Ironically, they have a similar Deoxyribonucleic acid – shameless beneficiaries of President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF bottomless benevolence. However, while Mr. Zhanda can argue how his stationery and ICT empire is a result of business acumen, would he have ‘qualified’ to be a ZANU-PF legislator without sipping from the cup of insolence? We may not know how many government tenders Mr. Zhanda won or how many ‘currency licences’ he benefited from Dr Gono, but of the three protagonists, he has strains of predictability.
Dr Kereke masqueraded as RBZ ‘advisor’ during the hyperinflationary at the time when Dr Gono exuded untouchable ‘demigod’ super governor status – doling farm implements, fertilizers, groceries and diesel only to perpetuate ZANU-PF tyranny. Dr Kereke’s meteoric rags to riches story – in a space of ten years he owns a state of the art hospital and a medical aid company – is to say the least, mind boggling. Now he accuses Dr Gono of impropriety, threatening to ‘wikileak’ damning information on what he claims RBZ’s shadowy deals. Which model of nuclear gas mask was he wearing in the windowless RBZ ‘situation room’?
But my problem is with the RBZ supremo. I do not wish to accuse him of anything, but merely make curious observations. He has gone ‘viral’ on how he can account for each dime that has made him one of the richest Central Bank governors in Africa. Dr Gono is a public servant. He is not expected to be wealthy. In Africa, when central bank governors, permanent secretaries, civil servants and presidents boast about their millions, we the poor automatically evoke an imagery of corruption. It’s commonsense. If he now alleges that he was a mere conduit for ‘government agricultural mechanisation’ – disclosure of beneficiaries of his billion US dollar handouts is urgent. Government programs are of public interest.
The good thing is there are thousands who accompanied Dr Gono barefoot in his stinky quasi-fiscal sewerage. Like him, they fear to wash their feet in public. Under the strict supervision of ZANU-PF, he dished tractors, scothcarts, ploughs, cars, generators and foreign currency. Even MDC legislators, business leaders and parents desperate for tuition fees in foreign universities made pilgrimages to the Gono Shrine.
We may never know what ignites the conflict between Dr Gono, Dr Kereke and Mr. Zhanda. Whatever it is, it contributed Zimbabwe’s current 10 billion US dollar foreign debt, not to mention ZANU-PF’s catastrophic hegemony. That to innocent citizens is unacceptable – especially that Zimbabweans who are not ZANU-PF beneficiaries have to suffer because Dr Gono couldn’t keep his monetary zip shut!
Some ZANU-PF legislators have protectively jumped to his rescue. Their reign will end by December 2013. Should Dr Gono not volunteer information now on who really was recipient of his benevolence? The next government will not be as tolerant as the current GNU. Zimbabweans have not forgotten how he kept ZANU-PF guns blazing and their machetes glistening in the 2008 electoral moonlight. We will remember him as the central bank governor who completely discarded his mandate and sacrificed professionalism on the altar of political expediency. His legacy will only be but that of the man who indulged public money in an expensive orgy – stroking the populist ZANU-PF ego.
Post published in: Analysis