Two interviews were conducted in Harare recently, and boy were they different! I mean different different like dzoramombe and agriculturalist different. Not the different you think though, different as in how they were conducted.
I know what you are thinking, but I don’t mean the different of one was publicised and the other was not. That is obvious.
There was the bizarre interview on the one hand, where a properly qualified jurist faced her accusers…sorry, her interviewers thinking she was being interviewed for promotion and found herself facing the Spanish Inquisition and…., about that later.
Cue in Simba Chikore, the guy that showed up at his own wedding wearing Koffi Olomide’s spare gowns, and could have been mistaken for one of the entertainers. That guy.
The one who lied about his age and married the First Virgin (according to Mum) before proceeding to have his first born son, Little FarEast Chikore, born in Singapore just a few months after granddad signed a constitution which suddenly said that children born overseas to Zimbabwe born parents are citizens by birth.
Always wondered why Ebagum agreed to that diaspora friendly law? Well, there is your answer, grandchild was going to be born kusingapore vanhu vane gomarara uko.
Turns out he and 133 other people showed up for the interview to be Air Zimbabwe Chief Operating Officer (deputy Managing Director, if you didn’t know). 134.
That has to be true, because if you wanted to lie about the number of people that got interviewed to be Chief Operation Officer in the World’s Friendliest Airline with a Tradition of Scaring…sorry, Caring, you do not say ‘we interviewed 134 people’.
You say something like ‘it was a dozen or so applicants’, and we settled on him. A dozen or so sounds like a lie, 134 seems too exact to be false so yes, this airline that we know to be performing so well that it has never had any planes impounded at Gatwick for non-payment of fees and has never cancelled flights without notice, sifted through thousands of applications and shortlisted 134 people for interview to be deputy to Captain Ripton (Krypton was already taken) Muzenda. Simon Muzenda’s son. To those Bornfrees reading this: that’s the guy that was deputy to Ebagum until his death in or around 2003.
And, I kid you not, after 134 interviews, it was clear to everyone including the Minister Joram Gumbo, that in a country of 14 million, out of 134 applicants, the person most qualified to occupy the second most important seat in the airline that is headed by the son of the late VP is the current President’s son-in-law, him of the Kofi Olomide costumes (confession, I actually like Bona, I think she is a cute kid, and I like that she does not talk a lot, or drink a lot like her brothers, or get into trouble a lot like Mujuru’s brood, so when someone shows up at her wedding dressed like Kofi Olomide I take a dim view of that, especially when he is the groom for Pete’s sake!).
Anyway, chakapiwa Simba chinhu chiya, the other interviewees were ‘heard’ texting to each other on Whatsapp. Of course, they still recalled that on the day of the interview, when it was Simba’s turn, music was heard coming from the interview room. It had the beats of the late James Chjimombe’s music, and the lyrics to match:
Kana uri mukwasha, mabasa ese ndeako…
Nyoka iyo, nyoka iyo……mukwasha urayayi nyoka…
Ndege iyo, ndege iyo……mukwasha urayayi ndege…
Of course, this was all based on merit. Explaining this obvious fact, Joram Gumbo had evidence why there was no nepotism at all. Because you see, aside from having interviewed 134 applicants (not a dozen or so, for that would be a lie, but a full 134), there was the fact that Ebagum himself was Joram Gumbo’s nephew!!! So how could Sekuru Gumbo possibly have favoured chimukwasha chemuzukuru? Very convincing evidence.
According to Gumbo: “We appointed him in his own right as Simba Chikore. Remember, he is a Zimbabwean who is entitled to take up any job as long as those offering it are satisfied that he is the best person. There is nothing untoward about that. In any case, the President is my nephew. Can people therefore objectively allege that I was appointed in irregular circumstances?” I guess that explains THAT appointment.
Of course, others later observed that this whole thing was more straightforward:hazvishamisi kuti tezvara vape mukwasha kombi yavo kuti ashandise. There. Nyararai.
Then there was the other interview. This one, was not in private. No James Chimombe renditions at that one. Fresh after vindicating the rule of law and judicial independence, ruling that you cannot prospectively proscribe human rights, and pointing out the error in Ebagum’s statements on his return from saving his children from that drug incident in Dubai, Justice Chigumba would have forgiven for thinking that this one was in the briefcase. Remember that time when he ‘warned’ judges, and she said tsk tsk tsk?
In any country, a judge that stands up for two important tenets of justice in one case would be the darling of the profession, toasted to no end for once again demonstrating why law is the noble profession. The press would garland her persona with glowing tales of bravery and intelligence, and fringe politicians would start some talk of making her President or something like that, not that judges should be politicians of course. But, as the tale of the Kofi Olomide impersonator tells us, this is not, ‘any country’.
When she showed up at her interview for elevation to the Supreme Court, Justice Chigumba would have expected to have softballs tossed at her and would have obligingly hit them out of the park. These were her people after all, the very same ones whose independence she had so valiantly defended against the all conquering Ebagum, him of the son-in-law that….you know what, let me just not go back to that attire. Him.
There are many that do not like Justice Chidyausike, but until a week ago I did not count myself among them. Now I do, but not last week. Because you see, I have argued cases in front of him, and say what you will, the man is in fact a very good lawyer.
When you are a lawyer representing people that are depending on you to get them justice, the last thing you want is some shitty judge with no clue as to what the law says sitting there thinking about the farm they got from Zanu PF and not listening to a word you are saying, then going to write a judgement that makes you think: what! did you actually attend the same hearing I went to?! Judges who go and write judgements on a case that has not yet been argued, then when you show up to argue it on the hearing date you are shown a piece of paper saying you have already been heard and you lost. Those judges are evil, and the worst.
Chidyausiku was not that judge. He knows the law. My first appearance before him was very soon after graduating and I thought I was doing very well until he told me to not use ‘fire-side stories’ (anecdotal evidence) to argue my case, then proceeded to point to the areas that I could perhaps direct his attention to! It was a humiliating and very educative experience, and I won. Ask any lawyer that has come before him and, agree with the guy or not, they cannot say that he does not know the law.
Which is why what happened to Justice Chigumba is so appalling. We are not dealing here with a judge who does not understand the principle of innocent until proved guilty. This is not a judge that thinks that anecdotes prove cases. This is not a judge that does not know that you cannot ambush someone with information and expect to know better.
So when he brandished that rubbish about some bribe in some pub, he did not do so because he somehow did not know that you do not accuse someone based on allegations and ask them to explain themselves. He had not suddenly become the blundering idiotic buffoon that thinks that allegations are evidence. He knows the law, that allegations are not proof. That the mental capacity of a person making scurrilous allegations need to be treated with caution. That a sitting judge cannot be asked to explain things that she has never been made aware of, and for which she has not been charged. That the interview was not meant to embarrass Justice Chigumba, but to discuss matters of suitability for the Supreme Court.
So, knowing all that, having that great brain of his, why on earth did the President’s cousin (don’t worry, when he was appointed the applicants were less than 134 I am sure, so there was no nepotism there either), why did he attempt to humiliate the judge in the manner that he did? Do we actually have people out there who are stupid enough to think that a judge would compromise themselves for $20,000?
And if she was that cheap, would Ebagum with our $15b stolen (read: banked in Singapore) diamonds money resort to threatening judges if he knew that the person going to hear such an important case could be bought so cheaply? Come on, are we meant to believe any of that rubbish? $20,000 seems decidedly low to buy a judge, don’t you think? Not that judges should be bought, but if they were, $20,000?
Besides, this is not a stupid person we are dealing with, she did not just show up with a pretty face and say “could I please be a judge?” She did very well in school. She qualified to go to University. She practiced law. So distinguished herself so well in that profession that she was recognised by the Judicial Service Commission and deemed qualified to be a judge. And she has demonstrated that, which is why she was deemed worthy of the interview for elevation in the face place.
Let us assume, for one second, that this very capable jurist wanted to solicit a bribe: nauseating I know, but bear with me. Are we to believe that if she wanted to arrange a bribe, she would show up at the venue herself?! That she would be that stupid?
Come on people, give us credit for some measure of credulity. Where would be the plausible deniability? Where would be the alibi? She suddenly wanted this $20,000 so much that she had to go look for it herself, then have her runner scoot over to the victim’s table and discuss it while she winks from across the room? Do these guys seriously think that we are so stupid that we would believe that?!
You bet they do.
It’s why they think that telling us that some Kofi Olomide impersonator was the most qualified person to run the operations of an airline, without producing a resume, then claiming that it had nothing to do with the fact that he married the President’s daughter. It’s why they think that we must believe that Captain Kryptonite (sorry, Ripton) Muzenda was the most qualified to run AirZim in the first place, and that it had nothing to do with his being the son of the late Vice President.
It is why they think that Supa Mandiwanzira was the best journalist to become Minister of Information, and that we are to believe that it has nothing to do with him being Grace’s inlaw. It is why they think we must accept that Gata is the best person qualified to run Zesa to the ground and that it has nothing to do with the fact that he is married to Ebagum’s sister (actually on that they could be right, he is the best person to run it to the ground, he is doing well so far!).
It is why you have the Chidhakwas, the Matibiris, the Zhuwawos, the Marufus of this world being ministers, senior police officers and ambassadors and we are meant to believe that it is because they are most qualified. So to my relatives in Belingwe, the reason why you’all don’t got no ministers or ambassadors or chief operating officers from your neck of there words is that you got problems, ain’t none of you got no qualifications.
They expect us to accept the public lynching of Justice Chigumba because they know we do not like corruption, yet it is the corrupt ones that are doing the casting of stones. They know our gullibility alright. Just how many farms did the President’s cousin (sorry, Chief Justice) get from our land reform programme? And while you google that, what is this thing I hear about an incident with Lupi Mushayakarara? Who was the bum that tried to put his hands on her …ah, person without invitation and had to apologise for it?
I want to say that the attack on Justice Chigumba was bullying of the worst kind but that seems to sanitise it. I want to say that Chidyausiku used his position as a bully pulpit, to try and lord over his misogynistic attack on an judge of integrity but that seems to place Justice Chigumba in the class of a victim, but she is clearly not that.
I want to say that Chidyausiku used his position to impugn the integrity of a good judge but that would suggest that he succeed, when he so clearly did not. I want to say that the attack on Justice Chigumba was so unexpected and coarse that she must have felt violated but that would not do justice to how she stood up to him and challenged his claims. She clearly expected that her bravery would have consequences, and confronted them head on. That was not a violated judge, but a strong judge who stood her ground and will not allow petty old horny toads to get away with such rubbish.
The attack on Justice Chigumba was a grubby act by a grabby old man who not only should but did know better, and must be condemned in the strongest of terms. The news that this might also have had something to do with the fact that he had had romantic illusions spurned by the same judge makes this whole process so vomit-inducing that you have to wonder how we got into this cesspit in the first place. That is, until you recall that it was because we decided that the country was the Republic of Z(v)imbabwe, and allowed a deranged old man to go about appointing his relatives to every available position of influence and called it merit.
Just one final thought: if we wanted Koffi Olomide to run our airline, couldn’t we at least get the real one? At least that way we could sing all the way to the ground. But then again, the man needs the planes to take little FarEast Chikore for baby clinic appointments to Singapore. It helps when daddy owns (sorry, runs) an airline.
Tinomudaishe Chinyoka is a UK based Zimbabwean lawyer and a prominent former student leader at the University of Zimbabwe.
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