By Patrick Guramatunhu-“While I don’t want to get into the issues around how and why there are sanctions, everyone knows that I personally had to flee my country, Zimbabwe, because of persecution 20 years ago,” said Strive Masiyiwa in a statement. “I have not been back since. For the avoidance of doubt; This is not an appeal for the lifting of sanctions.”

Masiyiwa has launched an appeal for help for Sudan and Zimbabwe to fight
the coronavirus outbreak. The two countries are facing economic sanctions
imposed by the West, particularly the USA and, to add insult to injury, they
were singled out when other countries had their debts written by IMF and
the other multilateral organizations.

In 2016 the then President Robert Mugabe admitted the country was
“swindled of US$ 15 billion in diamond revenue alone”! He never arrested
even one swindler or recovered one dollar.

The following year, 2017, Patrick Chinamasa, then Minister of Finance
confirm in parliament that government was getting 1/6 of the expected
diamond revenue. In other words the looting was still taking place.
Mnangagwa, Mugabe’s successor following the 2017 military coup,
promised “zero tolerance to corruption” and yet he too has yet to arrest one
swindler and/or recover one dollar.

The Chinese helped Mnangagwa rig the July 2018 elections and they were
back in Zimbabwe soon thereafter. Mugabe booted them out of Marange
and Chiadzwa diamond fields, the only looters who had been singled out.
They have since been back to pick up from where they left off!

So, writing off Zimbabwe’s US$ 8 billion debt would only have given the
regime yet another source of money to loot! We need a deeper
understanding of our nation’s problems and a wholistic solution!

Many Zimbabweans have avoid talking about gross mismanagement,
rampant corruption and, most important of all, rigged elections and bad
governance for the last 40 years. These problems have not gone away but
have instead grown and spread like the deadly cancers they are.

Today Zimbabwe’s once promising economy is in ruins, 34% of our people live in extreme poverty, according to a recent WB report. Our political system is total dysfunctional because politics is now a dirty game so dirty only seasoned thugs are playing it.

Many Zimbabweans left the country and have played no role is helping find
the solution to Zimbabwe’s economic and political problems. The corona
virus crisis is forcing millions of Zimbabweans to go back to a country still
ruled by the same corrupt, incompetent and vote rigging thugs complete
with the entourage of equally corrupt and useless opposition sell-outs.

Zimbabweans must now face the country’s teething problem of rigged
elections and bad governance or there will be heart-breaking gnashing of
teeth and countless deaths as Zanu PF’s blundering incompetence drag the
nation deeper and deeper into the abyss.

We are masters of our own destiny and so far we have let clueless buffoon in charge and it shows. How much longer are we going to let this madness continue?

“I don’t want to get into the issues around how and why there are
sanctions!” Why the hell not? If the country is ever going to get out of this
hell-on-earth then it is time we had a hard long look at ourselves and have a
no-hold-barred discussion of the nation’s problems!