Get well soon George, it's all forgiven

Get well soon George, it's all forgiven

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• Looking into Zimbabwe from outside

• 2005 Zim personalities of the year awards

• Mandaza: pitfalls of supping with devil

• Zimbabwe's small minded rulers

• Mugabe cornered by events out of his control

IN THE last few days there have been stories about a group of Russian journalists visiting Zimbabwe. They are being given the royal official treatment because they are considered to be friendly, or at least not outrightly hostile to the Zimbabwean government like most European media visitors would be automatically expected to be.

In its increasingly desperate search for friends, loans, oil, hard currency and saviours, Robert Mugabe's government has warmed up to a seemingly receptive Russian government that is flexing the international muscle it derives from new wealth earned from record oil and natural gas prices.

President Vladmir Putin’s government cannot be too bothered about delicate issues of systematic official beatings, torture, dispossessions and so forth. It is also always on the lookout for client states to restore what some nostalgic Russians perceive as the faded international glory of the now defunct USSR.

A Russia still smarting from having been part of a superpower union not too long ago to being considered a second-rate power by some now also takes any opportunity to show its independence of the Western powers that so detest Mugabe, and that Russia also has sometimes testy relations with. In addition, whatever misgivings they might have about the competence and trustworthiness of Mugabe’s regime as an economic partner, the Russians would nevertheless be keenly aware of Zimbabwe’s unique potential in many areas.

They may have gambled that it is good to have a foothold in the economy in case in coming years Zimbabwe gets a government that has at least some vague clue about how to run things. Of course they would have considered that Mugabe may hang on destroying the country for several more years or that an equal or worse disaster might succeed him.

But the Russians, flush with billions of dollars of hard currency reserves from their oil, would not feel much pain from having to write off the crumbs they are throwing at Mugabe and Gono to try to lure an ostracized, poorly-run, on-the-ropes-country with few options into their orbit. For the little “investment” they are putting in, the potential benefits are great and the risks small. Hey, resource-rich but desperate and poorly-managed countries willing to promise the national silver for some immediate, temporary relief are a dime a dozen.

"Putin’s government cannot be too bothered about delicate issues of systematic official beatings or torture. It is always on the lookout for client states to restore faded international glory"

CHIDO MAKUNIKE

Hence the exploration of links between the Russian and Zimbabwean establishments makes a kind of sense when you consider the current needs of both regimes. So central bank chief Gideon Gono goes there to explore the possibility of getting a little credit or fuel in exchange for one concession or another. The Zimbabwean state propaganda services optimistically crow about how the visiting Russian journalists are going to “tell the world the real story about Zimbabwe,” meaning to justify the Mugabe regime’s oppression and incompetence.

But how can you hope that a handful of chaperoned journalists from a distant Baltic country can make even the slightest dent in your government’s poor standing in the world when you have dismally failed to win the hearts and minds of the majority of your citizens abroad, and arguably at home as well? Assuming the Russian journalists did perceive Zimbabwe and its government in rosy terms, why would the world believe them instead of the millions of ordinary Zimbabweans who are anguished and unhappy about the state of their beloved country under the ruinous regime of Mugabe?

When a man who purports to be firmly and alertly in the driver’s seat is pictured fast asleep and snoring in public not just at United Nations conferences but at the wheel of the ship of state as well, it is inevitable that the country he rules will keep stumbling into one accident after another. Look at the now famous, widely circulated pictures of the latest Mugabe “UN nap” and then look at the state of our country to see what I am talking about! I rest my case.
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Some wags allege that bombastic Mugabe propagandist George Charamba is either a genetic or virtual clone of corrosive Herald columnist Nathaniel Manheru. Both identities, the public one and the one who bravely takes potshots at everyone in the service of his/their master under a pseudonym, have used their gifts for fiction to write some caustic things about anybody who exercises their right to say the regime of Mugabe has been a disaster for Zimbabwe.

I have also been personally on the receiving end of both “gentlemen” ( assuming or pretending they are gentlemen and that they are two separate people, strictly for the sake of fairness). So despite my disgust at the Jonathan Moyo-type sheer pleasure in nastiness exhibited by George Manheru/Nathaniel Charamba, I was deeply saddened to read a few weeks ago that my old nemesis may have a frightening chronic illness.

If this is true my dear nasty brother, may I hereby take this opportunity to let bygones be bygones and wish your continued access to medication that may ameliorate your condition, and for as long as possible. I forgive you for the nasty lies you have told about me on a number of occasions, when you have (as is your style) had to resort to attempted character-assassination when you could not calmly counter robust criticism of your master with reasoned debate and counter-argument.

I am bitterly opposed to the regime you are a prominent part of for ruining my country, but I do not wish you any personal ill will, the way you seem to do for anyone who does not agree with or support your master.

If you are indeed chronically ill as alleged, along with improved health I wish that as you ponder your mortality you develop greater humility and respect for your fellow citizens that disagree with the regime you serve. Whether on the job or in your domestic/matrimonial environment, please fight the inclination (if any, of course) to be violent in speech or in deed.

Try to exercise self-control so that you do not give the many detractors of the regime you serve the opportunity to say, “Ah, you see, as violent as they are as an unpopular, repressive ruling authority, so are they in their private lives.”

Recovery or not, I wish you well and in the spirit of ubuntu, African values and not kicking a man when he is down, will henceforth try to refrain from criticizing you too harshly. Unless of course you keep on being as haughty and nasty as before in the service of your master, the source of pain, shame and misery for so many Zimbabweans.

Chido Makunike is a social commentator. He writes from Dakar, Senegal. CONTACT CHIDO: chidomakunike@yahoo.com
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