WHY THE NEW FINANCE MINISTER INSPIRES CONFIDENCE

For me the greatest tragedy when it came to Zimbabwe was the mismanagement of the economy and state sanctioned corruption under the government of Robert Mugabe and not necessarily the lack of human rights. Other African countries also have bad human rights record e.g the treatment of the opposition leader and the disregard of the high court order in Zambia and the reported sham presidential elections in Rwanda. However these other countries manage economies properly making sure that their citizens stay home. Just look at the huge number of Zimbabweans in South Africa as compared to other nationalities.I left Zimbabwe in 2007 and as I have previously written in my blog the reason was to escape a failing economy. As the saying goes-Its the economy stupid!

 

So on 2 October 2017 I completed serving my 4 week's notice after 10 years of service with my employer in Pretoria. That same night, I took a bus to Harare. I would spend most of October 2017 between Harare, Chivhu and Mutoko concentrating on my piggery project that I already spent over $20 000 to develop. I also planned to farm tobacco since now I had the time. When I saw the devaluation of the bond note currency I decided against farming. After I had sourced feed that could last almost three months I came back to South Africa.I was fortunate that I got my terminal benefits within 4 weeks and I had a few hundred thousand Rands in my bank account and I let it stay there for more than a month. One thing was clearer I was not going to invest more money in Zimbabwe due to the economic distortions caused by bond notes. I had even considered taking our family back home to Zimbabwe and me and maNyoni we both decided that our kids had better prospects in South African.

 

Around December 2017 and January 2018, there was a dry spell that affected a lot of crops. I visited my in laws in Chivhu as well as my cousin in Mutoko, the situation was the same. I did share some of the photos of the wilting crops on Facebook. There is something that I did not disclose. Less than 1km from my in-laws' 35 hectare farm there is a big dam that was left by the previous white farmer and non of the new farmers have put up irrigation facilities. Also in Mutoko where my cousin stays there is a perennial river next to his plot.

 

A Chinese made diesel heavy duty water pump costs around $1 000. If I decide to buy the latest I phone it will be much more expensive than that. The question is will you get a return on your capital. I want to be honest, at times I have asked my self whether we did the right thing building and investing in Zimbabwe. Every time I go home with my wife, she is always chiding me about not completing our main house. I always remember the pain that I endured from 2009 to 2010 when I had to work overtime almost everyday, share houses and even rooms with the strangers to raise the money to build our two bedroom cottage in Zimbabwe. Now ever since bond notes came we battled to get rent and we ended up chasing away our tenants. The irony is that our home in Zimbabwe is far more spacious and comfortable than the one we stay in Pretoria. The question is will we ever go back to live in Zimbabwe?

 

As I previously shared with my friends on social media, I ended up deciding to vote for Mr Mnangagwa on the eve of the election after Robert Mugabe endorsed Chamisa. I was regretting my vote for ED after the post election violence where soldiers shot unarmed citizens. My message to president Mnangagwa is that if he let his economic team do their work unhindered he will have the support of many citizens both in and out of the country. It is hard being a foreigner, many people wants to come back home and are willing to invest their hard earned money back in Zimbabwe. We do not want handouts, all we want is a conducive economic environment.

 

With a functioning economy, there is no need to rig elections because citizens rewards good work, he just needs to look to Botswana Democratic Party and Chama Cha Mapinduzi of Tanzania which had been winning clean elections for years.

Its the economy stupid! I believe the only way for Zimbabwe now is up.

Maybe boys should also cry

Two days ago, I listened to maNyoni talking to our last born early in the morning preparing him for school. She asked him, “why are you crying, do you want to be a girl?” Our son was not happy that he had to stop watching cartoons and prepare for school that day. Last night I watched on ENCA news the story of the water polo assistant coach at Parktown Boys High School who pleaded guilty to 144 charges of sexual assault acts on young school boys on the school's premises. 144 is a staggering number maybe if boys were allowed to cry, this would not have occurred. I grew up in the 80s in Zimbabwe hearing the same message, boys don’t cry. Maybe boys should also cry.

I still remember the night around 1983 to 1984 at Amaveni Police Camp in Kwekwe when I was abused. That time I was only 7 or 8 years old, the girl was around 13 or 14. My father had been transferred from Belingwe to Kwekwe at the end of 1982. The girl was staying with his uncle after the death of her father. Her uncle also a police officer was also being transferred from Belingwe to Kwekwe and she was starting high school at Amaveni Secondary school and she had to stay with us for a few weeks before her uncle and family also moved to Amaveni. My mother that night innocently suggested that she sleeps  in the same bed with me and not with my two younger sisters as they were still wetting the bed. I woke up that night and she was molesting me. I just pretended to be asleep throughout the whole ordeal. Of course I knew what was happening, I had older cousins and I been taught about sex during the games called mahumbwe that was played during the school holidays back at the village. The next morning, I did not tell my mother about what had happened. Boys don’t cry and boys don’t talk about their feelings.

In 1999 when I was working in Zimbabwe, I visited a client in Harare and I saw the woman and I remembered her even though I had last seen her in 1989. I remembered that she had married towards the end of the 80s and her marriage had failed. I gathered the courage to ask her why she had done that to me and she never answered me by the time the client came back to the office. A few years, I learnt that she had died. The first person I told about that incident was my wife after we got married.

Growing up mainly in the police camps and at the village, I learnt that boys would only solve problems through fighting. I remember one evening I was playing in Amaveni Police Camp with Welly short for Wellington and he called one of the uncles a derogatory name of Nyatera (scandals made from used tyres normally won by poor men) and the uncle’s name was Taylor. We started fighting and Welly won that fight. A few months later we had another argument and we fought again and I won that fight. There was always a hierarchy based on who was the best fighter. At school, we were not allowed to fight but after school kids would solve problems by fighting on the way home. I was lucky that when I went to the village during the school holidays my father and mother came from the same village. I had a cousin on my mothers side who was 4 years older than me and he was feared and he would protect me when we went to herd cattle as that were the time when most of the fighting was done. On my father’s side, his younger cousin brother the late babamudiki Masimba protected me.

One day I was not in the company of my cousin brother and this bully whom we called Tina short for Tinashe and he is now late, I had been playing with him and out of the blue he pinned me down and wanted to spit into my mouth and luckily he missed. I had not provoked him and I would have done that as he was clearly stronger and older than me. The other day I was in the company of my older cousin sisters going to the fields and they initiated a fight between me and this guy of my age his name was Kumu short for Kumutsungirira. We did not finish the fight but he was clearly giving me a hiding. My older cousin sister Hazel would taunt me for years to come about that incident. Back at my mother’s house, you could not come home crying that so and so had beaten me up as the answer would always be the same, “go back and fight”.

 

The other issue that was complicated was on dating. Girls never told you whether they were interested in you, the first dating advice I got from my older cousins was that you had to pursue a girl as much as you can as girls were always shy and no did not exactly mean no. I remember in early 1999, I started staying in Avondale, Harare and most Sunday mornings, I would catch a taxi to Trinity Methodist church behind the High Court and the President’s Munhumutapa offices to attend the early English service. I liked that service a lot because it was very short and after that I would to do window shopping along the iconic 1^st Street of Harare and that before the economic crisis in Zimbabwe. I would then walk home. There was this girl who always sat next to me and would always look at me. I always thought that her glances where a disapproval for my terrible tunes whenever we sang from the hymn books. Growing up, I was told that I could not dance nor sing. It was only later that I realised that maybe she was just interested in me, I did not find her attractive. Around 2000-2001 she got married in the church.

In February 2002 during my mother’s funeral I barely cried. A Shona funeral is always complicated due to the politics involved. My mother did not want to be buried at the village and elders from both side of the family wanted her body to be taken to the village and I had to stand my ground. My father’s only brother had issues with me and I told him that we would address whatever issues he had with me after the funeral. My wife and sisters were being mistreated by relatives and I had to confront those relatives. I only managed to shed tears after the last body viewing at Lendy Park Cemetery after I saw my friend and best man Tonderai Masvosva.

Our three sons are growing up in a different environment than mine. At home they fight but at school fighting is not allowed and pupils can be expelled from school for fighting. Unlike my generation, they spend more time indoors as they have TVs, play stations, internet etc. Their world is changing and we should encourage them to talk about their feelings and not to bottle everything in. Boys must also be protected as well and they must taught properly so that they don’t contribute to the culture of violence and rape towards other boys and girls.

You want to go into business? Learn to make better and timely decisions

We all wish to advance in our careers as well as in business. Leadership can be a very lonely place mainly because of the weight of decisions that one has to carry. Towards the end of 2002, I landed my first management job as a team leader at Zimbabwe Insurance Brokers. I soon learnt how lonely it can be as a leader. In the insurance industry if you lack integrity, you will not last one day longer than necessary. Before I joined the company there was this team member who had conducted a corrupt transaction that eventually came in the open. Unfortunately for the team member, the Mazda 626 Cronos that had been poorly repaired belonged to the spouse of one of the senior managers at SMM Holdings. Then our company as well as dozens of prominent companies were  subsidiaries of SMM Holdings. This SMM Holdings senior manager went on to become an influential government minister and he was still a minister in the outgoing Zimbabwe cabinet.

 After I joined the organisation, the Managing Director came with the client to my office and told her that I would take over the issue and I started solving it. I started dragging my feet when it came to the disciplinary of the staff member. I do not know whether it was the fact that he was old enough to be my father or the fact that I could not gather the courage to start a process that could lead to his dismissal. One day the MD passed by my office and he did not even go through the General Manager whom I was reporting to. He was angry and he told me that, “Mr Kanyoka, you are handling this guy with kid gloves”.  Eventually with the help of the Human Resources officer I concluded the disciplinary case and we let go of the employee. It was a very difficult process for me. Leadership is not about being popular but about doing the right thing for the organisation to survive and prosper, however everything must be done within the confines of the law as well as the culture of the country

If you want to be a leader, you must start learning to make timely decisions wherever you are. For example you might be a trainee at the lowest level, when you refer any issue to a senior instead of just asking what to do you must also make your suggestions and if your suggestion is overruled find out where you went wrong and correct yourself. With time you will realise that more and more of your suggestions are being accepted and that is how you grow. Leadership mentoring also starts in the community, I come from North East Zimbabwe from the Zezuru clan we also speak Shona. In my tribe males are automatically assigned leadership roles. For example some of my older cousin sisters would wait for me to make the final decision. My father died when I was 14 and as the eldest child and son, I would have to take decisions that my father would have ordinarily have taken. I only realised later that my mother started mentoring me to be a leader long time ago. When my mother started receiving the megre widow’s and dependent’s government pension, she would always ask me for input on doing the budget for the household. As a result, I started learning to save money at the age of 15.  When she started a tuckshop at home, I would run it for her. When she started poultry projects, I would be involved in the running of the project.

One of the most difficult decision, I had to deal with was in early 1996 when I was told my sister was pregnant. My sister had just failed her O’Level examinations. It was up to me to tell her to go away from the house to stay with her boyfriend as per the custom in our tribe.  My sister left for a number of months and stayed with the boyfriend. At that time I was now teaching about 200km from home and during the school holidays, I saw that my sister would walk about 2km from the place where she was lodging to come with the child to eat at our house. It was clear that her boyfriend was not taking care of my sister and my nephew. It was painful for me to see her like that eventually I told her to come back home with her son. The following year my sister went to night school and passed her O’Level with very good results. She then came to stay with me in Avondale, Harare and went to the University of Zimbabwe’s A Level night school. Around 2001 my sister eventually got a good job and she was able to look after her son and she sent him to good schools and she raised him into a good and responsible boy. About two weeks ago my nephew who is now in his second year at University of Pretoria came to visit us and I thought to myself that life could have turned differently for him and my sister.

Every decision has consequences and in my over 22 years of working, the worst managers for me are those who get paralysed when the time comes for them to make decisions. It is better to make bad decision than no decision at all. We all make bad decisions at one time but the idea is to learn from our mistakes. Last year after I resigned from my job in October and went back to Zimbabwe. I had the time and the resources to farm tobacco and I eventually decided against doing so because of the economic environment. In November 2017 Robert Mugabe was eventually forced to resign and the environment changed for the better and I regretted my decision. This year after a gruelling election period, there has been times that I have asked myself if it ethical to invest in a country where elections are clearly stolen. I know that it is not about my personal feelings. If I pull the plug on my investments, it means dozens of people can be affected adversely. The other truth is that for democracy to flourish, there must be economic growth in Zimbabwe because the more people are impoverished the more Zanu-PF can hold on to power. About 24 months ago, there was an SRC election at the University of Zimbabwe and there were serious allegations that students were bought with plates of food to vote for Zanu-PF candidates. If educated people can be bought with food then what about poor peasants in the rural arrears?

Even the two thirds majority attained by Zanu-PF was fixed for them by ZEC

Like many Zimbabweans, I spent most of Wednesday 22 August 2018, following Constitutional Court proceedings. What captivated me the most was the presentation from Nelson Chamisa’s lawyer Advocate Thabani Mpofu. By the way I voted for Mr Mnangagwa and a Zanu-PF MP. The judges kept on questioning him as it should be. I am also inclined to agree with the observation from Senator David Coltart that the lawyers for ZEC and Mr Mnangagwa seemed to have gotten a free pass from the judges. This also brings with itself another unspoken issue among Zimbabweans, is the Zimbabwean judiciary truly independent? It was not lost on me that the current chairperson of ZEC is herself a judge of the high court. The previous chairperson of ZEC being the one who sat on the March 2008 presidential election results for a month is himself a judge president.

 Then there is Justice Chinembiri Bhunu who presided over the case where MDC activists were sentenced to 20 years for the murder of a police officer on what some argue was flimsy evidence.  Justice Chinembiri Bhunu is part of the Constitutional court judges presiding on the election petition. From what I have seen on social media, the majority of Zimbabweans seemed to have reached a consensus that Nelson Chamisa will lose this case. I agree with Advocate Thabani Mpofu that this election was fixed by ZEC for the benefit Mr Mnangagwa.If we consider the two thirds majority that Zanu-PF attained in parliament, this was also fixed by ZEC in order to benefit Zanu-PF. If one looks at the actual valid votes cast for candidates, you will notice total number of votes cast in urban MP seats is general higher as compared to rural MP seats; there was a deliberate attempt to have less number of MP seats in urban areas and more in the rural areas in order to benefit Zanu-PF.

In my view the so called two thirds majorities that Zanu-PF attained in parliament does not really represent the will of the people.  For example ZEC split UMP into two seats namely Uzumba and Maramba Pfungwe and yet for example Epworth that has a bigger voting population is still one parliamentary seat.  Another example is that if one takes four rural seats in Matebeleland namely Gwanda North, Gwanda South, Matobo South and Insiza South, the combined votes for the four seats are far less than Goromonzi South an urban seat. For example Harare province was allocated 28 seats when it should have around 38 seats as it has about 18% of the country’s voter population.

As individuals based both in and out of the country, we have to make decisions on our future regardless of the decision of the court this afternoon. Ever since the first disputed election in 2000, individuals would make decisions of whether to emigrate from the country or not. After each disputed election the country’s economy would suffer. Just imagine an investor coming to invest in a country where the election was clearly stolen and a court of law condoning such an election conduct. What outcome should that investor expect should he or she take his dispute to the same court of law?

The few questions that I can’t seem to get an answer. Why did Mr Mnangagwa rush to announce an election soon after the coup? Where they going to hand over power so soon after removing Mr Mugabe? Why waste so much money to hold a sham election that leaves the country so divided? I still remember the unity across political divide on 18 November 2017 when we marched to State House to demand Mr Mugabe’s resignation. Why did Mr Mnangagwa not put together a unity government for a few years to sort out the economy first? Why hold an election when you know that you won’t abide by the will of the people?

These immortal words from the late Morgan Tsvangirai are true even today, “Zanu-PF can rig an election, but they can’t rig the economy”. The tragedy is that it ordinary people who will suffer due to a failing economy.

The collective decision of Zimbabweans is wiser & must prevail

I voted for Mr Emmerson Mngangagwa and a Zanu-PF MP but I am not celebrating these results. Instead all I have been having were nightmares that started when I saw all those videos of soldiers firing live ammunition at unarmed protesters in the streets of Harare. Of course Zanu-PF won two thirds majority in parliament but this is not the true representation of the will of the people when you look at the voting numbers in urban areas. In my constituency of Goromonzi South, the total number of votes cast are almost 50 000. There was a deliberate ploy to limit the number of seats in urban areas and increase the number of seats in rural areas. However for presidential elections each and every votes counts and I suspect that Chamisa might be saying the truth when he says he won this election especially when you look at the conduct of the government after the election.

The results for each of to the 10 800 election were counted on-site and the results were posted outside each polling station and there was no dispute there. The problem arose when those results were collated at the national centre. It is an open secret that Emmerson Mnangagwa is deeply unpopular across the country and this was an election that he desperately needed to win at all costs. Everyone is asking Chamisa to go to court and this is unnecessary as all that is required is to engage the expertise of independent mathematician to properly collate the figures provided by each of the 10 800 polling stations to come up to the true votes for each candidate as that will truly represent the true will of the people.

 We warned Mr Mnangagwa not to rush into an election after he took over in November 2017 and instead put up a government of national unity for a few years and sort out the economy. Now we have a disputed election and citizens know how they voted and they are not accepting results. Some in the international community can accept the results but without the buy-in of citizens both in the country and outside the country the country cannot move forward. Some professionals have decided to leave the country and those in the diaspora will post pone investing in the country. In April this year, I decided to go back to work and during the induction in the presence of other 40 recruits, my CEO asked me on my assessment on Zimbabwe and I told him my honest opinion then to say there was hope then. In fact when I was self-employed or when I went for interviews at many companies, I would meet many influential people and the question on Zimbabwe always comes up and I have to give my honest opinion. How many Zimbabweans have hope for our country at the present time?

Zimbabwean election needs the thump-up of its citizens both at home and abroad. Zimbabweans of all walks of life are the true ambassadors of our country as we are in touch with policy makers throughout the world and when they ask us of our opinion we will tell them the truth. This past Friday, I was supposed to go back to Zimbabwe to finalise preparation for the coming tobacco farming season and I was too depressed about the events in Zimbabwe to even go back home. This morning, I was talking to one of my trusted associates back in Zimbabwe and he was telling me of soldiers continuing to assault people in the townships at night. Also the international media are carrying stories of the military brutality and the heavy handedness of the police. It seems we are back to Mugabe era or worse.

 

For this country to move forward, the true will of the people must prevail and I am reminded about what the Late Professor Masipula Sithole wrote in 2000 before the 2000 Constitutional Referendum, "The collective decision of Zimbabweans is wiser". Mr Mnangagwa made an unwise decision to call for an election and he must accept the true result and not rule by the gun. Mr Mngangagwa must fall on his sword.

The one day I worked for a labour broker

On my way to Mamelodi January 2018

As so called black middle class, we pretend to be detached from the working class struggles such as the trade unions' fights against labour brokers and the shocking service from Metro Rail.  We lie to ourselves that we are not affected by these events. Beginning September 2017 after exactly 10 years in the same job I had a decision to make. Do I stop my piggery project in Zimbabwe that I had already invested over $20 000 and concentrate working here in South Africa? It was not a very difficult decision to make as I did not see any career growth prospects so the next day I started serving my 4 weeks’ notice. Running a project in Zimbabwe whilst staying in another country is a challenge and especially when it comes to money issues it becomes even trickier. When a customer pays when you are not there you might never see a cent. So every two weeks either I or my wife would go to Zimbabwe to make sure that we buy stock feed and monitor the project. I have seen many people in the diaspora sending money for projects such as building a house and only for money to be squandered by relatives. In 2010 we also lost about $1 000 meant for plumbing when a close relative ran away leaving our small children with workers at our house in Zimbabwe.

My late cousin spent more than a decade in the United Kingdom and he sent a haulage truck and money to buy cattle, residential stands etc. When he came back to Zimbabwe around 2010 he had nothing and had to start constructing a house in Chitungwiza and when he died a few years ago he had not done much construction at his house. So on 2 October 2017, on the day I finished serving my notice, I took a bus to Harare that night. Travelling by bus is the cheapest way to get to Harare from Pretoria as it costs around R400 as long as you have time. I would spend most of October in Mutoko and I managed to buy about 6 tonnes of maize bran at about 40% of the price I had paid to farmers nearer to Chivhu where my piggery project is located. That feed would last me about 2 months. After transporting the animal feed, I came back to concentrate on my small transport venture in South Africa.

In December 2017, I had about 2 dozens of pigs ready for market and the price I was getting from our local butcheries was around $3 per kg. At times it would take between 2 weeks to 2 months to get paid even though the butcheries would sell the pigs within a few days. In December 2017, there was a huge demand of pork, where some supermarkets would sell pork for around $9 per kg, however for us farmers we never got to benefit from this windfall. I know of many small scale producers who had to stop pig farming as the status quo only favoured retailers and not farmers. In February 2018, I decided to increase my production so that I could raise 600pigs per year with the aim of opening my own butcheries. I then decided to go back to work temporarily in order to help raise the required finance to buy butchery equipment. I responded to a six month contract position at a big financial institution through what I thought was an employment agent and this suited me very well.

In the second week of February 2018, I went for an interview at the big campus closer to Florida. Two days later the agent told me, I had done very well and the company wanted to hire me. I was not very sure if I wanted to go. The agent had indicated that I might start on Monday. On Friday morning I had an appointment to transport a load for a client in Pretoria East. The client then asked me if I could transport an urgent load to Zimbabwe that day. When you are self-employed you do not let work pass by. By early evening on Friday morning, I was on my way to Zimbabwe. On the Zimbabwean side, I really battled with tyre punctures as I was carrying a heavy load and I only reached Hwedza on Sunday morning. I then drove home to Zimre Park took a bath and drove to Chivhu to check on my piggery project and then drove back to South Africa.

After driving two nights without much sleep I ended up sleeping in Polokwane. Around 8am on Monday the agent phoned me and I was still in Polokwane. When I arrived in Pretoria she phoned me again and I told her that I was not sure if I wanted to take up the job offer. After discussing the issue further, I told her I would start work tomorrow. I took Gautrain to Park Station very early in the morning as I hate being late especially for work. There was no way, I would drive 130km every day to and from work and put that much mileage on any of my cars. I went to Reya Vaya bus station and they said they don’t have buses going there. I then went to Metro Rail wanting to buy a ticket to Florida and the ticket seller told me that the train was running late. My only option was to go to a mini bus taxi. Given my experience with taxi drivers, I avoid them like a plague. I arrived at work around 07:30am and waited for human resources. I had to sign a few declaration forms but there was no employment contract.I ended up discussing with one of the guys who had started a few weeks earlier who informed me that the bank had a huge backlog and had employed a lot of contract workers and more were on their way.

I would spend the day in the claims department with a kind gentleman who was showing me the systems. The agent also phoned me and confirmed that she had e-mailed me the employment contract and this was a bit strange why the agent and not the bank was giving me the contract. After work, I ran 3km to Florida station to catch the Metro Rail train to Park Station. I can write books about my experience with Metro Rail shocking service as I used it almost every day from Pretoria Central to Mamelodi and then run 5km to Pretoria East and vice versa in the evening from November 2017 until March 2018 when I was self-employed. The way Prasa runs the commuter train service is pathetic; they do not care about passengers as well as the safety of their staff. I feel sorry for tens of thousands of commuters from Mamelodi who are now suffering ever since Metro Rail suspended the service. Some of these commuters are students, unemployed, factory workers, security guards, domestic workers etc. who are mostly people who are on minimum wage. A six day week monthly taxi fare costs around R720 whereas  a monthly train ticket costs about R160 and for a person on a minimum wage or unemployed that is a huge difference. In January 2018 Menlyn Taxi association increased their fees by 25% and they will be increasing again due to high fuel prices you can see the that the inflation for poor people is much more than the official rate of inflation.

After arriving at Florida station I had to ask fellow passengers about the expected arrival of the train since metro rail do not operate like Gautrain and they never inform any passengers about anything and you have to rely on the information from fellow passengers. The train soon approached around 5pm and we arrived at Park Station around 5:30pm and I disembarked from the train and I started asking where I could get the Pretoria train and they pointed out that the train I had disembarked was actually the express train to Pretoria. I quickly rushed back. The train started moving and skipping a lot of the stations until we got to Kempton Park and it started stopping for longer periods without explanation. At a bushy area around Olifantsfontein it stopped for close to an hour and we just waited. I asked fellow passengers and they said that was the norm and even in the morning it would behave that way.  I only arrived in Pretoria after 9pm and by that time my phone battery had run out and maNyoni was worried about my whereabouts. luckily in Sunnyside businesses open very late e.g. our Shoprite store opens from 6am to 11pm Monday to Saturday.

I rushed to the internet cafe’ and printed the employment contract. I have been in the insurance industry now for 20 years and I am also currently a law student and one thing I understand in this life is a contract I don’t just sign anything. I remember some years ago when I had to sign a lease agreement I had to ask the land lord to amend a few clauses. Reading the employment contract from the first page onwards, I realised that it did not comply with the Basic Conditions of Employment Act. I then wrote an e-mail to the agent pointing all these deficiencies in her contract and also informed her that I would not be signing it and I was no longer interested in the position. I gathered if the bank really wanted my services they would employ me directly and not through some labour broker who had no clue and would get a large portion of my salary and for what? The next morning I still woke very early as usual and caught a train to Mamelodi to continue with my usual schedule instead of going to Florida

ZANU PF YAKARUMWA NECHEKUCHERA

I had already made up my mind that I was going to vote for Emmerson Mnangagwa but for MP would vote for an MDC MP since we do not have a credible independent MP in our constituency of Goromonzi South. That was before Chamisa came up with his manifesto that was anti Palestine people and I decided that I would vote for a Zanu-PF MP. It is very difficult to be objective once you have chosen a side but at times something has to give. The opposition has been making a lot of noise about the independence of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission and I never took it seriously until the postal voting in Bulawayo involving the police and the recent interview between Ruvheneko Parirenyatwa and Justice Priscilla Chigumba. I have also taken note of what Christopher Mutsvangwa the War Veterans Chairman said about them not allowing Chamisa to assume power should he win the 30 July 2018 election.

A question I asked myself after pondering over the answers by Justice Chigumba in the interview, is the ZEC chairperson or ZEC itself free from government control and by extension free from Zanu-PF control? I looked to my past accounting studies for the definition of independence:

Independence is: (a) Independence of mind – the state of mind that permits the expression of a conclusion without being affected by influences that compromise professional judgment, thereby allowing an individual to act with integrity, and exercise objectivity and professional scepticism; (b) Independence in appearance – the avoidance of facts and circumstances that are so significant that a reasonable and informed third party would be likely to conclude, weighing all the specific facts and circumstances, that a firm’s, or a member of the audit or assurance team’s, integrity, objectivity or professional scepticism has been compromised (CODE OF PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT FOR CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS)


In the insurance industry when it comes to a tricky claims adjudication that may or not involve non disclosure of material facts presented before an insurance contract was entered into , we have a similar measure simply called a reasonable man test. In simple terms would mean, if you call an ordinary and neutral person and present the facts of the scenario to him or her what would their interpretation be of the question asked at inception stage and the answer provided e.t.c? Given the conduct of ZEC would one say they are independent and care about competence. My impression is that the conduct of ZEC does not inspire confidence and they are not truly independent of Zanu-PF. Hopefully with the advent of social media citizens will be able to continue exposing any weaknesses in their systems and their conduct and shining light on all the deeds being done in the dark.

The more Justice Chigumba tried to explain the Bulawayo Postal voting the more I became worried, she kept on saying it is the law and it got me thinking. For god’s sake the justice is different from other people who have presided over our election since 2000, people such as Mariyawanda Nzuwa and Tobaiwa mudede, she is actually a judge of The High Court whose job is to interpret laws and deliver impartial judgements. My understanding is that Zimbabwe is a constitutional democracy and hence we have constitutional sovereignty and not parliamentary sovereignty. In simple terms it means laws passed by parliament such as the electoral laws if they violate the constitution they can be declared as invalid by our courts. This insistence of, “ it’s the law “, sounds hollow as we have heard it before for example Slavery was legal, Apartheid was legal and Holocaust was legal.  As the Justice herself does she think the process is fair and what is she doing to bring about confidence in the whole process?

Let us remind ourselves how we got here. On the morning Saturday 18 November 2017, I landed in Harare to a different atmosphere. Finally Robert Mugabe was on his way out and there was no going back. In the afternoon, I also participated in the demonstration to State House and it was a time of great hope. Zimbabweans of all social classes and races came together that day to demand Mugabe’s resignation. People were carrying photos of Emmerson Mnangagwa and General Chiwenga. These were our heroes as they were finally helping us to get rid of Robert Mugabe. Millions of Zimbabweans were resigned to the fact that Mugabe would rule us until his death and his crazy wife Grace Mugabe would take over and there was nothing anyone could do so we thought until the generals rolled military tanks on the streets of Harare. There was so much goodwill for Mnangagwa and Chiwenga the heroes of the moment.

The biggest opposition to Zanu-PF rule has always been the economy so many people assumed that when Mnangagwa became president he would put together a unity government for a few years and sort out the economy. In true Zanu-PF arrogant style he retained much of the dead wood from Mugabe era in the cabinet and put back Chinamasa in finance and announced that the 2018 elections would go on as scheduled. Chinamasa and Mangudya the authors of the bond note were now back in charge. The decision to introduce bond notes was not a considered decision as it has created more problems for the economy and I still maintain that it must be scrapped (http://kanyokad.blogspot.com/2017/12/why-zimbabwe-needs-to-discard-bond-note.html . With elections around the corner it means money has to be found for campaigning, money that the country does not have. We saw chiefs getting new cars, increments for civil service, funding ZEC and a lot of other spending by the government. The budget deficit is getting wider and we are back to the Mugabe way of managing the economy.

The transfer rate in Zimbabwe is almost 1:2 and prices are rising in tandem and it might get worse and one is reminded of the immortal words from the late Morgan Tsvangirai, “Zanu-PF can rig the election, but they cannot rig the economy”. Now Zanu-PF is panicking but the problem is of their making. For money to pour into the country the elections must be free and fair but on the other end a free election means that Zanu-PF might lose power. How can a person sleeping in bank queue day in and day out vote for Zanu-PF. Already the election is not really free when one considers that millions of Zimbabweans will not be allowed to vote unless they come back to Zimbabwe. ZEC already is showing the whole world that it is not impartial.  Over the weekend I had a twitter exchange with a comrade and the consensus was whoever wins must win outright in the first round because if this election goes to a run off, the military will remove their mask and there will be pain.

I have to say I do not feel sorry for Zanu-PF as they are clearly panicking but this is of their own making. All I have to say to about ED, akarumwa nechekuchera, he thought he held all the cards. If he wins a disputed election there won’t be meaningful investment both from the international community as well as the diaspora community. Who wants to pour their hard earned money in a failing economy? I was not going to vote for Chamisa as he is clearly not qualified but now these are not normal times. If he wins he must assume power and our country can move forward.