Tendai Ruben Mbofana
In fact, information minister Jenfan Muswere was quite unequivocal, a few days ago, that the government did not need anyone, let alone world powers, instructing it on what was best for Zimbabweans.
This was in reference to the placement of 11 top individuals – including President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa and his wife Auxillia – as well as three entities under the Global Magnitsky Act sanctions by the US.
Muswere did not mince his words as he told whoever was listening that the authorities in Harare were not there to please the Americans, but to do what benefited the generality of Zimbabweans.
All sounds good, doesn’t it?
I could not agree more.
As a matter of fact, I would feel exactly the same if someone were to tell me how to run my own home.
Nevertheless, in what way is the Mnangagwa administration governing the country for the benefit of Zimbabweans?
As much as I do not need human rights organizations, for instance, to instruct me on how to treat my family – nonetheless, due to my utmost love for them, I do not abuse them.
I do not treat my family with care and compassion to please these organizations – but because of the profound love I have for them (family).
So, although the Zimbabwe regime should not be dictated to by anyone on how to govern the country, they should treat citizens with the greatest love and not abuse us.
We now need Muswere and even his principal Mnangagwa to inform the nation whether what the government or certain individuals within the establishment have been doing is for the benefit of Zimbabweans.
When the US placed Mnangagwa, his wife, and nine others on targeted sanctions, they (Americans) cited issues of human rights abuses, corruption, and election fraud.
Were the Americans lying?
I will not go into acts of corruption, especially involving our mineral resources, which I have heard through the grapevine as they lack incontrovertible evidence.
It does not matter that some of these accusations have been made by people closely associated with the highest office in the land who would be expected to be privy to the goings-on in the corridors of power.
For some of us who live in the city of Kwekwe, stories of gold mafias are awash, which involve some of the most powerful individuals in the country.
This has been the driving force behind most violent clashes in the minerals sector as well as the destruction of infrastructure (including schools and houses) due to illegal mining all over the Midlands province.
However, I would rather base my arguments on the self-confessions of those, such as Ambassador-at-large Uebert Angel and his sidekick Rikki Doolan.
Did they not speak, although unaware, in front of cameras for an Al Jazeera investigative documentary aptly named ‘Gold Mafia’ – where they openly implicated Mnangagwa, Auxillia, and Henrietta Rushwaya (Zimbabwe Miners Federation president) in gold smuggling and money laundering?
Did we not listen to him on television ostensibly talking with both Auxillia and Rushwaya on the phone supposedly arranging these deals?
In actual fact, the country loses over US$3 billion each year through the smuggling of our minerals, illicit financial transactions, and other corrupt activities.
In the meantime, ordinary citizens are sinking deeper and deeper into untold poverty and suffering – with nearly half the population living in extreme poverty.
Our medical institutions lack the most basics, such as essential medications, functional cancer machines, operating theatres, and ambulances.
We have 63 percent of our rural children dropping out of school, whilst the rest learn either in the open or in dilapidated structures while sitting on bricks and without books.
Their parents are forced to spend the entire day in the scorching sun for handouts of food and agricultural inputs on account of abject poverty.
When they fall sick, they need to walk for tens of kilometers to the nearest health care facilities, which, in most cases, lack the desired treatment.
Our towns and cities have now been effectively turned into glorified rural areas – with most having gone for years without potable water in our homes.
We are facing daily power cuts due to a government that has never invested in any significant new electricity generation technologies or stations since coming to power in 1980.
The prices of basic goods and services continue to fly out of the reach of the majority – as the government insists on keeping a useless local currency for the benefit of the ruling elite who profit through arbitrage.
So, I ask Muswere and his boss Mnangagwa: As much as you are justified in your disdain at being lectured to by world powers on how to govern Zimbabwe, are you yourselves satisfied with how you are treating ordinary citizens?
Do you honestly believe your actions are fair and good for Zimbabweans?
I will not even waste my time on the disgusting electoral fraud witnessed last year in August, which even the ZANU PF regime’s friends in SADC (who usually see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil) found hard to ignore.
Were these sham of elections not declared falling far short of regional benchmarks, to which even Zimbabwe signed up?
Have perceived opponents of the regime not been ruthlessly persecuted with relentless ferocity – with arrests on spurious charges, violent crackdowns, and even murders being the other of the day?
Was all that for the benefit of Zimbabweans – or was it not purely for the benefit and enrichment of the ruling elite?
So, before Muswere and his master Mnangagwa want to portray themselves as the innocent victims in all this sanctions debate, they first need to admit what they are doing to the people of Zimbabwe?
Who are the real victims here?
We are the victims!
We are the ones enduring the brunt of the Mnangagwa administration’s callous greed and brutality.
Indeed, Zimbabwe does not need any lectures from anyone, particularly outsiders – but the truth is there for all to see.
The Zimbabwe government is a curse unto its own citizens!
- Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to WhatsApp or Call: +263715667700 | +263782283975, or email: mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com, or visit website: https://mbofanatendairuben.news.blog/