A disappointment

Manchester United lost. That happens, once in a while. I personally think that they started well then inexplicably collapsed. It seems they collapsed three times this season and if they have to really dominate Europe they have to maintain their focus throughout a match. They lost sight of the ball against Liverpool (remember that 4-1 drubbing), then they repeated the 'feat' against Fulham a week later. But this time they did it at the most dramatic of stages. Then, there is that Nigerian fan who took his disappointment to extremes ... sad. Anyway, ManU will be back.

Schadenfreude, altruistic punishment or a remarkable diversion?

Well, nothing has changed! The same old permanent secretaries and their long lists on incompetencies. The same attorney general and RBZ governor. Okay here is my perception of all this, seriatim. Zimbabwe's permanent secretaries seem, at face value, to be simple career civil servants. Indeed some of them may be, but some are complex characters whose past and present attitude towards democracy and basic rights and freedoms is at best dubious and at worst malicious. An example, is the candidate for the Publicity and Information post, one Dr. George Charamba. While I do not know whose long hand authored the Nathaniel Manheru column, I feel that a person who condoned such extreme hate speech as was common on the column cannot be expected to be a servant who carries out honest media reform. I stand to be corrected, sorry, surprised. In addition, we should stop pretending that there were no other persons who would have taken over as PermSecs and that the current crop are not political appointees. The PermSec is the CEO of the ministry and I doubt if Mr Mugabe has ever appointed any of them on merit alone. I think he appointed them on their ability to sing praises to him first, any other qualifications being secondary and, in instances, immaterial. So, for the MDC to simply accept the so called criteria and accept the lot is a case of misplaced trust. Or misplaced hope. Or both. My verdict is that all the PermSecs have nothing to offer; in fact, they may turn out to be serious obstacles.

The attorney general is another interesting character. I do not want to delve into his qualifications. Bob might be untrustworthy democracy-wise, but he would not be so crass as to appoint an unqualified person to the post. What I feel uncomfortable about this man is his seemingly relentless pursuit of the nonsensical. What is the probability of Jestina Mukoko et alum succeeding in plotting, let alone succeeding in removing Bob unconstitutionally? Most of the people who stand accused of this crime are members of the MDC. Why then do you choose to prosecute minions when you are dining with the head of the MDC every day? Staggeringly, people who were involved in the abduction and subsequent murder of MDC activists Chiminya and Mabika are not being prosecuted even though they are quite well known. Is this a situation where a ZANU PF attorney general is deliberately blind to ZANU PF excesses but he is clear sighted about the activities of the MDC? Whatever the outcome of those prosecutions, Tomana will go down in Zimbabwe's history as a person who, when given the chance, failed to protect human rights and democratic pursuit; spectacularly. These charges have been recycled ad nauseum since independence and no one, I mean NO ONE, was ever been convicted. The question is why waste national resources in pursuit of a case where the so called evidence was extracted under duress when the accused was being held incommunicado after being abducted? The last time a judge was asked to pass a judgement on a case with a similar history, the learned and competent justice dismissed the state case as fictitious and set free the accused. While the judge set the Cain Nkala accused free, they suffered irreversible harm to both body and soul, and sadly one is said to have died after the ordeal. The question to Tomana is, why are you repeating the same thing?

The RBZ governor is like everyone's pet project! Bob says he won't go, the service chiefs are happy with him, Gilbert Muponda wants him gone (yesterday!) and Biti is busy clipping his wings. I do not know what to add to the debate but I will try. First, Mr Mugabe should remember that he is not God. Second, he should remember that he once swore in his mother's name that the MDC will never win elections. Third, God gives you a long life so that events in your life will teach you how to be humble. Fourth, governing with the consent of the generals is not the same as governing with the consent of the governed. The service chiefs are happy with Gono. Of course, they have to be. Where else in the world do you get a central bank governor who has bought an army, an airforce, a police force, an intelligence agency and a prison service by giving the leaders cars, tractors generators etc which he has purchased using money stolen from other people's forex accounts? They would be mad if they did not support him. Chinamasa's loud noises are irrelevant, and are best left without the dignity of a comment. Then, there is Gilbert, of all people. While Gono did a lot to dispossess other business people and to persecute and haunt them out of the country, I do not think that Gilbert can, in all honesty, point at Gono and tell us how bad he is. But then, which one of the dispossessed business people wouldn't be willing to donate a rope to hang Gono? Mr Biti's efforts are commendable in as far as he wants to address governance issues at the RBZ, especially the bizarre arrangement where the governor chairs the board and runs the RBZ. That is an obvious recipe for disaster. But, if his objectives are vindictive, then he should be stopped. What I really do not understand about Gono's case is why we are so obsessed with his discomfort? Is it a case of Schadenfreude? Or are we calling for his punishment for the benefit of Zimbabwe as a whole? Or our attention is being diverted to Gono so that we lose sight of our agenda to deliver democracy? After all, Mr Gono himself knows that he is not liked, nor trusted by the ordinary Zimbabwean. There reasons he is not resigning are difficult to come up with but I think the following could be some of the reasons; 1) a desire to hide or alter records at the RBZ that would be inimical to his freedom or that of his so called principals, 2) a disproportionate sense of individual ability and a bloated ego, 3) a hope that the West and other donors will 'go to sleep' and give him millions of USD so that he can repurchase the generals etc, 4) an absence of a sense of shame for past misdeeds, which is ominous, 5) he is a useful focal point for people's efforts while ZANU PF plans their next orgy of violence or some other such undemocratic endeavour. 

Decisions that change everything, yet change nothing

The title of this blog is a common cliche, but I will use it. I have seen Zimbabwe make so many decisions that change everything, yet change nothing. In February, people were happy to have this chimeric inlcusive government. They were hoping, as all desperate people are wont to do, that the IG will bring change. Well, it did. Every civil servant earns USD100 a month. The net effect of this sum is to shift civil servants from one category of obscene and desparate poverty to another. No point in calculating the Gini coefficient here! We no longer have the 'change-money' industry but we seem to have violent crimes and robberies increasing by the day. We no longer have extreme hate speech on TV, but journalists are still being jailed for quoting documents that are in the public domain. We even have visits from the most interesting quarters - North Korea! Very interesting friends at this juncture; well at least they built that colossal cemetery which we confuse with a heroes' acre. Then we have the Mutambara MDC formation suspending all and sundry making Job Sikhala totally Jobless! I liked the responses from both Sikhala and the youth leader. All I need to point out for the two is; pretending to resign from a party after being suspended makes you less credible critics of the same party. If there was something wrong with the party, you should not have waited to be suspended for you to write your erudite articles on the failures of the party. For the record, I have always viewed that formation (you included) with suspicion.

The RBZ and my money

I have read a lot of commentary on the activities of the RBZ for the last five years. Needless to say, every Zimbabwean has been a victim of whatever errors (or failures) that are attributed to 'our governor'. I have also read his response in various articles. I think Gono's major weakness is his overwhelming perception of being a genius of some sort, to the point that he comes across as arrogant. Which is rather unfortunate if you are in the kind of situation he is in. I know that GG may insist on being around for some time but the reality is he is no longer welcome to head the country's central bank and in many respects he should be bypassed. I think all Zimbabweans, including Gono himself, should openly and honestly tell him to go.

There are several pertinent questions that have to be asked whenever we assess his tenure at the helm of the RBZ. Honest answers to these questions may give us an indication of what to do. Under what circumstances did the RBZ come to owe NGOs, universities, companies and farmers? Did the RBZ inform the affected individuals or ask them for their money? These two questions are best answered by the statement that he raided the accounts. Out of interest, is it legal for the central bank governor to simply raid an account? Further, how does a sane, rational individual, acting rationally, expect the affected individual to operate without the raided funds? 

It seems there is a method to this madness after all. The agenda was to save ZANU PF, but one of the most interesting consequences of this theft is that the affected individuals (especially the farmers) became dependent on the reserve bank and began to see it as their saviour against the evil west that had imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe. This is a spectacular case of the Stockholm syndrome where hostages think their captor is right. There are some within Zimbabwe who still think Gono was right. 

I recently read an article in which GG was putting forward the case for subsidies for farmers. I disagreed with him on a lot of points. First, the subsidies that are given to farmers in Europe, US and elsewhere come from national budgets with proper safeguards and accountability not from a single entity that appoints itself the national procurement agency. Second, the RBZ cannot claim to be subsidising farmers when it owes farmers that much money. What would be the point of the subsidies if the farmers are completely deprived of earnings that would improve their capacity in the long term? In addition, the RBZ (or at times the GMB) set the price of the produce. If you do the maths you will realise that the farmers were overall taxed (as opposed to being subsidised) by the institution that at face value seems benevolent. Third, the land reform programme is neither a programme nor a reform exercise. Let's stop lying about the obvious. Farm invasions and a few policies that have been haphazardly put together do not constitute a programme. And, vindictive and racist displacement of farmers is not reform. What we should do is revisit the whole exercise and optimise it so that national resources are used for the benefit of the nation. Meanwhile, no subsidies should be sent in that direction ... afterall all GG's subsidies for the past five years have failed to make the country food self sufficient. Fourth, the subsidies for the past five years (especially fertilisers, diesel etc) were simply sold on the black market. Gono is aware of that. At the relevant time, people who raised their voices against this were labelled as anti-Zimbabwe, unpatriotic etc.

I know one of Gono's main arguments about what he did was the 'sanctions' excuse. I know there are many contested issues pertaining to sanctions but one of the most obvious; (which has been acknowledged even by ZANU PF itself) was the main reason why the restrictive measures were put in place - political violence. While some people may want to yell on the rooftops about a bilateral dispute between Britain and Zimbabwe, the reality is that there are many innocent children of Zimbabwe who were murdered in the course of various electoral campaigns up to 2008. In addition, some of the lunacy is still ongoing (irrational detention of obviously innocent people). It would be irresponsible and outright delusional to expect the whole world to watch this breakdown of the rule of law and reward it by giving the perpertrators line sof credit and IMF funding. Anyway, even if the restrictive measures were there; does their existence justify the bankrupting of institutions by the central bank?

The central bank's wayward behaviour does not stop there. Why would you wait for four years to comply with a supreme court ruling? Who will compensate the affected for the lost business opportunities? While I am not happy with Zimbabwe's banking sector in general, I do not agree with a situation where an individual can ignore court rulings and then comply in his own sweet time. There is no reason why the RBZ faile dto comply sooner.

I read, and laughed long and loud, the comment in the Fingaz of Thursday May 08, 2009. I first thought the editor serious, then realised that it was probably meant to be a joke. Zimbabweans do not have a reason to thank GG at all, except if he quits, then we will thank him for doing the rational. The editor of the Fingaz had just run out of ideas. Further, there are people who still think GG did a good job. It's okay to hol such and opinion but ask yourselves how the dispossessed farmers, NGOs, bankers etc feel about the situation. You may have benefitted from the 'bags' and the whole 'moneychanger industry' but the rest of the country did not benefit and such behaviour has to come to an end.