President Mugabe and his last supposedly last ditch sanctions lifting errand boy Premier Morgan Tsvangirai
Whatever has become of President Mugabe to place his trust in PRIME Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, who in his own past assessments is, an ignoramus puppet of the West and good for nothing Tea Boy and task him with the onerous responsibility to get 7 year old sanctions hanging on his neck?
Surely there should be better qualified and articulate minds in his sanctions riddled Zanu PF party for this critical role than an ignoramus Premier only in government because of a botched March 2008 election strategy that exposed Zanu PF unpopularity among the colonially deluded Zimbabweans who did so little to support his liberation war efforts and land reforms and were hell bent on repaying him with booting him out of the Presidency.
How can the invincible dear leader raise his hands in surrender and gamble the political fortunes of the vanguard party by allowing the leader of the party of puppets to get in sanctioned contact with the Anglo-Saxons that nearly succeeded in sponsoring the Premier from unseating him from the Presidency that was only averted by the timely intervention of the Zimbabwe Defence forces?
It must be a calculated last ditch gamble that he must do everything possible to ensure the Premier fails for if he was to succeed in getting the sanctions that the SADC and AU as well as the brainiacs in Zanu PF have failed to get lifted what political message would that send to the Premier’s multitudes of adoring supporters ?
What will be the implications of a successful mission by the MDC leader on sanctions to the waning fortunes of the “vanguard” Zanu PF party and those of the iconic Dear Leader President Robert Mugabe?
This kind of political brinkmanship is better avoided than attempted because both in success and failure to get sanctions lifted the MDC leader will strengthen his party’s relationship with the virulent Western regimes.
If he succeeds which must be made as near impossible as can be without letting out the objective, then that would mark the beginning of an accelerated end of the Zanu PF hegemony.
If he fails the electorate will be unforgiving on any actions on the part of Zanu PF they will rightly single out as having interfered with the Premier’s noble intentions.
Of course Zanu PF has the propaganda machinery that it will use to cast aspersions on the leadership abilities of the Premier and the myth that he is a western aid magnet for the country but that won’t resolve the problem that alienated the majority of the electorate from Zanu PF.
The need for western aid and international credit to resuscitate the battered economy is not in dispute but credit for that revival will accrue to the MDC to the same extent failure will impact on Zanu PF for failing the MDC to obtain international support for the country.
It is a catch 20 situation where Zanu PF is in a lose lose position so the propaganda that Tsvangirai is Mugabe’s sanctions errand boy may as well be intensified and if he succeeds the President and Zanu PF can have a basis on which to claim credit and triumph over illegal western sanctions.
In the preferred event the Premier fails which is likely under the prevailing political environment in the country, it would be a lot easier to dispel the claim by the MDC about its Western friends with billions waiting to be delivered to the country if there is regime change.
In the premise the brinkmanship by President Mugabe must be well publicised and oversold to make it easier to claim credit for the lifting of sanctions if they are lifted and or damage Tsvangirai’s perceived ability to attract financial support for the country.
That is the ill advice that President Mugabe took before tasking the Premier to champion the sanctions uplifting project.
The Premier has on numerous occasions categorically distanced himself and his party from allegations that he requested Western and EU nations to impose any restrictions on the country but he along with his party supports the restrictions because Zanu PF has for decades remained intolerant of opposing views to its agenda and has no respect for democratic governance.
Addressing people at the party’s 10th Anniversary celebrations in Chinhoyi, Premier Tsvangirai made it clear that his main concern is not about restrictions imposed on Zanu PF leadership being lifted but rather the building of destroyed cooperation bridges between the coalition government and the international community with a view of moving the country out of its current pariah status.
He reiterated that it was up to the imposers of the restrictions to lift them as and when it suits them if they are satisfied that the restrictions are no longer serving the purpose for which they were imposed and certainly not up to him as he had no part in determining reasons for their imposition on whoever and how far the affected have satisfied the preconditions set for uplifting of the restrictions had been satisfied.
On departure at the Harare Airport the Premier reiterated that his mission was sanctioned by the Global Political Agreement (GPA) that mandated the coalition government to re-engage the international community with a view to mend strained relations.
Despite those clear statements about his mission anonymous Herald Reporters disclosed that the Premier had been tasked by “the Government to call for the removal of sanctions and seek a financial package to revive the economy.”
The only factual part of the statement is that the Premier’s current mission has been mandated by the Coalition Government.
The purpose of the mission is being misrepresented as “to call for the removal of sanctions and seek a financial package to revive the economy.”
If that was the mission then it is bound to fail because the messenger in person states to the contrary that his mission is neither to call for the removal of sanctions nor to beg for international aid but rather to revive international contact and relationships between the country and countries that had severed dealings with the previous Zanu PF government.
Clearly if the coalition government had despatched the Premier on a mission to seek financial aid and call for the lifting of sanctions- a task possible of completion without the need to travel- there would be no reason why the emissary would state the mission in different terminology as he has repeatedly done.
Assuming for once that the Herald reporters were briefed of the purpose of the Premier’s mission by President Mugabe and not the coalition government, it is likely that what the President has been told to be the purpose of the mission by his personal advisors is at variance with what the government mandated its leader to do on this mission.
The Herald reporters departed from the notion that the premier had been despatched on the mission by the government and suddenly purported that the Premier had instead been despatched on the mission by the President with the changed specific objectives of calling for the lifting of sanctions and seeking financial help to resuscitate the economy.
The reporters from the State flagships disclosed that President Mugabe had told Mr Payne that “Government had tasked PM Tsvangirai to visit the US and European capitals to call for the lifting of the embargo and seek aid to resuscitate the economy.”
The herald reporters then disclosed that sources close to the deliberations between President Mugabe and Mr Payne had told the paper that the President expressed hope that his visit would lead to the removal of the sanctions the US imposed through the so-called Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act (ZDERA).
The likely closest informant of the Herald reporters can be none other than Information and Publicity Secretary George Charamba who doubles as Presidential spokesperson.
If as we suspect he is the source the Herald reporters relied on it is not surprising that they published a clearly misleading version of the Premier’s mission.
It is not clear why the reporters did not disclose what the Premier’s spokesman James Maridadi told them was the purpose of the mission when he confirmed the Premier’s itnary for this mission preferring rather to disclose hearsay from undisclosed sources privy to discussions between the President and a US government emissary Mr Payne where the premier was not present to confirm what the President allegedly tasked him to achieve on this mission.
James Maridadi actually refuted that the Premier had been tasked by the President to seek the lifting of sanctions and beg for financial support and said the spin was from detractors of the coalition government on a mission to project the premier as a junior errand boy of the President rather than an equal partner in the coalition government leadership.
That did not stop the herald reporters continuing to rely on hearsay from its undisclosed informants that informed the reporters that;
"The President especially underscored that what Zimbabwe wanted were not just handouts and donations, but soft loans and credit lines which Zimbabwe would pay back on the strength of its own resources.
"He was hopeful the Congressman’s visit would bring ‘the flag of freedom from sanctions’," a source said.
The reporters from the Herald are fully aware of the Premier’s stance on the question of sanctions which is at variance with the purport in their report hence the reliance on phantom informants to justify a position they expect the Premier to take on the sanctions issue.
“But lately, there has been a common call across parties for an end to the embargo. Besides Zanu-PF, the MDC formation led by Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara has spoken strongly against the embargo. On MDC-T’s side, PM Tsvangirai has indirectly called for the removal of the sanctions, urging the West to lift the "restrictive measures," the reporters partially conceded to the Premier’s position on sanctions.
But that stance is not satisfactory for the reporters some of whom are victims of the travel banishments to EU and Western countries.
They want the Premier to be vocal and resolute in unshackling them and affected Zanu PF sympathisers from the travel bans.
They are wondering why the travel restrictions against them are still in place long after both MDC formations have joined Government and wonder why they were targeted.
In an apparent show of their confusion the reporters then rely on the GPA to justify the premier’s mission but deliberately misrepresent that the 15 September agreement mandated the Premier to travel to the US and Europe to secure the lifting of sanctions without disclosing which article of the GPA contains such rubbish.
The agreement was simply to condemn sanctions against the coalition government if any were in place or being contemplated given the changed political circumstances in the country.
Those previously targeted can take advantage of the GPA to show that they no longer deserve to be under any form of restrictions and convince the imposers of restrictions to lift them.
The premier is not under any form of internationals restrictions and he does not wish the government he leads to be viewed as an extension of the defunct Zanu PF government and carry the liability of international financing restrictions for crimes he did not commit nor intends to commit.
He will thus not succumb to any pressure from whosoever to waste limited time he has on ensuring the coalition government remains on course to achieve its clearly stated targets by being sent on an errand to have sanctions that do not interfere with his government lifted.
“The sanctions, therefore, remain the major outstanding issue of the GPA, which gave birth to the inclusive Government,” bleated the herald reporters.
The question is outstanding between whom? If it is outstanding between the affected and the imposers what has that got to do with the coalition government.
The only impediment that the premier is concerned with is the one in ZIDERA which compels the US government representatives on International Financial Institutions to vote against any extension of credit financing to the Zimbabwe government then led by President Mugabe but now under his leadership.
The logic of that concern is that the Premier has good grounds to argue that he has not inherited a Zanu PF government but formed a coalition government which has no association with the excesses that demanded the sanctions on credit extension to the country.
The surest way to have the individual sanctions lifted is not for Mugabe to task Tsvangirai or anyone to do the biding but to merely accept the demise of Zanu PF hegemony and refrain from excesses of that regime which he is finding hard to do and thus perpetuating the lifespan of the sanctions.
The herald reporters could do themselves a great service by telling advising the president to stop human rights violations, commercial farm invasions and titled land repossessions without compensation, persecution of other political formations functionaries through a Zanu PF patronised AG, respecting the Constitutional amendments that ushered the coalition government and ceasing to act unilaterally on restricted areas of exercising power.
That way the imposers of the sanctions will have no basis upon which to maintain them.
But then we are preaching to a media house that is highly opinionated and does not heed advice from anyone other than Zanu PF.
That is why the reporters will languish in sanctions that little bit longer than is necessary.
And while still at it President Mugabe has the least qualifications to design a workable and persuasive sanctions lifting programme of action.
If he had such acumen the sanctions would not have been imposed on his government in the first instance.
Alternatively he would have managed to get the sanctions lifted over the past 7 years he has been moaning and groaning about them at every possible opportunity.
It is thus unwise to project the Premier as an emissary of the President in relation to any request or demand for sanctions to be reconsidered because as soon as the request or demand is believed to be from President Mugabe the imposers would want to check how far he has moved away from the behaviour that caused the imposition of the sanctions.
Clearly the claim that the Premier is running errands for the president is disingenuous especially coming from reporters who genuinely want to be relieved of the sanctions effect.
But then the same reporters may be yearning for the continuation of the sanctions to find reason to spike the leader of the coalition government who is not by any means their preference for leadership.
The premier however is not as daft as the Herald reporters have been indoctrinated to believe he is.
The Premier is a seasoned politician who does not rely on vindictive retribution of opponents to have his way but rather who salvages hopeless political predicaments and turn them into advantages and leave his detractors with egg all over when he triumphs against adversity.
That asset of the Premier only becomes evident in matters he believes in whole heartedly. He will do anything to get the sanctions lifted if he believed that the targets have reformed but they continuously display exhibit latent hangovers of behaviours that are consistent with the reputed culture of impunity that Zanu PF is renowned for.
That is why the premier will tread with extreme caution when confronted with the sanctions question.
He will do everything to avert restrictions targeted at the coalition government if it displays symptoms of a homogeneous and cohesive administration guided by legal principle but will not travel the extra mile for those in the coalition government that are bent on using the laws selectively against perceived and or real foes.
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