What to expect from ED whose focus is on ruling forever? Mbofana

In January this year alone, the CCZ (Consumer Council of Zimbabwe) reported that the cost of the food basket for a family of six was at a staggering ZW$3.6 million.

That was three months ago!

At the incredible rate at which the local currency is depreciating, with the subsequent equally unbelievable increase in the prices of basic commodities, this figure has undoubtedly already spiked further.

In all this, the average Zimbabwean earns in this useless currency, which, in real terms, can not afford a mere fraction of what any normal person would require to put a decent meal on the table.

When government nurses threatened to go on industrial action last week, they claimed that, when converted to the stable greenback, their monthly salaries amounted to a paltry US$10.

NSSA pensioners, if they are extremely lucky that month, may be awarded US$30 – although most times they are paid in meaningless Zimbabwe dollars.

Surely, who is expected to survive on that money even for a day, let alone an entire month?

What an insult!

These are not isolated cases, as the generality of ordinary Zimbabweans are finding it nearly impossible to make ends meet.

In fact, half the population is living in extreme poverty – with an estimated 3.5 million facing starvation this year alone.

Yet, according to reports, President Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa earns an average monthly salary of US$111,609 – US$12.163 as the basic salary, plus daily allowances ranging up to US$7,320.

On top of that, his administration had absolutely no qualms buying him a private jet (a Dassault Falcon 7X) at a mind-blowing cost of US$54 million.

I have a question that bothers me.

Does Mnangagwa not care that the people he ostensibly leads are enduring such indescribable poverty and misery?

As the president, should he not be spending sleepless nights trying to find a solution to the citizens’ untold suffering?

Or, would that be expecting too much?

Besides, is he not more concerned about ensuring that his dream of ruling Zimbabwe forever – or, at least, until God calls him – is fulfilled?

Has that not been the main focus of the ZANU PF leader ever since his party failed to garner enough parliamentary seats for the two-thirds majority necessary for constitutional changes?

Is it not clear that, top on his priority list, is the removal of the presidential two-term limit?

Before the ink of the disputed 23rd August 2023 election results had even dried, there were already fervent plans afoot to ensure that the elusive absolute majority was achieved. We are Ignite Media Zimbabwe.

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The fact that these elections had already been deemed falling short of national and regional democratic benchmarks – by SADC and other bodies that observed the sham process – did not bother him at all.

It was straight into the business of finding a willing pawn to facilitate the decimation of the opposition through questionable recalls of recently elected legislators.

Now that Mnangagwa has attained the two-thirds majority, at least in the lower house of parliament, he is now expending all his energies in the quest for his party to support his cause.

These days, wherever ZANU PF members meet, the slogan is ‘Mnangagwa will still be there in 2030’.

Never have I heard ruling party supporters singing and chanting for Mnangagwa to immediately address the skyrocketing cost of living.

Who has ever come across ZANU PF members sloganeering: President Mnangagwa, we are suffering, and you need to address our plight with urgency?

Yet, most of these supporters are part of half the population living in extreme poverty and facing imminent starvation!

It is all about Mnangagwa being afforded an opportunity to amend the country’s supreme law for his own personal ambitions.

Where does the wellbeing and welfare of ordinary citizens fit into this plan?

Whilst the house is burning and the children dying, the father would rather be focused on his own personal survival!

What manner of a father is that?

We are hungry, and we have no money – yet our leader is more interested in another term as president!

What an utter outrage!

He is not even seven months into his second (and, legally, final) term, and he is already obsessed about 2028!

What are his achievements in the time he has already been in power?

So, why on God’s green earth is he so eager to go on, seemingly forever?

The main problem with Zimbabwe is that we have leaders, but we lack leadership!

We desperately need leadership that places the interests of the nation ahead of their own.

We need and deserve selfless leadership that is willing to forgo everything for the people of Zimbabwe.

Tragically, those in power are the total opposite!

For our president, as long as his family is well-fed and swimming in opulence, losing that privilege should be prevented at all costs!

Everything and everyone else does not matter!

Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to WhatsApp or Call: +263715667700 | +263782283975,

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