(NEWZIMBABWE) ZANU PF mourns Marange ignorance

COMMENT - ZANU-PF has much to be proud of, and it is the only alternative for the development of Zimbabwe, if that development is going to have any meaning for the people of Zimbabwe. They can be the owners of their own country, or watch it being given away to foreign powers and corporations by the MDC. The 'some Jew' referred to in the article refers to the world's monopoly diamond miners, the Nicky Oppenheimer and his son. Inelegantly put perhaps, but what is at issue is the monopoly ownership of the world's diamond industry, the proceeds of which should not go to a single family, but to the people of Zimbabwe, Botswana, South Africa and Namibia.

ZANU PF mourns Marange ignorance
by Staff reporter
08/08/2010 00:00:00

A COLUMNIST for the state-run Herald newspaper, who is widely believed to be President Robert Mugabe’s spokesperson, Gorge Charamba, says it is inexcusable that ZANU PF was unaware of the existence of diamonds in the eastern Marange district.

Charamba, who writes under the pseudonym Nathaniel Manheru said the party’s ignorance of the potential riches in Marange showed it does not understand the country despite being in power for three decades.

“Zanu-PF has been in power since 1980. It has had long enough time to understand this society from pebble to mountain. Yet it does not,” Charamba wrote in the Saturday issue of The Herald.

Zimbabwe is this week set to auction a stockpile of diamonds extracted from the area which is expected to earn the country over US$1 billion.

Industry experts estimate Marange has the potential to contribute between 25 to 35 percent of the world supply, earning the country billions of dollars.

The revelations have astonished ZANU PF officials who feel the country would not have suffered the economic collapse experienced over the last decade had the discovery been made earlier.

Charamba said the ZANU PF's ignorance of Marange’s potential had “far-reaching consequences”.

“How is it that we did not know we had diamonds in Marange? These were discovered in the 1950s, held since then by one De Beers; exploited surreptitiously after then by the same.

“What is worse, even after we knew it, we never quite grasped the extent of the wealth in our possession, until some Jew told us we controlled between 25 to 35 percent of the world supply,” Charamba said.

He added that the party’s inability to flag its achievements had allowed the “MDC-T to pilfer the outcome of (its) hard-made investments”.

Charamba cited a recent report by a United Nations that Zimbabwe had Africa’s highest literacy rates.

“It takes a report from a UN agency to tell us that ah, your nation is literate, most literate on the continent. Who educated those children for that spectacular literacy level?

“Who inventoried our success and achievements? Who proclaims them? Not us! We are Zanu-PF, please!” he wrote.

Charamba also claimed that the party was not taking what he felt was due credit for the relative improvement in the country’s economy.

He said ZANU PF had meekly allowed itself to be described as the party which destroyed a once vibrant economy and claimed the ongoing economic turnaround was the result of policies introduced before the inclusive government assumed office.

“We wake up to be told by an MDC secretary-general, now Finance Minister, that the economy will register upward of 7 percent growth. We the gods in the chair for the past 30 years, can’t we count?

“In Zimbabwe success has no brand, which is why record-less parties and politicians walk stout, all on greatness thrust upon them, thanks to Zanu-PF’s reticence,” Charamba added.

Zimbabweans are expected to go to the polls to choose a substantive government sometime next year and parties are already gearing for the crucial ballot.

And with independent analysts indicating key economic sectors such as mining, agriculture and tourism will continue to record positive growth the battle to claim credit for the turnaround has already started.