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ONCE a criminal, always a criminal, so the saying goes.

 

In Mugabe’s case, it would be apt to amend it to once a murderer, always a murderer.

 

There are compelling grounds to draw parallels between what the murderous regime of Robert Mugabe is engaging in now, and what happened to Matabeleland in the 1980s.

 

Then, Mugabe never forgave the people of Matabeleland and some areas of the Midlands for overwhelmingly rejecting him in the 1980 and 1985 elections in favour of Joshua Nkomo, then leader of PF-Zapu. He dispatched his crack North Korean trained 5^th Brigade under the command of Perence Shiri to exact revenge for his rejection. What followed was untold and unprecedented suffering that Mugabe has refused to apologise for, let alone acknowledge.

 

The current crusade against opposition supporters in the provinces of Mashonaland, Masvingo, Midlands and Manicaland is a re-enactment of those days as he is now punishing the people that he previously regarded as his bona fide supporters for having also, overwhelmingly rejected him in favour of the winner of the March 29^th elections, Morgan Tsvangirai. Mugabe has unleashed his whole army and other security machinery against the people for simply having exercised their universal right of electing who they want as their leader. Mugabe simply did not have the stomach to accept the will of the people and resorted to what he knows best, violence.

 

The brutality and dehumanizing treatment that is being wrought on ordinary Zimbabweans for having exercised their right is a blight not only on Africa and its leaders but on the whole world, whose leadership is just content with making noises in forums without showing any real intent to bring Mugabe to account for his actions. Mugabe has been emboldened by the lack of action that the world took against him after his first genocidal actions in Matabeleland.

 

That there are other people such as the lamentable Thabo Mbeki of South Africa that are prepared to endorse his dastardly behaviour and the treatment of people who did not vote for him has spurred him to escalate the violence against innocent Zimbabweans who are said to have authored their own misfortune by voting for Morgan Tsvangirai.

 

There has been a surge in incidence of violence and deaths of opposition supporters since Mbeki left Harare on that fateful day he travelled to Lusaka to attend the SADC meeting. The regime has become more arrogant after Mbeki’s infamous statement about there being no crisis in Zimbabwe. It was an endorsement that the cornered Mugabe regime was desperately seeking and waiting for with bated breath. Given that it was issued by none other than Thabo Mbeki, referred to variously as the West’s point man on Zimbabwe, meant that Mugabe could do as he pleases.

 

Surely, given that the problems in Zimbabwe are spawning a crisis in the region, one would have expected Mbeki to be more proactive in his efforts to find a solution to the crisis in Zimbabwe as this is going to definitely affect his country’s ability to host the 2010 World Cup. I think that the time has now come for the world leaders to start questioning the efficacy of holding such a tournament in a region that is best by strife.

Mbeki has proved time and again that he is all for the maintenance of the status-quo and is averse to a new dispensation taking over in Zimbabwe. Apart from Mugabe, Mbeki has made himself the number one enemy of the Zimbabwean people and had it not been for the robust judicial system and the trade union movement in South Africa, he would have happily acquiesced to the passage of arms of war that were to be used on innocent and defenceless Zimbabweans for having had dared to vote for Morgan Tsvangirai.

 

I wonder how Mbeki can honestly talk of giving more time to ZEC to do the verification of the results, when he is aware that the said verification is actually the opposite of the results that they already have in their possession. Where in this world had it ever taken three weeks to come up with elections results? Please spare us the comparisons with Mozambique as there simply are no grounds for comparison.

 

For starters, Mozambique was coming out of a long civil war and to the best of my knowledge there is currently no civil war in Zimbabwe. Besides, we have the manpower, skills, experience and knowledge in conducting elections that Mozambique did not have. Paraguay, an impoverished country of 5.6 million held its elections on April 20, 2006 and results were out by the following day. If it could be done in Paraguay, why could it not be done in Zimbabwe? In Paraguay, they had international observers to ensure the credibility of the elections, something that is an anathema to Mugabe given that he does not want to be held to account.

 

Paraguay had an impartial and professional Electoral Commission, something that Zimbabweans crave and yearn for, and instead they get the same recycled faces as Commissioners for ZEC, people who have been at the heart of stolen elections since 2000.

 

How in all earnest can the appointment of Joyce Kazembe (she was in the Electoral Supervisory Commission and was one of the vice chairs of the Constitutional Commission), Jonathan Siyachitema, (former Anglican Church Bishop and a staunch supporter of Nolbert Kunonga) or Prof George Kahari, (a former Ambassador to West Germany and allegedly an advisor to Mugabe), Vivian Ncube, Sarah Kachingwe ( a former Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information), Theophilus Pharaoh Gambe (former chairman of the Electoral Supervisory Commission and Zanu-PF lawyer) be viewed as consistent with the notion of an independent commission given that they are all Mugabe acolytes? Kazembe came to prominence through her association with Dr Ibbo Mandaza who was a staunch defender of Mugabe and is now Dr Simba Makoni’s leading strategist.

 

Zimbabweans yearn for an impartial and independent judiciary, and instead they get a bench that is blatantly pro-Zanu-PF, a bench and a legal system that allows the same person to defend ZEC and Zanu-PF in court. It is wrong for George Chikumbirike can represent both ZEC and Zanu PF in the current electoral disputes as this smack of gross conflict of interest.

 

If that does not expose how compromised ZEC has become as an institution then what else can?