Mugabe's endorsement irresponsible

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By Prof Jonathan Moyo

IF President Robert Mugabe truly and honestly believes that he is a serious presidential candidate in the general election scheduled for March 2008 and that he can best govern this battered country until 2013 should he win, then he miserably failed to demonstrate that at the controversial Zanu PF extraordinary congress which started late yesterday afternoon.

The simple truth is that Mugabe has no national reason to seek reelection and that Zanu PF is being particularly irresponsible by allowing him to do that in a disgraceful manner as shown yesterday at the special congress.

So pathetic was Mugabe’s performance that when he was formally declared the ruling party’s presidential candidate, fair-minded Zimbabweans in and outside Zanu PF who had or still have a soft spot for him for one reason or another did not know whether to laugh or cry.

The televised ill-fated declaration was as unwise and as sad as a different but morally equivalent event some 29 years ago when an aged and out-of-shape Muhammad Ali unwisely agreed to defend his world heavy weight boxing title against a young and agile Leon Spinks who went on to clobber and humiliate him on February 15 1978.

Because Zanu PF’s irresponsibility has caused it to fail to protect the national interest and because Mugabe is apparently determined to thrive under that failure in pursuit of his personal ambition to be president for life, it is now up to Zimbabweans across the political divide to rise to the challenge by finding a united front to stop Mugabe and his cronies from turning their self-indulgence into a national catastrophe.

Before he was declared as the Zanu PF candidate yesterday, Mugabe opened the Zanu PF special congress with an uncharacteristically insipid speech, delivered in a cracking voice and notable for its shocking incoherence, irrelevance and lack of inspiration. His rambling speech sent a clear, loud and very worrying message to bemused delegates that Mugabe now represents an unhappy past.

But if Mugabe’s speech was pathetic from the point of view of someone who desperately needed to convince his special congress delegates and the television audience that he has what is required to solve the nation’s daunting problems many of which have been caused by him or during his controversial rule over the last 27 years, the proceedings that followed his uninspiring speech proved beyond any doubt that the Zanu PF special congress was a charade.

Consider the following: Mugabe’s hopeless speech, which was full of the same old clichés he has been saying over and over again to no useful end, was immediately followed by a perfunctory tabling of the central committee report for adoption by Vice President Joice Mujuru who had the appearance of someone who was so removed from it all that she could not care less. Her dutiful act was followed by long-winded and useless vote of thanks from Vice President Joseph Msika whose essence was to confirm that the Zanu PF presidium would be better consigned in a museum than anywhere else in a properly functioning society, let alone a democratic one.

When the presidium was done, the secretary for legal affairs, Emmerson Mnangagwa, was asked to announce the main purpose of the special congress and he outlined two. First, he said that the special congress was being asked to ratify constitutional amendment 18 and he narrated the background to its enactment by the Parliament of Zimbabwe which he situated in the Sadc mandated South African led talks between Zanu PF and the two MDC factions.

What was shocking is that Minister Mnangagwa did not seem to appreciate the absurdity of asking a Zanu PF congregation, with no standing in our Constitution whatsoever, to ratify an Act of the Parliament of Zimbabwe. The matter would have been different and even understandable if he had asked the Zanu PF special congress to ratify decisions of the Zanu PF central committee in support of processes, including the inter-party dialogue, leading to the enactment of Amendment 18.

Someone needs to tell Zanu PF’s manipulative barons that once a law has been enacted by the Parliament of Zimbabwe, and assented to by the President, only the courts can pronounce themselves on that law one way or the other. No other body has the competence to ratify or do anything else about that law besides abiding by it.

After the absurd and meaningless ratification of Amendment 18, Minister Mnangagwa then announced that the second, and obviously most important, business of the day was to declare Mugabe as the Zanu PF presidential candidate in the 2008 presidential election allegedly "in compliance with Article 5 section 22(4) of the party’s constitution and in terms of Article 6 section 30(3) of the same constitution".

Article 5 section 22(4) of the Zanu PF constitution deals with the convening of an ordinary, not special, congress and provides that resolutions emanating from the party’s provincial structures, youth league and women’s league shall be circulated to the constituent organs of congress at least 14 days prior to the date of congress.

A number of these organs did not meet the requirement for making resolutions 14 days before the congress and some of them, like Matabeleland North, made their resolutions in support of Mugabe only last Saturday on December 8 while Masvingo reported to have done so only yesterday on the day of the congress! In the circumstances, while all the reporting organs recited Article 5 section 22(4) of the Zanu PF constitution to justify the resolutions they read in support of Mugabe, a majority of them violated that provision and shamelessly displayed their violation on national television.

In addition to this, all the reporting 10 provinces along with the youth league and women’s league claimed that they were declaring Mugabe as the candidate of the party in terms of Article 6 section 30(3) of the Zanu PF constitution which deals with the powers and functions of the national people’s conference. Section 30(3) of that article provides that the national people’s conference "shall declare the president of the party elected at congress as the state presidential candidate of the party".

What is instructive here is that this article is specifically about the powers and functions of the national conference and not congress or a special congress. It was very strange, and indeed incomprehensible, for the youth league, women’s league and 10 provinces to pretend to be following the Zanu PF constitution when they were in point of fact using a provision on the national people’s conference and mischievously conflating it with the special congress.

While those who read the strange resolutions in support of Mugabe’s candidacy did not know what they were doing and clearly are not familiar with the Zanu PF constitutional provisions that they were invoking, those who drafted the resolutions new exactly that they were manipulating the party’s constitution in order to violate it . This was done as part of the desperate efforts to impose Mugabe’s candidacy on an unwilling but helpless ruling party now incapacitated by deep divisions.

After all the organs had read the resolutions that had clearly been written for them by manipulative powers behind the scenes, Zanu PF national chairman, John Nkomo, formalised the declaration of Mugabe as the presidential candidate by acclamation.

The delegates responded by looking at each other in bewilderment. The usual chanting of slogans, singing and dancing were all forgotten. Even the singing national commissar, Elliot Manyika, remained glued to his seat looking as confused if not as sorry as everyone else. Mugabe himself looked equally perplexed and even fearful. As if there was the hand of God at work, Nkomo looked at Mugabe and sought to reassure by saying, "Cde. President we have tried".

All this was live on television. There was something about the images which seemed to foretell what we are most likely to see on the day of the results of the 2008 general election.

To any discerning observer who was either inside the special congress yesterday or who watched the charade unfold from the beginning to the end on television, it was clear that nobody in Zanu PF actually supports Mugabe’s candidacy. Everyone understands that it is wrong and the most telling statement in that regard is the holding of a sham special congress when a national people’s conference was in order.

The tragedy in Zanu PF is that its leading factions, especially those associated with Solomon Mujuru and Emmerson Mnangagwa, are now using their mutual hatred as a way of expressing their support for Mugabe. The divisions between these factions has widened and deepened as they compete to prove which faction supports Mugabe more than the other. One can only imagine what would happen if these factions were to unite against Mugabe in support of Zimbabwe.

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Comments

While it is good to analyze and critique the actions of other political entities—particularly dying wood like Mugabe. Zimbabweans and the world will benefit from Prof. Moyo accepting that he blundered enormously by going to bed with Mugabe, define herein as an unthinkable serious presidential candidate in the general election scheduled for March 2008. Without this admission you would have miserably failed to demonstrate your wisdom and ability to think like anything worth a leader with conscious, awake and thinking followers.

Very few political prostitutes and opportunist hop around parties and get elevated to position of leadership or remote advisors in the least –Jonathan should not habour any high hopes, even in the midst of a weak ZANU PF governing party and an opposition in shambles.
While it is good to analyze and critique the actions of other political entities—particularly dying wood like Mugabe. Zimbabweans and the world will benefit from Prof. Moyo accepting that he blundered enormously by going to bed with Mugabe, defined herein as an unthinkable serious presidential candidate in the general election scheduled for March 2008. Without this admission you would have miserably failed to demonstrate your wisdom and ability to think like anything worth a leader with conscious, awake and thinking followers.

Very few political prostitutes and opportunist hop around parties and get elevated to position of leadership or remote advisors in the least –Jonathan should not habour any high hopes, even in the midst of a weak ZANU PF governing party and an opposition in shambles.
Jonathan,

Appreciating the insightful revelations about all clandestine and manipulative moves of the current leader you have made, I challenge you to balance it by not dwelling too much on this. Zimbabwe needs to start acting and move aheard. It would be equally, or more profitable to devise, promote, suggest ideas that can pull our country out of this quandary. And we stand ready to support the initiative. We have already lost a lot, losing the little that's left by way of sacrifice is not an issue any more. You deserve our praise only if you follow justice, and justice alone! Institute it, support it, implement it and prepare to lose for it - and the curse shall be purged from the midst of Zimbabwe.
politicians always say the current leader has failed in this or that way with no alternative in sight..its not good because the general population looks up to you to stop this madness the moment we elect you. honestly, no body wants Mugabe, so the issue would be how to remove him from power. we need not dwell on his pas, he has failed since late 80s so he must go, but how since he has state machinery & everything.
Hie Jonathan. Good to hear your accurate and incisive analysis of the status quo in Zimbabwe. You have stayed in Kenya before and possibly know the characters at the center stage there. Would you kindly give us a lecture on the possible similarities between Kenya 2008 and Zim 2002 and the advantages and disadvantages of responding to a crisis the way Odinga did? I am sure it could have prevent similar scenarios in Zim 2008.
Greetings Professor.

In as much as I value and respect your ability to analyse and tackle difficult political issues persuasively, i believe NO ONE doubts the fact that you are the mastermind of the mess we are in today. Against all odds and on your own, when all in ZANU PF had lost hope and the public was sensing an opposition victory, you managed to single-handedly pull the strings and applied all politics fundamentals to secure victory and another term in office for the ageing man. In my whole life i'll never forget how you managed to do it, i respect you. i also believe that the President will ever be grateful to you for that. You were a perfect placement, NO ONE will ever doubt that. My main question is that, during your term in the ZANU PF camp when you were Minister, did you actually belive that the ZANU PF policies and way of doing things was justified to the extend you defended them? Personally i want change, but i do not believe that the current crop of opposition leaders are presidential material. i will forever be greatful to Tsvangirai for coming up with a meaningful and well deserved opposition, but they lost focuss along the way and sometimes they speak before thinking, which later haunts them and leads one to doubt their capabilities.

Can someone come up with a plan to get Zimbabwe out of this mess without the unnecessary blame game and shedding of blood. Of all the learned people how is it that noone can come up with a plan? Is it that he (Mugabe) is so smart to outhink most of the learned.

If possible Professor, can you comment on the proposal that i have, which goes like:
DESPITE THE ECONOMIC PROBLEMS FACING ZIMBABWE, IT IS STILL CRAWLING SIMPLY BECAUSE OF THE ZANU-PF EDUCATION POLICY IT IMPLIMENTED ON GETTING INDEPENDENCE.
i say so because, most Zimbabweans are literate and instead of fighting a hopeless and losing battle trying to unseat Mugabe, they would rather look at alternatives of putting food on the table. Thanks to the education, many people can do cross-border trading and others are professionally employed,like me outside Zimbabwean borders. I enjoy constructive criticism and personally i admire Mugabe's personality not the party, but i'm equally hurt by the economic situation that i'm happy if there can be a meningful alternative to his old and tired ideas and propaganda.
Your views professor Jonathan Moyo are good and correct but we hate you for what you have done to our beloved Zimbabwe. You are part and parcel of what is happening right now. You are the devil himself and history had already been written. We do not want to see you again in top political Zimbabwean politics.
We are waiting for your feedback on the entry of Simba into the ring. Will he really be the uniter that we have been waiting for? Will ZANU and MDC neutrals finally see a place where they can come together and topple the Bob man?
Yes prof what do you make of this new development? I am sure in your own personal capacity you must have an opinion. Interesting enough is the fact that your assessment of the congress was well and on point. Dr. Makoni himself mentions the shenanigans of the congress.
come on jona we are waiting for your coment on Simba Makoni
well, i think it's high time the Professor writes an article about this Dr Simba Makoni entry in to the presidential race. I believe your assessment is long overdue.
Jonathan has to stop this critisism of zanu pf and its faded mugabe. its time he hsa to offer equally effective solutions to zimbabwe as he vehemently destroyed a determined zimbabwe in unseating mugabe in 2000 - 2002 period. Tell zimbabweans what they are to do and not what zanu pf failed to do, for all know that, there is no need for any one to start telling them
CQX
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