Now seems to be the word of the moment. Kubatana subscriber, Sophie Zvapera, wrote to Kubatana sharing a short story about her sister and a new year resolution . . .

I phoned my sister’s seventeen-year-old daughter to wish her a merry christmas and a prosperous new year since they were visiting the rural areas and I was not going to be able to talk to her till after new year. She was excited to go and see her nana and I asked her whether she had already made her new year resolution. I wish I had not asked! She said all she wanted was to study hard and pass her A levels this year and find herself a place in some university somewhere outside Zimbabwe where she can do her studies.

Then I cried!

I cried because my sister’s daughter was going to this mission boarding school and at the end of last year she was sent back home before schools closed because there were no teachers, no food, the school fees that we were paying in zim dollars were not even enough to buy a loaf of bread. Therefore there was nothing that the school could do except to send all the students back. I started thinking of all the other children who have the same resolution as my sister’s daughter and who cannot go to school as the term starts because they cannot afford to pay private college fees in foreign currency. Here is a whole generation whose hopes and aspirations have been shattered by a group of Mugabe’s thugs. They are thugs because they have stolen our children’s future yet they claim to be governing or whatever they call it because the people voted them into office. Which people I ask? How many of all these school and tertiary going students’ future have these politicians quashed, trampled upon and thrown into the dust bin all for the sake of political power? What happened to the concept of investing in the youth for they are tomorrow’s future leaders? What legacy are we leaving for our children?

So while I am still wiping my tears I will put my request to the political leaders for the new year. This political bickering, grandstanding and media statements will not bring back the lost years for our children neither will it arrest or correct all the things that are wrong in this country. So for the sake of Zimbabwe please put people’s interests first and foremost and rescue the global political agreement from wherever it is and come up with a government that will take the country forward. This does not require Monthlante, SADC, AU, UN, Britain or America just us Zimbabweans can do it if there is the political will to do so. How long can we continue to have all these abductions, murders, cholera, starvation, HIV/AIDS and all the deaths before all you politicians say the people have suffered enough?

It is now or never.

Eddie Cross keeps on writing, optimistically at that. Where oh where does he find his eternal spring of MDC fervour from?

Of course it depends on who you’re speaking to. Some disillusioned MDC activists have been lamenting the party’s collective lack of intelligent strategising and their lack of any kind of consistent pressure bearing activism. Of particular concern was the MDC’s lethargic response to their cadres being abducted by Mugabe’s henchmen. Especially insulting was Tsvangirai’s late in the day threat to abandon any participation in The Talks unless the abducted people were produced by 1 January 2009. Where’s his sense of urgency and immediacy? Like can he spell the word NOW.

Apparently 12 MDC activists are still missing. So Mr T, what are you going to do about it? Flip flop, again?

The majority of Zimbabweans are unanimous that the MDC must not agree to a junior role in a new Government but if the MDC hasn’t realised by now (that word again) that Zanu PF are leading them around by the nose (some say pricks, with the occasional stroke to keep them engaged), then they are more foolish than any of us ever imagined. They might have a “road map” regarding how they will eventually govern Zimbabwe (according to Eddie), but they are certainly way off track on the getting rid of the old man side of things.

Mugabe is so entrenched that we need a battalion of super strength bull dozer’s to dig him out, many of them driven by 57 cm high tokoloshes. Talk certainly isn’t going to do it.

Eddie Cross also tells us that

Mr. Tsvangirai has received his passport – that was finally extracted from the Registrar Generals hands and taken to Gaborone by the South African Ambassador and handed to him by the Ambassador on Christmas day.

That’s an Ambassador too many for my liking. But now that he’s got his new passport perhaps he can come home and finish the job.

An encampment of MDC MPs in Unity Square with Tsvangirai at the helm, until all abducted activists are returned and released, might be a good place to start.

Granted, not as comfortable as exile in Bostwana though.

It’s the first working day of the New Year and I’ve been checking out the emails that have come in over the holiday. One of them suggested various ways to work off all that Fruit Cake. I smiled because if you’re Zimbabwean you don’t have to do a lot of working off of any excess. Simply because there’s not a helluva lot to consume in the first place. Take my Christmas Eve dinner for example: bacon, eggs and Jack Daniels. I was lucky to inherit Jack from a friend who left the country recently.

But one of my favourite emails came from Lionel who says some useful stuff . .

It has been a hard year for all but I wish you all a very happy new year and a prosperous one at it too. Let us hope that all parties concerned really begin to think of all the people of our country and not just their petty power grabbing techniques. A new beginning means everyones participation, as we have all learned, a country does not run on politicians only. They need people to do the other very important tasks, like teaching, doctoring and sweeping the street. No job is menial and as Africans we must get out of the habit that only degrees count. There is a man there with a lot of degrees but what has he done? The rest is history. Now you all have a good day and we will catch up in the New Year.

Zanu PF has one objective – to remain in power. Everything else is subject to that caveat. The apparatus of state (power apparatus, army, police, tax office, civil service, currency, central bank, other economic tools, etc) are to be used to that effect. The population of Zimbabwe, and the services they require (education, health, infrastructure – roads, water, refuse disposal) are to be used to that effect. The economy, and the economic basics, all primary, secondary and tertiary portions, are to be used to that effect. The ‘war veterans’ are to be used to that effect. Race is to be used to that effect.

The members of the ruling party are in power to make money. I am not a Marxist for nothing – Karl Marx believed, and I agree with him, that economics/money is at the root of EVERYTHING; he said it went right down to marriage – to create a better economic unit. So Zanu PF is a business, as is all politics. It is a job, a method of employment, a wage earner, and if you are good (or good at it), a very good ‘wage’ earner. A method of getting rich!

Zanu PF discovered that it was possible to buy power – that is, purchase people to keep them in power. This is known as patronage. And the army – civil servants with guns – were the most important ones to by bought.

Zanu PF discovered that there was no need to balance the budget. Feel free to spend more than you earn, because so long as you can print money, you can cover the gap. So long as there is no free press, or anyone to ask prying questions (eg a civil service that answers to Zimbabwe and not Zanu PF), they do not have to be bought off.

Civil service jobs (right up to the ministers) were the traditional method (as most socialist/labour/left wing governments are accused of) of buying power/patronage. Then Zanu PF made unbudgeted payouts for the war vererans. Then all the Ministerial permanent secretaries’ jobs went to ‘retired’ soldiers. Then farms for everyone the rank of major and above, and most politicians as well.

However, the farms ‘redistribution’ was a last step. (And why did Zanu PF stop land redistribution in 1985?); a) they failed to put farmers on farms – which is a crucial mistake when your economy is based on agriculture to the extent that ours was. (This incidentally is why land redistribution before 1985 was successful – you had to have a Master Farmers Certificate to be awarded a land grant). b) those given farms discovered that you actually had to farm the land to make money. Simply owning a farm did not make one wealthy.

This meant that, the long term plan, to take the mines and businesses, encountered problems. Bith the potntial givers and takers realised that just handing them out would not be enough, so there was little point in stealing them. Unfortunately, the means of buying patronage was running out.

Remember how a government is supposed to work in an economy? A budget is needed, where income = expenditure. Income is from taxes. Taxes are those levied on the economy. If the economy has collapsed and no economic activity is occurring, your tax will be less (or nothing) and therefore, your expenditure will be/should be less. Expenditure is how you buy power/make money.

But if you can print money, what do you need to balance a budget for?  Print more money to cover the gap. And talk fast (made easy by a lack of a free press) and convince people that there is some other reason for inflation (or cholera for that matter). However there is a physical limit to how much you can print and talk. Eventually it runs out. Even the stupidist people begin to think for themselves. Again, the means of buying patronage was running out.

Patronage jobs are given to people who are loyal to the giver of the job. Not based on any ability to do that job. Hence, rising to the top of any ‘official’ organisation have been those loyal to Zanu PF. The abilty to manage, get things accomplished, achieve goals, motivate staff and get the maximum work out of them, make machines and other apparatus continue to function, vehicle fleets continue to drive, service to be provided – that is secondary.

So, when you now go to any ‘government’ body, and find that nothing has been done; a) they want a bribe – because there is no ‘real’ (government) pay, and the only reason to stay in that position is for what you can take home to feed your family (and since we are not paying them via the tax routeÉ) b) there is no one of any competence (or if there is, they are in some menial job at the back of the outer office down that corridor on the left out of the way of the public who might actually pay them) to do anything.

So now, nothing works. No education, no health services, no refuse collection, no water, no electricty, no fuel, no food. Everyone with any competence has a job. In the UK of South Africa. But not to worry, cholera is under control.

This ‘failure to separate’ also leads to a new problem. Now that the ‘ruling’ party is the official opposition, the civil service (right down to rural and municipal levels) is out of step with (new) ruling party policy. They are no longer able to ‘make’ ruling party policy, which kept them making money from their position. Therefore, they have a serious ‘disinterest’ in seeing a change of ruling party, or listening to new orders from new bosses (who are really just the representatives of their real, old bosses, the population of Zimbabwe). Their patronage post is in jeopardy.

There most definately has been a coup. It has certainly not been overt, nor has it happened at any partcular point. It was hidden, and it crept up. But compare today to ten of fifteen years ago. Who conducted the coup? That is another reason that it has not been noticed. It has not really been the army (the ZNA, ZDF, Z Air Force, etc) It has been conducted by what I call the the Zanla High. Remember that stretching back to liberation war days, Zanu was the political side, a front for, Zanla. One of the liberation armies, the one that won the war.

They are the military establishment. Despite the fact that the Mujurus retired, Mutasa and Mnangagwa are ‘civilians’, Chinamasa is a lawyer, one is a party Chairman, one’s a policeman, one a prison officer, Shiri flits from army to air force, and a few others are also inside this group – they are the ‘militant’ core of Zanu PF/ZANLA (or the new one). They are not currently, or possibly ever have been, part of the classic Zimbabwean military, but they are part of a junta that has taken control of Zimbabwe, often using the classic military. They maintain their theory of military/militant takeover. Hence the concern with martial law, Botswana bases, arms shipments, the JOC, etc. It is what they know (and how they did it).

Post liberation-struggle, they have maintained ‘alternatives’ as layers of cover. ZAPU was absorbed a a cover. The political party, Zanu PF was formed as a cover (with possibly the party chairman as cover for, or controling from within, the junta), SADC and the AU were useful curtains to be worked on from within, etc.

These layers of cover are slipping away. Zapu is leaving, for example. In addition there is the Makoni factor. Simply by surviving, even if he failed to win, he has demonstrated that the former ruling party does not have to be slavishly followed. You can make you own voice be heard, say different things, suggest different paths, all away from that dictated by the Zanla high command.

And the former ruling party is fracturing. Some want to use power to retain power. Some want to reform the party and its policies, to regain mass support (and that power). Some want to vut and run with the money they have already made. Some want to (need to) retain power, even if there is no more money to be made, in order to retain that which they have already stolen. Real heart attack material!

They are bombing each other. Killing each other. (Quite convinced now that they do have ‘degrees in violence’). Party elections are fired upon by the riot squad. The civil service with guns are beating up bank tellers, and openly stealing from forex dealers.

So now what? So now what? How can they hold on? And it is my opinion that change is happening. I will not say to what, or when it will be finished, but it is happening. They have to do something new, because the old ways are bankrupt (like the country). Former friends are gone, former enemies are still enemies, and are no longer crying for the implementation of the unity agreement, but the removal of the regime, and the civil service are on a go slow, mainly because they are waiting to see who their new bosses are going to be.

They cannot dollarise. a) this would be an admission of failure. Too serious to contemplate or cover up, expecially after the party chairman ranted on at length about our ‘sovereignty’. (Which they have done what with? And was an excuse for what?) It is fine to ‘licence’ forex shops (it provides an income to steal), or charge forex earners in dollars for their electricity (or to licence their generators), but they cannot overtly simply move to dollars. b) they would have to balance a dollar budget. There could be no printing to paper over those gaps. And with no economy to provide income, there could be no expenditure. And if they cannot pay the civil service with guns, who will protect them from the civil service with guns?

Cholera. This cannot be hidden. It is our only export at the moment. And it cannot be solved with the current system. Either the system must be changed (impossible), or force/power/guns must somehow solve it (dismiss the problems).

Hence, my feeling that change is happening. A more naked, open, junta control, with no facade of democracy, (with no patronage to offer). Or a shakedown to more democratic control, stable economy (one you can plan within), health and education, roads, public transport, etc.