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A rejoinder to Jonathan Moyo
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FROM PAGE 2
39.
It is important that we locate the Prof’s statements in the post-Mugabe
era and evaluate what kind of society he thinks Zimbabwe should be.
One classic statement reads as follows: “It was wrong for ZBC then to have allowed those NDA programs to be aired in the first place. This is because the NDA was a Zanu PF political NGO, and within Zanu PF itself it was a factional project, that was intended to counter the NCA and prop up Mawere’s political principals outside the rules of fair and democratic play. In the circumstances, we could not have been able to justify having NDA running weekly television and radio programs and not giving the same opportunity to the NCA”.
It is important that the Prof tells the public about the identity of faction he is talking about. Could it be the same faction behind the Tsholotsho project? If it was, how does the Prof justify his actions against a “supposedly friendly force”?
40. In explaining why I could not be allowed to be on air, the Prof states: “Besides, Mawere had no known public broadcasting credentials to pose as a journalist or some kind of a Larry King on television. The whole affair was a terrible circus. Mawere would appear almost weekly as a guest on Radio One with Pat Manala answering all kinds of meaningless questions and leave that to become an anchor on television in the weekly NDA program “Talk to the Nation”. While this circus was consistent with the strategic purposes of the NDA as described above, it was not consistent with the professional and ethical standards of public broadcasting. So it had to be stopped and it was.”
In the Prof’s world, it is clear that the ban was based on personal grounds and yet he now wishes to disguise it as if it was based on rational political and national interest grounds.
41. I also need to situate the Prof’s comments about me in the general discussion of tolerance and how government should treat its citizens. He states as follows: “Yet Mawere wanted to be allowed to run amok on the airwaves simply because the NDA was a Zanu PF political NGO. He was understandably surprised and annoyed when he was given an emphatic no. He then took his case to his Zanu PF principals and complained bitterly against me, alleging that I was there to destroy Zanu PF from within and started campaigning for my removal as minister.”
It is these kinds of reckless statements that do not assist in nation building and constructive discourse. The Prof should expose my alleged “political principals” and explain why they would have allowed me to take the government of which they were supposedly a part to court. Why did the Prof not disclose these material facts in his court affidavits?
42. The Prof at his best then states as follows: “When Mawere realized that he was not going to get any joy from using his political principals to put pressure on me through the politburo and their whisper campaign against me, he went to the High Court of Zimbabwe and cited ZBC and myself as respondents. The case was heard before fugitive Justice Paradza, a close ally of Mawere and confident of his then political principals, who ruled in Mawere’s favor and surprisingly ordered that the programs should be reinstated on air.”
What kind of a society does the Prof want when he loses a case he then becomes reckless with his statements and assume that a judge cannot make independent decisions on merit but decisions can only be swayed if they are against him. I am not a close ally of Judge Paradza but now can sympathize with his personal predicament in that like me he is also labeled a “fugitive”. It does not take a genius to know where the word “fugitive” for those who disagree with the Prof came from.
43. The Prof makes an outrageous allegation that I called him “gay” without disclosing the source of the allegation. It is important that if the Prof genuinely seeks to be taken seriously as a scholar and politician that he also thinks before he put pen to paper. I do not see the relevance of these allegations when all we need to know is the role the Prof played in banning the NDA programs.
44. In Prof’s world even if you get a judgment in your favour, it does not matter as reflected in the following statement: “While the fact that Mawere won the case in court was not a problem at all because that was one of the two probable outcomes of the case, Justice Paradza’s order to reinstate the programs on air was surprising and in fact totally absurd. Since Mawere was alleging a breach of contract, upon finding in his favor, the Court was expected to then award him damages for that breach but not to order a specific performance such as that the programs should be put back on air as if the Court has competence to enforce that kind of performance.”
The Prof fails to acknowledge that the order sought was for specific performance given that the decision to terminate the contract was made by a Minister who was not part of the corporate governance structure of ZBC. It is important for the Minister to situate his comments with the comments of Gono who was the Chairman. I find it surprising that in the Prof’s diatribe there is no single reference to Gono notwithstanding the fact that Gono claimed that the decision to ban was made by the ZBC. If anything, the response by the Prof confirms that he was the principal behind the decision to ban and when convenient he now wishes to blame Mugabe for even the decisions that he made himself.
MY PERSONAL BUSINESS CREDENTIALS
45. With respect to my business credentials, the Prof states: “I am aware of references to Mawere, especially among New Zimbabwe.com forumites, as an exceptional entrepreneur or a wizard in business engineering. Well, those references could be coming from people from outer space who know something that mortals on earth do not know. Otherwise, I for one have never been aware of Mawere’s exceptional prowess as a businessman or an investor. I do not know of a single asset that Mawere has ever acquired through his own labor or through an honest business dealing using his own assets or resources.”
It is clear that the Prof has no respect for me as a businessman and he is entitled to his opinion in as much as those who admire me are entitled to theirs. I wonder what the Prof would say about me if I had given him the loan of R300,000 without any conditions. Would he still say that I am not an honest businessman or an investor? He alleges that there is no single asset that I ever acquired through my own labor and yet fails to identify whose labour was responsible for growing SMM to make it attractive enough for a cabinet committee to be set up to handle its affairs when other companies are allowed to have a natural death. Is the Prof suggesting that I have no brains to initiate my own business affairs or he is suggesting that only ZANU-PF principals are responsible for business success in Zimbabwe and yet never take responsibility for the plunging the country into poverty, hyperinflation and unemployment?
46. It is important to register who the Prof calls “true entrepreneurs”. He states: “Zimbabwe has over the years seen some true entrepreneurs who have used the little they had whether by way of their knowledge or personal savings to build business empires or real enterprises to admire. Among them I would include Strive Masiyiwa who first had Retrofit Engineering and later Econet Wireless driven by Masiyiwa’s engineering background and business acumen; Nigel Chanakira whose Kingdom financial enterprises speak for themselves; James Makamba who built Telecel and Shingi Mutasa who is doing wonders at Cresta hotel group and TA Holdings in general. I have also admired the sterling business efforts of bankers like Mthuli Ncube, Leonard Nyemba, Enoch Kamushinda and hard workers like Ben Mucheche whose buses we have all been able to see and use.”
Is it not surprising that Strive Masiyiwa is on the Prof’s list when he was responsible for banning the Daily News in which my company was also a shareholder? Why did the Prof not acknowledge Strive as a true entrepreneur when he was still in government? Could it be that the Prof got loans from these businessmen? I am not sure what the Prof would say if he knew that even Strive did business with Mugabe when he owned Retrofit. I am not sure whether the Prof is aware that the late Vice President Nkomo, Zvobgo, Msika as well as many other Ministers in Mugabe’s government played a big role in Strive’s legal case with the government and yet this is okay with him.
In the case of Nigel Chanakira, the Prof may not be aware that he is related to Murerwa. In his case with Shumba, I was surprised to be confronted by two ministers i.e. Chindori-Chininga and Elliot Manyika pleading his case. I even had a meeting at Nigel’s office with Manyika to discuss his problems regarding the Econet shares. If we looked at the business record of all the individuals in the Prof’s list, what would be their true stories and can we attribute their success to their known friends who may belong to ZANU-PF? Can we confidently say that Mutasa, Makamba, Kamushinda, Chanakira, and Masiyiwa have no friends in ZANU-PF? If they have, can we also not subject them to the Mawere test? Can the Prof wearing an academic hat assist the country in better understanding the interplay between business and politics? Why is it that the Prof is selective in his memory?
47. For the record, I never worked for the IMF. I worked for the World Bank from 1988 through 1995 when I relocated to South Africa where I have been since then. I am not sure where the Prof got the information that I worked for the IMF?
48. The Prof acknowledges makes the allegation that: “The passage of time will show that Mawere used these and other high ranking Zanu PF connections to set up all kinds of pyramid schemes through which companies like SMM were acquired and through which he used false pretenses and empty promises to collect monies from Zimbabweans in the Diaspora, some of whom are still angry with him to this day, as part of the building of what he now calls his sole assets.”
For the benefit of the public, can the Prof disclose the connections that I used to set up pyramid schemes? It is important that we bring these people to book and make them accountable. He alleges that I used false pretenses and empty promises to collect monies from Zimbabweans in the diaspora. Can he name one individual who is complaining and explain why they are afraid to take legal action against me if this was the case? It is irresponsible for the Prof to make defamatory statements without any substantiation. If any explanation was required about why I lost my assets, the Prof provides the best explanation. It is clear that because in his eyes I did not invest anything like white commercial farmers who are alleged to have stolen land from blacks independent of when they actually came to Zimbabwe, we should lose the assets to the state. This is the kind of mindset that does not take Zimbabwe forward and against which the merits of the “so-called third force” must be evaluated. If the Prof is any part of that construction of a post-Mugabe era, then I do not want to be part of it.
49. The Prof states as fact that: “I remember Mawere coming to me in 2000 with files on the insurance industry in Zimbabwe which he wanted me to use to write negative articles in the press for a fee to smear Old Mutual whose assets he was then keen to loot as part of pyramid scheme building through corporate raiding. There are witnesses to this including some people who were then very close friends of Mawere but who now are not. I refused to cooperate and told Mawere that I write from my mind and conscience and not from anybody’s wallet. I still have those files and his notes on them and I had a chuckle going through them just before writing this response.”
t is important that the Prof produces the files that he claims I gave him. What were the contents and why is only coming clean now? Why did he not expose me then? How was I going to benefit from the alleged pyramid scheme? The Prof should confirm whether I have attempted to take over Old Mutual? If so, he should provide details for the public to know. It is also important that we get a response from Old Mutual otherwise the Prof liked a naked Emperor can continue to scandalize people with impunity.
| "I only believe that my record can be judged by what I did to make Zimbabwe great" |
| MUTUMWA MAWERE |
50. The Prof states as fact that: “In Zimbabwe, a key strategy of pyramid schemers and corporate looters—like Mawere who use or rather abuse State resources under the political security of patronage from their political principals—is to set up an intricate network of shelf and offshore companies around the world. That network is then used to extract and export key natural resources, especially minerals such as asbestos in Mawere’s case, and other commodities from Zimbabwe. Within this network of pyramid schemers, companies trade with, or export to and import from, each other. It is a network of under invoicing, transfer pricing, money laundering and outright smuggling all of which is otherwise known as financial or business engineering.”
If the Prof is to be taken seriously, it is important that he provides the evidence to support the scandalous allegations he makes. In what context did I abuse state resources? In the Prof’s mind who is the state? I have never received any invoice from the state. I am not sure what the Prof means by the state or he is trying to perpetuate the baseless allegation that SMM was indebted to the state. People should be told that ZESA, RBZ, and all parastatals are now defined as the state for the purpose of expropriation. If your company owes money to ZESA, be careful that the Prof’s people can spring a surprise on you one day trying to takeover your company on the grounds that you abused state resources. This is what happened in the case of SMM. First allegations were made of externalization and transfer pricing and then this led to specification and reconstruction. Can the Prof explain how any person can abuse state resources when the state does not exist at law as a counterparty to any transaction in business? If I abused the state, then who was my counterparty in the government and why has that person not been brought to book?
51. Just to demonstrate his ignorance about business, the Prof makes the following statement: “When pyramid schemes flop, they collapse like a deck of cards. Cases in point are Enron in the United States, Goldenberg in Kenya and ENG in Zimbabwe. Also, because financial or business engineering is basically a glorified criminal activity, its political and business perpetrators often end up in jail and the American Enron, Kenyan Goldenberg and Zimbabwean ENG cases bring home this truth.”
Can the Prof explain how SMM was a pyramid when the government had to use a nominee company in the UK to buy a so-called “deck of cards”? Can the Prof also explain how a company that the government declares as insolvent in Zimbabwe would have a positive value of US$2 million in the UK? If SMM was insolvent why then did a cash strapped government fork out US$2 million to buy the claims of SMM’s former owner? In the case of Zimre, can the Prof explain why the government through Gwaradzimba placed the company under reconstruction retroactively for the sole purpose of ensuring that the rights belonging to my companies would then be taken by the government? Is it the role of government to put in place measures to crowd out private sector investors through legal and administrative measures and then seek to benefit from such measures?
52. The Prof makes very serious allegations against his former colleagues in ZANU-PF by stating that: “One does not have to be a robotic scientist to realize that Mawere’s alleged business empire was an ill-conceived pyramid scheme that has collapsed with devastating effects on Mawere who foolishly thought he had become a business mogul when he was a mere front or face of political gladiators from whom he tried to steal the loot and run away.”
Can the Prof name as in the case of the Kenyan Goldenberg case, the political gladiators that he is referring to so that as Zimbabweans construct the architecture of a post Mugabe era they can take note of these gladiators so that they are never part of any government in the future. If the allegations are correct that I was a front, it is important to expose my so-called principals in the national interest. I believe that it is wrong for any public official to use his position to benefit private people and fail to disclose his/her interest. To the extent that the Prof knows my principals, it is important that we work together to expose them. What I acquired in 1996 was a private company and yet it appears that there exists in the minds of the ruling elites that the transaction would not have taken place without state corruption. Why would the Prof be fixed with the information and the government has not disclosed this in the various affidavit in different courts?
53. It is amazing that the Prof makes reckless statements without regard for the truth. For those in doubt about the Prof’s role in the expropriation of my assets, this statement tells it all: “What I think is fair as poetic justice about the Mawere saga is that some of the looted assets, such as SMM, have been reclaimed by the State and are no longer in either Mawere’s hands or those of his Zanu PF political principals who had conspired with him in the first place. A future democratic government will inherit these assets for the nation.”
It is clear that the Prof justifies the expropriation of my assets as a democratic enterprise in as much as a future democratic government will inherit land, banks, SMM for the nation. We do not need to guess who will be in charge of the state given the analysis of the Prof regarding the Budiriro by-election and what is required to remove Mugabe.
THE R300,000 AFFAIR
54. With respect to my allegation that my problems with the Prof started with his request to borrow R300,000 from me. In his own words he says: “First, he claims that he initial attracted my wrath immediately after I was appointed as a government minister in 2000 after he declined to advance me a personal loan of R300, 000.00 to finance a mortgage in South Africa because I refused to disclose a repayment plan. Significantly, he does not say what wrath it was because he is inventing it in the typical fashion of a paranoid attention seeker. Otherwise it is indeed true that a mutual friend, Musekiwa Kumbula who first introduced me to Mawere in 1985, approached him on my behalf over the mortgage issue. There was no problem with the repayment plan at all. However Mawere, through Africa Resources who were going to advance the payment, wanted some security in foreign currency and I offered an equity investment in the United States but it was not possible to do and get the required paperwork within the very short time the mortgage financing in South Africa had to be finalized. In the circumstances, I had to find an alternative which did not require a collateral arrangement based on my equity investment in the United States and the matter ended there.”
It is significant that the Prof acknowledges that he did try to borrow the R300,000. The Prof says Mr. Kumbula approached me on his behalf. While this is irrelevant, the truth is that he was the one who approached me. What is significant is that while the Prof would not allow other Zimbabweans like Makamba, Kuruneri to have foreign assets, he now acknowledges that he offered an equity investment in the United States? Does the Prof still have the equity investment? Can the public be told about this equity investment? Where does the Prof stand on Gono/Mugabe’s anti-corruption/externalization crusage? Does he support it?
55. The Prof makes a valid argument that his is an elected legislator by stating that: “Second, Mawere cynically claims that the reason I wrote my article on the Budiriro by-election and the state of opposition politics in Zimbabwe is because I desperately want to be accommodated by the opposition. His cynicism is based on either ignorance or malice or outright stupidity or all of these things rolled into one. This is because everyone else knows that I am an elected opposition member of parliament who ran and won as an independent candidate against candidates from Zanu PF and the MDC in the March 2005 parliamentary elections.”
What we are not told is how much of the state’s resources were used to promote the legislator’s personal interests. Can the Prof confirm if Gono opened a CBZ branch in Tsholotsho? If so, what was the business rationale? What was the role of the media he controlled in his journey to his current position as an elected legislator? Prof please come clean about how you abused the state.
56. The Prof seems to have strong views about the abuse of power by my so-called principals and yet he has not used his role as legislator to expose Mnangagwa. He states: “As an elected opposition parliamentarian, I am already working with my colleagues in the opposition on a number of legislative and other issues of mutual interest or national concern in and outside parliament. It is therefore an oxymoron, and in fact rather silly, for Mawere to imagine that I should want to be accommodated into something that I already am part of. Some people are breathtakingly naïve.”
It is important that we understand from the Prof what better initiative to undertake than to expose corruption and to the extent that I am one of the examples of how ZANU-PF politicians have corruptly abused office, why is he not taking this up? Could it be because he is afraid to expose his co-conspirators in the Tsholotsho team?
57. On the question of unity among the opposition forces, this is what the Prof would like us to believe: “If Mawere really read and understood my article on the Budiriro by-election and the state of opposition politics in Zimbabwe, he would have noticed that my plea and emphasis was that the opposition forces in Zimbabwe should forge a united front with reform minded elements in Zanu PF. I made it clear that simply uniting forces that are already in opposition would not be of strategic value in the current scheme of things given the prevailing national and international balance of social forces along with the opportunities created by Zanu PF’s succession conflicts and the economic meltdown.”
Is the Prof suggesting that the opposition should forge a united front with the corrupt ZANU-PF politicians that he refuses to expose? Would it be in the national interest for the Prof to offer a solution that we lead to more economic disaster and where public officials can victimize a private individual using the state machinery on the grounds that they were left out. If this is Mnangagwa’s position, should the investing public trust him? Only a few weeks ago, the President had private meeting with Rio Tinto and Impala Platinum investors assuring them that Zimbabwe was a safe investment destination. As a result, Zimplats announced an investment of US$258 million in Zimbabwe. Can we assume that the President will expect something in return for posturing in public that the government will not accept an equity stake below 50% and yet cut a deal that is significantly inferior to the stated government position? Could it be that the President or the Minister in the Prof’s mind cut a personal deal? Can the Prof use his parliamentary platform to expose such deals rather than focus on Mawere because he did not give him what he personally wanted?
POSA AND AIPPA
58. With respect to his role on POSA and AIPPA, the Prof now wants us to believe him when states that: “Third, and last on issues personal to me arising from Mawere’s article, he claims that “…before the entry of the Prof in Zanu PF, Mugabe did not have the balls to enact POSA and AIPPA. I honestly wonder whether this is a sick way of cleansing Mugabe from his atrocities or it is another example of Mawere’s ignorance, malice and outright stupidity all put together.”
I am not the one who served in Mugabe’s cabinet and was fired for refusing to toe the line. If the Prof believed that Mugabe was exclusively responsible for the chaos in Zimbabwe, why then did he accept to serve in his cabinet and implement undemocratic policies? The Prof should be aware that we are not kids. The Prof was aware of Gukurahundi when he joined the cabinet and defended Mugabe. Why did he join if he thought Mugabe was so evil? Reading from the Prof’s response, it is clear that he still holds strong views about free expression, rule of law and property rights. I can only imagine if the Prof was a President, then there would be poetic justice for all those opposed to his myopic views and the nation will be the beneficiary.
He now says that the dreadful provisions of POSA were manufactured by Mugabe without his input? I never said anything about my support for the MDC. In any case, under the laws of Zimbabwe I am not allowed to vote or participate in politics. Accordingly, there is no value that I can add to the Zimbabwean political process apart from telling it as it is rather than work on the misplaced basis of amnesia. We owe it to future generations to be honest about our conduct rather than blame other people. Could the Prof enlighten us when he discovered that Mugabe had commandist leadership style? If the Prof had been allowed to contest the Tsholotsho constituency as a ZANU-PF candidate, would we have known about his views against Mugabe?
59. The Prof even gets crazy to suggest that he had no input into POSA and AIPPA when he states as follows: “I suppose by claiming that Mugabe did not have the balls to enact POSA and AIPPA before I became a minister, Mawere is opportunistically trying to join and profit from the ridiculous bandwagon of some opposition voices that have been making the same foolish allegations that I authored POSA. To this day, many rational people cannot understand how a minister of information can be claimed to have authored a security law such as POSA when there were ministers of national security, home affairs and defence.”
If the Prof did not believe in these laws and knowing how strong willed he is, why then did he continue to serve in Mugabe’s cabinet? A simple and straightforward explanation would help rather than the prevarication of the Prof.
60. The Prof now wants us to believe that Messrs. Dabengwa and Nkomo are culpable for putting into place POSA by stating as follows: “While it is provocative, and maybe even interesting for some, to link me with POSA the undeniable fact is that Dumiso Dabengwa and John Nkomo know how and why POSA was drafted to replace LOMA because that was done under their watch as ministers of home affairs. But even so, Dabengwa and Nkomo cannot shoulder the responsibility as individuals because of the clear history of the making of security laws in Zimbabwe that precedes both of them.”
It is important that the Prof educates us on how Mugabe operates. Does he operate a cabinet style government where each Minister is assigned responsibilities and report to Cabinet? Did Prof deal one on one with Mugabe or he was part of the cabinet where decisions were made on a collective basis? If the Prof attended cabinet, can he tell us what he said in those cabinet meetings when the obvious concerns about AIPPA and POSA were raised? Is the Prof trying to tell us that Mugabe never allowed debate in Parliament in which case all the decisions were made by him?
61. The Prof as the Minister for propaganda who banned NDA now wants us to believe that it was Chinamasa and Welshman Ncube who are to blame by stating that: “As for AIPPA, it was indeed drafted under my watch as minister of information and I take full responsibility for that. It is a matter of the public record readily available through the Hansard which captures parliamentary debates and proceedings that the AIPPA law as it stands was drafted by agreement between Patrick Chinamasa and Welshman Ncube after the original draft had been thrown out by the parliamentary legal committee then chaired by the late Edison Zvobgo.”
Are we to read in this revelation that the Prof had no input in the drafting of AIPPA? Who was the principal driver of AIPPA and what injury was the law supposed to cure? The Prof now wants to hide behind parliament and the two principal parties i.e. AIPPA and MDC when it is common cause that the Parliament only serves to rubber stamp executive decisions. Is the Prof trying to make us believe that he was just a robot? The Prof even has the guts to say that: “They even tried to takeover Mawere’s Tribune but found it to be too useless.”
Why is he telling us this now?
CONCLUSION
62. Just as I believed when I embarked on the journey to stake our interests as blacks in business 10 years ago with the acquisition of SMM, the promise of Africa to African can only be realized if those who believe in its future take responsibility for their actions and are accountable. As one of the first generation big business players in a continent used to commission takers, I knew that the road was risky and fraught with dangers and hence the need to document our corporate stories so that future generations can draw lessons from our experiences. This conversation with the Prof is particularly significant in that unfortunately his views have been influential in shaping the destiny of Zimbabwe and its people.
To the extent that he continues to be a political player it is important that we understand the mindset that informs his actions and analysis so that past mistakes are avoided and that future is shaped by those who genuinely believe that it is the individual and not the state under the control of mad Professors who drive change and on whom we should depend on. The state like any referee can play a catalytic role but the ultimate people who shape the quality of a game are the players. I have accepted to play in the space of business on the recognition that enterprise development and production can be the defining litmus tests for success rather than mere political rhetoric.
63. I only believe that my record can be judged by what I did to make Zimbabwe great. I still hold the view that a nation where citizens are freed from poverty and insecurity is likely to be more successful than one where citizens dwell on writing good constitutions and have free and fair elections that they alone only wish to win. It is for this reason that I believe that it was tragic that the Prof killed the NDA seed before it could even germinate. It is also unfortunate that he now wishes to be an ambassador for something he was not a part of and benefit from selective memory.
64. I encourage the editor to use his leverage on the Prof to ensure that he does respond to the questions raised in my long response.>>>>>>>>>GO BACK TO PAGE 1
Mutumwa Mawere's
weekly colum will appear on New Zimbabwe.com every Monday. You can contact
him at: mmawere@global.co.za
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