CONVERSATIONS PROVOKE AWARENESS

The thread below is an extract from a whatsapp group, BOAF ESWATINI AGRI and if you find the conversations thought provoking and would want to be part of a community where open, frank and honest conversations take place, to shape and define the character and personality of the AFRICA WE WANT collectively, you can join via the following link:

https://chat.whatsapp.com/IHtdmIricvp7bS9u7BaKBj

01/26, 18:14] +263 71 384 : Masikati akanaka vaMawere just wanted to respond casually

Capital is never manna my brother.

Noone ever wants a life and future where his/her existence  and condition entitles him to harvest ….but in all honest who has not benefited from a friend connection even stranger in life. Vanhu vanojegana in life but it’s strange how some people *behave* when  they get up the ladder. I have 2   3 experiences of this scenarios where a mere acquaintence was helped from pauper stage to big offices.

Life is about kusimudzirana Of course those  who made it through their intellect see no need of giving a hand to anybody. They ask why can’t you be like me.

Believe it or not spirituality comes into play in life. We are gifted differently.

In short by asking for assistance from anybody is not a question of entitlement but in most cases for genuine cause.

There is no element of entitlement in _asking_

Ask yourself why people skip all other houses/individuals and seek  assistance at your house/office. Don’t forget people need each here and there. That’s humanity. So I persist question of entitlement is out .

[01/26, 18:23] Mutumwa Mawere: Thanks for sharing. This is an important departure point. 

You may be unaware of the background hence taking things at face value can be counterproductive.

ENTITLEMENT is real and it must be understood from both sides.

[01/26, 18:23] +27 64 021 :  13 years ahead with Mnangagwa!!! Is your thinking alright?? Are the no better people who can take over and do better?? Terrible thinking indeed

[01/26, 18:30] Mutumwa Mawere: #1 Charity is not entitlement – is this correct – charity is supplier driven and no one need not ask?

[01/26, 18:31] Mutumwa Mawere: Need ask

[01/26, 18:32] +263 77 792 : You mean meeting Head of state us terrible thinking?

[01/26, 18:33] +27 64 021 : 13 years from now?? Are you okay in your mind??

[01/26, 18:34] +263 77 792: What’s wrong with what I said Chief

[01/26, 18:35] +27 64 021 : You are not thinking forwards but backwards with no ambition at all

[01/26, 18:35] +263 71 384 : True its not entitlement at all.

[01/26, 18:37] +263 : How do you judge ambition chief

[01/26, 18:37] Mutumwa Mawere: Did you take notice that a person like @⁨HE⁩ was offered to nominate a charity of his choice and he did?

[01/26, 18:44] +263 71 384 : Maybe we should change word *charity* to empowerment because *charity model approach is archaic.

[01/26, 18:46] Mutumwa Mawere: Do you agree that empowerment could be a tricky variable and no shared understanding exists on what it means?

[01/26, 18:50] +263 71 384: It all depends from what angle you look at it from.

[01/26, 18:57] Mutumwa Mawere: Do you agree that nothing self-creates including wealth? 

You can’t give that which you don’t have. 

Even government cannot give what someone has not given up to create. 

Government takes and gives what it would have taken hence it can’t be a vehicle for empowerment because the process of robbing those who gave up value to change value solely to mislead those who receive into believing that the value extended for no charge is coming for government as a principal constitutes robbery and as such undermines the promise inherent in work ethic and the value created in the process.

[01/26, 18:58] Mutumwa Mawere: Not sure if the underlying sense is self-evident in the random verbiage.

[01/26, 19:07] Mutumwa Mawere: Kondozi vs Irvines: A tale of fowl hypocrisy

I’ve recently finished reading My Kondozi Story: The People’s Hope Pillaged, a book by Edwin Moyo, a businessman and former journalist. Great read.

It recounts one of the most sordid chapters in Zimbabwe’s land reforms; the seizure and pillage of Kondozi Estates, once one of the most successful agricultural enterprises in the country.

Moyo was a partner in Kondozi with the De Klerk family.

Kondozi was a thriving business. It supplied produce to Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Marks & Spencer, and Waitrose in Europe. It employed up to 15 000 people directly, and thousands more in support services. The company was a $50 million export business.

Then, one day, a few chefs drive by, see all the lights in the sorting sheds, and decide, “hell, that looks like a heck of a farm to take”. And they did. Chris Mushowe got himself the farmhouse, a nice house on the hill.

Happy with the farmhouse, he didn’t bother much with the farming stuff. From his perch up there on his hill, one imagines, he looked down with great pride upon the estate as it went into ruin. “No going back on Kondozi”, Jonathan Moyo screamed in the Herald.

Eventually, Kondozi collapsed. It had nobody to sell to, workers lost their jobs and our country lost a forex-earning asset.

The farmhouse? Oh, it was burnt to the ground after the new master forgot to build a fireguard around the property. Basic stuff, really.

After reading this book, I couldn’t help but draw a contrast with Irvines, the country’s biggest chicken business (now owned by Innscor).

Now, here are two companies; Kondozi, owned by a black farmer, and Irvines, founded by a racist white man.

How is it than that, our land reform – this pioneering exercise in black empowerment – left the business owned by the black farmer in ruin, and the one owned by a racist Rhodesian thriving?

Let’s wind it back a bit.

William M. Irvine was the founder of Irvine’s, this iconic name in the fowl business.  It started at his Waterfall’s home. Irvine is also the guy who, in 1971, as an MP for Ian Smith’s party, proposed the Residential (Property Owners’) Protection Act.

This would basically be an apartheid law. At the request of half of an area’s property owners, a neighborhood would be “racially restricted”, with members of different races – even if they are owners themselves – being evicted.

(This was to add to other segregation laws, such as the Land Apportionment Act, enacted much earlier, and also the Municipal Amendment Act of 1967, which segregated public spaces. All basically like Apartheid South Africa’s Group Areas Act.)

Now, fast forward to 2013, when Irvine passed away. All was forgiven. The comrades loudly wept for him. Easy to see why.

In 2007, out of ideas on how to stall inflation, the government made a decree; all prices were to be slashed by half. That same year, the government also tabled the indigenization law.

Both these moves should have worried Irvine; they were both a consumer business and a white-owned enterprise. But no worries. According to a US cable out on Wikileaks, David Irvine, William’s son, boasted to US embassy staff that his company was safe.

At the time, Irvine’s Day Old Chicks business was doing some 350,000 chicks weekly. They were allowed to keep a larger chunk of their export earnings than the law allowed.

“In a special arrangement with RBZ Governor Gono, Irvine manages Gono’s chicken projects in return for permission to retain 90 percent of the company’s monthly US$750,000 export earnings.”

And even when Masimirembwa’s notorious “price control task force” came knocking, the Irvines knew who to call.

says the cable:

“His (Irvine’s) primary contact was Price Task Force member and Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Nicholas Goche, whose extensive commercial farm is a major grain supplier to Irvine’s.”  

Nice.

No trouble getting cheap feed for the chickens either.

“Adding to the company’s special benefits, Irvine’s also has a generous allocation of grain (“enough to build up stocks”) from the GMB at the GMB’s low, highly subsidized, controlled prices.”

And, besides all that, Irvine’s was selling “spent breeders,” through “the back door to a ZANU-PF bigwig at twice the controlled price”. According to Irvine then, speaking of the bigwig, “she is high enough to protect me”. 

The chickens ended up on the black market “at triple the controlled price”.

Everyone was happy. The bigwig was happy. Irvine was happy. The beds were well feathered. 

William Irvine and his son had even visited Dydimus Mutasa at his home “seeking protection from possible takeover under the pending Indigenisation Bill”.

Mutasa, says the cable, “received the two businessmen warmly and told them not to worry about the Bill”.

Now, this was around the same time Kondozi owner Moyo found himself at Mutasa’s house in Rusape, begging for help to stop the invasion of his farm. Mutasa, instead, sent him away. He backed the takeover. Moyo had to seek help from VP Joseph Msika who, it appears, was powerless to stop it.

Moyo writes:

“Msika later confided in me that he had never seen such evil men as Mutasa, Mushowe, and their allies.” Msika was later quoted in a paper calling the bunch “immoral little boys”.

Mushowe told Moyo that Kondozi had to be seized because the De Klerks, Moyo’s minority partners, “were racists”. Clearly, the sort of racists that had sought to segregate our cities was more acceptable, not these De Klerks. Mushowe even demanded shares in Kondozi, throwing a fit when denied.

Now, in Zim, there are a lot of black entrepreneurs like Moyo. Guys who just want to build businesses in their own country, naively think their country can allow them to thrive without having to pay tithes to bureaucrats.

There are also many like Irvine, who’ve built empires by paying protection fees.

So, even here in this country where people’s pasts, especially in their defense of racist Rhodesia, are constantly brought up, there’s nothing to cause mass amnesia in big offices more than a few well-stuffed envelopes.

Nothing causes amnesia like a steaming pile of cash. It makes you forget you fought to allow young blacks to thrive, and makes you forget those who fought to install apartheid. 

So that’s how a program we were told was meant to give blacks a say in agriculture, ended with mwana wevhu’s agribusiness in ruin, and the racist white guy’s agribusiness in the money. 

Because, in Zimbabwe, with all our ‘pro-black’ and empowerment rhetoric, the black enterprise cannot be allowed, and is not trusted, to succeed all on its own, without paying homage and fees. 

Yes, here in Zimbabwe, this bastion of all things black empowerment and pan-Africanism.

Comrades, please, your fowl hypocrisy is showing.

[01/26, 19:24] +264 81 406 : Very fascinating.

[01/26, 19:43] +27 64 021 : Indeed there’s a lot of hypocrisy in government. They get away with too many things, just too many

[01/26, 23:02] Colletta Madzvamuse: That’s very true. His Wisdom is still relevant years later after he spoke them

[01/27, 01:34] Colletta Madzvamuse: With the little that I know about World History, I’m left questioning if People in Power are Heartless or it’s the Power that make them Heartless. Seems as if in this quest to be deemed the Most Powerful, those trusted with the Power end up doing whatever it takes to hold on to that Power to get their way. Innocent People ALWAYS end up suffering. In a Democracy, it’s supposed to be a government for the people by the people. If that’s the case, it simply means that the people have the right to hold those in Power Accountable. When they abuse their Power, the People have the right to ask questions. But we all know that’s not how things are. If someone is in Public Service, shouldn’t they welcome any criticism the same way they do any support? It shouldn’t be a crime to ask questions for better Understanding. Then why is it a Crime when people ask questions? If the Person who is in Public Service feels that they don’t have to be held Accountable for any of their actions, what then do we do as the Public when our right to question things has been taken away? We then as a people have to take action to get that right back. What action do we then take? Are we going to unite as a people to fight for our rights back? Because this will be something that’s not for the faint hearted. With the help of Social Media, we’re now aware of so much that we weren’t exposed to before. Talking about these matters has only brought awareness. But change will come when we all get organized and dedicate ourselves to do whatever it takes to see it happen. It’ll take a lot of Hard Work but if people are to unite on this with sacrifice and dedication, it can be done.

[01/27, 05:58] +27 83 302 : If by some divine occurance corruption ends today and democracy and modern day civil rights implemented would africa develop rapidly off the back of current technological innovation and industrial policy.

[01/27, 06:20] +263 71 384 : And you tell me there is democracy anywhere in this world. Pick one democracy.

[01/27, 06:31] +263 77 557: Your rights are enshrined in the constitution, in this case the constitution of Zimbabwe. The challenge over the years has been on the way we use to solve challenges, at most the solution are far away from the challenge. Power is attained through political means but is regulated through the constitution if you try to regulate it politically you create more mess.

[01/27, 06:55] +268 7606 2602: Interesting! You mention that people in power are heartless and  the public in general is innocent. What is your defination of innocent?What do the innocent do or not do? And what is the defination of heartless?

My opinion is that most countries have good constitutions, bill of rights, good legislation – which basically means the politicians deliver accordingly

What is glaringly, to the point of embarassment, is the total failure  to implement. Ministry leaders, Middle managers, Civil Servants and even independent departments/parastatals are the biggest and infact the ‘key and only let down’

What do politicians have to do with lack of reliable electricity?? Where are the engineers, the MBAs etc?

Russia attacks Ukraines electricity infrastructure with bombs and it is generally repaired within 24 hours. In our African situation, in the absence of war our engineers are unable to keep the lights up for 24 hours.

[01/27, 07:04] +27 83 302 : Nyati musaite zvekutamba nesu

[01/27, 07:06] +263 77 557: Elaborate

[01/27, 07:09] +27 83 302 : Is china more democratic with fairer laws and allowance of dissent than zimbabwe?

[01/27, 07:12] +263 77 557: Samaita China has a different system which almost a one party state system we cannot refer to China while interrogating Zim situation

[01/27, 07:19] +27 83 302 : We should as we are evaluating systems ie.whether democracy, zero corruption and modern liberties are a necessary condition for a tasty seven days

[01/27, 07:38] Themba Bassoppo MOYO: Yours truly in the ARL promp and freil.

[01/27,07:47] Mutumwa Mawere:

Thanks for your detailed response.

This setting is simply a grouping of diverse and independent human beings.

The creator intended that no human being would be privileged to know what another mind is thinking or anticipate reactions.

@⁨HE⁩ proposed that I, the person, consider writing a memoir for the benefit of him and others.

I have yet to be privileged with his copy of his dissertation.

I am resigned to accept that his research on the affairs of SMM may have been written for the benefit of getting a degree and not to raise any awareness of the toxicity of the absence of the rule authored by a law that Prof Jonathan Moyo aptly described as BARBARIC AND SATANIC notwithstanding the fact that this law was born when he was a cabinet and more importantly he was appointed to a cabinet committee to prosecute it. 

The people who authored this law are alive.

Mugabe claimed ignorance of the law to me but did confess that as President he was made to sign documents that he often had no clue as to the contents and implications.

Some of his trusted colleagues would explain verbally to him and get him to sign based on trust.

With respect to the Reconstruction of State Indebted Insolvent Companies Act, he did concede after my submissions to him and having given an example of a pregnant woman or a sperm indebted woman egg, whether pregnancy could change the identity of a woman or a woman remains a woman.

He accepted my analogy to conclude that whether a juristic entity is indebted to a so-called state or a non-state actor, it falls within the ambit of a creature governed in terms of the Companies Act, which act is a law of general and universal application.

In the meeting where this conversation of 4 took place, two are dead – him and SK Moyo, two are alive – the former First Lady and me.

It would be futile for me to give my version without an attempt to confirm if the meeting took place at all.

Now turning to @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩, he is in this group and since June 2021, he took giant steps forward.

I am related to him by totem but I did not know we were in the same whatsapp group.

We are of the SAVE totem and he had no duty to take any next step forward but by joining the Friends of SMM (FOSMM), a group whose establishment and origin was inspired by @⁨Themba Mliswa⁩ who is also in this group and whose inaugural Chairman @⁨Adv T Mavula⁩ who is also here, he realized that the chats in the group were largely informed by speculations and superstitions to the effect that the acquisition of SMM in March 1996 was tainted by mystery and corruption.

It was alleged that the acquisition was the brainchild of President Mnangagwa who personally chose me to be the front and in doing so corruptly used public funds to pay for the consideration.

@⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ was 22 when the reconstruction act was applied in relation to the affairs of SMM.

He was not an MP like @⁨Themba Mliswa⁩ at any time in his life and only joined the FOSMM whatsapp group because he had requested for financial assistance to assist in building the party, FEEZ, he was a member of.

I told him that instead of asking for money like @⁨Themba Mliswa⁩ and his YARD colleagues had done leading to the registration of FOSMM as a trust only to be condomized when @⁨Themba Mliswa⁩ got what he wanted as an elected MP, he should become an active citizen not an opportunist.

He heeded the call and instead of asking me to write a book which would be one-sided, he would as a citizen and in terms of s2 of the constitution play his part in asserting the supremacy of the constitution by suing the implicated President in relation to allegations made by MR EDWIN MANIKAI a close friend of @⁨Themba Mliswa⁩ that the decision to divest and deprive the shareholders of any company deemed to be under my control was politically driven.

This allegation is contained in a message of 21 March 2021 that was penned by Manikai to Fred Moyo, who was a participant of the FOSMM whatsapp group.

When I asked you whether you know @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ it was a genuine question because even President Mnangagwa under oath accused him in judicial proceedings of being my surrogate and puppet.

You are my niece yet you have no knowledge of a person like @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ who against all odds has the courage of steeping up to the plate in the search of the truth.

You have responded as follows:

[1/26, 9:50 PM] Colletta Madzvamuse: Sekuru I hope your day was a good one.

[1/26, 9:50 PM] Colletta Madzvamuse: I wasn’t aware of Mupasiri

However, the response is telling and instructive.

Now that you know @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ do you agree that he would be more competent to convert his story into a book than focus on me to sit down and talk to you on a one sided version?

@⁨Taps Machiri⁩ my nephew not only did he follow the @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ but chipped in financially as did @⁨Joseph Mudekunye⁩ but in the family whatsapp groups, no one has bothered to say anything about @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩’s courage and audacity to openly and transparently seek to hold the incumbent President to account for his state of knowledge and involvement in the heist or corporate coup using public power prior to the coup of 2017. 

This is part 1 of my conversation with you.

You have said more that needs to be responded to step by step so that the wish of @⁨HE⁩ can be realized sooner than later.

I salute people like @⁨HE⁩ @⁨Randlord⁩ @⁨Jack Matiza⁩ @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ @⁨Joseph Mudekunye⁩ @⁨Taps Machiri⁩ for standing on their feet and not on their knees begging for charity but doing what the constitution demands of them.

@⁨Arthur Mutambara⁩ waa a personal witness to some of the post-reconstruction chats between me and Mugabe and so were @⁨Brylyne⁩ @⁨Jackie Mutambara⁩ yet the silence exposes the reality that those who know something would rather be eloquent in their silence.

@⁨Themba Bassoppo MOYO⁩ confirmed that he was at the dinner in 1997 that @⁨Arthur Mutambara⁩ featured in his book IN SEARCH OF THE ELUSIVE ZIMBABWEAN CREAM an AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THOUGHT LEADERSHIP – VOLUME 1 whose launch I attended.

I thought of sharing the pics before I spoke to @⁨Arthur Mutambara⁩ that @⁨Themba Bassoppo MOYO⁩ had already distorted the narrative even though I am still alife by asserting as true and fact that the event was about the inauguration of ARL, a company that I established in 1994 before I resigned from the World Bank in 1995. 

This speaks volumes of how history can be masqueraded by the very people who claim to have lived it. 

You can see the promise and challenges of speaking truth to power and while some were happy to associate with me simply because Mugabe was in the mix, they would choose to whisper or write books glorifying their achievements with footnotes on the reality and sacrifices of others.

The dinner in Florida was a direct consequence of the dinner I paid for in South Africa at which Mandela & Mugabe attended on 2 August 1997 in Four Ways, SA.

@⁨Udo⁩ @⁨Nwabisa Mtshali⁩ @⁨Themba Bassoppo MOYO⁩ @⁨Arikana Chihombori⁩ were there. 

@⁨Lady Sansa⁩ who is an accomplished playwrighter @⁨+27 74 518 2620⁩ who is also a writer please take notice of the stories so that you may not complain of being denied stories by people who lived the experiences yet are long on imagined story telling simply to boost their egos.

Thanks for being critical of using whatsapp groups as platforms to provoke, ignite and inspire story telling.

I hope in the quiteness of your time, you will pause and reflect on the importance of building knowledge to provoke mind shifting shared experiences.

Henceforth judge your actions on what you choose to do after knowing a giant like @⁨Ticha Mupasiri⁩ so that when my name is mentioned his name will forever be linked and associated with what is missing.

He unlike many, did what the constitution compels all of us to ensure that the rule of law is protected.

@⁨John Samaita⁩ you asked me what is the RULE OF LAW in private yet you seem determined to avoid the question in groups and in so doing condemn the future to regard me as an obsessed and dellusional idiot.

@⁨Mark⁩ you commended after seeing the pictures and I hope your question is answered that life permits amnesia and selective memory.

The people who have the luxury of writing their stories forgetting that no outcome self-creates will be provoked to respect history and its unfolding without fear, pride or prejudice.

Mugabe did not end up in Florida unless minds met and resources were provided yet some will simply glorify outcomes with no investment in the idea and prosecution.

This is the tragedy that I hope @⁨HE⁩ is trying to address.

By the way @⁨Arthur Mutambara⁩ says he doesn’t know you but he knows of a Mukanganwi who is a pharmacist.

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