and bred in an environment and institutions where the leader or representative of the people is supreme and therefore untouchable. Their decisions are always right and unquestionable.

So who is going to change these attitudes so that the age-old African head concept can be removed to create a climate where a leader is a servant and to an extent a slave of the people?

Is it the leaders themselves? NO. NEVER!!!

Already the peasants are victims of more than a decade of a vicious and pervasive ZANU-PF propaganda. We should not look up to them to change the situation.

The labourers in our urban areas are so much imprisoned by the need to at least find a meal at the end of the day that their help is minimal, if at all.

The middle class is caught up between two vices –having to hang on to their precarious positions (rendered so by government’s abandonment of the workers in favour of full-scale capitalism) and so tying their hands and minds; the understandable fear of sudden unemployment in a country where occupational advancement is not so much meritocratic but nepotic even in the private sector.

The upper class is so much pre-occupied with commercial crime and ascertaining that its bossy position is spread far and wide by hook or crook.

Industrialists are busy playing a three-team criminal game pitying the government with a select side from international financiers and the rich world.

The government, in the face of predetermined defeat, now faces the povo as their opponents in the finals.

The possible task bearers are educational institutions and the media. It is the duty of educational institutions to entrench in their curriculum the reorientation of the people on the issue of freedom, democracy and human rights.

It is the duty of the mass media to penetrate the hearts and minds of the people, heralding the birthof the Third Republic.

By their very nature, the two have the capacity to reach a wide majority of the youth before further pollution corrodes the minds of the innocent.

The youth are the only salvation because to target the old and conservative old guard of the Second Chimurenga would be tantamount to attempting the holy feats of the Son of Man, Jesus himself.

Unfortunately, the intellectuals (who are harbingers of knowledge)have joined the ranks of the pretentious and opportunist opposition where debate has been limited to party and ideological castigations often unconstructive and petty.

It is pure folly to blame socialism for ZANU-PF’s failure when in fact ZANU-PF never introduced socialism in Zimbabwe outside the confines of its congress and central committee meetings. The whole argument stinks of neo-colonial thinking, political and economic ignorance and immaturity.

With almost all of the intellectuals (those who have openly come out of their shells) parading their classroom theories vainly disguised as national constructive criticism and the independent media only echoing hogwash of the so-called opposition parties, then I do not see us coming anywhere near to unseating ZANU-PF.

Normally one would expect the opposition parties to champion the revolutionary path to true multi-partyism and true democracy. However, in Zimbabwe, ranked with ZUM is a miscellany of democracy champions stretching from intellectuals to neo-colonial demagogues like ZANU (Ndonga) and the FORUM.

These supposed opposition parties are dogged with leadership starvation and internal squabbles. Their leaders fall far too short of the established charisma and oratorical prowess of President Mugabe hence the talked about but largely unacknowledged belief that despite ZANU-PF’s total failure, there is yet no leader who has the qualities for replacing him.

I find it hard to believe that even the educated people believe that the likes of MPs like Nzarayebani and Malunga are heroes in the making – those with guts to openly challenge ZANU-PF.

A cursory glance at the issues they are alleged to have raised voices against reveals that the issues are pubic knowledge. Their revelations in Parliament are nothing more than ZANU-PF appeasement and can best be described as a mockery of the people’s intelligence.- By Kanaka- Edicesa News.

Editor Note: Confused by this article. You ought to be. This article is from the January 1993 issue of The Insider but what is talks about could equally apply today, just different characters.

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