EVEN before the release on Wednesday last week, by the Cable News Network (CNN)’s David McKenzie and Brent Swails, of a report on Zimbabwe which claimed the country was being rocked by demonstrations, the script had long been written.
And it was the usual old and tired song that the Government of Zimbabwe was violating human rights, only this time there was a new twist, one which attempted to present to the world the fallacy that Harare was now a police State.
To give impetus to their malicious story, the CNN duo interviewed a man they claimed was an officer from the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP).
It was a hatchet job that betrayed CNN and its handlers’ bubbling anger on yet another dismal failure by the protesters to locate a tipping point from which they could finally dismantle the ruling ZANU PF Government.
For quite some time, from July 31 2013 to be precise, when ZANU PF walloped a hapless MDC-T, Western anger against the ruling party has been building with ferocious intensity.
The recent sporadic and violent protests have given the anti-Zimbabwe camp a leeway to reignite the protracted and vicious propaganda against Zimbabwe.
Zimbabweans watch out; the barking dogs are back!
In the lead-up to the demonstrations, suddenly there was life in the opposition, licence given to them by ZANU PF’s sometimes tepid approach to issues, particularly those which strengthen the party.
The zeal with which the opposition grabbed the demonstrations project with both hands was a damning indictment on ZANU PF’s seemingly innocuous culture of only uniting during election time.
Unity must be preserved all the time.
The latter statement may well be true, but it is misleading to suggest ZANU PF can lose an election on the basis of this chronic approach to issues.
True to form, CNN and other international media outlets were simply there to do the bidding of the opposition, with lies against Zimbabwe.
Mckenzie’s drama has since been aptly described by chief police spokesperson Senior Assistant Commissioner Charity Charamba as a ‘Hollywood movie perfectly stage managed’.
“Zimbabwe has known only one leader since independence,” reported the excitable McKenzie.
“First as Prime Minister, then President, there has only been Robert Mugabe at the top for the last 36 years.
“There have been challenges, opposition and violence, but the 92-year-old leader has always known how to deal with dissent and stay in power, frequently using brutal tactics.
“But now there are protesters, young and leaderless, united by social media.
“And members of the security forces, so key to maintaining order, are no longer unquestioningly loyal.
“Are all of the ingredients finally in place for a change in Zimbabwe.
“‘We’re not afraid of what will come’,” says anti-Mugabe activist Hardlife Mzingu, the report went on.
“For weeks now they’ve stood up to Mugabe’s security forces on the streets of the capital Harare in what are quickly becoming weekly protests.”
McKenzie went on without even noticing the irony that the protestors he endorses destroyed property.
Issue 6 of South Africa’s Institute of Security Studies has been published with the usual ‘future in Zimbabwe is bleak’ mantra.
Authored by Piers Pigou and titled Zimbabwe’s reforms an exercise in credibility – or pretence?, the report says:
“The Zimbabwean Government claims commitment to a reform agenda that its adherents believe will underwrite its recovery.
“Yet it faces an increasingly uncertain future, unable to implement this agenda, buffeted by a host of internal and external exigencies.
“It appears on course for yet another disputed election in 2018.
“Prospects for recovery that had improved during the Government of National Unity (2009–2013) have narrowed considerably as social and economic conditions worsen, political uncertainties intensify and the state limps from month to month as finances dry up.
“Drought has crippled crop production. Zimbabwe is again facing major political and economic challenges. Prospects for recovery under the leadership of 92-year-old Robert Mugabe and his chief lieutenants in ZANU PF are looking increasingly bleak.”
An article titled ‘Zimbabwe and the Power of Propaganda: Ousting a President via Civil Society’ by Michael Barker on April 16 2008 lays bare the strategy of the international media to tarnish Zimbabwe’s image.
“As the case of ‘democratic’ interference in Venezuela has been well documented, this article will provide a critical – although by no means exhaustive – investigation into the complex issues raised by the current political interventions by foreign organisations into Zimbabwe’s political affairs. Initially, this article will examine how ostensibly progressive mainstream media have acted as imperial flak machines to legitimise ongoing interference in Zimbabwe. Subsequently, it will demonstrate how Western governments’ carried out an overt cultural war to successfully manipulate Zimbabwean civil society, and will then conclude by recommending how concerned citizens might best further the protection of human rights in Zimbabwe and elsewhere. 
“Zimbabwe is a strategic country for the US because events in Zimbabwe have a significant impact on the entire southern Africa region.” – (US Agency for International Development, 2005).
In 2002, America’s key democracy-manipulating organ, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), played a vital role in supporting the temporary ousting of Venezuela’s democratically elected President Hugo Chavez. So given their current interests in Zimbabwe, it is critical to ask two questions: “What are their reasons for interfering in Zimbabwe’s affairs and second; should progressive activists be concerned about these interventions?” 
Let those with ears listen.