AFRICAN EYE

Sometimes I have been viciously persecuted, because of my stand against corruption, at other times, I have had to wait for years, because some corrupt individual or individuals, were blocking our way. And always I prevailed, because, "faith abides" it never, ever, fails.(Strive Masiyiwa,Econet Wireless Founder).This startling confessing by Masiyiwa comes at a time when Zimbabwe is embroiled in serious acts of corruption that has remained the major Achilles of Zimbabwe’s ailing economy. It has become rare today in Zimbabwe to bump into the caliber of people such as Masiyiwa who because of their faith in God and principles continue to stand strong against this evil called corruption. Corruption has become institutionalized and many people have embraced it in schools, creches, colleges, passport offices, on roads, government, the list is endless. Recently I attended a public meeting organized by Zimbabwe Democracy Institute (ZDI) that sought to unravel and discuss the content

By Rawlings Standgun Magede On Sunday, 28 April 2013, i had the opportunity to watch a programme, on SABC1 called Sunday Live which was holding a debate on youth unemployment in South Africa. On the panel was Richard Ntjana, from the Youth Chamber of Commerce, Thulani Tshefula, president of the South African Youth council and Zwelinzima Vavi, the Secretary General of Congress of South African trade Union (COSATU). What came out of the debate is that the South African youth council has since begun to take initiatives on youth unemployment by engaging government and has since started to work extensively with non-governmental organizations, youth groups, and are frequently holding road shows, where they engage youths on the contentious but serious issue of unemployment. On the other hand the Youth Chamber of Commerce has followed suit in its mandate to equip youths by engaging youth entrepreneurs who would want to start businesses and equip them with skills and connect th

The story that appeared in the Herald of a real estate company, River Valley Properties owned by one Mrs Smelly Dube, who is described as a “grateful resettled farmer”, who build a house in Gweru for President Mugabe cannot go without probe. The house is valued at US$50, 000, with a booster pump worth more than US$500,000 dollars with capacity to supply water to more than 4300 households both in Hertfordshire phase 1 and 2 which are currently being owned and developed by River valley properties. The reason for her building the house was to honour and appreciate the president for the land reform programme. The company also gave more than 1000 high and medium density stands to civil servants and offered to provide building materials on monthly basis payment. For a company that doesn’t even have the sense to set up a website for its marketing and advertising, or even advertise on zimclassifieds, River Valley real estate must have so much money to splash. Minister Chombo was the guest

By Rawlings Standgun Magede Recently, i was debating the recent referendum with COPAC co-chair, Paul Mangwana over the legitimacy of the yes vote. His argument was that Zimbabweans did well by grabbing this opportunity presented them and voted in favour of the document as this process had taken a lot of time and money.He went to argue that there is no constitution that can best meet the term “people driven” citing that even the American constitution was written by less than five people and yet it is ranked as one of the best constitutions in the world. To him the fact that only a “handful’ of people were consulted during the scandalous outreach programme, made the constitution “very’ people driven. While there might be a grain of truth in his argument i reminded him that the United states of America and Zimbabwe are totally different countries at different socio-economic and political developments, hence those countries are worlds apart in terms of governance to say t

If recent results of a constitution debate on the YES\NO vote hosted by Crisis in Coalition, are anything to go by, then the politicians who are advocating for yes votes have everything to worry about because the people rejected the COPAC draft describing it as a weak and selfish draft meant to further the interests of politicians. COPAC co-chair Douglas Mwonzora,Virginia Muwanigwa from Womens coalition, Psychology Maziwisa from ZANU PF and Dr Charity Manyeruke from the University of Zimbabwe were advocating for a yes vote .On the other hand the No vote was represented by Clever Bere(NCA).Job Sikhala(MDC-99)Munyaradzi Gwisai(ISO)Simba Makoni(Mavambo). . Speakers of the yes vote came one after the other trying to defend the draft constitution but to no avail. The people objected when Psychology Mazivisa stated that if ZANU PF was to win the coming elections, it will amend the constitution and this brought the discussion to a standstill. What this means is that people will have n

By Rawlings Magede Over the years the Zimbabwe has witnessed many socio-political and economic changes. These changes have a direct effect on every age group. However, the most vulnerable group is the youth who remain at the mercy of circumstances. With the scourge of unemployment running rampant, many fall unsuspectingly into the trap of being used for other selfish means by politicians. The youth constitute the majority of the population, this entails that whenever there is any economic haemorrhage and meltdown, and they are affected the most. Despite this, over the years, the youth have played servitude and prostration at the hands of politicians who have continued to use them as barricades against leadership change and renewal. The problem we have in Zimbabwe today is that those in positions of leadership are not prepared to relinquish their privileges so as to accommodate the plight of the suffering masses ( youths included)such as dealing with the high rate of unemploy

The COPAC led process has been nothing but a circus so blatantly diverted by politicians leaving a lot of questions unanswered for the common man to question whether if the sole responsibility of writing this law of the land is for a few privileged politicians. Zimbabwe is ours too! Many still question why the constitution has been reduced to a contest of just three political parties namely ZANU PF and MDC formations instead of the whole nation. This poison that has been injected into our nation must be eliminated because the people of Zimbabwean are not as docile as what the politicians take them to me. While this debate of who should write a constitution appears more poignant with each passing day, what lies ahead of us is not only an onerous task but an important choice to be made by the whole nation that will shape the next generation. It is a task that must be executed with caution by every Zimbabwean. It’s high time we get over the politics of thinking that everything in Zim