MDC-T Announces The Death Of Zimbabwe
One foreign journalist observed in March this year that the MDC seem to be "in awe" of Mugabe after he observed the way they behaved at the swearing in and the subsequent meeting he attending, including the one above, at the launch of Finance Minister Tendai Biti's STERP, which has failed completely, with not a single thing wished for in it being realised. Now Biti says the West is not going to help after all and that he and Tsvangirai will take the Mugabe route and try to use whatever resources are in Zimbabwe to bring about recovery!!!!Harare, Zimbabwe, 30 August 2009
Zimbabwe;s Finance and Secretary-General of the MDC-Tsvangirai has effectively announced the death of Zimbabwe by telling the media today that the moribund Inclusive MisGovernment has given up all hope of getting aid from outsiders and will now instead seek to find the money it needs locally.
He says the idea of expecting anything from the West "is a joke".
Of course, you will recall me being vilified when I said in March this year that no aid would come from the West and that before long Tendai Biti and Morgan Tsvangirai will be shouting at Britain and America in frustration.
MDC and Tsvangirai apologists said I was dreaming and that Tsvangirai wuold deliver the aid and I would be shamed. They have now been shamed.
This is extremely significant, this announcement from Biti. He specifically said "Zimbabwe is now on its own." Which is what some of us have been telling him all along.
To fully appreciate that this means the death of Zimbabwe, there are few things we need to understand. So, the context then, is as follows:
Was it not the MDC-T itself that, when it was still an opposition outside government, insisted repeatedly that the only way Zimbabwe could emerge from this financial morass was through the aid given to it by donors and aid agencies?
Was it not Tsvangirai and his party who, during their various campaigns for office, including last year in March, insisted that they had "partners just ready and waiting for a signal from us to release US$10 billion" to aid Zimbabwe's recovery?
That signal has now been given, has it not, with Tsvangirai touring the world and telling anyone who will listen that he and Mugabe are now best buddies, committed to the Inclusive MisGovernment and that all this was not reversible?
Where are those partners now?
Still, the more important thing to take from this announcement is that it means there is no recovery on the horizon in Zimbabwe. Things will now get worse, much worse.
Why?
Because what Tendai Biti has announced is no different from what Mugabe has been doing all along: trying to use internal resources to revive the economy.
As Mugabe struggled to do this, frozen out of the International community, the MDC-T jumped up and down like excited children, deriding (rightly so) these moves by Mugabe, saying it was all wasted effort, Zimbabwe would never recover until it re-engaged the Western powers with deep pockets.
So the MDC-T are now doing exactly what they have been telling us for a decade can not be done. They are now pursuing the same "Look Home" policy they have always maintained does not have a snowball's chance in hell of making an impact?
You see, we would at least get some confidence if the MDC-T had demonstrated while in power that they actually have substantive policies that can harness that local potential, the potential they now agree with Mugabe is all they have.
But, the MDC-T has demonstrated so far that it does not have a single policy initiative different from that of ZANU PF and Mugabe.
I will give US$50 to anyone who points out to me just one policy initiative from Tsvangirai that is different from Mugabe's, one that he has tabled and implemented as per his mandate.
Instead of acting differently from Mugabe, the MDC has adopted his way of doing thing, be it firing striking doctors, controlling prices (the daftest decision this Inclusive Government has ever made, which ensures that there is no prospect of service delivery improving).
The government of Morgan Tsvangirai (he is responsible for policy formulation and implementation, he keeps telling us, making this his government), has taken up Mugabe's approach to the Land Question, it has threatened companies like Telone, the telephone company and even the cellphone companies, DIRECTING them to reduce prices regardless of viability concerns.
Tsvangirai has failed to resolve the issue of Zimbabwe's massive mineral deposits, including gold and diamonds, with his own minister, who is deputising the Mining portfolio, instead adopting the Mugabe line and denying all evidence of abuses at the Chiadzwa diamond fields to the world.
Tsvangirai himself denies that there are continuing land invasions, taking Mugabe's line that the problem is white farmers who will not leave their properties, which have been acquired by his government.
Tendai Biti's own programmes, STERP and the 100-day Wishlist, are nothing but fanciful lists of Zimbabwe's woes, ending in an appeal to the world to give the government money to resolve them.
As a western diplomat told us towards the launch of Mavambo on July 1 this year:
"There is no plan in place and we keep asking Tendai to give us detailed requirements. He needs US$8 billion, is all he will say." The diplomat says it is not clear from any presentation what the US$8 million is for exactly and that his government ( a European one), would have been glad to told, for instance, how much tar, gravel etc is needed to resurface Zimbabwe's roads, after which they themselves would procure those materials and deliver them to the Zimbabwe Roads Agency.
But the MDC is failing even this test, instead turning around and demanding the money a la Mugabe, so that they can set their own priorities, such as buying luxury vehicles and houses for themselves.
In essence, then, Mugabe and Tsvangirai are peas in a pod. Their approaches to Zimbabwe's problems are now confirmed to have converged.
As a result, it is now almost certain that Zimbabwe will remain in a quagmire. SADC can not help with funds. Africa does not the money. And the West is now written off. Even the East, Mugabe's preferred partner, is proving coy when it comes to giving aid and donations.
Just as an aside, Biti, in the same interview carried by state media today, is already speaking of next year's budget and saying his strategy to be unveiled then will have a "three to four year horizon".
The significance of this is that it shows all and sundry that the MDC-T is now intent on staying in the Inclusive Government for five years. They are not moving out even as the people groan under the intolerable burdens imposed on them by this bloated and voracious regime of Mugabe and Tsvangirai.
Zimbabwe;s Finance and Secretary-General of the MDC-Tsvangirai has effectively announced the death of Zimbabwe by telling the media today that the moribund Inclusive MisGovernment has given up all hope of getting aid from outsiders and will now instead seek to find the money it needs locally.
He says the idea of expecting anything from the West "is a joke".
Of course, you will recall me being vilified when I said in March this year that no aid would come from the West and that before long Tendai Biti and Morgan Tsvangirai will be shouting at Britain and America in frustration.
MDC and Tsvangirai apologists said I was dreaming and that Tsvangirai wuold deliver the aid and I would be shamed. They have now been shamed.
This is extremely significant, this announcement from Biti. He specifically said "Zimbabwe is now on its own." Which is what some of us have been telling him all along.
To fully appreciate that this means the death of Zimbabwe, there are few things we need to understand. So, the context then, is as follows:
Was it not the MDC-T itself that, when it was still an opposition outside government, insisted repeatedly that the only way Zimbabwe could emerge from this financial morass was through the aid given to it by donors and aid agencies?
Was it not Tsvangirai and his party who, during their various campaigns for office, including last year in March, insisted that they had "partners just ready and waiting for a signal from us to release US$10 billion" to aid Zimbabwe's recovery?
That signal has now been given, has it not, with Tsvangirai touring the world and telling anyone who will listen that he and Mugabe are now best buddies, committed to the Inclusive MisGovernment and that all this was not reversible?
Where are those partners now?
Still, the more important thing to take from this announcement is that it means there is no recovery on the horizon in Zimbabwe. Things will now get worse, much worse.
Why?
Because what Tendai Biti has announced is no different from what Mugabe has been doing all along: trying to use internal resources to revive the economy.
As Mugabe struggled to do this, frozen out of the International community, the MDC-T jumped up and down like excited children, deriding (rightly so) these moves by Mugabe, saying it was all wasted effort, Zimbabwe would never recover until it re-engaged the Western powers with deep pockets.
So the MDC-T are now doing exactly what they have been telling us for a decade can not be done. They are now pursuing the same "Look Home" policy they have always maintained does not have a snowball's chance in hell of making an impact?
You see, we would at least get some confidence if the MDC-T had demonstrated while in power that they actually have substantive policies that can harness that local potential, the potential they now agree with Mugabe is all they have.
But, the MDC-T has demonstrated so far that it does not have a single policy initiative different from that of ZANU PF and Mugabe.
I will give US$50 to anyone who points out to me just one policy initiative from Tsvangirai that is different from Mugabe's, one that he has tabled and implemented as per his mandate.
Instead of acting differently from Mugabe, the MDC has adopted his way of doing thing, be it firing striking doctors, controlling prices (the daftest decision this Inclusive Government has ever made, which ensures that there is no prospect of service delivery improving).
The government of Morgan Tsvangirai (he is responsible for policy formulation and implementation, he keeps telling us, making this his government), has taken up Mugabe's approach to the Land Question, it has threatened companies like Telone, the telephone company and even the cellphone companies, DIRECTING them to reduce prices regardless of viability concerns.
Tsvangirai has failed to resolve the issue of Zimbabwe's massive mineral deposits, including gold and diamonds, with his own minister, who is deputising the Mining portfolio, instead adopting the Mugabe line and denying all evidence of abuses at the Chiadzwa diamond fields to the world.
Tsvangirai himself denies that there are continuing land invasions, taking Mugabe's line that the problem is white farmers who will not leave their properties, which have been acquired by his government.
Tendai Biti's own programmes, STERP and the 100-day Wishlist, are nothing but fanciful lists of Zimbabwe's woes, ending in an appeal to the world to give the government money to resolve them.
As a western diplomat told us towards the launch of Mavambo on July 1 this year:
"There is no plan in place and we keep asking Tendai to give us detailed requirements. He needs US$8 billion, is all he will say." The diplomat says it is not clear from any presentation what the US$8 million is for exactly and that his government ( a European one), would have been glad to told, for instance, how much tar, gravel etc is needed to resurface Zimbabwe's roads, after which they themselves would procure those materials and deliver them to the Zimbabwe Roads Agency.
But the MDC is failing even this test, instead turning around and demanding the money a la Mugabe, so that they can set their own priorities, such as buying luxury vehicles and houses for themselves.
In essence, then, Mugabe and Tsvangirai are peas in a pod. Their approaches to Zimbabwe's problems are now confirmed to have converged.
As a result, it is now almost certain that Zimbabwe will remain in a quagmire. SADC can not help with funds. Africa does not the money. And the West is now written off. Even the East, Mugabe's preferred partner, is proving coy when it comes to giving aid and donations.
Just as an aside, Biti, in the same interview carried by state media today, is already speaking of next year's budget and saying his strategy to be unveiled then will have a "three to four year horizon".
The significance of this is that it shows all and sundry that the MDC-T is now intent on staying in the Inclusive Government for five years. They are not moving out even as the people groan under the intolerable burdens imposed on them by this bloated and voracious regime of Mugabe and Tsvangirai.
"Black man, you're on your own"-Bantu Steven Biko
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