ZIMBABWE has a very serious problem that threatens to keep dividing us as a nation.
That problem is intolerance by the ruling Zanu PF party and a sizeable number of its supporters who rabidly and misguidedly believe that Zimbabwe belongs to them alone.
The party has become so bigoted about opposing views to its dogma that as we head for the 2023 elections, its hatred of all opposition is now bordering on xenophobia.
Some ruling party functionaries have declared that the party would set its dogs on the opposition and are prepared and ready to even murder the main opposition Citizens Coalition for Change leader Nelson Chamisa simply because he is leading a movement against the ruling elite who have hijacked the nation for self-gain through corruption and looting of national resources.
And the cacophony of voices denigrating all opposition to Zanu PF rule is growing, with a Chivhu councillor, Tafadzwa Mukandi, being the latest to declare: “If we see that you have gone against the ideologies of the party, we will definitely come for you. This party is the very party that enhanced the land reform programme to which you are beneficiaries. But when we see that you are working against the gains of the liberation struggle, we will not tolerate that and we will definitely come for you … Some people died for this country, yet you want us to tolerate sell-outs.”
This mindset is terrifying and one of the major reasons why many Zimbabweans, for example, decide to leave the country as they are not allowed to hold an opposing view to that of the ruling party, which has presided over a crumbling economy and is prepared to kill nationals and completely destroy the economy simply because it feels it is its right to do so.
What is so very disconcerting is the fact that the country’s police force appears utterly oblivious to the threat to peace, harmony and unity the utterances by those in Zanu PF are posing. So much for the police’s mission to “maintain law and order, protect and secure the lives and property of the people”.
Maybe it is high time President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who has described those in the opposition as sell-outs, told us that Zimbabwe is not a multiparty democracy and all elections are just a façade.
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The actions of his party simply show that Zimbabwe is not a democratic nation that believes in constitutionalism.
An open declaration by Mnangagwa that Zimbabwe is a one-party State would save us the headache of wasting our time and resources holding useless elections every five years and by-elections in-between.
We are saying this because the xenophobic attitude of the ruling party and its functionaries is forcing us to make this conclusion.
Would anyone be wrong or exaggerating that Zanu PF is a dictatorship which has little respect for the country’s laws and its people?
The cap fits, and the ruling party must wear it.
