Dear Mr President
“Balancing the need for economic growth or saving the lives of the people?” you said.
“I came to the conclusion that if citizens die, if our people die, we cannot resuscitate them.
“The economy can die, it can be resuscitated now or in the future, as long as people are alive.”
The tragedy here is Zimbabweans will die in their hundreds of thousands whether you extend the lockdown or not.
You have handled the whole corona virus outbreak with your trademark blundering incompetence and the consequences are the virus has spread far and wide. You have been advised to test, track, isolate and treat. You have only done 7 000 tests, far short of the 30 000 you promised. Without accurate test data all your decisions have been guess work, just shooting in the dark.
Zimbabwe has done very little of the other activities, tracking, isolating and treating.
Whilst it is true that easing the lockdown when the number of corona virus cases are set to increase was clearly unthinkable. Still there is no empirical evidence to show the chaotic lockdown of the last five weeks is having any notable effect in slowing down the spread of the virus.
The lockdown is yet another one of your overrated ; “a dog’s puny fart that will never put out the furnace fire”, a the Chinua Achebe would aptly put it!
As for resuscitating the economy, the Zimbabwe economy was already in total meltdown after 40 years of unrelenting decline. When you seized power from Mugabe following the November 2017 military coup you were cocksure of reviving the economy and proclaimed “Zimbabwe is open for business!” No one answered the call, the flood of investors never materialised.
Investors are a shrewd lot, they were never going to be fooled by Zanu PF musical chairs game and empty rhetoric. You promised to end corruption and corruption is still rampant to this day. But most important of all you promised to hold free, fair and credible elections only to blatantly rig the July 2018 elections.
You failed to produce something as basic as a verified voters’ roll. You claim that you received 2.6 million votes but none of the election observers could trace or verify claim with no verified voters’ roll.
Go ahead, extend the lockdown by another two weeks, make it three weeks if you wish. It is clear that you are not testing aggressively because you want to hide the true picture of the seriousness of the corona virus in Zimbabwe – cook the figures, the Chinese Wuhan covid-19 recipe. The Chinese did the tracking, isolation and treating; you are not. And hence the reason the virus has been spreading like wildfire.
You rigged the July 2018 elections and cheated Nelson Chamisa and his MDC friend. You have failed to rig economic recovery before the corona virus pandemic and you will not do so after the pandemic. And most important of immediate importance, you will never ever cheat covid-19!
As Zimbabwe moves into the cold winter days of May, June and July the number of corona virus cases and deaths will soar. Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans are going to suffer and die unnecessarily because of your repeated blundering incompetence, you will not resuscitate any of the died. Will you do the only honourable thing then – admit you failed and step down?
What Zimbabwe has needed for the last 40 years is a competent and accountable government and the country needs one such government now as matter of life and death. Even now a competent government will help save many Zimbabweans from unnecessary suffering and death. And only a competent government will revive Zimbabwe’s economy now.
If there is one thing the tragic events of the corona virus have proven beyond all reasonable doubt it is that Zanu PF does not have the monopoly of knowledge. Zimbabwe must now break with the past, end the curse of rigged elections, and restore all the individual freedoms and rights including the right to free, fair and credible elections and the right to life.
Zanu PF rigged the 2018 elections, the party is illegitimate and must step down! Mr President, this is not negotiable! Step down or you will be forced to do so.
Yours sincerely,
Wilbert Mukori
Citizen of Zimbabwe.