The lions and vultures in ZANU-PF

As beasts of prey vultures and lions display fascinatingly different characteristics in the jungle. Lions hunt down and kill their prey themselves. Some times it can be tiring business giving chase until they kill the prey. Sometimes they earn bruising kicks and tosses from the prey, which go down fighting. After the kill obviously the lion helps himself to the juiciest portion of the meat to his fill before they abandon the carcass, hence the saying, having a lion’s share. The hyena, green with envy can only watch salivating from a safe distance. He dares not ruffle the lion while it feeds. Is it not without good reason that the lion is referred to as king of the jungle?

The vulture meanwhile can only circle high above in the sky or perch on a tree branch and wait, wait patiently for her turn when the lion has long left, to peck on the leftover bones. They are birds of carrion that scavenge for dead animals in the bush. They neither hunt nor kill their own prey. What the vulture lacks in strength and courage it over compensates in patience. The vulture is the most patient animal. Witness its behaviour excellently captured in that Pulitzer Prize winning photograph that provoked an avalanche of outpouring philanthropic sentiment for the staving inhabitants of the troubled horn of Africa in the 1990s. Hopping behind that crawling starving baby too weak to walk to the nearest feeding point, the vulture could never prevail on itself to finish off that dying child to satiate its own hunger. Queer animal nature isn’t it?

ZANU_PF political jungle has spawned its own fair share of lion-like and vulture-like politicians over time. These animal characteristics have become more evident among so called party stalwarts as the party prepares for the March 29 election.

It is common cause that there are two factions in the party both eagerly eyeing Mugabe’s throne. They are both agreed that the incumbent should be succeeded sooner or later and one faction, lion-like, has decided to give chase to the prey in the hope of catching and killing it in Zimbabwe’s political jungle to secure the coveted lion’s share come March 29. There are obvious risks attendant to this option. The prey might put up a spirited fight and escape altogether. The other faction which shall remain anonymous for the present, vulture-like waits in the sidelines but actively wishing Mugabe to die literally or at least to quit politics of his own volition. They dare not take on the man but wish Mugabe to expire politically without them raising a finger. They see and believe Mugabe’s political demise as inevitable and themselves as the logical beneficiaries of his departure. Little does it ever occur to them that there may be hyenas and jackals waiting to give them a stiff competition for the same trophy.

That Mugabe can outfox them all and turn the hunter into the hunted in the treacherous political jungle is a possibility none of the beasts of prey and scavengers alike have given serious consideration. They say in Shona Hakuna inofurira ivete, meaning no one works and toils for another’s benefit.

Zvenyika E. Mugari