THE recent malicious attack on Zimbabwe in Geneva by CCC spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere was another vain and vile attempt to tarnish the country’s image.
Pundits, however, contend the many unwritten elements about the country’s liberation struggle, such as reliving that gory tale through pen and paper, must now form a critical chunk of the schools curriculum as a matter of urgency.
This is because our erstwhile tormentors, the Rhodesians, who, together with their Western kith and kin sponsoring CCC and its allies, have seized the war of liberation narrative in order to present themselves as a viable alternative and are now on a relentless drive to make Zimbabweans forget about their agony-infested past by not only publishing lies-riddled stories but using international platforms to paint as bleak a picture as possible for the country.
Zimbabwe risks losing a whole generation and history to a relentless enemy capitalising on the many gaps of that untold story.
And it is not difficult to trace why CCC is playing ball in that anti-liberation struggle project.
The dreadful September 11 1999 formation of the MDC, which has since degenerated into several parties, and is now called CCC, was not only meant to curtail the fulfilment of the one of the key grievances of the liberation struggle — land redistribution — but to shift the country’s narrative from a nationalistic-driven thrust to what those in the opposition ingenuously refer to as the ‘struggle for democracy’.
Within Rhodesian circles and Western citadels, CCC and its allies are taught to parrot the narrative that theirs is yet another ‘struggle’ for what they claim is ‘freedom’ of the majority.
The idea is to disconnect the legacy of the liberation struggle from the collective memory of the masses through their fallacious claims that the majority have yet to accrue any benefits from that hideous war.
We hardly hear them mention the many success stories of the Land Reform and Resettlement Programme which they openly detest, the many empowerment initiatives across the country or the fact that many of them are beneficiaries of sound education policies where they benefitted from Government grants.
And then the likes of Fadzayi Mahere, like her peers before her who, on the same platforms called for ruinous sanctions to be imposed on the country, she also fervently tried to tarnish Zimbabwe’s image recently.
This is why there is need to constantly remind progressive Zimbabweans that many of those who now make deafeningly hollow noises about 43 years of alleged failure are beneficiaries of that education policy and have not repaid education loans they received from the same Government they now vilify on behalf of their Western masters.
This is why it is important to unpack Mahere’s statements with the impending elections in mind.
While on paper her utterances were innocuously meant to reincarnate the usual opposition anti-Zimbabwe sentiments on the international arena, it has emerged that the reluctant admission within CCC that it is headed for a nasty defeat in August means presenting a picture of a country that is teetering on the brink will force the so-called international community to rubbish results of that election.
Within CCC, there is a frenetic push for another Government of National Unity (GNU) from which they will get another political lifeline after their August drubbing.
But the looming mauling will not only be against CCC, it will also be a thumping against the Rhodesian remnants with Zimbabwe and outside its borders together with their Western kith and kin, meaning the country must now put in place measures to ensure that the war of liberation forms the core of our curriculum.
In Geneva, Mahere was dutifully pushing for that highly unlikely GNU scenario.
“Ours has been a slow burning struggle for democracy, following a liberation war of independence that provided the illusion of freedom but no tangible sign of its much needed fruit,” she said before regurgitating the now nauseating opposition lies that Government is ‘violating’ the rights of the country’s citizens, including the likes of Job Sikhala and Jacob Ngarivhume who are in prison for inciting violence.
“I stand here today to let the world (know) that Zimbabwe is currently reeling under a dictatorship much worse than Robert Mugabe…the Government’s war against freedom and its weaponisation of the law against myself and other Government critics such as Job Sikhala and Jacob Ngarivhume are calculated to send a chilling message to the rest of the society.”
She finally latched on to the crux of her matter, saying ‘the world (the West) must insist on this election being free, fair and credible’, in carefully crafted remarks meant to prime the progressive world for the usual post-election hollow ramblings of ‘rigging’ by the opposition and their Western handlers.
As she was playing to the Western gallery, back home in Zimbabwe where real politics takes place, Presidents Emmerson Mnangagwa and Filipe Nyusi were touching on a critical issue that has been slowly slipping away from the minds of many Zimbabweans – the liberation struggle legacy.
Zimbabwe, through President Mnangagwa, wrote another piece of history when it handed over a piece of land to President Nyusi for the construction of the Samora Machel Liberation Monument at the Liberation City where the Museum of African Liberation is situated in Harare.
This history then becomes difficult to erase when such honours are bestowed upon heroes of our struggle.
It was mainly from Mozambique that the war of liberation in which thousands were massacred, which CCC and its Western and Rhodesian handlers are disconnected from and openly detest, was executed.
It is also this unwavering solidarity in honouring the iconic Machel that further defines Harare’s relentless quest to shake off the shackles of colonialism and neo-colonialism as represented by CCC that shapes the trajectory the country has taken over the past 43 years.
The fruits of that solidarity which are manifesting through the innumerable successes that are being scored by black people, especially in agriculture, mining and several other sectors, can never be stolen by the opposition for and on behalf of the West.
So too will the legacy of the liberation struggle which the majority will be voting to defend and protect in August when Zimbabwe finally puts to an end the neo-colonialial madness that CCC has been clamouring for over the past two decades.
