Tuesday 26 January 2016

The harmattan that brought Buhari is dredging Nigeria clean of corruption - Zim is feeling the chill. By Patrick Guramatunhu.


In his book, THINGS FALL APART, Chinua Achebe has often written about the harmattan winds or storm as the precursor or bearer of great change. It is the harmattan wind that fanned the inconsequential bush fire into the roaring inferno that destroyed the great forest and all the animals that failed to get away. It was the harmattan storm that carries the swarm of locust whose ravenous appetite stripped the land of every morsel of greenery. First it was the animals that starved to death and soon the people too died of starvation.

 

Nigeria’s harmattan storm have continued blowing and, as usual, brought great change. It was the harmattan storm that blew Nigeria’s old guard of corrupt and incompetent leaders to bring President Muhammadu Buhari last year. He vowed to deal with Nigeria’s (and most of Africa) greatest curse – corruption – and he clearly was meant it unlike so many other leaders who have paid the usual lip-service.

 

A few weeks ago the Nigerian government announced it was going to recover $2 billion from former military strongman General Sani Abacha whose corruption practices have become the stuff of legends. On Monday Nigeria’s information minister, Lai Mohammed, announced that the regime has just uncovered corruption cases implicating state governors, ministers, business leaders, public officials and bankers who stole $6.7 billion dollars in the seven-year period 2006 to 2013.

 

The democratic harmattan winds that swept President Buhari into office has fanned an anti-corruption forest fire that is scorching the land and not ever the big game are failing to get away.

 

2006 was the tail end of Olusegun Obasanjo’s presidency; he was replaced in 2007 by Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

 

Zimbabweans will remember Olusegun Obasanjo as the former Nigerian President who was the head the AU elections observer team of Zimbabwe’s July 2013 rigged elections. It was him who down played the significance of President Mugabe’s failure to produce voters roll, amongst many other serious irregularity, and endorsed Mugabe’s victory.

 

Nearly one million Zimbabweans failed to cast their vote that year because their details were not in constituency voters roll they expected to vote in. There is no doubt that the regime had deliberately and systematically posted the details of opposition party supporters into other constituencies other than the constituency they had registered.

 

Of course the people would have discovered their names were not in the constituency voters roll and have this put right if the voters roll had been released for public scrutiny at least one month before the voting as is required by law. The regime’s refusal to release the constituency voters roll is therefore highly significant particularly when President Mugabe’s winning margin was one million votes – the same as those denied the vote!

 

The Nigeria’s anti-corruption drag-net has only dredged one-year of President Obasanjo’s eight years, 1999 to 2007 and has already caught some big fish. So corruption was rampant in Nigeria during former President Obasanjo’s watch. As a Zimbabwean whose life has been turned upside down as has that of millions of other Zimbabweans; it is impossible to forgive or forget his public endorsement of Zimbabwe’s 2013 fraudulent electoral process.

 

The eye of harmattan democratic storm that swept President Buhari into power in Nigeria last year has not as yet reached Zimbabwe but there is no doubt there is a chill in the air. The stories of Nigeria’s anti-corruption drag-net catching the granddad of looters like General Abacha recovering the looted wealth is bound to make Zimbabwe’s big-spenders who are looting as much as $2 billion a year groan.

 

President Mugabe rigged the July 2013 elections; President Olusegun Obasanjo helped the tyrant get away with it. Mugabe thought he would rig the country’s economic recovery too but has since failed. Zimbabwe’s worsening economic situation is socially and politically unsustainable. As if that was not bad enough, Zimbabwe is facing an El Nino induced drought; decades of misrule will make the situation worse than ever, the regime is stone broke for a start.

 

Zimbabwe’s harmattan democratic storm has brought back home to roost the problems of mismanagement and corruption, Zanu PF has denied existed all these last 36 years; they are the driving force behind the country’s worsening economic meltdown. President Mugabe has managed to resist regime change for 36 years by cheating, bribing, vote rigging and even murdering his opponents but in the economy he has met an adversary like no other, he cannot cheat or murderer economic recovery!

 

It is the economic meltdown that will in the end force democratic change, regime change, in Zimbabwe!

4 comments:

  1. President Mugabe rigged the last elections but he should never imagine that he is therefore not accountable to the people of Zimbabwe; he is and must be reminded of that everyday.

    By failing to appoint a successor President Mugabe has made the country even more economically and politically unstable than ever. The country is facing a catastrophic economic situation with millions out of work and living in abject poverty because he rigged elections to stay in power although he clearly has no clue how to get the nation out of this mess. The infighting in his party means the regime is taking its eyes off the economic crisis!

    Jenny Williams is right to demand that President Mugabe appoints his successor and end the infighting in Zanu PF that is taking the regime's attention away from the burning issues!

    It is people like you, Suitable Kajau, who have encouraged tyrants like Mugabe to believe they are above the law and accountable to no one. Get it in your thick head, President Mugabe is accountable to Jenny Williams and every other Zimbabwean out there.

    Nigeria's President Buhari has gone after that country's corrupt ruling elite and has already netted some big fish and recovered billions of dollars. Zimbabwe is going to have a similar exercise and there will be no stone that will not be turned over to ensure every corrupt official is brought to book.


    We already know President Mugabe has been looting $2 billion a year from Marange. He will be held to account for it; much more so given he used the loot to bankroll his vote rigging!

    ReplyDelete
  2. President Buhari has shown the world, especially his fellow African leaders, that when the is the political will and iron determination even problems like institutionalized corruption can be stamped out. All these reports of corrupt leaders being hunted down and having the loot taken away and throwing the individual in prison is giving some people I know sleepless nights!

    As Zimbabwe's economic situation gets worse and worse the gap separating the have have-everything and the have-nothing will become wider and deeper. The nation will have no choice but to after every penny of the stolen loot, the government will need every penny to finance the recovery and rescue the millions have-absolutely-nothings!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes President Buhari has raised the bar and many African leaders are now fighting a rare guard to justify why they have failed to do the same. The pressure on the next Zimbabwe regime to recover the loot President Mugabe and his cronies have stolen is increasing by the day!

      Delete
  3. @ Choto

    There was never such a thing as GPA Electoral Law reforms, the GPA democratic reforms looked at the structural reforms to restore the independence of ZEC so it can carry out its duties without fear or favour and deliver free, fair and credible elections.

    The electoral law reforms MDC-T are proposing in NERA will never free ZEC, the Police, Media, etc.,etc. from the control of Zanu PF; Obert Gutu has just admitted as much in his latest article.

    The most important point here is that the democratic reforms identified as necessary for free, fair and credible elections in the 2008 GPA are what we need to implement BEFORE the next elections. MDC failed to get even one of these reforms implemented in five years of the GNU because they are incompetent, corrupt and sold-out to Mugabe.

    We do not another GNU to implement the reforms just a independent body whose composition is to be worked out and agreed.

    ReplyDelete