So Little To Show Of ZANU PF's Commitment To The GNU

I have not written any articles in months, and have been receiving some mail questioning why I have not been writting of late. Well it has been due to a lot of reasons and one of them was to make sure I gave the developments in Zimbabwe my undivided attention...yes you heard me right,...undivided. A lot has been unfolding in Zimbabwe since the inauguration of the Prime Minister, his deputies and the swearing in of Ministers.

The latest developments in Zimbabwe are nothing new to Zimbabweans. Like I had written in one of my articles in 2008 (We Have Walked This Road Before), I am sure that Zimbabweans are removed from being surprised by the President Robert Mugabe's unrepenting attitude. After having sacrificed an arm and a knee, Morgan Tsvangirai still finds himself in very awkward and terribly testing times. Such is the transitional period in Zimbabwe, that we still have people who are also testing the authority of the President himself.

Robert Mugabe's commitment to the Power Sharing Agreement and the people of Zimbabwe remains very questionable as is suspicious. I find it so absurd for the president to be digging his heels with the issue of farm invasions after the Agreement. It is the only thing he can talk about whenever a hundred or more people gather. He took the opportunity again at his 85th birthday celebration to once more tell the nation that invasions will continue. Such a defiant attitude squrely undermines the Agreement signed by the three parties and it is becoming increasingly evident that ZANU PF thrives on this rhetoric, violence and confusion intentionally.

This unchanging attitude displayed by the President, a man who must be leading the wagons on the railroad to reconciliation and reconstruction, leaves a lot to thought. But then again, the President has a poor histrory of leadership and one would not expect him to champion justice, fairness and certainly not transparency and restoration of democracy. In the midst of all this, we still have the continued incaceration of human rights activists whose trumpped up charges continue to hover over their heads. The MDC has spoken out severally, Human Rights Organizations have spoken out as well as the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon. They have all urged Zimbabwe to release these activists in the spirit of the Government of National Unity,but, alas all these cries are falling on deaf ears.

It sounds a bit fishy for the President to instruct his officers to release the activists and the officers refuse to. It seems to me the President has not been running his kraal properly for quite a while now, infact he only remains the figure-head of his political party with considerably diminished powers and authority. Security chiefs continue to exert a lot of pressure on him as they are the people who wield massive powers in the country and continue to flaunt them. It has increasingly become evident that the GNU agreement is only recognised by a few within ZANU PF whilst others still want to operate in the old way and be defiant to the new office bearers. The fact that Gideon Gono was re-elected to Govenor of the Reserve Bank unilaterally as well as the recent appointment of the Attorney General, is a clear defiant attitude,showing a lot of contempt and disregard for the agreement which clearly states that such appointments must be made with consultaions from all parties. It is a breach of contract.

ZANU PF still want to hold on to the most influencial and powerful areas whilst forcing the MDC into becoming underdogs. There are a few reasons the President could come up with for the re-appointment of Gideon Gono. He is a man who has ravaged the country's economy and utterly failed to curb record breaking inflation, which also happens to be the world's highest. He has continually tried to address currency shartages by printing more money and flooding the country with useless notes whilst using other people to hoard tonnes of the notes in bunkers to finance their foreign exchange scams. Clearly, his appointment was not by merit, but influenced to a much greater extent by personal reasons, that are removed from benefitting the country.

The current Government of National Unity is a structure standing on very shaky and sandy ground, partly because of the unwillingness by ZANU PF elitists to change as there is fear for everyone. The appointment of the Attorney General comes as no surprise and as Mugabe said, it is one appointment that will not be reversed. It comes with recomendations from the security chiefs. They are aware of the fact they may soon be investigated for corruption and a lot other criminal activities they have participated in. So they are trying to close all loop holes and find their comfort zones. There is a belief that there could be a which hunt and a tremendous feeling that the the GNU has left them expossed.

Strategically, the appointment of a ZANU PF sympathetic Attorney General is imperative in order to give the top brass the assurance they need that there shall not be any criminal investigations of any sort in their names. Robert Mugabe had to take them back to their confort zones and this is one other way of doing so. Whilst on the other hand, ZANU PF continues to charge and prosecute MDC officials and supporters in a bid to destabilise and weaken the party before the elections that Robert Mugabe has started talking about.

Whilst the MDC continue trying to work hard in government to impress the voters, funders and other stakeholders, ZANU PF is busy destabilising and crippling the MDC through detaining and prosecuting its activists. What we are witnessing is no different from what we witnessed in the early 80's when ZANU PF and PF ZAPU joined forces. It did not take long before ZANU PF declared Joshua Nkomo and PF ZAPU as people who wanted to topple his government after they had planted some arms in one of ZAPU owned farms.

ZANU PF and Robert Mugabe have always managed to pull tricks out of their bag, just when everyone thought "...yes we got them this time!". Uncle Bob has always managed to pull fast ones and one wonders what trick lies ahead in waiting for the MDC. He has always had the ability to pull rabbits out of his hat in full glare of everyone and then forcefully squeeze the world to applaud his senseless tricks.

Kwanele Sibanda is the Editor of Zimnewsroom.org