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VP Mphoko barking for his dinner

Opinion & Analysis
ZANU-PF’s age-old quest to engage a high-profile Gukurahundi apologist seems to have been achieved through the appointment of Phelekezela Mphoko to the post of Vice-President.

ZANU-PF’s age-old quest to engage a high-profile Gukurahundi apologist seems to have been achieved through the appointment of Phelekezela Mphoko to the post of Vice-President.

Judging from Mphoko’s frantic attempts to absolve President Robert Mugabe from Gukurahundi blame, Zanu PF has finally got its man.

Press reports indicate that Mphoko has been busy selling the view that the disturbances in Matabeleland and parts of Midlands provinces were a Western project to destabilise the then fledgling nation of Zimbabwe. Mphoko was at pains as he tried to absolve Mugabe from personal involvement in the commission of the massacres.

Political bull-excrement does not normally come in such magnitude! How can a man who probably lost members of his close family and former colleagues from the liberation struggle blatantly desecrate the victims many of whom lie in unmarked graves?

How can a man who supposedly served under Zipra with valour insult the very people Gukurahundi was unleashed to decapitate? How can a man who is suspected of having sold out his soul to Zanu PF fail so dismally in allaying those suspicions?

Does Mphoko know that his vehement denial of Mugabe’s involvement in the Gukurahundi massacres is just as bad as Hitler’s deputy denying that Hitler was never involved in the Holocaust? Mphoko’s defence of the indefensible is really disturbing. His attribution of the massacres to Western governments’ machinations is lame and insensitive to the people who still seek closure to this national scar.

Mphoko’s disparaging denials render him a perfect example of a man who will do dirty bidding for his next meal. He is a man so desperate for quick fame that he will sell his soul to earn his meal.

Those who accuse him of having deserted Zapu/Zipra and joined Zanu PF may have a point. It is possible that Mphoko is coming out of his sell-out closet with a bang.

Having worked for many years in obscurity, he no longer has to mime the lyrics for his meals, but can literally wax lyrical about this issue to increase the size of his ration.

The well-placed, well-paid and overfed Vice-President faked amnesia by momentarily disregarding the well-documented ins and outs of the Gukurahundi saga. He conveniently blocked out the fact that the Fifth Brigade was trained specifically to help Mugabe achieve total dominance in Zapu’s strongholds. He chose to disregard that the only way Mugabe could impose his dominance was through shock and awe operations where wanton bloodletting was the order of the day.

In his supposedly intelligence-led submission, Mphoko is alleged to have suggested that Mugabe unleashed Gukurahundi with no malicious intents.

He claimed that Gukurahundi was a Western project, a declaration which might have struck a wrong note in his song for a meal. If Gukurahundi was indeed a child of the West, then Mugabe was probably a mole for Western intelligence organisations.

Mphoko chose to distort modern history. He attempted to deny that Mugabe engaged the North Koreans for support in the formation of his so-called crack force that would be answerable to him.

He assumed sole responsibility over the operations and actions of Gukurahundi and he was privy to the situational reports during the operations. Mugabe knew that people were being massacred and he did nothing to call off the onslaught until the killings reached unprecedented levels.

If Mugabe was not complicit in the Gukurahundi massacres as Mphoko claims, why were the findings of the Chihambakwe Commission of Inquiry not made public? Mugabe’s refusal to release the report only reinforces its damning truth on his cruelty.

The report might have caused some blood-curdling moments for a man who had a degree of callousness from seeing piles and piles of dead bodies of those killed during wartime massacres in Chimoio and Nyadzonya.

Before Mphoko proffered a tasteless explanation, Mugabe and his accomplices Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa and crew did not have any plausible defence against the massacres.

Suddenly Zanu PF seems to have been thrown some leverage, a lifeline to absolve it from its own heinous commissions. Mphoko’s attempt for plausible deniability is puerile.

Here we see Mugabe’s hands dripping with the blood of our kith and kin yet Mphoko says it is the blood of a chicken slaughtered for his dinner!

This is indeed Mphoko’s moment of madness. How can he try to defend Mugabe from what he has confessed to?

Mugabe’s lame closure to the Gukurahundi massacres is that it was “a moment of madness”.

Mugabe does not deny Gukurahundi, he simply does not want to talk about it. So, who is this Mphoko fellow who thinks he can cover up a crime that has all but been confessed to?

History will judge the Mphokos harshly. Who does not know that Gukurahundi was Mugabe’s project?

Mugabe unleashed Gukurahundi on innocent people. There is evidence of him gloating over the “success” of the operations.

Everyone else in Zanu PF was enthused by the devastating progress the Fifth Brigade made. Instead of Mphoko sanitising the devil, why does Mugabe not shame the West for himself?