Mugabe and The Politics of Hatred

Mugabe and the Politics of Hatred

Better a Leader of Vision

Zimbabwe today, in November 2007 is a country that has no direction, the fastest shrinking economy and the scavengers are enjoying eating the carcass of what was a country always on the downhill.

Having obtained independence in 1980 Zimbabwe went steady into decline, a decline never exposed by the international liberal media. Since 19881 the Zimbabwean dollar was in steady decline, prices of basic goods began steadily rising culminating in the 5 000% inflation that Zimbabwe has today. Zimbabwe’s decline is not a new phenomenon, Mugabe and his cronies have never known how to handle the economy, they never had the interest, to them it was magic.

Any Zimbabwean can tell you that bread lines existed since the early 80’s, the international media though never criticized this as they felt at least Zimbabwe is doing well for Africa. Bread lines, flour lines, mealie meal lines, they always existed, the problem now is that there is no bread, there is no flour, there is no mealie meal. Since the 1980’s people had to be ‘dealers’, that is they would get goods not available in Zimbabwe and sell them on the black market, smuggling goods like televisions, tool kits, radios batteries, cassettes from South Africa and Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe’s decline is not something that happened overnight, it occurred the minute Mugabe took power, because Mugabe was only interested in protecting himself and his cronies, many of whom he turned against and killed.

Mugabe has always been a master of reactionary politics, he reacts to a situation, he himself never had a vision. He stole other peoples visions but did not know how to implement them, a classic parasite of ideas. His true vision because of lack of a personality, was to create hatred, hatred in order to keep power, hatred towards the Ndebeles in the 80’s, hatred towards whites in the late 90’s, now hatred towards Zimbabweans, the same Zimbabweans he drove into a frenzy in the 80’s to hate Ndebeles.

He has now created a mess in Zimbabwe, having created the mess he says he needs time to fix it, therefore not only lacking a personality, he also lacks shame. A man of shame would say I resign, I have made a mess. If the mess was created with good intentions he would have resigned, however the mess was created out of politics of hatred, a knee jerk reaction from a reactionary.

Africa though is famous for getting rid of parasites like Mugabe, Amin, Mobutu and replacing them with other people with no vision. Chiluba replaced kaunda, but Chiluba had no vision, Kabila replaced Mobutu, but Kabila and his son lack vision, Tsvangirai has not told the world his vision besides getting rid of Mugabe.

Zimbabwe needs to respect knowledge. Whoever takes over from Mugabe needs to understand that, if there is no respect for knowledge Zimbabwe will remain what it is, maybe home for others, but a non significant player in the global arena. It will just be a society that prays that commodity prices are high and the lucky few will benefit. Yet Zimbabwe should have long entered the technological game, it had a somewhat reasonable electronics industry at independence, Zimbabwe should with leaders of vision been contributing to the space age, the level it had attained at independence was high, all ignored by Mugabe in his politics of hate. Mugabe a man who rather used instinct than thinking, and he is capable of thinking, his problem is he directs his thinking towards creating hatred.

Zimbabwe needs a group of leaders who will create a constitution that respects knowledge, therefore a constitution that will respect the individual, something totally lacking in most of Africa, and rarely achieved in the world even by societies that use the concept of rights for individuals as propaganda. Zimbabwe had a chance, now it needs to rebuild because that chance is nearly gone.

Zimbabwe can no longer afford politics of hatred created by Mugabe and Smith, otherwise Zimbabwe as it was created by Cecil Rhodes will not survive, it will break up into many parts.

Bhekuzulu Khumalo