In response to Zim politicians plot post-Mugabe reforms: This is an interesting post-President Robert Mugabe analysis on the political and economic landscape.
I tend to agree with the British embassy’s position that the quoted intelligence documents in Reuters’ hands may be a well-crafted misinformation campaign.
They look also like they have a second use as a fishing expedition for local and foreign reaction to suggested policies, such as a partial or complete reversal of the land reform programme, total re-engagement with dispossessed white farmers and the West and opposition and ruling party coalition in a transitional government to appease the masses.
It may be true the Lacoste faction of Zanu PF has adopted the mooted ideological ground post the Mugabe era. And it is equally true a coalition with MDC-T and Zapu would suit their strategy.
Speaking on a Chinese television, while on a visit to China in pursuit of the elusive mega deals, Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa, if I remember well, attributed Zimbabwe’s failure to see the light and reform, to pride.
It wasn’t his pride he was talking about, but that of his boss. But then the President may never have liked the chaotic land reform programme.
According to Press reports this year reflecting on the past, the President is said to have pleaded with war veterans running amok on farms to give the government more time to negotiate with the British over the land issue.
He was, however, pushed into it by a court ruling by the late former Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku and probably the uniformed forces fronted by the war veterans’ leadership.
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Economically, the experiment backfired spectacularly leading to a reappraisal of the position towards the centre by the Lacoste faction.
It may be a belated convergence of ideas between the two factions. The delay in pronouncing the late Chief Justice’s hero status may have its roots in the overzealous judgment that has now cost the country tens of billions of dollars and thousands of lives.
The convergence of positions, but not personalities, come at a time when the attempt to create an upper middle class and upper class from the ruling Zanu PF elite based on sweet oligarchic aspirations through legalised looting of the State, Russian style post the Soviet era, has also yielded little fruit.
Ironically, the much-maligned 51/49% shareholding law in extractive ventures may have served the nation well. For investment into mining, it became a poison pill.
The question is: Did the poorly formulated oligarchic aspirations implementation project, through legalised looting of the State, have the full blessing of the President and the Team Lacoste faction?
As it is, while Team Lacoste may have an economic model and ideological position, the G40 faction, besides calling on youth, still has to give its position on economic reforms. Do not be surprised, if in the end, it is identical to Lacoste’s, but it may go a bit further by addressing Gukurahundi legacy issues as well. The latter may be Lacoste’s Achilles heel. Nyamasvisva
