Denford Magora's Latest Zimbabwe News Blog

You will recall that, after the 2013 elections, our analysis of the reasons behind the results of that election were the most quoted and cited by international media, from The Guradian & The Times in London to the New York Times and Washington Post, Sunday Times of South Africa and many others. Reuters also picked it up and distributed the analysis widely. So readers, we are reading the tea-leaves again and we will meet here when the results are announced. But we will be doing so to do what we did in 2013, which is basically to point out why our reading was, yet again, correct. And how it was, yet again, ignored by those who can most benefit from it. There is one particular bomb in the MPOI/Afrobarometer survey released in Bulawayo on Thursday, June 07 2018 as Zimbabwe prepares for an election to be held on July 30 this year. Basically, everyone, including MDC Alliance people, has missed this particular bomb. Buried in the results are results that will see Nelson Chamisa ge...

The Zimbabwe Independent newspapers, part of the stable of rabidly pro-Nelson Chamisa newspapers owned by Alpha Media Holdings, has a prominent full page article in today's issue which claims that Britain as well as diplomats in Zimbabwe generally, have abandoned the MDC-T amidst concerns about lack of capacity to deliver on the change Zimbabwe needs. The paper claims that Britain wants Mnangagwa to be president of Zimbabwe after the elections, saying they trust him to deliver on the issues that would turn Zimbabwe around. The shift happened in 2013, apparently. Below is the full text of the article in the Zimbabwe Independent : BY KUDZAI KUWAZA   Britain has shifted its foreign policy on Zimbabwe which was previously anchored on seeking to influence on seeking to influence political change via opposition political parties, and is now pushing for change from within ZANU PF - the same template the West used to catalyse reform in the Soviet Union.  Change i...

The jailing of Dickson Mafios (above) this week on charges of border jumping is part of a grand strategy to contain and eliminate the threat of impeachment and toppling of President Emmerson Mnangagwa by G40 Trojan Horse candidates, the opposition and Jonathan Moyo's NPF The details behind the plot to topple President Mnangagwa through impeachment make for a very interesting read and I'm surprised none of our mainstream media are willing to delve deep into it. When Webster Shamu was caught red-handed rigging the elections in his neck of the woods, the expose also cracked wide open a conspiracy that has now been confirmed for the first time in public by President Mnangagwa himself. You've read stories about Shamu sponsoring and fielding candidates against Chris Mustvangwa (President Mnangagwa's Special Adviser who is in line to become minister of Information and Publicity after the elections) in the Norton Constituency primary elections. That saga, apparently, ...

There is no doubt now that there is a plot against Nelson Chamisa, one designed to obliterate his political career by the end of next year. Or sooner. Let me explain. Morgan Tsvangirai ran a solid outfit as MDC leader. He gathered around him people of intellectual capacity and strategic prowess. People like Welshman Ncube, Tendai Biti and a host of other backroom operators the public does not know about. These minds are still in place. Those people, even ones who had disagreed with Tsvangirai and walked away, are all back at Chamisa's disposal. It is inconceivable then, that, with such a deep well of talent and brains that he could tap into, Nelson Chamisa is repeatedly having to be on the back foot, speaking out of turn and being caught in downright lies. He started with airports at your house, bullet trains and spaghetti roads. When that elicited derision and a backlash, someone apparently told him to pivot and project himself as a statesman. Which he took to me...

Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai At the Press Conference today when he fired Energy Minister Elias Mudzuri and shifted some deck chairs on the Titanic Government. Harare, Zimbabwe, 23 June 2010 Clearly, the knives are now out for those said to be plotting against Morgan Tsvangirai's Life Presidency of the MDC that carries his surname. The Prime Minister of Zimbabwe has fired one of the two heavyweights against him in the party. Elias Mudzuri, the Minister of Energy, is now no Minister at all, "redeployed to the party", according to Morgan Tsvangirai. Tendai Biti the PM left alone. This is basically a shot across the bow for the Finance Minister. Now he knows Tsvangirai means to be elected president at the next Congress and still has power to destroy careers for the leaders of the MDC-T. Indeed, the tone of the press conference left no doubt at all that the Prime Minister had said he was firing Mudzuri for incompetence. Mudzuri also suffered for what Tsvangirai considered ...

Harare, Zimbabwe, 12 June 2010 While Econet is claiming that it is now the largest mobile phone network in Zimbabwe, most of its vaunted huge subscriber base have been failing completely to make phone calls since last week. The company to have greedily chased numbers while completely neglecting its infrastrcuture. While putting out dubious claims of base stations being built, it is clear Econet has fallen into the same trap as befell Netone a year or so ago: failure to invest in infrastructure in order to continue giving service to customers. Super dividends and profits are being declared by Econet, which it now turns out is a bad move because that money should have gone to ensuring good quality service. People on Econet right now just get the message: "Disconnecting" when they are trying to call out. This has been happening for a week and just as the World Cup starts. Previously, these companies (like Econet) could blame their incompetence on the bad politics and the bad eco...

Minister of Energy and MDC-Tsvangirai alleged "Organising Secretary" appears incapable of organising a piss-up in a brewery. The Minister went on national television to lie to the nation that he had ordered ZESA not to implement power cuts during the world cup. But a large section of the Harare population failed to watch the opening matches on Friday because of ZESA went ahead anyway and cut them off Harare, Zimbabwe 12 June 2010 A whole cabinet Minister, a man from the Tsvangirai MDC who is now Minister of Energy, Elias Mudzuri, faced the cameras last week and lied through his teeth, as has been proven over the last couple of days. Mudzuri told the nation that there would be no power cuts and load-shedding for the duration of the World Cup tournament in South Africa, which most people in Zimbabwe will be following. (I myself am not a soccer fan at all, by any stretch of the imagination. I am more a cricket and tennis person and I have actually never attended a soccer match ...

© Zimbabwe Standard Newspaper This is Locadia Tembo, who is now apparently Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's girlfriend. Her relationship with the Prime Minister, who heads Zimbabwe's opposition, the MDC-Tsvangirai, which is in a coalition government with President Robert Mugabe's ZANU PF, has caused a rift in the opposition party, with senior figures alleging that she may be part of a CIO (Central Intelligence Organisation) plot to infiltrate the Prime Minister's party. This is because she a sister to ZANU PF's MP for Goromonzi, a rural constituency Harare, Zimbabwe, 03 June 2010 Discontent within the Executive of the MDC has apparently reached such high levels now that there is a real risk of a split being caused as a result of a relationship the Prime Minister and leader of the MDC-T, Morgan Tsvangirai, has started with a woman who allegedly has strong links to the the party of President Robert Mugabe, ZANU PF. Tsvangirai is said to be in a relationship with Loc...

Morgan Tsvangirai, president of the MDC-T and Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, addresses a press conference at his party HQ in Harare on May 16 2010. Tsvangirai is frantically trying to contain a looming threat from two factions in his party that have now joined forces and are pushing for a Congress to be held so that they can challenge his position. Tsvangirai has reacted by stripping Secretary General and Minister of Finance Tendai Biti of the majority of his powers, as well as effectively suspending Elias Mudzuri from the position of National Organising Secretary, a post effectively now held by a Tsvangirai loyalist, Morgan Komichi. The MDC-T Congress, postponed time and again, is now, according to Komichi, only to be held after a General Election in Zimbabwe, whenever that may be. Harare, Zimbabwe, 25 May 2010 Some time back, I was accused of being a nay-sayer, a hater of the MDC etc for pointing out facts that are now emerging to be true. Last week, Tendai Biti, the most potent and cre...

"Bastard!"- Julius Malema, the South African ANC Youth League president shouts at and insults Jonah Fisher, a BBC journalist at a press conference on Thursday last week at Luthuli House (ANC Head Office) in Johannesburg. Malema says he supports everything Mugabe is doing and that the ANC will support the Zimbabwean president in the next elections in that country. Harare, Zimbabwe, 11 April 2010 The independent media in Zimbabwe today is once again engaged in wishful thinking over the firebrand South African ANC Youth League leader, Julius Malema, with the Zimbabwe Standard plastering on its front page the header: ANC Dumps Malema Over ZANU PF Stance. The paper's report is based on the fact the South African president, who is also the mediator in Zimbabwe, Jacob Zuma, had issued a statement saying that "leaders should think before they speak"and the fact that the ANC spokesman also issued a statement saying Malema's comments on the MDC-Tsvangirai and his beha...

Buttock-waving Mugabe women supporters and youths disrupted a Constitutional Conference in Harare last July 14 (above), leading to police being called in to restore order and guard the meetings. Now, ZANU PF, Mugabe's party, and MDC-Tsvangirai have joined hands to loots funds allocated to the process by donors. The donors have responded by refusing to pay for lavish bar bills, room service and US$40 daily "allowances"for almost a thousand delegates, including gatecrashers and street kids who were allowed to attend the last workshop earlier this month. The organisers from ZANU PF and MDC responded by looting US$4 million given to them by Finance Minister and Tsvangirai confidante Tendai Biti Harare, Zimbabwe, 24 January 2010 Donors like the United Nations Development Fund have dumped the corruption-ridden Zimbabwe Constitution-making process amid claims by ZANU PF that the move is informed by the failure of Western governments to craft a Constitution on behalf of Zimbabwe....

Morgan Tsvangirai is booed as he leaves the podium at Southwark Cathedral in London after he failed to finish his speech to Zimbabweans there on June 20 2009. The MDC leader and Zimbabwean Prime Minister had just called for Zimbabweans to return home because it was now safe despite all evidence to the contrary. Tsvangirai subsequently told a reporter in South Africa that he stands by the statement that Zimbabweans outside the country must return and that he would no longer support their claims for asylum since things had normalised back home. Tsvangirai supporters should have no problems following this instruction since they believe that he is never wrong Harare, Zimbabwe, 23 January 2010 Although ZANU PF youths and even the military continue to run riot in the rural areas of Zimbabwe, threatening "a bullet to the head"for anyone voting for Morgan Tsvangirai in the next elections, most MDC supporters in the Diaspora (especially United Kingdom and America), continue to defend ...

After invading farms (above) in Zimbabwe, ZANU PF went on to dish out these farms to people with no resources to work the land, while some senior politicians from both ZANU PF and MDC managed to lay their hands of multiple farms, hoarding them in the hope that they would get title deeds and eventually sell the farms (perhaps even back to their former owners). This makes the likelihood of a Land audit to investigate productivity and those with more than one farm highly unlikely. On Tuesday, a ZANU PF Minister told Zimbabwe television that there will no land audit until sanctions on Zimbabwe are lifted Harare, Zimbabwe, 21 January 2010 Robert Mugabe's party has ruled out carrying out a Land Audit demanded by the people of Zimbabwe, the MDC, opposition parties and donors who want to pour in aid for agriculture in Zimbabwe. And they are blaming "sanctions" for their refusal to allow an audit to gauge whether there are black farmers with multiple farms and to also see whether ...

Lovemore Moyo, the Speaker of Zimbabwe's Parliament, is now engaged in an ugly and unprofessional turf war with the Clerk of Parliament, whom the MDC-Tsvangirai faction sees as a ZANU PF appointee. It is a continuation of the turf war between Mugabe and Tsvangirai, with the Prime Minister and his party trying to assert their authority as the largest party in parliament. This has led them to see conspiracies everywhere, including in the professional conduct of the Clerk. The Clerk stands his ground and it appears that there is nothing the MDC-T can do to him since he is playing it by the book, while Tsvangirai's party wants him to "get with the programme." Harare, Zimbabwe, 20 December 2009 The fight for political space and authority between ZANU PF and Morgan Tsvangirai's MDC has now spilled into parliament, with the Clerk of Parliament, the long-serving Austin Zvoma, threatening legal action against the MDC-Tsvangirai-appointed Speaker of Parliament Lovemore Moyo...