100 days of failure
Posted by: webmaster
By Prof. Jonathan Moyo
IF there is one development that has raised troubling questions about the seriousness of the coalition government which completes its critical 100 days in office on Saturday next week, it is Wednesday’s launch by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Vice-President Joice Mujuru of what they unconvincingly presented as the government’s 100-day action plan. What action plan?
Curiously, Wednesday’s launch of the purported 100-day action plan came 90 days since the formation of the coalition government and 45 days since the launch of STERP, which some in the government say is an economic recovery plan while others in the same government say is an emergency recovery plan, as if the words economic and emergency mean one and the same thing.
Even more curiously, the latest launch was done 38 days since the wasteful Victoria Falls cabinet retreat during which the 100-day action plan was crafted while the Prime Minister, his two Deputy Prime Ministers, ministers, their deputies along with permanent secretaries, sought to get to know each other through horse and helicopter riding and boat cruising when most Zimbabweans were failing to make ends meet.
IF there is one development that has raised troubling questions about the seriousness of the coalition government which completes its critical 100 days in office on Saturday next week, it is Wednesday’s launch by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Vice-President Joice Mujuru of what they unconvincingly presented as the government’s 100-day action plan. What action plan?
Curiously, Wednesday’s launch of the purported 100-day action plan came 90 days since the formation of the coalition government and 45 days since the launch of STERP, which some in the government say is an economic recovery plan while others in the same government say is an emergency recovery plan, as if the words economic and emergency mean one and the same thing.
Even more curiously, the latest launch was done 38 days since the wasteful Victoria Falls cabinet retreat during which the 100-day action plan was crafted while the Prime Minister, his two Deputy Prime Ministers, ministers, their deputies along with permanent secretaries, sought to get to know each other through horse and helicopter riding and boat cruising when most Zimbabweans were failing to make ends meet.
Parliament must not lead making of a new constitution
Posted by: webmaster
By Prof. Jonathan Moyo
IS IT proper or acceptable for the current hung parliament to be the key institution to spearhead the making of a new democratic constitution under which Zimbabwe will be governed well into the unknown future?
The answer is an emphatic no.
There are four reasons that should be carefully considered to understand why the decision to use Parliament as the vehicle for making a new constitution for the country is fatally flawed and they are the following:
IS IT proper or acceptable for the current hung parliament to be the key institution to spearhead the making of a new democratic constitution under which Zimbabwe will be governed well into the unknown future?
The answer is an emphatic no.
There are four reasons that should be carefully considered to understand why the decision to use Parliament as the vehicle for making a new constitution for the country is fatally flawed and they are the following:
- Because it is necessarily a product of the temporary electoral choices that depend on the political winds, interests and prejudices of the moment, parliament is by definition not inclusive enough to represent, articulate or defend the broad and permanent interests of society that must define the pillars of any democratic and enduring constitution.
- The coalition government formed on February 13 is not yet in a position to play a cohesive national role in the making of a new constitution for the country, not only because it still has to resolve outstanding issues around its formation, which could lead to its premature collapse if not carefully handled, but also because Zanu PF and the two MDC formations are yet to find a common public interest agenda to define the coalition government beyond partisan interests.
Who is funding Vic Falls retreat?
Posted by: webmaster
By Prof. Jonathan Moyo
WHAT is the cost of the coalition government's retreat or even treat that started Friday and runs for the entire weekend in Victoria Falls and who is footing the bill?.
This question has become both urgent and important against the background of growing public interest in a number of high profile and high budget so-called summits that some government ministers have been hosting
under murky circumstances at five star hotels across the country.
Over the last month there have been well-funded and highly publicised summits on water, women and youth, tourism along with ministerial dinners in such sectors as science and technology among others.
WHAT is the cost of the coalition government's retreat or even treat that started Friday and runs for the entire weekend in Victoria Falls and who is footing the bill?.
This question has become both urgent and important against the background of growing public interest in a number of high profile and high budget so-called summits that some government ministers have been hosting
under murky circumstances at five star hotels across the country.
Over the last month there have been well-funded and highly publicised summits on water, women and youth, tourism along with ministerial dinners in such sectors as science and technology among others.
IS Zimbabwe finally in a political transition?
Posted by: webmaster
This is an edited version of a public lecture presented at Africa University on March 11 by Professor Jonathan Moyo, independent MP for Tsholotsho North.
While its historical background and intervening dynamics are quite complex, the answer to this question is very simple: Contrary to self-serving proclamations by politicians, the formation of the inclusive government by the country’s three ruling parties, Zanu PF and the two MDC formations 36 days ago does not constitute a transition to a new political order or even a new Zimbabwe.
Instead, we are now in an uncertain period of a pre-transition which might result in a real political transition or might degenerate into chaos or might even slide back into the dark past.
This is because a political transition is defined by the emergence of new institutions based on new values led by a new leadership under a new constitutional framework driven by a new vision. None of these qualities define the inclusive government which, while it does have some new faces, is based on the old order in every respect.
While its historical background and intervening dynamics are quite complex, the answer to this question is very simple: Contrary to self-serving proclamations by politicians, the formation of the inclusive government by the country’s three ruling parties, Zanu PF and the two MDC formations 36 days ago does not constitute a transition to a new political order or even a new Zimbabwe.
Instead, we are now in an uncertain period of a pre-transition which might result in a real political transition or might degenerate into chaos or might even slide back into the dark past.
This is because a political transition is defined by the emergence of new institutions based on new values led by a new leadership under a new constitutional framework driven by a new vision. None of these qualities define the inclusive government which, while it does have some new faces, is based on the old order in every respect.
Stop creating false controversies
Posted by: webmaster
By Prof. Jonathan Moyo
BELOW are three important questions that emerged last week whose rational answers expose very serious dangers to national healing and cohesion posed by some elements in our midst who have taken into trading in false controversies perhaps hoping to keep Zimbabweans deeply polarised as a destructive platform for sinking our beleaguered country and its battered economy deeper into the abyss.
* Is it right for the leader of the main MDC, Morgan Tsvangirai, to demand that he and his party should have been consulted by President Robert Mugabe on various national issues including the appointments to key State institutions, such as Attorney General and Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, when Tsvangirai has not been sworn in as Prime Minister in terms of the September 15, 2008, political agreement between Zanu PF and the two MDC formations or in terms of an enacted Constitutional Amendment Number 19 currently before Parliament?
BELOW are three important questions that emerged last week whose rational answers expose very serious dangers to national healing and cohesion posed by some elements in our midst who have taken into trading in false controversies perhaps hoping to keep Zimbabweans deeply polarised as a destructive platform for sinking our beleaguered country and its battered economy deeper into the abyss.
* Is it right for the leader of the main MDC, Morgan Tsvangirai, to demand that he and his party should have been consulted by President Robert Mugabe on various national issues including the appointments to key State institutions, such as Attorney General and Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, when Tsvangirai has not been sworn in as Prime Minister in terms of the September 15, 2008, political agreement between Zanu PF and the two MDC formations or in terms of an enacted Constitutional Amendment Number 19 currently before Parliament?
Moyo slams claims he 'engineered' Mugabe's victory
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Through newZimbabwe.com
TSHOLOTSHO North MP Professor Jonathan Moyo has hit back with fury at claims that he “engineered” President Robert Mugabe’s “landslide” election victory on June 27.
Moyo said the allegations, carried by internet news sites, were “flattering, but unfortunately false”.
Moyo, reports said, had worked clandestinely with Zanu PF’s election campaign team and held regular meetings with top Zanu PF officials including Emmerson Mnangagwa at a house in Avondale owned by one Pauline Mahoya, said to be the second wife of former Midlands provincial governor, July Moyo.
The former Information Minister said the allegations, which he was not given an opportunity to respond to, were “coming from an absolutely idle mind”.
He said: “The people who were behind Mugabe’s media campaign deserve credit for a job well done, and the credit is not mine. I would have no qualms taking credit for it if I had engineered it as it is being said, but I do not deserve the credit, so I won’t take it.”
TSHOLOTSHO North MP Professor Jonathan Moyo has hit back with fury at claims that he “engineered” President Robert Mugabe’s “landslide” election victory on June 27.
Moyo said the allegations, carried by internet news sites, were “flattering, but unfortunately false”.
Moyo, reports said, had worked clandestinely with Zanu PF’s election campaign team and held regular meetings with top Zanu PF officials including Emmerson Mnangagwa at a house in Avondale owned by one Pauline Mahoya, said to be the second wife of former Midlands provincial governor, July Moyo.
The former Information Minister said the allegations, which he was not given an opportunity to respond to, were “coming from an absolutely idle mind”.
He said: “The people who were behind Mugabe’s media campaign deserve credit for a job well done, and the credit is not mine. I would have no qualms taking credit for it if I had engineered it as it is being said, but I do not deserve the credit, so I won’t take it.”