Zanu-Pf: Africa only emulates

Zanu-pf: Africa only emulates

 

By Bernard Bwoni

 

Democracy is a playground for capitalists and imperialists! Those with baleful intrigue on Zimbabwe! Those bankrolling the discerning local political manikins! Why the specific enthralment with Zimbabwe?

 

That the MDC misunderstood and misinterpreted the term democracy is a fact. That it cannot be all-embracing, universally prescribed and inflicted is also a fact. A means to an end, indeed it is.

The West imposed excessively punitive and felonious sanctions on Zimbabwe to ‘propel Zimbabwe towards the democratic end’ and that cannot be disputed; democracy from the Western supermarket shelf with local Zimbabwean shopkeepers!

Sanctions are a war without the guns and the bloodshed. Yes democracy is worth fighting for. Yes democracy is worth dying for. But is it worth killing for? Let’s say sanctions achieve the intended outcome, that there is regime-change in Zimbabwe, the opposition is propelled to power at the expense of the millions of Zimbabweans who endured the distress and privation induced by the nefarious sanctions. Coerced democracy one can argue or a means to the democratic end. What?! You have to have drunk some Juice to get that!

All people have a right to life. There is no smooth side to killing, there is no painless side to violence, travel restrictions or targeted sanctions do not cause a whole nation to suffer, there is no excuse for acts of violence; there is no better or worse violence and all perpetrators walk the same line in the eyes of the recipients of the acts. Violence in politics must never be understated; there are innocent victims and misguided perpetrators. A machete’s slicing affliction bears the same abhorrence as sanctions. It is only degree that discerns the two deleterious immoralities.

We are going to have our elections on July 31 2013. We are going to have political violence mentioned repeatedly in the next few weeks and even deeds of political violence perpetrated. The external media of those with a vested interest in Zimbabwe will most definitely go into overdrive in apportioning all blame to one side, to the side whose recalcitrance to their neo-liberal and imperial agenda they find revolting.

Political violence must be condemned for the evil crime it is and must clearly be distinguished from any other criminal offence. The criminals must be dealt with accordingly. The USA and MDC find it politically expedient to blame this type of violence on Zanu-PF which is unfortunate and divisive. We had the often and always over-zealous and boisterous Tendai Biti making unfounded allegations that Cde Didymus Mutasa was responsible for the young boy’s death.

Let us be honest and clear as a nation that in Zimbabwe political violence is party-wide. Political violence is a malady, an ailment of those with misguided and misplaced designs. Political violence will be used to push forward the interests and agendas of the powerful, the external players with inauspicious grounds and local players with misdirected fidelities.

President Mugabe has been speaking incessantly against violence and in all his addresses he has made it clear that it is unacceptable. The President has set the tone and all parties must start looking at ways forward rather than use the solemnly grave issue of political violence as gimmicks to attract alien onslaught. All parties must reign in on undesirable and violent elements within their individual parties. In a unique environment like Zimbabwe elections are likely to evoke apprehensible anxiety. There is nothing wrong in acknowledging such uneasiness, in fact affective and reflective avow of this disquietude is part of national accretion and cicatrisation.

In Zimbabwe the opposition believe that they are denied their ‘freedoms’ to associate, their freedom to ‘subvert’ the nation for the purpose of their ‘democracy’ and regime change agendas; their freedom to change the current system which they see and believe to be unjust. The only issue that concerns me as a citizen is that while the motive appears admirable, the method and the players seem to have occult intent, privy designs.

Zanu-PF believes and rightly so that the political playing field has been made uneven by extraneous forces, the felonious sanctions, the covert and overt extrinsic intercession.
The local opposition vehemently deny this even when the attestation is crushingly and nakedly there to the contrary.

Is it a case of Mr Tsvangirai in his world genuinely wants ‘democracy’ and those who fund and found him want ‘democracy’ and the status quo that aims at maintaining and preserving the prerogative of a few white former settlers? Mr Tsvangirai’s associations are what let him and his party down.

The issue is about trust. It is allowed to wine and dine with the elites of London, the bourgeoisie of Brussels and the cowboys of Texas, but it is naïve and irresponsible to feed them the false hope that land reform will be reversed if you end up in government.

This is not the time for gimmicks Mr Tsvangirai! People can drink gallons of Juice but Juice alone will not empower and emancipate the black people of Zimbabwe!
Why clamour for Juice yet eschew indigenisation and empowerment?

The Zanu-PF journey is one journey that the rest of Africa can only emulate! I salute you my heroes!

In Mugabe Africa must seriously trust!

In Mugabe Africa must seriously trust!

By Bernard Bwoni

As the media circus hijacked the memorial service of Mandela, certain ideological African themes are becoming more prominent and ineradicably embedded. There is a resurrection of the belief in the African ideology and the resonant acclamation President Mugabe received at the mention of his name at the FNB stadium is affirmation of the credence. The people of Africa, the real people of Africa know who their real heroes are and no amount of illusory media sophistry and air-brushing is going to change that. President Mugabe received a standing ovation and he did not even stand at the podium to give a speech. The man must be doing something very right. No let me rephrase that, the man is doing something right. Legends are born, not scripted. It is that unwavering, lifelong and indelible ideological immersion to a cause that personifies Robert Mugabe amply. What is interesting to note is that the inexorable thunderous ovation for Mugabe was right in the glare of those hypocritical kingmakers with privy designs and ominous intent who have incessantly and historically misinformed and disinformed the world about Mugabe. The Mugabe frenzy that is sweeping across the African continent has no preclusion. Those with inauspicious intentions on Zimbabwe have tried suppressing and smothering the ideologically-congealed Mugabe mania for it to resurface again and again as happened at the FNB stadium. Robert Mugabe’s standing ovation was for an unshakeable belief in a cause and the ovation for Obama was sheer curiosity and that novel feeling of seeing a black man fronting the very threat to that African cause. 

Robert Mugabe is an extraordinary African. A man with the black African cause permanently ingrained to his whole being is what defines him. Zimbabwe has been under siege and the man has soaked all the demonization and onslaught with an unparalleled tenacity and resoluteness. He is a principled man with an indefatigable bond to delivering his people from the implacable neo-colonial structure which manifests itself in many forms to continually quell the African quest for lasting and real independence which seeks to economically liberate the continent and its people. The tumultuous ovation he received in the FNB stadium was no gimmick. That was open recognition from real African people with an unfulfilled thirst for definitive emancipation and not the delusory independence they had to settle for. Robert Mugabe represents real hope for the masses with an unfeigned and authentic proposal to truly liberate Africa and Africans. Do not believe the media hype about demons and dictators! That is just a smoke-screen to asphyxiate the African economic genesis that has the unique bonafide raison d’être to uplift and upgrade the lives of black Africans. Aid and donations have not done it yet! Most definitely will never do it and Africans eternally declassed to beggars and burgers! No real meat, no substance just barebones. No foreign aid is ever truly altruistic and the sooner Africans realise that the better. Only pessimism, calamity and undesirable negative anticipation shapes black Africa in the eyes of those with baleful and exploitation-inspired intrigue on Africa and representation of Africa is in terms of absences, delinquencies and alien. Obama delivering a hot-air speech to the permanently economically crippled black people of South Africa at the memorial service of a revolutionary who could have forced an upgrade of their lives is one of the most strikingly sardonic moments in African history. As the themes continue to emerge, Robert Mugabe’s ideals are resonating well with Africans continent-wide.

South Africa, a significantly unequal society with one of the highest gini-coefficient rankings in the world is on the threshold of a riveting social and political malfunction. Someone somewhere failed to fully address the obvious inequalities which define and are deeply entrenched in this ‘Rainbow Nation’ today. The standing ovation for Robert Mugabe, a real driver for change to address the historically and racially skewed inequalities and to economically empower the black people of Zimbabwe, is affidavit to the inevitable cataclysmic unravelling in South Africa. Little brother will guide big brother towards the summit of economic freedom.

Robert Mugabe is a visionary leader period! The unique feature about this living legend is the unflinching fidelity to ideological course and epistemological substance. When South Africans stood up and gave a resounding ovation to the man who has dedicated his entire life to the Zimbabwean cause, the South African cause was instantly thrust on the agenda. The inequalities in South Africa are not going to be addressed by flamboyant oration from the neo-colonial point man of those who wish to indefinitely degrade Africans to eternal bondage. Africa must seriously starting putting trust in the Mugabe vision. The Mugabe inspired and perceptive astuteness which seeks to dismantle and restructure the neo-colonial DNA which continues to inextricably fasten Africa and its people to enduring subjugation.

 Bernard Bwoni

Jonathan Moyo- redefining efficiency and clarity of vision

Jonathan Moyo: redefines clarity of vision and efficiency

By Bernard Bwoni

December 7, 2013

Politics is about policy and policy is what defines and solidifies a country. It is the foundations and the boundaries, what unites a country, what carries the country forwards and what charts our paths and defines our future generations. It entails efficiency, equity and political practicality. The inclusion of Jonathan Moyo in the new cabinet as Information, Media and Broadcasting Services minister reflects President Mugabe’s commitment to fulfilling those promises made during the election campaign. Moyo mirrors vision, decisiveness and exudes affective and reflective emotional intelligence. Since his appointment, there has been definitive course of action for the sake of facilitation and progress. There is palpability in terms of policy and there is a course of action. The man is taking action and this is what we voted for. Someone who addresses issues head-on and act!  Hate or love the man but there is a practical commitment to national cause and national trajectory!  The man is not just talking, he has fired an entire board of the national broadcasting corporation for what he described as ‘’a mess which has been practically run down in a manner that borders on criminal neglect and mismanagement whose disclosure will shock the nation." You cannot promote mediocrity at the expense of national accretion.

Moyo is not waiting for 2018 to start campaigning again. It is about right here, right now! The moment is right now, this is the defining moment. Something is in fact happening. Someone is addressing mismanagement and incompetence and no excuses! It is all about doing the right thing and doing things right. It is about clarity of declared objectives which are there for the preservation of national interests, long term benefits for all citizens.

 There is a commitment to addressing pressing and real issues, getting hands dirty and driving up processes in this revamping and redefining stage. This is a must after years of depravation, dearth and deficiency; those years of forfeiture and privation induced by those abominable economic sanctions and the impediment to our people-centred policies. There must be an undertaking to quality for its long term aftermath and precise focus on bringing everyone on board. That people-orientated spirit that shy away from divisive politics!

The minister is clear about a move away from factionalism and towards national ideology, national identification and execution. This is what he had to say recently ‘’What we have on the ground are not ideological factions driven by ideas or policy substance, but we have some kind of mini-personality cults; factions based on support for individuals and not support for the party, that are content-free and that are ideologically bankrupt,”. Moyo is clearly stating, let us reintroduce ourselves, reinvent ourselves and deliver on our promises. There is tangibility of this commitment to national vision and what is also striking is the consistency, the resolve and uncompromising attitude towards nation building.

Zimbabwe is on the threshold of an unprecedented economic miracle and as such particular attention must be paid to our investors both locally and externally. There must be a commitment to breaking down barriers as opposed to building them. Intricacy and complexity costs and as a nation focus must be on making things simple, start making things happen and clarity of vision and focus must be fostered nationally and government has to undertake an unwavering committal to flexibility and accountability.

National development and augmentation is only feasible with joint traction as a country. What about if every department starts tackling mismanagement and incompetency the Jonathan Moyo way? It’s not about big conferences and symposiums but the real hard graft on the ground! No gimmicks and no half-hearted pointless statements. There is an undertaking to pursuing novel and creative economic, diplomatic and psychological strategies to kick start our country. ZIMASSET, the land reform, the empowerment and indigenisation policies are not gimmicks. These are solid and home-grown people-focused initiatives that will definitely create the much needed jobs and improve people’s lives and take Zimbabwe to the pinnacle of prosperity. That is exactly where this great country belongs. If only this unwavering committal to addressing exactly what concerns people as Minister Moyo and others have been doing can be cascaded down to every department. Let us give credit where it is due.

Democracy, deception and dictators

Of democracy, deception and dictators

By Bernard Bwoni

December 19, 2013

Is it just the great western hype or the only way out of the African accretive and development delay? A camouflage which serves only to shroud the African reconstruction and reformulation with that unique raison d’être to eternally update and upgrade the existence of those historically dispossessed and disadvantaged. A ‘democratic’ process that remains bogged down in a polarised quagmire, an anomalous and disconcertingly confused and confusing quicksand. Zimbabwe does uphold the principles of ‘democracy’ in its entire entirety and a signatory to conventions that adhere to democratic principles of civil liberties, universal suffrage, human rights, due process, equality and freedom. A pre-condition that the west assert when prescribing and inflicting ‘democracy’ on African countries in particular to become more ‘democratic’ is democracy promotion through elections and multi party political participation. All eligible citizens are accorded the right to vote. If we are to go by the standards set by the ‘bearers of democracy’ then Zimbabwe is Africa’s supreme democracy. However to those stakeholders resolved on subverting national sovereignty, those with peculiar concerns on Zimbabwe it definitely is not.

Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy where the king is both head of state and head of government, where the Qur’an is the constitution and the country is governed on the basis of Islamic Sharia law and elections are as rare as hen’s teeth. The same duplicitous and clandestinely hostile hype that applies to Zimbabwe does not apply in Saudi Arabia a regime which brazenly violates human rights but enjoys cordial relations with the same players who chastise democratic Zimbabwe for illusory allegations which in Saudi Arabia are paltry preschool pastimes. China is another example of a country that does not adhere to the western notions of democracy yet it is set be the world’s largest economy and even Great Britain has been looking east as well.

Democracy is just too vague a term so easy to misunderstand, misrepresent or misinterpret whether deliberately or not. A concept that is clear as mud when applied to African context. Deliberately misinterpreted and misrepresented by those with a delitescent inducement and ingenuously misunderstood by those who obliviously front the cause of those who deliberately misinterpreted the process as a means to their own end. It is very easy to invent and contrive allegations of human rights violations, lack of rule of law and civil liberties. The fabrication used as a means to an end the deceitful forgery as justification to disparage Mugabe and the devious concoction as an excuse to interfere and intervene. It is a foreign inception that has inevitably continued to disconnect with the African establishment. It is a system as opposed to individual failure whose aetiology is multifactoral and multiplex. In fact in the African context it is an abstract conception that is synonymous with stagnation and in some cases retrogression. Take a look around the continent and the trend is repeated country after country. The problem with constant change in young civilisations is lack of continuity and consistency. There is no specific focus or joint traction and those are ideal conditions for retrogradation which is a perfect case scenario for the exploitation and manipulation of the African continent.

That democracy the term is a demented alien set of country-specific principles that cannot be all-embracing and universally prescribed and inflicted is fact. It is a means to an end with no end. Sanctions are also a means to an end but not the end itself. The west imposed excessively and harshly hellish sanctions on Zimbabwe to ‘propel the country towards the democratic end’ and that cannot be disputed; democracy on the western scene with local minders and keepers. All people have a right to existence. There is no smooth side to killing, there is no painless side to violence, travel restrictions or targeted sanctions do not cause a whole nation to suffer, there is no excuse for acts of violence; there is no better or worse violence and all perpetrators walk the same line in the eyes of the recipients of the acts. Violence in politics must never be understated; there are innocent victims and misguided perpetrators. A machete’s slicing affliction bares the same repugnance as sanctions. It is only degree that discerns the two pernicious immoralities.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

In Zimbabwe the opposition believe that they are denied their freedoms to associate, their freedom to ‘subvert’ the nation for the purpose of their ‘democracy’; their freedom to change the current system which they see and believe is unjust. The only issue that is of concern is that whilst the motive behind is laudable, the method and the players seem to have Machiavellian machinations and portentous persistence. The government believes and rightly so that the political playing field has been made uneven by extraneous forces, the unlawful sanctions, the covert and overt external intersession. The opposition vehemently deny this even when the attestation is crushingly and nakedly there to the contrary. Do people genuinely believe those who liberated this country would wilfully engineer the suffering of those they liberated from the crooked clutch of colonisation, imperialism and apartheid? And for what purpose, why undo all the hard-work? Hubris versus purity, purity always triumphs. A tug of war between defenders national sovereignty versus democratic stakeholders of outlandish and ominous attributes. What is it going to be, a dictatorship that corrects and redress an unequal system and promotes people-orientated policies such as a redistributive land reform and empowerment policies or a democracy that safeguards the interests of the perpetually privileged minority?.

Bernard Bwoni can be contacted on bernardbwn@aol.com

ZimAsset: sleek or sloppy slogan?

ZimAsset: sleek reality or sloppy slogan?

By Bernard Bwoni

The eventful year 2013 witnessed the end of tenure of the GNU in an election widely endorsed by African election observers from regional blocs as free, fair and credible but instantly given the not-credible seal of disapproval by the West. The opposition disputed the election results and were well within their rights to challenge the result and file a petition at the Constitutional Court which upheld President Mugabe’s victory. The International community (another term for the US and Europe) expressed and have continued to express reservations publicly on the ‘credibility’ of the electoral process which has meant delays in their re-engagement with the Zimbabwe government. The government of Zimbabwe has remained widely open to positive re-engagement with all its international development partners, past and present.

Following on from the landslide victory, the government has put precedence on economic convalescence and revival. There has been a genuine commitment to address the issues of re-engagement with the ‘international community’, employment creation and regenerating the dilapidated infrastructure. The finance minister Patrick Chinamasa recently went to the IMF and World Bank as part of the re-engagement process and to reopen lines of credit and attract the much needed direct foreign investment. The IMF has placed Zimbabwe on a Staff Monitoring Programme (SMP) as a condition for re-engagement with Zimbabwe if successful implemented and government has remained committed to the programme.

The Zimbabwe government in a positive move to stimulate economic growth has launched robust reforms. The government launched ZimAsset which is a results based management economic blue-print with the aim of increasing and improving quality of government expenditure, increase productivity and competitiveness and improve the business environment as a whole. The financial sector has remained constrained and vulnerable to external and internal shocks and government has not been performing as effectively as it should in terms of revenue collection in particular the alleged weak diamond revenues. In a proactively positive move Minister Chidhakwa has indicated commitment to ‘tracing’ the unremitted revenues and restructuring diamond mining boards.

Over the past few days a number of Zimbabwean analysts have come up in droves castigating ZimAsset as mere politicking not based on reality. The Zimbabwean economic growth has stagnated with a looming liquidity crisis and emotions are understandably running high. This year the economy was expected to stabilise around 5% on a background of improvements in mining and agriculture but that has not happened and growth has remained at 3.4%. When it comes to the general populace it is about ‘bread and butter issues’. The argument that is thrust forward against ZimAsset is ‘blue-prints do not put food on the table’ and in its own right this is a valid argument. However from a government standpoint, as policy-makers economic revival is a priority and novel strategies to kick-start the economy are needed. The furore of countless experts and analysts reproving the economic blue-print without putting forward constructive arguments makes ZimAsset the only attractive option.

The effects of the sanctions and limited access to credit lines must never be under-stated for that has had a detrimental effect to economic recovery. The government has tried re-engaging the IMF and World Bank and the country’s poor credit rating has negatively impacted the ability to access new lines of credit. According to the government ZimAsset is meant as a measure to improve the investment climate and come up with sanction-busting strategies to enable full exploitation and value addition to the country’s abundant natural resources. When broken down to its bare components ZimAsset is a positive strategy that can only be judged following full implementation.

Contrary to the analysts and experts who have dismissed it entirely as gimmicks, the 129 page blue-print actually sets measurable and achievable sector outcomes and the sector outputs are point specific for every key result area. It addresses key areas which if effectively implemented will kick-start the economy. The Quick Wins in the Value Addition and Benefician Cluster if implementation is point-perfect we will see a resurgence of the ailing economy. The blue-print is pin-pointing the specific areas of the economy which will redress the issue of dearth of value addition which has always been the bane of our economic growth. The Chisumbanje ethanol project, the ZimSteel project, establishing of diamond-cutting and processing, stabilising agro-processing projects and strengthening of small and medium enterprises are sure practical strategies to inject life into the economy. However a strategy without effective implementation will remain but just a strategy and that is why some analysts are sceptical. But then if you read the document closely you will notice that the strategy for implementation is via a result-based management system with clear organisational visions and goals which are translated into a results framework of outcomes, outputs, strategies and resources.

A result-based management agenda has always proved effective in most organisational settings and incorporating it into a national economic blue-print is a bold move by the government. The strategy is equivalent of financing that makes payments contingent on the independent verification of results which has the potential of improving decision-making, transparency and accountability. The system aims to focus on actual results as opposed to just activities and outputs. There are clearly defined expected results, regular evaluation and taking timely corrective action. Korea, Australia, Uganda and Malaysia have successfully implemented result-based management systems. The four clusters which are Food Security, Poverty Eradication, Infrastructure and Utilities, and Value Addition and Beneficiation which are identified within ZimAsset are critical to the Zimbabwean economic revival. That is all things being equal of course. These are complex and mammoth blue-prints which require effective implementation.

The system requires an effective senior and middle management structure to ensure vision and focus is cascade down organizational structure. If effectively implemented ZimAsset is Zimbabwe’s own home-tunneled way out of the economic down-turn. The danger is if not fully and effectively implemented it will just end up as a sleek blue-print disintegrate into an empty slogan.

Bernard Bwoni can be contacted at bernardbwn@aol.com

Tony Blair could have invaded who?

Tony Blair could have invaded who?

By Bernard Bwoni

All the devious and dishonest denials and the deceitful negation from the architects of the flagitious sanctions and invasion plots, with their local collaborators deceiving the nation into believing these were travel bans, restrictive measures and genuine engagements. Some called the sanctions a myth and a make-believe story forged by Zanu-PF. The conniving, the concoction and the cunningness of the duplicitous designers of the sanctions and their local partners, some dubiously dubbed them prohibitive measures against the regime. All the malevolent protagonists denied their existence, the US vehemently denied, the EU washed their hands and the local opposition uxoriously laughed off the sanctions as mere restrictions on the ‘oppressive regime’. We were fooled into believing these were mere visa bans on President Mugabe and his ‘cronies’, to prohibit them from travelling to Europe and America. The local opposition in Zimbabwe was disingenuously boisterous, artlessly dismissive and naively opinionated about the existence of economic sanctions against Zimbabwe. The dogmatically goofy Tendai Biti used to front these crooked disclaimers. They brushed off Zanu-PF’s incessant cries of the ravaging effects of the mercilessly criminal sanctions. None of the architects of the sanctions was morally upright or honourable. Those who callously crafted the illegal sanctions blocked their ears, covered their eyes and filled their western-funded bellies to the nation’s sanction-induced poverty-stricken commotion.

The sanctions were and are still as real as life itself, an austere life inflicted on an innocent nation and its people by a counterfeit local opposition which spuriously claimed to be brokers of democracy and liberators of the people. The small print is what legitimised these deceitful designs and muddled the whole nation. The documents are written in such a way as to mesmerise, to suffocate and armed the credulous local opposition with immoral means for national onslaught and destruction.

As Mr. Chester Crocker beautifully and chillingly put it, ‘In order to separate people from Zanu-PF we must make their economy scream and I hope you senators have the stomach for what we about to do”. The US former Secretary for African Affairs and this statement he made in his testimony to the US Senate hearing in 2003. And he was right; boy oh boy did the Zimbabwean economy scream! However it was the sanction-busting Zimbabwean spirit that triumphed over the adversity, that resilience that lifted the amazing people of Zimbabwe from the depth of despair to the summit of hope. The sanctions failed to break that Zimbabwean spirit, the western handlers and those they handheld failed in their sinister quest to break that Zimbabwean spirit. The only other option was a callous plot to invade Zimbabwe which was entertained by the naïve ones; the Tony Blair project and Thabo Mbeki has an honorary place at the Heroes Acres!

In the eyes of those resolved on subverting national sovereignty, those with peculiar concerns on Zimbabwe in the time period and socio-political climate, re-colonisation was served with cheap wine for the local opposition. There is no doubt that democracy is one of the best things to ever happen to mankind. However it is just too vague a term if misunderstood, misinterpreted or misrepresented deliberately or naively. Deliberately misinterpreted and misrepresented by those with a delitescent inducement and genuinely misunderstood by some who were founded and funded by those who deliberately misinterpreted the process as a means to their own end.  Yes I have said it! It is very easy to fabricate and contrive allegations of human rights violations, lack of rule of law and civil liberties. The fabrication as a means to an end, the deceitful forgery as justification to disparage Zanu-PF, the devious concoction as an excuse to intervene militarily and the contriving as a blueprint for sanctions; Uncle Tony to the rescue!

It is Zanu-PF’s contumacious attitude to the neoliberal ethos that is the sole reason for the economic and political sabotage that befell Zimbabwe and the MDC’s dutiful embrace of the same is the reason for the continuation of the sabotage. The Tony Blair project!  Political and economic warfare is used as a means of subverting a nation. There is no way of correcting this crude political caricature.

The journey towards political legendary is not a haphazardly and hastily walked one. It entails having a cause, a just cause, a dedication and commitment to national course and national cause, an unshakeable belief in the cause. No lubricant required to make hasty the process; it does not require one to inflict sanctions and stealth bombers against own people to hasten their peregrination towards political glory. Even Uncle Tony’s invasion would not do it! A genuine cause not one manufactured for own selfish self-serving ends, for the purposes of illegal regime change. The destitution and economic hardship that has been inflicted upon us is the price we might have to pay to safeguard our political and economic independence. We might have to develop even higher-tolerance thresholds in the face of the distress and privation induced by these specific economic sanctions and future threats of Tony-inspired invasion plots.

Bernard Bwoni

The Zimbabwe Dollar returns: economics versus emotions

Dollarisation: economics and emotions

By Bernard Bwoni

Economists, wherefore art thou? The Cross-Biti Economic Theory, an economic model of those engineered out of a pessimistic prospect whose speculative negativity is only intended to create uncertainty and panic. These erudite economic experts must be fully aware of the damaging impact of their negative conjectural scaremongering about the Zimbabwean economy surely? The fragile economy does not need these echoes of doom at the moment. Everyone is fully aware of the colossal task ahead. The Zimbabwe economy is afflicted with low capacity utilisation and value addition and government is working towards a move away from net importation of goods to local value addition and that is stating the obvious. Everyone knows that.

‘Zim-Asset is a wish list that is not based on reality’. A statement like this must be backed by empirical evidence for it to be taken seriously.  This is an unsubstantiated and random claim from one of the leaders of the doomsday pact. Zim-Asset is in fact based on a result-based management system to ensure accountability, efficiency and effective delivery of service.

‘There is no such thing as a free lunch’. The benefits of dollarization have come at cost for Zimbabwe. The case for or against dollarization is a contentious issue and requires delicate hands and sober minds. The recent highly opinionated speculative statements from a former finance minister of Zimbabwe about an imminent return of the Zimbabwe dollar are irresponsibly unfortunate, unnecessary and untimely. What is the point of creating uncertainty and panic? Why inject panic into an already fragile financial system?

What is it going to be, inflation or monetary control? With dollarization, the Reserve Bank has basically lost its influence on conduct of the monetary policy which means it has given up control of the interest rate and money. In as much as dollarization has brought inflationary stability, it has in fact eliminated the possibility of financing the fiscal deficit with seigniorage which also compound the current liquidity crisis because without this possibility of public financing, the government will have to look for fallback sources of revenue. What has happened is that government has basically given up control of the money supply which regulates and restricts any stabilising response of fiscal policy to adverse extrinsic and intrinsic unpredictability.

‘Think like an Economist’. The model is emotionally-charged, duplicitous and disingenuous as it is superficially skewed towards dollarization and armed with negative anticipation when it comes to the reintroduction of a domestic currency. Zimbabwe is currently facing a banking sector and liquidity crisis. Dollarization has imposed limitations on the Reserve Bank’s role as the lender of last resort to the banking sector which means local banks are already at a disadvantage and prone to internal and external shocks. Quantitative Easing is a source for liquidity and without a domestic currency the Reserve Bank will have to look for alternative sources to respond to financial crises. The Zimbabwe economy has widely been opened to capital mobility, left vulnerable to shocks and government has its hands tied in terms of flexibility to respond to these shocks. What this doomsday pact should be telling us is how to address these liquidity crises emerging.

Should Zimbabwean banks establish lines of credit with international institutions to respond to liquidity problems? What are the pitfalls? It is apparent that the country is facing huge fiscal deficits, deeper external imbalances and continuous capital flight. The current banking sector crisis indicates an unstable demand for money which is impacting on the capacity of the Reserve Bank to conduct monetary policy. The Zimbabwean banking sector is thus left susceptible to high insolvency risks, higher deposit volatility and propensity to suffer sudden disruptions in capital flows. There is a series of systemic banking crises in Zimbabwe with slower and more volatile output growth without any visible gains in terms of domestic financial depth. If the Reserve Bank had the role of lender of last resort it would be in a position to provide loans to crisis-hit banks facing liquidity problems. This needs to be talked about as distressing as it is.

‘Agriculture is in such a mess that it will take many years to get back on its feet, but the restoration of secure land rights and the resumption of low cost financing will start to push out in 2014/2015’ said one cross emotional economic analyst. Why the cross preoccupation with restoration of secure land rights? How come the beneficiaries of the land reform are not the ones clamouring for ‘restoration of secure land rights’? Remember the Kenyan example? I am sorry to cross you, but there is nothing wrong with a 99 year lease. The same cross analyst making contradictory predictions of a theoretical agriculture sector in a mess but indicators on the ground show a booming sector buoyed by bumper tobacco harvest of over 160 million kg of tobacco and earnings totalling US$1.3 billion up from US$700 million in the 2012. What ‘mess’ is this cross analyst talking about? The duplicity of the cross analyst and the emotional outbursts from one of our former Finance Ministers defines this crafty economic model.

The issue of dollarization as contentious as it is needs national attention minus the associated emotions. Panama was the first fully dollarised economy in South America and managed to fully bring back their domestic currency. Zimbabwe is also the first economy in Africa to fully dollarise? Bring on the debate!

Bernard Bwoni can be contacted at bernardbwn@aol.com

Robert Mugabe: principles and ideas for preservation

Mugabe: principles and ideas for preservation

By Bernard Bwoni

Mugabe represents a substance-endowed bonafide movement with concrete and original principles to uphold the ideology of self-determination, self-respect and self-preservation. It is the definitive struggles that have historically and repeatedly continue to afflict the African continent and its indigenous people that epitomises the Mugabe cause. The principles and ideas of Mugabe define a permanent struggle to realistically disconnect the people of Africa from twisted neo-colonial structures which continually seek to eternally forsake and consign Africans to a lifetime of braise and beggary. The ideas that Africa must define its own destiny, the idea that the black Africans are no lesser beings and African countries are sovereign nations who have a fundamental right to self-determination embodies the Mugabe vision. ‘’We of Africa protest that, in this day and age, we should continue to be treated as lesser human beings than other races’’. An insightful leader whose ultimate purpose is a foundational fidelity to unconditionally unhitch the people of Zimbabwe and Africa from the historical homicide inflicted upon them by a brazenly neocolonial inception; an establishment that remains clandestinely intact and reinvents itself in continuously cunning and counterfeit conformations. Of the open-zips, the shut minds, the high seas and the mediocrity.

"We have fought for our land, we have fought for our sovereignty, small as we are we have won our independence and we are prepared to shed our blood"….."So Blair, keep your England and let me keep my Zimbabwe," It is no longer just about Mugabe the man, but the boundless beefy ideas, the prodigious principles and profoundly dense values. It is that infinite potency, the definitive detail, unique blue-print and permanent patch of the African fighting fabric. A man so loved on the continent yet much loathed offshore by a neocolonial formation; it is that conscientious conviction to the African cause that inspires the deep-rooted contempt from the very same covert and overtly biased establishment. The diabolical and devilish denigration of Mugabe the man is just a vicious veneer to extinguish the inevitable spread of the Mugabe ideological flame that is popularly proliferating across the continent. It is the familiar disconnected ramblings of the permanently purblind Africans who cynically clutch to the misplaced and misguided hope of a Mugabe finale that should distinguish the man from the idea. The Mugabe idea has no epilogue, it has no bounds and it is here indefinitely to nurture and enhance the lives of citizens who have endured eternal austerity and deprivation. It is an eternal verity as real as life itself.

‘Was it not enough punishment and suffering in history that we were uprooted and made helpless slaves not only in new colonial outposts but also domestically’? Mugabe principles and values are a precept of teachings, life lessons, life struggles, a determination to continually empower and endow the lives of Africans who have sustained abiding privation and colonially and racially-inflicted forfeiture and destitution. It is a lifelong struggle to arm and empower the minds and spirits of Africans to defend Africa and African ideals.

‘The land is ours. It's not European and we have taken it, we have given it to the rightful people... Those of white extraction who happen to be in the country and are farming are welcome to do so, but they must do so on the basis of equality’. It is a lifetime devotion to address the despicable inequalities and dishonorable deeds from a callous colonial configuration. The Mugabe ideas expound the non-negotiable notion of ownership and total economic independence to rectify a deliberate disparity. It teaches the key principles of equity, fairness and respect. The long term vision of lasting prosperity and real ownership is the intended outcome but is currently characterised by obscurity and manipulation from the crafty chicanery of an unrelenting external saboteur and an impressionable internal handheld opposition which naively stand in the way of progress.

‘Don't drink at all, don't smoke, you must exercise and eat vegetables and fruit’. A morally upright ideology defined by an emotionally intelligent and perceptive visionary leader, counselor and teacher. It is a social construct and system which transcends Mugabe the physical man, it goes above and beyond panAfricanism as it has notably redressed and restructured the historically racially-contrived bias and imbalance in Zimbabwe and to be cascaded continent-wide.  An ideology cannot be enforced it is born out of a quest for unifying verities for ideological accretion. These are principles worth preserving.

Bernard Bwoni can be contacted at bernardbwn@aol.com

Zimbabwe Focus Narrative: Nelson Mandela: Legacy betrayed by hypocrisy

Zimbabwe Focus Narrative: Nelson Mandela: Legacy betrayed by hypocrisy:  Mandela: Legacy betrayed by hypocrisy By Bernard Bwoni First and foremost I would want to express my sincere condolences to the...

Nelson Mandela: Legacy betrayed by hypocrisy

 Mandela: Legacy betrayed by hypocrisy

By Bernard Bwoni

First and foremost I would want to express my sincere condolences to the Mandela family, the people of South Africa for their loss and may his kind and selfless soul rest in peace. The man was a revolutionary first and global statesman second no doubt about that. It is quite endearing to see how the man was loved by so many, a hero to South Africans he helped liberate, a celebrity to those who once referred to him as a terrorist and detained indefinitely and a global statesman to those who heard about him. Some have called him a ‘sell-out’ who pandered to the whims of the racist apartheid system, some have labelled him a global icon and some Africans have remained neutral. Mandela brought political independence and peace to South Africa and at that contentious and crucial time political power was more than enough. Black South Africa had to learn to crawl before they could walk. The man deserves our respect as Africans. Let this African hero rest in peace after 27 years of torture, privation, humiliation and being broken down by a racist and unforgiving system.

Let us respect and honour what Mandela stood for and not what he achieved or did not achieve and could not achieve. He was absent for 27 years and to be fair there was not enough time to achieve it all. The man has left a legacy for politically independent South Africa and for those who he forgave and indirectly or directly re-empowered. Africa has its heroes and legends and they are not worldwide political celebrities. The Mandela legacy was hijacked by the same system that incarcerated and broke him down. I sympathise with Mandela, a selfless man under siege from his own legacy due to the hypocrisy of a permanently irreversible racist system that continually manifests itself in duplicitous and disingenuous forms. One moment Mandela is a terrorist because of his pro-people policies, the next he is the world’s greatest statesman because his selflessness safeguarded the interests of white apartheid South Africa. It is quite insincere how the establishment wants the world to perceive this great son of Africa. He is portrayed as a man who forgave and forgot the evils of an unforgiving and relentless system that only serves its own interests and no one else; an unrepentant system that continues to deceive and misinform at the expense of the African continent. Mandela was a fiery and uncompromising young black African revolutionary who challenged a racist and unjust system. A young man with the African ideology indelibly tattooed on his spirit. 27 years in penitentiary for that ideological tattoo he paid. That is the Mandela the western media circus will never celebrate. The Mandela the racist system broke down we respect for his resilience and humility. The man had a cause, a just cause for that matter. The worldwide media celebrity that got separated from the revolutionary we still respect and honour. The establishment that separated the revolutionary from the man Africa must forever guard against.

I always wonder why men of principle and uncompromising commitment to the African ideology such  as Patrice Lumumba, Robert Mugabe, Kwame Nkrumah,  Steve Biko, Amilcar Cabral, Thomas Sankara and Muammar Gadaffi just to name a few have been confined to the back pages of history books. The common defining feature about these Africans is their unswerving assiduity to the African cause, to upgrade and economically empower black African lives. The selfless, humble and broken Mandela had no choice but to choose peace and political power over economic emancipation. On the other hand the forgotten and invisible visionary African leaders put emphasis on cascading real power down to the people, advocating for policies that focused on African self-sustenance and self-reliance and deconstructing that neo-colonial structure that continues to render Africans perennially indebted to those who subjugated and economically raped the African continent for centuries. Who really defines our heroes as Africans? How come it is African leaders who focused on ameliorating black African people’s lives who are portrayed as demons and devils worldwide? Patrice Lumumba was mercilessly slaughtered for his people orientated policies and his resistance to Belgian neo-colonial advances in the Katanga region. Thomas Sankara, a morally upright and pragmatic African legend who at the time of his brutal assassination owned a Renault 5 car, a handful bikes and received a $450 a month salary has never and most likely will never feature on the celebrity-crazy establishment media.  Robert Mugabe has endured unimaginable western media onslaught and demonization for his unwavering committal to economically empower the people of Zimbabwe through his people-focused land reform and indigenisation policies. Colonel Gadaffi was callously and cowardly murdered for it. Lumumba suffered the same fate, so did Cabral. The African ideology will never be allowed to take root because it goes against the 500 year plan to continually exploit the continent of its abundant natural resources until fully exhausted. Any ideology that seeks to economically empower black Africa will forever be suffocated and ridiculed.

It is quite disheartening that our heroes are being defined by those who have historically relegated Africans to perpetual serfdom and servitude. Mandela is an African icon, a legend and revolutionary, a young man who got up one day and said enough is enough of this injustice and racism and the price he paid for his dedication to the African cause was 27 years in prison. An Africa which decides and defines its own heroes is a truly liberated Africa. Let us respect and honour our heroes and never forsake them because the establishment said so. Let us honour our heroes and respect them for putting their lives on hold to liberate us all.

 

Bernard Bwoni (the African ideology will not die)

In Mugabe Africa must seriously trust!

In Mugabe Africa must seriously trust!

By Bernard Bwoni

As the media circus hijacked the memorial service of Mandela, certain ideological African themes are becoming more prominent and ineradicably embedded. There is a resurrection of the belief in the African ideology and the resonant acclamation President Mugabe received at the mention of his name at the FNB stadium is affirmation of the credence. The people of Africa, the real people of Africa know who their real heroes are and no amount of illusory media sophistry and air-brushing is going to change that. President Mugabe received a standing ovation and he did not even stand at the podium to give a speech. The man must be doing something very right. No let me rephrase that, the man is doing something right. Legends are born, not scripted. It is that unwavering, lifelong and indelible ideological immersion to a cause that personifies Robert Mugabe amply. What is interesting to note is that the inexorable thunderous ovation for Mugabe was right in the glare of those hypocritical kingmakers with privy designs and ominous intent who have incessantly and historically misinformed and disinformed the world about Mugabe. The Mugabe frenzy that is sweeping across the African continent has no preclusion. Those with inauspicious intentions on Zimbabwe have tried suppressing and smothering the ideologically-congealed Mugabe mania for it to resurface again and again as happened at the FNB stadium. Robert Mugabe’s standing ovation was for an unshakeable belief in a cause and the ovation for Obama was sheer curiosity and that novel feeling of seeing a black man fronting the very threat to that African cause. 

Robert Mugabe is an extraordinary African. A man with the black African cause permanently ingrained to his whole being is what defines him. Zimbabwe has been under siege and the man has soaked all the demonization and onslaught with an unparalleled tenacity and resoluteness. He is a principled man with an indefatigable bond to delivering his people from the implacable neo-colonial structure which manifests itself in many forms to continually quell the African quest for lasting and real independence which seeks to economically liberate the continent and its people. The tumultuous ovation he received in the FNB stadium was no gimmick. That was open recognition from real African people with an unfulfilled thirst for definitive emancipation and not the delusory independence they had to settle for. Robert Mugabe represents real hope for the masses with an unfeigned and authentic proposal to truly liberate Africa and Africans. Do not believe the media hype about demons and dictators! That is just a smoke-screen to asphyxiate the African economic genesis that has the unique bonafide raison d’être to uplift and upgrade the lives of black Africans. Aid and donations have not done it yet! Most definitely will never do it and Africans eternally declassed to beggars and burgers! No real meat, no substance just barebones. No foreign aid is ever truly altruistic and the sooner Africans realise that the better. Only pessimism, calamity and undesirable negative anticipation shapes black Africa in the eyes of those with baleful and exploitation-inspired intrigue on Africa and representation of Africa is in terms of absences, delinquencies and alien. Obama delivering a hot-air speech to the permanently economically crippled black people of South Africa at the memorial service of a revolutionary who could have forced an upgrade of their lives is one of the most strikingly sardonic moments in African history. As the themes continue to emerge, Robert Mugabe’s ideals are resonating well with Africans continent-wide.

South Africa, a significantly unequal society with one of the highest gini-coefficient rankings in the world is on the threshold of a riveting social and political malfunction. Someone somewhere failed to fully address the obvious inequalities which define and are deeply entrenched in this ‘Rainbow Nation’ today. The standing ovation for Robert Mugabe, a real driver for change to address the historically and racially skewed inequalities and to economically empower the black people of Zimbabwe, is affidavit to the inevitable cataclysmic unravelling in South Africa. Little brother will guide big brother towards the summit of economic freedom.

Robert Mugabe is a visionary leader period! The unique feature about this living legend is the unflinching fidelity to ideological course and epistemological substance. When South Africans stood up and gave a resounding ovation to the man who has dedicated his entire life to the Zimbabwean cause, the South African cause was instantly thrust on the agenda. The inequalities in South Africa are not going to be addressed by flamboyant oration from the neo-colonial point man of those who wish to indefinitely degrade Africans to eternal bondage. Africa must seriously starting putting trust in the Mugabe vision. The Mugabe inspired and perceptive astuteness which seeks to dismantle and restructure the neo-colonial DNA which continues to inextricably fasten Africa and its people to enduring subjugation.