Fragile State? What fragile State?

Vukani Madoda The Sharpshooter
The highlight of the recent World Economic Forum on Africa in Durban was when President Robert Mugabe reminded the whole world of what we have always know.

We have always known that Zimbabwe is not a fragile State, neither is it part of an “axis of evil”, or an “outpost of tyranny”, as propagated by those failed leaders of the Western world called George W Bush and Tony Blair and believed by their whacky successors.

One thing about President Mugabe is that he speaks the brutal truth and he always carefully choses the right platforms to set the record straight.

Whilst Britain and its allies have consistently exploited their media outlets such as the BBC to pound unsuspecting non-Zimbabweans with malicious lies about the real state of our country, President Mugabe is the master tactician who knows how to deploy “shock and awe” to put the truth exactly where it belongs.

Of course, the unpatriotic one, suffering from the usual severe and acute identity crisis, particularly the long lost son or daughter who went to the Diaspora at the turn of the century and never could afford an air or bus ticket to travel back home, still thinks Zimbabwe is a fragile State.

Some thought it was crazy for President Mugabe to say Zimbabwe was the most highly developed country in Africa after South Africa.

Well, many, many tourists have come to Zimbabwe thinking they would see bullet holes, slums and shattered glass in our central business district of Harare.

They have come here imagining they will see soldiers and military personnel at every street corner.

They have been misled to think that AK-47s and armoured vehicles are a common sight as the State brutalises its own people.

Some have imagined that human rights abuses will be the order of the day when they land here, and that dead bodies will be littering the pavements.

We have heard of tales of how some of them come to our beautiful country thinking that they will see us pushing wheelbarrows of worthless currency to buy a loaf of bread as if this was Weimar Germany.

But the moment they get here and they find they can swipe away using their Visa and MasterCards, and when they see people peacefully going about their daily business, they realise that Zimbabwe is not the fragile State that the BBC and other outposts of media tyranny make it out to be.

True to the nature of the BBC, when President Mugabe boasted that Zimbabwe has the highest literacy rate and that we are expecting a bumper harvest this year, the BBC just had to dig deep for the negatives. “Last year, more than four million people were in need of food aid in Zimbabwe after rains failed.  “The country was once known as the breadbasket of Africa. . .Zimbabwe has a severe cash shortage. . .Hyperinflation forced the Government to abandon the Zimbabwe dollar in 2009. . .Mr Mugabe. . .ruined the economy…”

Come on BBC, seriously? Four million people? Who was counting? How many died of starvation?

Severe cash shortage of US dollars? Which African country has as much US dollars in common circulation as Zimbabwe does?

Hyperinflation of 2009, which country on Earth has never had inflation? What is the rate of inflation in Zimbabwe today? Is it not something like 0,06 percent?

Why can’t you mention that?

To add shame to their already pathetic reporting, they dig up a dubious World Bank statistic table that puts Zimbabwe’s literacy rate 86,9 percent and 11th in Africa below The Seychelles, Equatorial Guinea, South Africa, Sao Tome, Libya, Namibia, Mauritius, Cape Verde, Botswana and Swaziland.

The bias is sickening!

The desperate attempt to downplay the truth of what President Mugabe told the World Economic Forum bordered on the grotesque and the disgusting.

Surely only the gullible will for one moment believe Zimbabwe is a fragile State.

The BBC could not even bring itself to acknowledge that Cde Mugabe is the most educated President in the whole world.

A fragile State? What fragile State?

We have been under economic sanctions for close to two decades but we are still holding our own.

We have a national road network, hospitals, schools, universities, democracy and a functional Government well in control of the levers of State and its entire territory.

We have managed to maintain our integrity, our sovereignty and our dignity in spite of deliberate efforts to frustrate the gains of our hard-won Independence.

Yes we have our problems but we are not a fragile State.

This is a growing State, a State with great potential and which looks beyond the next election and beyond the next generation.

If there is anything fragile in Zimbabwe, it is the illegal regime change agenda that manifests itself in illegal economic sanctions.

The illegal regime change agenda clings to the sanctions because all else has failed.

A fragile State? What fragile State?

Added to development and literacy, Zimbabwe has the best record of peace and security, if not in Africa then in the world.

Peace means we have stability and stability means we have security. It is rare to encounter violent crime, drive-by shoot-outs or high-speed cops-robbers-and-robbers-chases.

The stability of this country means we have the time and space for development, for growing crops and for education.

Zimbabwe a fragile State? What fragile State?

Dubulaizitha!