Jonathan Moyo and mid-term fiscal policy review horror

The professor's nightmare as he watches his media hegemony begin to crumble


The political momentum that the MDC is gaining from involvement with the coalition government is evident from the reaction coming from Zanu PF to the mid-year fiscal policies unveiled by Finance Minister (FM) Tendai Biti.

When he accepted appointment as the coalition government’s FM, Tendai Biti made it clear that he was not going into government as a junior partner to anyone and would give as much as he takes from anyone entertaining such foolish thoughts.

Professor Jonathan Moyo was not impressed. Suddenly he has emerged as the seasoned Zanu PF financial analyst on anything concerning the Reserve Bank and or the Ministry of Finance.

He has tried everything and anything to discredit the FM but his chequered past is proving a major obstacle and projecting him as a nuisance unworthy of any audience.


From the date the MDC nominated Hon Biti as the FM of the coalition government, Prof Moyo took great exception and projected that the FM’s term in office will yield the same results as the terms of Zanu PF failures Enos Nkala and Simbarashe Mumbengegwi.

He has gone further and tried to hang the FM to dry under the blaze of the Civil Servants US$100 stipend payments, the tenure of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) Governor Gideon Gono, the downward revision of the 2009 budget, the hosting of the ministerial bonding retreat in Victoria Falls, the Multi-Donor Trust Funds and the Premier’s Western nations official visit without any measure of success.

He has taken it upon himself to go on a reckless crusade against anything MDC-T superintended be it in Parliament, Cabinet or at any material level of governance.
He has been assigned unlimited support of the State media and the Attorney General in his demoniac crusade yet all he is managing to do is further alienate Zanu PF with the ordinary voters and increase MDC-T political momentum.

Each time his attempted besmirch of the MDC-T has hit a brick wall he has been forced to eat humble pie and try and spin the successes in Zanu PF’s favour.

The nation has not forgotten how he teamed up with Zanu PF propagandists in concerted efforts to credit the success in taming hyper inflation to Zanu PF’s Dr Gono and Patrick Chinamasa’s January 2009 budget which never saw the light of the day in parliament.

After that shameless volte farce when he saw that the US stipends had condemned Zanu PF to the political dungeon the populace watched in amusement as the Tsholotsho MP roped in 2 MDC-M MP’s to join him in a High court action aimed at nullifying the election of MDC-T’s Lovemore Moyo notwithstanding that none of applicants had contested for the position and the loosing contestant Paul Themba Nyathi has refused to be enjoined in the suit.

Now Prof Moyo is leading a crusade aimed at trivialising the FM’s mid-year fiscal policy review and revision as an MDC-T political stunt that will not yield any good for the country.

Prof Moyo does not get it. Anything he opposes is viewed as being in the best interest of the nation by the majority of the populace which has not forgiven him for his disastrous sojourn as spokesman of the defeated 2000 Constitution Commission that attempted to entrench one party rule under a Presidency with draconian powers followed by his tenure as Zanu PF Information and Publicity Minister.

Most Zimbabweans are questioning in whose interest Prof Moyo is acting if not Zanu PF’s.

For all his obsession with electoral procedures in the election of the Parliament Speaker the general populace cannot reconcile his determination to nullify this institutional election but has not shown the same concern with the stolen Presidential Parliamentary and Presidential elections since 2000 but rather defended the more serious and glaring irregularities.

Closer to the election he is obsessed with reversing, the general populace is questioning why Prof Moyo did not find it a serious enough irregularity that President Mugabe withheld Presidential election results for 35 days after the election was held and reconstituted a dissolved Cabinet to legislate Electoral law changes that justified his out of time demand for a Presidential runoff election following heavy defeat at the hands of Tsvangirai in the initial contest.

They also question why, if Prof Moyo’s motivation is purely based on the entrenched belief in maintaining the reputation of Parliament, he has not complained about the election of Zanu PF’s Edna Madzongwe as Senate President by irregularly and unilaterally appointed Senators by a President whose legitimacy was in dispute at the time he made the appointments.

With reference to the Professor’s discomfort with the midyear fiscal statement recently presented to Parliament by the FM which he has decided to debate outside Parliament through postings on various Zimbabwe related news websites, Zimbabweans are chuckling their hearts out.

Prof Moyo is miffed that FM Biti has decided to abolish a phenomenal 40% import duty slapped on foreign newspapers retailing in the country that was introduced in June 2008 at the height of the sham June 27 presidential runoff election campaign.

His argument is that by removing the punitive duty the FM was preparing communication channels for his MDC Party to use in the next electoral campaign that should foreclose the coalition government tenure of office.

Assuming for once that the Professor is right, where does that leave the decision by the previous Zanu PF finance Minister to impose the punitive duty on foreign publications Prof Moyo falsely accuses as enemies of the state.

The logical conclusion from Prof Moyo’s tirade on the abolition of the duty on imported publications is that the duty was imposed for political reasons in the first instance otherwise there is no logic why a duty imposed for economic reasons would result in negative political outcomes on its removal instead of negative economic results it was imposed to mitigate.

And Prof Moyo disingenuously concedes that fact when he concludes that the FM scrapped the duty to benefit the “Prime Minister’s controversial Newsletter, and The Zimbabwean, an MDC-T-affiliated newspaper which is published in Britain by sworn enemies of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle and nationalist interests.”

In typical fashion he goes further to threaten that because the Minister has politicised the media duty, “It now remains to be seen what the rest of us will do.”

Many people are saying we will buy the cheaper publications but Zanu PF supporters are saying we will burn the publications.

Prof Moyo must be arrested if that happens because he is clearly behind the Zanu PF intention to deny people access to government approved information sources.

He should never be allowed to get away with the vindictive acts by Zanu PF zealots he is campaigning for as he did when he ordered the total silencing of the Daily News leading to the bombing of its Printing Press where no one has been arrested to date.

Prof Moyo must further explain why if it was not for political reasons the duty was imposed at a time when President Mugabe rolled out his vicious runoff campaign that barred publication of any MDC-T election campaigns by the State broadcaster and media houses and why he says the Zimbabwean is an MDC publication.

Professor Moyo must also be put to task to explain why the publications with a Zimbabwean market large enough to constitute a national threat are exporting their publications from outside the country borders and why he as a patriotic MP does not move legislation in Parliament authorising any broadcaster or media house wishing to access the Zimbabwean market must be allowed freedom to operate within the country without harassment from the State.

Prof Moyo must be told that Hon Biti meant every word when he said he would give as much as he takes from any politician who felt he was coming into the coalition as a junior parter to anyone.

It is because of the draconian laws that Prof Moyo legislated during his tenure as Zanu PF Minister of Information and Publicity that the country no longer has a media industry to talk about other than the one controlled by the State which has a reputation of misrepresenting facts in support of Zanu PF.

Instead of whingeing about the scrapping of a politically motivated duty on media imports Prof Moyo would serve the nation well if he leads a crusade to reform the country’s iron fisted control on the media and thereafter demand punitive duties to be imposed against imported publications to protect and nurture the local industry he unwittingly destroyed.

Prof Moyo’s complaint about the FM’s “backdoor attempt to assign the communication function to the ICT Ministry is outrageous coming from him as an MP elected to monitor Executive excesses on behalf of the people.

Was he instructed by the President to complain for and on his behalf or does Prof Moyo think he is the Presidential advisor and spokesman?

George Charamba will keep silent for now but Prof Moyo must never delude himself that he has had the last word on this one and his fingers will be burnt.

Prof Moyo sadly believes that the President has discretionary powers to instruct Parliament what to legislate for and not in a given period.

To the contrary parliamentarians have the people’s mandate to seek regulation of areas of people’s concerns through parliamentary statutes that the President has no power to veto.

By waiting for Presidential directives on what to legislate or not Prof Moyo proves what most Zimbabweans have known about him that he is all hot air but brainless. How does a president decide what should be legislated on or not if the MP’s do not raise the areas of concern through Parliamentary motions and discussions with portfolio Ministers.

If the FM does not have powers to demarcate Ministerial Portfolio responsibilities Prof Moyo as an MP would be even further placed to determine which Ministry is responsible for which function in the absence of a Presidential proclamation to that effect as is the case with coalition government ministerial portfolios at present.

The over enthusiasm of professor Moyo to create nonexistent conflict between the FM, Premier and ICT minister is nothing new but it does not licence him to lie about MDC-T conflicts.

Where are Strive Masiyiwa, Chadehumba and Sibotshiwe whom the Professor alleged were calling the shots in MDC policy formulation in preparation for roles in government?

Finally, the professor must know that the GPA is an annexure of the Constitution of Zimbabwe and under it Executive power in the country is shared between Cabinet Ministers, The Prime Minister and the President.

As FM, Hon Biti holds key responsibilities of advising not just the Presidency and the Premiership but also Parliament, the Judiciary and the Bureaucracy on financial fundamentals that impact positively and negatively on the economy.

The days when the advisory role was usurped by Dr Gono are in the past and Prof Moyo must come to terms with that reality.

Childish arguments on semantics of terminology to be used by the FM when presenting national statements are stereotypes that will not get the country anywhere.

Hon Biti must never allow himself to be hamstrung by outmoded stereotypes that inhibit himself from articulating people’s problems in language they understand.

Prof Moyo has no chance in hell of discrediting the FM and he will sooner rather than later realise that his desire to see information dissemination in the country monopolised by Zanu PF controlled State Media will be circumvented if the country does not wake up to the reality that access to information and dissemination thereof is a fundamental right that must be respected by politicians and citizens alike.