Tag: dictator

Bob’s latest speech blunder

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe made a speech blunder on Tuesday during the opening of the third session of the eighth Parliament of Zimbabwe.

Instead of reading the parliamentary opening speech, Mugabe re-read his State of the Nation Address, which he delivered in late August.

Presidential spokesperson George Charamba acknowledged the blunder.

“There has been a mix-up of speeches resulting in a situation where his Excellency, the President, delivered the wrong speech,”Charamba said.

“The mix-up happened in his secretarial office, therefore the delivery in Parliament should be set aside. The error is sincerely regretted and corrective measures are being considered.”

Last December, Mugabe shocked more than 12,000 delegates at the Zanu PF congress held in the capital when he unwittingly denounced his own party.

More often during rallies and political gatherings, Zanu PF officials usually denounce the main opposition party led by Morgan Tsvangirai, the Movement for Democratic Change.

But instead, Mugabe said then: “Pasi neZanu PF”, which means “Down with Zanu PF”.

Earlier opposition leader Simba Makoni alleged that the Mossad had been hired by President Robert Mugabe to ensure he won by computerized rigging of the vote.

Ibbo Mandaza, a senior member of Makoni’s campaign team, told the Mail & Guardian that the voters’ roll had been manipulated to favor the ruling ZANU-PF and that the format of the voter’s roll was devised by the Mossad on instructions from the Zimbabwean government.

Information technology expert Valentine Sinemane told the South African newspaper that the electronic version of the voters’ roll, sold to the opposition by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission for $2,400, was compiled by an Israeli company named Nirkuv Projects.

Mandaza said that ZANU-PF asked for Mossad help because of the intelligence agency’s experience with elections in other countries. “They have expertise in vote-rigging. Also, Mossad is looking for any kind of support and alliances and therefore Zimbabwe is the obvious target,” he said.

He said that the opposition was aware that Mossad had been active in Zimbabwe recently. Six Mossad agents arrived in Harare and held top-secret meetings with government officials involved in state security before the election.

Source: ANA/M&G

Mugabe defends Zuma

President Jacob Zuma was defended from an unexpected quarter on Wednesday, when visiting Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe urged the South African media to “stop tarnishing him”.

“You can tarnish me – I don’t care,” he said at a media conference after he had met Zuma for official talks on his first state visit to South Africa since 1994.

“We are Africans. We don’t tarnish our leaders,” he said, adding that while political opponents could have disagreements, they should support national unity.

Though Mugabe sniped at his old enemies such as former British prime minister Tony Blair and Western governments more generally, he also showed flashes of surprising humility.

He and his ministers had exchanged some very harsh words when Zuma was trying to mediate an agreement between Mugabe’s Zanu-PF and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) a few years ago. But on Wednesday he was full of praise for Zuma, congratulating him for his government’s efforts to resolve the recent political dispute in Lesotho and for its peacekeeping work in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

He also thanked Pretoria for its tolerance of illegal Zimbabwean immigrants, “as our people have really offended… by jumping the border and disturbing your social systems.”

He said this problem had been discussed in the talks on Wednesday, “and we said we must find ways of controlling the movement of people which have not been sanctioned”.

And he referred to South Africa as Zimbabwe’s “elder brother” economically, appealing to it to help Zimbabwe add value to its extensive natural resources.

South Africa rolled out the red carpet for Mugabe, receiving him with full honours on only his second state visit, and raising diplomatic relations to the highest level.

In his long and rambling speech at the media conference, Mugabe also ironically thanked South African journalists for giving him so much publicity “as a real dictator”.

But he insisted that he wasn’t such a dictator after all, citing the way he had let his old enemy, the late Ian Smith, who was the prime minister of the former Rhodesia, keep not only his own farm, but also his father’s farm.

Source: IFS