Post election sentiments.

This comes a bit late but the scenario at play is still quite fresh to the people involved and affected. I am talking about the political arena of Zimbabwe, the major players, spectators and the ticks that feed of the unfolding events. With the victory of a party that had a lot of people crying foul over the victor which seemed to everybody to have come too easy. Rigging was the primary suspect tool that Zanu (PF) used and we do not know what else. Blessing-Miles Tendi, a professor of African studies at Oxford spelled out some of the causes that led to Mugabe's landslide 61% victory against Tsvangirai's 34%. Tendi says among the elements at play here is a theory of called preponderance of incumbency which means the advantage the ruling president has over the opposition because he/she has control over institutions such as the media which he uses to popularize his campaign. After the election, the much anticipated regime change turned into just but another pipe dream, a dwindling hope for people who had been dreaming about it since the turn of the millennium when the officials of the government suddenly went into full swing in their abuse of state power among other things. Since then, they have been having an orgy with state resources turning a blind eye to the decrepit state of the nation.

I must say I am extremely proud of the Zimbabwean DNA. Despite the cloud of gloom that descended and settled over our country, our resilience has kept us going. There was nothing wrong with the agrarian land reform except for the brutal way it was carried out. Some people argue that when the settlers were effecting a take-over from our forerunners, they were as brutal as the invaders as the takers-overs of white owned farms were wrongfully termed. However, that is another chapter for there were many elements at play that led to the loss of patience by the people who were expecting the land issue to be addressed. Nobody decried the invasion of African land, until the system established by the setters turned around to haunt them in the sense that the educated Africans, whom they had put into schools so as to exploit them used their knowledge to stage rebellions that spread across the continent like wildfire and soon, they were dethroned. Maybe it was a little too late which brings me to a pertinent issue in our continent's politics.

It seems to me as if the current breed of leaders are just vying to be what European colonialists were to people including them. Europeans established classes in African societies, the bottom peasants, the middle class- educated Africans and the top of the pyramid was occupied by them. This was in a century where industrialism was largely involved in economic prowess and progress. The Europeans owned the means of production, they owned the capital that was used to procure the means of production and they controlled the system that fueled economies in the colonies. These systems in turn derived from their mother countries. They also relied heavily on their mother countries and all the produce, raw materials and all the good things were shipped over to countries of their origin where they were processed and sent back to African colonies where poor Africans employed by the rich Europeans were to buy them, further making rich the same. I think the system of exploiting black finance is still large at play in the continent and overseas here in the developed world. Many poor brown skinned people buy exorbitantly priced apparel to keep up with stereotypes while buying from white owned businesses. It is such a sad situation where in Africa, foreign owned corporations run timber, mining and other huge operations expropriating profits while leaving the continent's nature damaged and irreparable. All this is fine with African governments because here is the issue: A reigning president is approached by a wealthy industrialist from the developed world, and he, having reverence for particularly 'white' business people, readily agrees to take whatever is placed in the plate to silence him because he has the power to stop this abuse of his country's resources. When this has been done, the industrialist's company moves in and begins digging, felling and doing all sorts of things to support their empire while the bribed government official flies to the mother country of the industrialist where he buys lavish cars, suits and furniture for his mansions and before he comes back, has medical check-ups and work done to him by foreign doctors. This is the reason why the continent will not progress while all this evil is going on.

So having established that the leaders of African countries are after the glory of the former colonial master and nothing at all about the emancipation of their own, save for a few blessed souls. There may have been fear for such a reincarnation if Morgan Tsvangirai had risen to power in Zimbabwe. Many people like me held a belief that his was a promise for a truly democratic Zimbabwe although I did not necessarily go with what a blind supporter would do, I supported the democratic principles embraced by the party he led, not the man necessarily and my peers saw this as a sign of hatred for the man. For the man, I hold nothing against and will not. The party's late response to strategize and gear up for elections may have been seen approaching during its tenure in the government of national unity established in February 2009. They did not do many things which they could have done to convince the electorate that they were up for the job but again, that may have been caused by the foul play by the opposition ministers and people who otherwise were key to their passing decisions that would have benefited the people. Another reason caused largely by years of Mugabe's demagogic rhetoric and the land reform, many people saw Tsvangirai run back and forth to western governments to consult and seek financial help and were a bit skeptical especially when Mugabe went on to say that the western governments were trying to install him as their puppet and Mr Tsvangirai failed to exonerate himself from those allegations quite fluently. That again is another fish to fry. The way I see it is, Tsvangirai had a promise of good political goods. His was a way that involves everyone in the running of a country, that's what democracy rests on, total involvement of people in that country in the affairs of the same. He met with an electorate that vacillated and was manipulated, beaten, killed and simply had not enough motivation to effect change. It seems we are comfortable in our thorny bed and the prospect of having to transfer to an eiderdown bed involves having to move and pricked further so we might as well lie there motionlessly.

Now, the irony of the situation in the country is indeed saddening as there has not been yet any developments on the government front to prove to people that the promises that bought them over are going to be fulfilled any time soon. The finance minister is expected to work miracles to come up with a feasible budget for the nation and the decline in revenue inflow is disturbing. Outflows majorly civil servant remuneration (about 70%) is gobbling up a large part of the little that is trickling in. While this is going on, there is nothing much being said about the money being obtained from sale of Zimbabwe's natural resource, diamonds which word has it that they have been hijacked by Zanu PF officials to enrich themselves while poking fun at the government's administrative duties. They deny any wrong doing but the question is, how can they afford to live lavishly if the government pays civil servants so measly? It's a case of former colonialists having returned in the form of rich black rulers. What a shame?