Messages From Zimbabwe

A BBC investigation in Zimbabwe has uncovered evidence that senior people around President Robert Mugabe are benefiting from the sale of illegal diamonds. World Affairs Editor John Simpson has just returned from a visit to Marange, in eastern Zimbabwe, which contains the largest known concentration of diamonds in the world.

Until six months ago the Marange diamond fields were occupied by hundreds of illegal local diggers.

The diamonds were easy to find. They either lay on the surface or just a few feet below.

The diggers sold them to dealers in nearby town of Mutare, who smuggled them out of the country.

Then on 31 October, we were told, the government moved in.

Helicopter gunships, soldiers and police were sent to attack the illegal diggers.

At least 150 of them were killed. According to survivors we spoke to, some of them were set on by police dogs and torn apart.

Senior sources in the capital, Harare, insisted that an operation on this scale could only have been authorised by President Robert Mugabe himself.

Now the diamond fields at Marange are under the control of the army, and the roads around it are guarded by police road-blocks.

It proved to be very hard for us to film the diamond fields for the BBC, though in the end we managed it.

Yet, as it turned out, the purpose of the operation was not to take over the diamond diggings in order to provide revenue for Zimbabwe‘s almost empty treasury.

Diamonds are still being dug out at Marange, but reliable sources in Zimbabwe insist that they are not appearing on the legal market.

Instead, we were told, they are still being smuggled out of the country and sold illegally.

So who are the beneficiaries?

In Harare we spoke to a former judge, who was once President Mugabe’s top civil servant and played a key role in the Lancaster House negotiations in 1980 which brought about Zimbabwe‘s independence.

Justice George Smith retired from the bench in 2003, and nowadays he is a consultant to Zimbabwe‘s diamond industry.

In the current climate in Zimbabwe, it is dangerous even for a man as distinguished as Justice Smith to name names.

But when I asked him if he was talking about people right at the top, he replied: “Very much so.”

Zimbabwe has great mineral riches, yet it has been driven almost to economic collapse.

One hundred trillion Zimbabwe dollars are now worth $3 (£2).

Yet Robert Mugabe’s closest supporters thrive as a result of illegal diamonds.

Not surprisingly, people in Zimbabwe call them “blood diamonds”.

 (Source)

For the first time a handful of white farmers saw one of President Robert Mugabe’s cabinet ministers and his land invaders humiliated over farm seizures.

Deputy prime minister Arthur Mutambara, on a mission assigned him by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, went into the heart of the most troubled farming area on a whirlwind visit, ignored deeply rooted district protocols, took control of the multi-party fact-finding visit, and ordered invaders off the land.

He accused the invaders of “reaping what they did not sow”, of breaking the law and destroying the economy. He told policemen to uphold the law. He also called one of Mugabe’s loyalists “immoral”.

Mugabe’s land minister, Herbert Murewha, his head cast down, had to endure Mutambara’s volley of anger when he saw tens of thousands of kilograms of export fruit rotting because the farmer, Ben Freeth, has been prevented from entering his packing shed in the past few weeks.

Freeth’s farm, Mount Carmel, has been given to Mugabe’s biographer, former information minister Nathan Shamuyarira. “You are giving Mr Shamuyarira a bad name,” he told Landmine Chigombira, the top thug on Freeth’s farm who has ordered workers to be beaten and houses to be pillaged in the past few days.

Mutambara then told the assembled crowd on the farm that Freeth and his team must be left to live in their homes peacefully and to return to work the same day.

An hour later, after Mutambara left, Freeth and his workers were chased away.

However, Mutambara said after the trip – the first one by the inclusive government sworn into power two months ago – that he would not react to the defiance of his orders. “What matters is that the next time Mugabe denies there have been fresh land invasions I can say that is not true, I saw it for myself.”

Freeth and his father-in-law, Mike Campbell, are still recovering from injuries from last year’s vicious attacks.

“It didn’t make any difference today, but at least he (Mutambara) came and he took control, he questioned workers and they told him how they had suffered and he was obviously angry at what has been going on. Let’s see how this works out,” said Freeth.

“There will be no holy cows. The axe will hit where it may and we will not tolerate any government official who is prolonging lawlessness in the country,” Mutambara said on another farm he visited.

“Our country is trying to attract investment, attract foreign aid. We can’t afford to be damaging business confidence in this country.”

Farmers in the area told officials that 17 farms had been affected since January and that the president of Zimbabwe‘s senate, Edna Madzongwe was behind one of the seizures.

“It’s going to be interesting to see what comes out of this,” said Colin Cloete, former president of the Commercial Farmers’ Union, whose farm Mutambara visited first.

“Word got out early in the morning that he was coming and some of them packed up and left. I was quite impressed,” he said.

(Source)

A committee representing ordinary parliamentarians on Friday accused Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC party leadership of double standards, saying it will defend its members who are facing imminent disciplinary action after receiving vehicles from the central bank against party position. The committee, formed a month ago after Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Gideon Gono pledged to allocate second hand vehicles to the lawmakers until government sources funds for new cars, accused the MDC-T leaders of duplicity. Addressing a press conference in the capital, the chairperson of the committee Makhosini Hlongwane (ZANU PF MP) said MDC-T leaders in the executive had received vehicles from the central bank to discharge their duties and should not stop ordinary MPs from doing the same. Tsvangirai’s MDC said the over 50 MPs from the party who received vehicles from the central bank would face disciplinary action. It said lawmakers should be allocated vehicles through a parliamentary loan scheme.

Hlongwane said backbenchers were in a desperate situation since their election in March last year. “Matters affecting our honourable MPs have not been addressed for too long,” Hlongwane said. “Since March 2008, we have had a deplorable situation where members of parliament have been travelling in haulage trucks and public transport, buses, kombis and sometimes ambulances to attend parliamentary business. That is not good. Can you imagine an honourable Member of Parliament carrying copies of the Hansard in a haulage truck?” He added: “In some cases we have members of parliament smuggling bread into hotels because they cannot afford lunch and dinner in hotels, which would have been booked for them by Parliament (most hotels only provide bed and breakfast). That is deplorable.”

Hlongwane accused the MDC-T leadership of double standards. “No member of parliament should be denied to participate in government business, including the interim use of these (central bank) vehicles. We are not being extravagant, we are cautious. Even more cautious than most people who claim to have more financial prudence,” he said. “I don’t want anyone to misread on our preparedness to defend members of parliament who will be victims for receiving the second hand cars by those who received brand new Mercedes Benz and limousines. We are going to watch and see. We will respond to these matters when they come. We are not clamouring for material things.” The donation of cars, Hlongwane added, should never be seen from the “perspective of one party”. “There is a subtle instigation to create an unpalatable relationship between members of parliament and the executive,” he said.

(Source)

Botswana has offered a US$70 million credit line to help revive struggling Zimbabwean industries, a senior Zimbabwean official said on Thursday.

“Botswana is proposing to provide US$70 million in credit support for some industries, all that is left is to tie up the agreement,” the official said.

A Botswana delegation, led by the secretary for Economic and Financial Policy, Taufila Nyamadzabo, met Zimbabwe’s Finance Minister Tendai Biti in Harare to discuss details of the financial package.

Nyamadzabo said the global financial crisis is keeping Botswana from doing more.

Zimbabwean Finance Minister Tendai Biti thanked Botswana and said he hoped others “with much bigger pockets” would also pitch in.

Biti was flying to South Africa later Thursday to review pledges other neighbours have made.

Southern African leaders have urged Africans to help Zimbabwe, but also made clear their resources are limited.

South Africa, the region’s economic power house, may be heading into recession and Botswana is seeing demand for its diamonds falter.

(Source)

At least 29 people were killed and 39 injured when a bus plunged into a river bed near Chivhu town in southern Zimbabwe, police said on Thursday.

“Twenty-nine people were killed and 39 sustained various injuries when a bus travelling to Harare ploughed into Munyati River,” on Wednesday, police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena told AFP.

“We suspect the driver lost control after the right front tyre burst.”

He said police had set up a temporary post at the Chivhu hospitals where they are inviting relatives to come and identify bodies of the dead.

The accident happened on the same road where a collision killed the wife of Zimbabwe‘s new Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai in March.

Traffic accidents in Zimbabwe are mainly caused by the bad state of roads which are littered with gaping potholes often referred to as “drumholes” because of their size.

(Source)

Violence intensified on farms across Zimbabwe over the Easter holidays, with farm invaders attacking workers and owners, while more than US$2 million worth of produce could go to waste after invaders stopped harvesting operations on at least at two farms. At Nancy Carmel farm near the town of Chegutu, a farm labourer was severely burnt after a mob of farm invaders assaulted him and threw him into a fire, a farmer, Ben Freath, told Zim Online. The invaders have also been stealing mangoes at the farm, according to Freath, who is part of a group of white farmers who successfully challenged the legality of the government’s land reform programme at the regional SADC Tribunal. “About US$50 000 worth of mango has been affected and 150 workers are not allowed to work. One of them was thrown into the fire … they beat him up and he suffered a broken skull,” Freath said.

At Stokedale farm, also near Chegutu, invaders forced operations to a halt and oranges worth US$2 million could go to waste as a result, according to Justice for Agriculture (JAG), a pressure group for white farmers. A group of invaders stormed Wolghamton farm in Chipinge in the east of the country over the holidays and attempted to stop owner Trevor Gifford from harvesting timber at the farm. Gifford, who is also president of the Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) that is the main representative body for the country’s white farmers, said invaders showed him a “fraudulent court order” that he should stop harvesting the timber. “They had a fraudulent court document in which the beneficiary wanted to get the police to stop me from harvesting saying he had obtained a court order to do so,” said Gifford.

Freath said farmers had written to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai who formed a power-sharing government with President Robert Mugabe last February and has called for the arrest and prosecution of farm invaders. “We have made reports but the Joint Operations Command (JOC) is controlling the situation. We have written to the Prime Minister (Morgan Tsvangirai) regarding what is happening but at this stage it is being allowed to continue and it is difficult for the PM or anyone else to stop it,” said Freath. The JOC, a committee of top securocrats and powerful politicians, is said to be behind the mobs of Mugabe’s ZANU PF supporters, war veterans and state security agents that began invading farms almost immediately after formation of an inclusive government in February between Tsvangirai, President Robert Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara.

The JOC that includes the commanders of the police and army – and should have been defunct by now in terms of the power-sharing agreement between Zimbabwe’s political parties — is said to be opposed to the new government and is seen as blocking calls by Tsvangirai last month on the police to arrest farm invaders. Commercial farmers’ organisations say invaders have since February raided at least 100 of the about 300 remaining white-owned commercial farms, a development that has intensified doubts over whether the unity government will withstand attempts by ZANU PF hardliners to sabotage it. The International Monetary Fund and Western countries have – on top of other conditions – made it clear that hey would not consider giving aid to the Harare government while farm invasion continue. Zimbabwe, also grappling with its worst ever economic crisis, has since 2000 when land reforms began, relied on food imports and handouts from international food agencies mainly due to failure by resettled black peasants to maintain production on former white farms.

Poor performance in the mainstay agricultural sector has also had far reaching consequences as hundreds of thousands of people have lost jobs while the manufacturing sector, starved of inputs from the sector, is operating below 30 percent of capacity. The SADC Tribunal has ruled that Mugabe’s controversial programme to seize white-owned land from whites for redistribution to landless blacks was racist, discriminatory and illegal under the SADC Treaty to which Zimbabwe is signatory. Mugabe, who has in the past rejected the few rulings by Zimbabwean courts against his land reforms, rejected the regional Tribunal ruling and vowed to press on with farm seizures.

(Source)

South Africa remains committed to assisting in resolving the economic crisis in Zimbabwe, the foreign affairs department said on Wednesday.

Director-general Ayanda Ntsaluba said the department was considering a proposal received from the Zimbabwean government.

“South Africa will help in alleviating the plight of the most vulnerable in terms of targeted sectors like health and education and in terms of credit line,” Ntsaluba said.

The government was in discussions to determine how much it was prepared to give Zimbabwe, but declined to speculate.

“We’d prefer not to say how much is involved as discussions are still underway,” Ntsaluba said.

It was vital for other SADC countries to join in in helping out in Zimbabwe as the inclusive government there continued to work together as a unit.

“We continue to be encouraged by progress the inclusive government is making. We get a sense of greater coherence and commitment by all parties involved,” Ntsaluba said.

(Source)

Zimbabwe‘s speaker of Parliament on Sunday announced a 25-member committee drawn from both ZANU PF and the two formations of the MDC which will oversee the drafting of the country’s new constitution, but appealed for funding for the process to be a success.

The committee drawn from President Robert Mugabe’s ZANU PF party, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and Deputy Premier Arthur Mutambara’s faction of the MDC will with effect from Monday convene an all-stakeholders’ conference.

The 25 members of the committee are, from ZANU PF Flora Bhuka, Walter Chidakwa, Chindori Chininga, Joram Gumbo, Paul Mangwana, Martin Khumalo, Tambudzai Mohadi, Olivia Muchena, Monica Mutsvangwa and Thokozile Mathuthu; from MDC-T is Amos Chibaya, Gladys Gombani Dube, Ian Kay, Cephas Makuyana, Evelyn Masaiti, Editor Matamisa, Douglas Mwonzora, Jabulani Ndlovu, Brian Tshuma, Gift Chimanikire and Jessei Majome; then David Coltart, Dalumazi Khumalo and Edward Tshotsho Mkhosi (from MDC-M); and Fortune Charumbira (President of the Chiefs Council).

Speaker of the House Lovermore Moyo said the select committee will drive the writing of the new constitution for the country in the next 18 months as outlined under the global political agreement (GPA) the parties signed last year.

“The constitution making process will require substantial financial and human resources,” Moyo said at press conference in Parliament.

“I therefore, call upon all progressive forces to join hands with us in ensuring that the process brings tangible results that we can all be proud of.

“This historic inter-party political agreement places the responsibility of leading the constitution making process on the Parliament and more importantly, provides an opportunity for the country to create a constitution by the people for the people.”

He said a constitution was a living and sacred document that “we should all be proud of”.

Moyo said a draft constitution should be tabled by February next year, before it is put to the public for a referendum in July of the same year. The draft constitution must be introduced in Parliament by October next year.

Moyo, aware of the 2000 referendum that rejected a government-driven draft constitution, pointed out that Parliament needed to be diligent so that the constitution making process is a success.

“This is because making a new constitution for Zimbabwe, not for the present, but for posterity, is the major deliverable expected from the seventh parliament which we cannot be found wanting.”

He said apart from lawmakers, members tasked with the drafting of the new constitution will be drawn from business, students, rights groups, churches, media, women’s groups, labour and farmers among others.

The drafting of new constitution is expected to lead to free and fair elections once the supreme law is signed into law by the president.

According to Article 6 of the GPA, a parliamentary select committee will be composed of legislators and representatives of civil society, but the committee will have a final say in the drafting of the proposed constitution.

The agreement states that the select committee should be in place two months after the formation of the inclusive government and should convene an “all-stakeholders” conference within three months after its appointment. The inclusive government was formed on February 13.

The public consultation process, the pact reads, should be completed no later than four months after the stakeholders’ conference and referendum shall be held to allow Zimbabweans to have final say on the draft constitution. 

In the event that the draft is approved in a referendum, it shall be gazetted within a month of the date of the plebiscite and would be introduced in parliament not later than a month after the expiration of a period of 30 days from the date of gazetting.

Zimbabwe is currently governed under the 1979 constitution agreed at the Lancaster House talks in London. The constitution has been amended 19 times since the country’s Independence in 1980.

An attempt to introduce a new constitution between 1999 and 2000 failed after the NCA and other civil society organisations, backed by a nascent MDC, successfully campaigned against a government-sponsored draft.

NCA chair Lovemore Madhuku has promised to oppose an new draft penned by political parties without direct input from the public.

“People must write their own constitution directly, not through politicians, parliamentarians or government. The surest way to make sure that a constitution is respected is if it is written by the people themselves and carries their word,” Madhuku said after the signing of the GPA on September 15 2008.

(Source)

I looked through a list of one of the more recent line-ups of the ZANU PF government and found that in the list of 58 or so Ministers were 17 PhDgraduates, many from prestigious Universities in Europe and the USA. Mugabe himself is no slouch, he works out, drinks very little and eats sparingly. He has 6 University degrees in valuable skills such as law and economics and is clearly above average in intelligence. Why then the propensity to self-destruct?

They know what is required to run a modern economy; we have lots of examples of economic reform programmes adopted with great fanfare and then fudged and abandoned. They did a lot of good things in the early 80’s and yet they have these blind spots. How could they ever have imagined they would get away with Gukurahundi? Murambatsvina? How could they expect to be able to destroy the commercial agricultural system and still feed the country and keep the economy on its feet? But they did, clearly, because that is just what they have done and have expected to be absolved of all wrongdoing, if not by the deluded West then by their colleagues on the African Continent.

Now, in front of the whole world they sign up to an African brokered deal after 18 months of tortuous negotiations and then, even before the ink is dry, they are violating the agreement in fundamental ways and expecting to get away with these violations. The list of violations grows every day. Farm invasions, theft of private property, illegal detentions, false allegations against neighboring States and agreement partners, abductions, murder, torture, illegal appointments, failure to implement agreed reforms and now manipulation of ministerial mandates.

Last winter, 95 per cent of the wheat crop was grown by the traditional large-scale commercial farmers, 5 per cent by the so-called “new” farmers. Last summer 97 per cent of the tobacco crop was grown by a handful of remaining large-scale growers, the same can be said of milk, pigs, poultry and fruit. Yet the secretive cabal that runs the security and legal apparatus of the transitional government under ZANU PF tutelage is, as I write, destroying every last vestige of what was a decade ago, the most productive agricultural community in Africa. In doing so they are using violence, theft and extra legal methods that defy logic and any sense of justice.

We are now just 30 days from the date by which winter crops of wheat and barley should be planted. I can predict now, with absolute certainty, that the winter crops will be half or less of those planted last winter. April is the start of the new crop cycle for tobacco and if things remain as they are, this country, which at one time ranked with Brazil and the United States as a producer and exporter of quality flue cured tobacco, will cease to be a significant player. The industry is about to collapse totally.

Tobacco firms will close their processing plants and the largest auctions floors in the world will become warehouses for food aid. Our economy which just ten years ago sustained a population of 15 million and supported an education system that was the pride of Africa together with a health system that was able to deal with all but the most complex cases, is down to being unable to support even the most basic of services. In January total tax collections were equal to US$4 million, less than 2 per cent of what we needed to run the country. Yet the men and women who did this to us give no sign that they acknowledge their failures or even that they were in any way responsible for our total collapse.

The irony of the fact that they have participated in the past in forums that have yielded principled statements on human and political rights, signed up to agreements guaranteeing those rights and giving verbal accent to them on many occasions, then violated those same principles with impunity in the pursuit of power, seems to be lost on them. They spent most of their lives demanding democracy and equal rights only to brush both principles aside when challenged at the ballot box. When faced with limited and targeted sanctions by the very people who supported their struggle for justice in the 60’s and 70’s with mandatory UN sanctions against Smith, they cry foul.

They had become one of the most corrupt and greedy administrations in the world and yet they demand to be trusted with others funds and allowed to do as they please with aid. They flaunt their wealth before an impoverished nation where just a month ago, 75 per cent of the entire population had to be fed by foreign donors because the government could not do so or be trusted to do so if empowered. Yet these people, show no shame, no understanding or even awareness of what damage they have done, not just to the people and nation of Zimbabwe, but to the entire continent as we all bear the consequences of the failures of leadership in Africa. Especially when that leadership should know better, because of their own history, their education and experience and the relative sophistication of the society they managed.

I am afraid this propensity to self-destruct is a mystery to me. Many would assign a racial connotation to the failure – certainly Ian Smith would crow that he had been right about “them” not being “ready” to run their own affairs. Who could argue with him? That is the real tragedy of this situation; do they understand that? I see no sign that they do at present yet it is so painfully obvious to any informed observer.

I know that countries only learn from mistakes and that if you read European history about 500 years ago you will see the same failures, the same shortcomings and destruction. Nevertheless we live in hope that education, culture and communications together with centuries of experience and reform would enable us to avoid these pitfalls. To stand on others shoulders instead of falling into the same holes in the road they left behind. But somehow ZANU PF seems incapable of this and seems incapable of reform itself.

Hundreds of people are writing and calling me every day to say that MDC is being sucked into the ZANU PF morass and will suffer the same fate if it does “nothing”. I will admit that if we do not make progress on rectifying the many transgressions of the GPA and very soon, that the whole caboodle could come tumbling down. Right now this failure is holding back progress on all fronts and even though international donors have doubled their aid to the country in the first quarter of this year, both patience and time is running out.

Eddie Cross
Bulawayo, 12th April 2009

(Source: via email)

The Pitfalls of National Consciousness is the title of the third chapter of Frantz Fanon’s famous book, The Wretched of the Earth. It is one of my favourite pieces of political writing on Africa. It is recommended reading for African politicians, particularly those who have landed into positions of power after years of struggle.

It never ceases to amaze me how virtually every African country has utterly failed to heed the message, especially relating to the destructive conduct of its leaders upon assumption of power.

It remains true of the liberation generation and the new generation that took over after years of failure. Countries like Zambia, Malawi and Kenya that have experienced the phase that Zimbabwe is presently going through should guide our leaders not to repeat the mistakes they made.

In our quest to remind our leaders of these basic errors, let us consider a hypothetical ‘Mr Minister’ – the new generation politician who fought against the failures of the post-independence era and promised a new dawn.

The idea here is to consider tell-tell signs of when Mr Minister may be crossing that very thin line that separates the new from the old. In other words, how can we tell if Mr Minister has really created new footwear or if he has simply stepped into the old shoes?

Law & Order

Mr Minister, who has now escaped the ranks of the opposition begins to speak the language of authority; the language of law and order. Suddenly, he has become a defender of even those laws which not so long ago were employed against him.

Now he understands the need to ensure adherence to the laws of the country, however harsh, as long as, he will say, “it helps to maintain peace and order in the country”. Mr Minister’s new favourite word is ‘unity’, so anyone who raises dissent is regarded as an enemy; as an unruly element out to undermine the ‘unity of the nation’.

The first test, which will inevitably come sooner or later, is when sections of the frustrated public try to demonstrate their unhappiness, the venue of choice often being the street. The public will be keen to use the supposedly new found space which Mr Minister promised during the struggle.

However, Mr Minister will appear on national radio and television asking people to be patient and issuing a veiled warning that demonstrations will not be tolerated because they threaten the ‘stability and unity’ of the nation. If his call is unheeded, Mr Minister will readily call upon and deploy riot police to ‘maintain peace and order’. People will be told that such actions are necessary to ensure that ‘normal business’ is not disrupted by ‘unruly’ elements.

At some point, appalled by the slow pace of the changes, people will begin to ask when the repressive security laws will be repealed. They will be told that at this stage, economic issues take priority. Mr Minister has suddenly realised that so-called repressive security legislation is only bad if you are on the other side.

In fact, the likelihood is that Mr Minister will begin to see enemies lurking behind every corner – so he is going to need extra security. Very hefty men will suddenly be at his side whenever he appears in public. Mr Minister might even begin to see some loopholes in the existing security laws and will probably call for amendments to ‘strengthen national security’.

Conspicuous Consumption

During his time in opposition, Mr Minister was an ardent critic of the lavish lifestyles enjoyed by government ministers and their associates. He questioned the necessity of buying every minister a Mercedes Benz when the state of public roads was so bad.  He railed against the obscene display of ill-gotten wealth whilst the public was languishing in a sea of poverty. At that time, Mr Minister spoke the language of the suffering.

However, once in government the luxury that looked disgusting from a distance suddenly looks too appetising to ignore. Mr Minister is shown his new Mercedes Benz and the bad state of the roads becomes a secondary issue. The plight of the public that he so loudly championed is forgotten.

Instead, he invents justifications for accepting the new found luxury. He could even cheekily suggest that he is obliged to accept the new luxury ‘on behalf of the people’ – that they should be so proud to see one of their own riding this symbol of power!

If a ministerial colleague rejects the Mercedes Benz, he will probably find, to his astonishment, that he is not applauded or emulated by Mr Minister and other colleagues. Rather he is castigated as an upstart and populist – anoda kuonererwa. Anoda kuzviita ani? (Who does he think he is?), they will ask dismissively. Others will simply sneer – Ndeyekwake iyo! (That’s his problem) and proceed to accept more.

Now, that ‘upstart’ of a minister will have to be very careful henceforth because he will be walking on political eggshells. Even his erstwhile comrades will be watching him very closely to pick up on any slip-ups. Perhaps someone somewhere gets busy studying very old and dusty files to check what the ‘upstart’ may have done in the past so that he can be ‘shamed’ and ‘nailed’.  He could even be arrested on spurious charges.

At that point, Mr Minister and colleagues will probably declare, very smugly, ‘let the rule of law take its course’. No-one will ever want to emulate ‘upstart’ minister’s conduct that, it will have become clear, is unbecoming of a politician.

Foreign Havens

Mr Minister previously criticised government officials who paid scant attention to local schools and universities whilst they sent their children to expensive schools and universities abroad. He railed against those who chose to fly to South Africa for medical treatment whilst local facilities suffered through neglect.  He promised to trace all the funds that were looted and stashed away in foreign bank accounts. He even campaigned for sanctions to freeze the assets of the government officials. He promised that once in power, he would immediately declare his assets on a public register to ensure transparency.

However, a few months down the line, talk of assets declaration becomes muted. Children and relatives are dispatched to foreign schools and universities even though the local universities and schools have failed to open or operate normally. The teacher is paid USD100 whilst university fees at a UK university are upwards of US$15,000 per academic year (that excludes living costs). Any hint of pain, the minister or his spouse is flown to a foreign hospital. Asked why, aides say Mr Minister is important to the nation, he needs special care.

Power & Wealth

The new minister does not have much of his own, except what the party gave him for his sacrifices. They say he doesn’t know how government works and must therefore be inducted. Never mind that those who perform the induction about how government works are exactly the same persons whom Mr Minister previously criticised precisely about how that government worked! Not surprisingly, he may end up adopting that very behaviour that he previously disagreed with.

Mr Minister, who previously had no financial interest outside the country might be inducted about how to open a ‘safe and secure’ offshore bank account. He might be given a ‘loan’ from the new friends – payable whenever – don’t worry munun’una (young man/lady), they will say reassuringly.

The young man/lady will be most grateful. But that’s a ‘locking device’ – Mr Minister is suddenly locked into the web of corruption. With unclean hands, he has neither the voice nor will to point to the many tainted hands around him. Like the Mafia, the minister has become a ‘made man’ – he is one of them.

Growing Distance

After trying so hard to portray himself as a man of the people, Mr Minister may not even realise how fast and long he has distanced himself from the people through the seemingly ‘small’ things that he has done or not done. He will talk about how government business is done, like a true expert, who finds it hard to understand why his audience does not understand him and his role.

He will become very busy and unavailable to his old friends and associates. Indeed, he will have made new, more powerful friends whose good qualities he now appreciates. Because of the new lofty status, he suddenly finds it hard to even greet old friends in the company of his new buddies. He probably calls them the ‘povo’ or the ‘masses’. He is embarrassed when he sees them. He will not answer calls. He will be too busy to reply any form of their correspondence.

Journalists, who not so long ago were cherished partners, will find it increasingly hard to get interviews. Journalists who criticise the minister may never be granted an interview again, ever. When asked hard questions about emaciated prisoners, Mr Minister will probably profess ignorance or say it is exaggerated or use the old line, ‘The government does not comment on individual cases’.

Asked about former colleagues languishing in jail, he will probably protest that the matter does not fall within his remit. Old comrades are now simply ‘a matter’. He will dilly-dally, use very big words that mean absolutely nothing and generally show frustration with a journalist who is seen to be asking ‘too many questions’.

Final Word

When these things begin to happen; when we see these things, then that bug called power is slowly finding comfort in the bloodstream of the new Mr and Mrs Ministers. I hope they engage in some self-introspection, look at their conduct closely in the coming months and judge if they have become or are becoming any of these things.

There is very one simple lesson: change comes in small quantities; it comes in those small gestures; in very small ways, even those ways that you think are unimportant. They matter.

(Source)