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Perspective, Stephen Mpofu
AT long last and after wondering freely for close to four decades, chickens will finally come home to roost with the Parliament of Zimbabwe laying on their rendezvous earlier this week.

Soon after Independence in 1980, the democratic new government of Prime Minister Robert Mugabe set out to remould the country into a socialist state, inspired by the ethos of socialism in countries that had morally and materially anchored the armed struggle that secured our motherland from a racist, foreign ruling culture.

Cde Mugabe led the crusade for leaders in his Government to declare their assets because he had apparently sensed the potential emergence of a two-tier order of social structures developing in the country in future with the obscenely rich perched at the very top while the poor and the poorest of the poor wallowed in their miseries at the very bottom, with possible violence between the two structures gathering up, like a violent storm in the sky.

Sadly, however, the leaders in point would not die to self and always be seen to be with the people as men and women of the people.

Not that any of the leaders in question defied their Prime Minister openly. No, they did not. In fact they preached socialism from political anthills by day and by night embraced capitalism with all its attributes.

Apparently frustrated at the refusal by the leaders now pushing hanging or fledgling potbellies to tighten up their belts as it were, Cde Mugabe referred to them as “creatures at the top”, a description that later formed the title of a book by this communicologist.

[Partly inspired by Cde Mugabe’s relentless push for a socialist state, and to grace shelves on local bookstores later this year, Creatures at the Top is a political and social commentary that will make some people turn in their graves and those still on their feet wag angrily fingers at this scribe.]

It should surprise no one were names of past and present leaders of this country to be found on Panama papers, alongside the names of some wealthy leaders exposed by the world press not so long ago.

Today — who knows — some of those Members of Parliament and ministers probably live in or own separate palatial or stately edifices tucked away in some effluent suburbs of our cities.

But be that as it may, the Zimbabwean masses have undoubtedly applauded the move by Parliament earlier this week to approve the asset declaration and code of conduct in conformity with Zimbabwe’s new constitution.

Under the new development those leaders affected must make regular disclosures of their possessions or face as yet unspecified penalties.

However, “declaring” the assets should not mean merely providing a list of what the leader possesses or has acquired. The HOW of the manner in which the assets came about is of paramount importance as it will show corruption or non-corruption tendencies by the leader concerned.

Following the latest development in Parliament, President Mugabe would absolutely be justified to crack that mild, yet infectious trademark smile of his and say: “my mouth did not fall down after all.”

The move by Parliament comes in the wake of reports that some leaders had fiddled with state coffers for political or personal business aggrandisement and that it had taken the initiative of the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission to expose the rot.

The asset declaration register will serve as a kind of yoke restraining a span of oxen from wondering off the furrow to snap at succulent grass on the side, causing the plough — the government or the ruling party — to leave behind ugly banks for weeds to flourish and choke the young crop.

Thus, the leaders affected by regularly making a clean breast of their possessions are expected not to serve their surfeited bellies as their masters, but, rather, to work indefatigably serving the sunken-bellied povo as their true masters who put those MPs and ministers in the positions in which they remain ensconced.

Ideally, it would act as an incentive for voters to expose errant leaders for appropriate sanctions to be meted out where the exact forms of punishment to be visited upon defiant leaders were to be known to all and sundry.

Contextually, therefore, MPs should be applauded for acting timeously as the country’s economic blueprint, Zim-Asset, requires people who commit their every time and initiative to the overall improvement of the welfare of our nation as a whole rather than engaging in piling up layer upon layer on one’s belly to flaunt it to the less privileged of our society.

This is therefore a call to arms on the warfront against corruption, poverty and want by all those touting themselves as leaders.