Western democracy is a deliberate distortion of reality!

Comrades and Friends.

There are a number of things that have happened in our society that has prompted us to question our judgement, our behaviour and the whole concept of democracy. For example; in 1980 we all celebrated the leadership of Mugabe with such euphoria that any feelings to the contrary were not acceptable yet today we are lamenting the viciousness of the same man. What happened? Who is to blame for letting a monster into office?

Many say democracy is the rule of the people, what I wish to know is; what happens when the majority is wrong. In a real democracy the expectation is that, what the majority wants rules the day! So, if the majority believes that one plus one is equal to three, that should sail through despite known knowledge to the contrary!

Who should therefore restrain society from making bizarre choices? This brings me to the core of my thinking. The rule of the people does not exist in the absence of political, social and economic parity; rather what exists is the continual aspiration by human beings to progress away from a state of deficiency towards a state of happiness.

Deficiency is relative to one’s knowledge. Since knowledge is also dependent on the environment, by extrapolation deficiency is also relative to the environment. In this regard, poverty- which is a deficiency in what is perceived as basic-is qualified differently depending on one’s environment. Since nearly everybody in America can afford a cell phone; it might be viewed as being poor if one does not own a one. There is however a bushman in Kgalagadi who does not know what a phone is; so failure to possess something that one has no knowledge of does not necessarily amount to deficiency.

There are basic needs that are common across humanity; food, water, shelter and clothing. These determine the threshold of human needs. At any moment in life; unless by voluntary deprivation, every human being seeks to have them. These make up the atomic unit of happiness.

Happiness or good life is a perceived state of parity between one’s desires and what one owns. As basic needs are met, humans tend to shift their attention to other needs that knowledge necessitates. The more advanced our knowledge and aspiration of good life, the more our needs. That is why people have different desires in life.

The American Declaration of Independence lays what is accepted by many as the basis of democracy:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

The equality spoken of here is that of access to power and not that they have equal power. Power cannot be created or destroyed but can be changed from one form to another. In modern day life, there are certain predetermined enablers of access to power that offers an advantage to other people. These include environment, inheritance, intellect and they can force those of lesser circumstances to unwillingly give up competing for power.

When people are born they do not have the same ability to control the environment around themselves. It is true that in a democracy people have certain inalienable rights like life, liberty and pursuit of happiness but in all non-suicidal human beings the desire to live supersedes the desire to be happy. Nevertheless, because of the basic needs some people would stumble or get stuck in the struggle to live while those from advantageous environment go ahead to pursue happiness.

Those who are left wallowing in the basic struggle to live are always in an altered state of consciousness, and are unable to ascend the aspiration ladder. This ultimately means that they forfeit or postpone their opportunity to access power.

When people forfeit their right to power, somebody takes their share. The person who takes that power unfortunately does not have the authority to use that power. In other words he does not have the justification or the right to use that power. So he needs to come back to he rightful owner of that power so that he/she authorises him to use that power.

So elections however free they might be are not a process of collectively and voluntarily using people’s power to make a decision; rather, they are a way of giving authority to somebody who has, due to other advantages illegally claimed their power.

Most of those who claim power illegally do not seek the authority openly; rather they use a proxy amongst those in deficiencies - one whom they assist to rise from the manacles of deficiencies- so that people are hoodwinked into believing that one of theirs has now ascended to help them.

So, when we look at Mugabe, we realise that he was extracted from society and people authorised him to use their power for pursuit of happiness of certain other people whom he protected for 18 years until they dumped him for another proxy.

Since then people have been authorising the abuse of their power either by Mugabe or by the new proxies. Both sides have been feeding people with half truths and half lies; consequently people have been committing their authority to people who wrongly claim that they would alleviate their dire deficiencies.

As stated above; those whom they give authority are always pre-occupied with the pursuit of their personal happiness and not their concerns.

For example, those in MDC whom we thought had the conscience to make moral choices, chose to accept the blatantly expensive Mercedes Benz as parliamentary packages despite the humanitarian (threat to life) situation in Zimbabwe.

Nelson Chamisa is quoted as saying: “It’s a symbol of authority and power … If you don’t have it; people will think you don’t have power. They feel good when they see one of their own in power.”

HL Mencken once said “If experience teaches us anything at all, it teaches us that a good politician, under democracy, is quite unthinkable as an honest burglar.”

So Comrades and Friends remember, Western Democracy is the rule of some people for some people by the authority of the people!