In his recent speech addressing an audience in Des Moines, Iowa in the United States MDC-T Treasurer General Roy Bennett spoke about what he terms "the struggle for democracy in Zimbabwe.
" He told the gathering that "Zimbabwe is not fighting for a return to democracy because the country has never enjoyed or experienced democracy in any real sense." This is a ridiculous perspective by Roy Bennett who is an icon of the remnants of colonialism in Zimbabwe.
He is unrepentant and mindless over the terror he and his imprudent ancestors caused on Zimbabweans since time immemorial. Bennett should be the last person to preach democracy if ever he is to speak at all.
What form of democracy did the imperialistic white men come to impose on Zimbabwe and Africa during their habitual periods of craziness and madness particularly in the 19th century, when they aggressively and violently expropriated our land, resources, power, comfort, heritage and democracy for over a century?
They subjected the black population to continual exploitation as they tapped them of their labour mercilessly while working on their stolen farms and industries. Zimbabwe first held democratic elections when the white state was broken-down, and they were declared by the international community to be an accurate reflection of the will of the people, which resulted in the country's independence.
Since then, the same fashion has remained, as democratic elections are held periodically as per the provisions of the constitution. During the Rhodesian era in which Bennet and his counterparts rejoiced unchallenged supremacy, elections excluded the black majority.
Bennet never sounded that there were oddities to that system. He worked flat-out to prop-up that repressive regime as he worked for it as an operative of the notorious Selous Scout.
This was a special force, which was crowned with special responsibility to cause terror on black nationalists who championed black people's cause at the time. In view of such a tyrannical regime, what democracy was there in which Bennet played a pivotal role?
Bennett is a permanent hypocrite who does not realise that he is operating in the public eye where he caused terror in the recent decades. He is hypocritically speaking of democracy as lacking in a system, which came to break repression and replace it with true African democracy, which he has also enjoyed since Zimbabwe's independence on April 18, 1980.
He never faced retribution for his horrific callous activities that he performed against blacks. The then Prime Minister Mugabe declared a universal policy of reconciliation between whites and blacks.
Bennet was a direct beneficiary of this policy despite his devilish roles prior to independence. It is surprising to note that he boldly gathers energy to mislead the whole world about the correct status quo prevalent in the country. Bennet said, "The closest Zimbabwe got to democracy in the 1980s was the continued existence of Zapu, Zanu-PF's main rival since the 1960s and a party that garnered most of its support from the Ndebele ethnic group in the south-western provinces of Matabeleland."
His views are warped and rusty. How does he explain the co-existence of the three Global Political Agreement partners in the Inclusive Government in which his political party Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) is a key player?
Isn't this democracy at its best? How many political parties existed in Rhodesia? If at all he is genuinely frank, how come he doesn't mention that era to be the worst in terms of democracy deficiency? His sanity is in complete doubt! Roy Bennet fails to tell the public that, their massive support of the MDC-T is a clandestine strategy to restore the white supremacy, which was torn apart at Independence.
The rest of white community in and outside Zimbabwe rallied behind MDC as a grand plan to set-up a puppet government which they could manipulate, and re-impose their failed control of resources in the country.
He is a frustrated former white colonial Rhodesian who is seeking undue revenge over their broken rule in this country. In this vein, his cheap propaganda against Zimbabwe's integrity is synonymous with someone who is tasting sour medicine in this dispensation in which his kith and kin do not have another opportunity to loot our resources any more, especially land, which they farmed illegally for more than a century.
However, he should note that, turning back the hands of the clock in Zimbabwe is no longer possible.
Zimbabwe will never be a colony again. Re-establishment of white rule is now an abomination.
In MDC-T democracy has no space. This has culminated into ugly intra-party fighting which led to internal violence as supporters grapple for their rights which they are denied, especially by the dictatorial party leader Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, who does not take any criticism lightly.
His dictatorial tendencies led to the split of the former MDC in 2005 when he took a unilateral decision for the party not to participate in the national senatorial polls, after a party decision through a vote to proceed into these elections.
Recently he secretly amended the party constitution through devious means so that he could retain party presidency by default. Roy Bennet, Morgan Tsvangirai and the MDC-T should be taken for elementary lessons on democracy so that they adopt sound judgments on critical national issues.
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Thats true - zimbabwe has never had true democracy. Why should the Rhodies repent? Is mugabe going to repent for grossly mismanaging the country for 30 years? Is zanupf going to repent for the 2000 odd people it has murdered since the new millenium? Is Mugabe , Shiri and the rest going to repent for the 20,000 Matabele murdered? Just the usual rubbish to blame the white for the woes of my comrades in their failure in Zimbabwe.
I still wonder what Zimbabwe would have been like today, had the winner of the first Presidential election in which Africans were allowed to vote, Jonathan Nkomo, had actually been allowed to take the office, instead of being overruled by Mugabe and the military. There was really little difference between their two platforms, really. Both endorsed socialist redistribution policies that would have failed, regardless of who was President. I think, though, that had the citizens of Zimbabwe been willing to stand up to the "liberation heroes" when they were injured and tired from their victory against the Selous militia, and said, "No, Nkomo is who we elected, and Nkomo will be our President," the "liberation heroes" might have actually backed down at the time, and thus set the same democratic precedent that the military of every other thriving democratic government has set, of the military serving the civilians instead of bullyong and ruling over them with an iron fist.
Then, when Nkomo's land reform plans began to fail much like Mugabe's did, instead of leveraging the military to seize the means of production by force like Mugabe did, he would have simply been voted out of office and replaced with someone who would eventually have no choice but to replace land redistribution with a private ownership system that would give the land to any citizen of Zimbabwe, African or Rhodie, who proved themselves able to manage money well enough to buy it. Without the barrier to African land ownership that was a cornerstone of the Smith regime, most of the land would be taken over by Africans who would have managed it well, instead of cell-phone packing cronies of the President's regime.
But what's done is done. Mugabe has set himself up as the new Ian Smith, and his "liberation heroes" will have to be killed in combat like the Selous were. And after that, assuming the goal is a true democratic government instead of another copy of the Smith regime, when the military that won the war demands that their top general be installed as President for Life, the civilians must stand up to them and say "No! Your general will submit to the election process like the other candidates, and if he loses he will swear loyalty to the winner or be killed as a traitor!"
The threat may even have to be backed up with more force, as needed. But a government controlled by the military can never be a democracy.
Joshua Nkomo. My memory for names has never been good, and age seems to be making it worse every year.
Bennett's right - true democracy has never existed in Zimbabwe. Mugabe has had more then 30 years to do so and instead he and ZANU-PF have seen to it that the common man has no real say in government and is also afraid to honestly express his own opinion about the current state of affairs.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai are side of a coin.Is it possible there are no others in their parties to lead.At least the other has brains sometimes you think' better the devil you know and better still an educated one'.Zimbos are too clever to be fooled,you can give your flimsy excuses to stay in power and change constituitions to suit WHO?
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