By Cde Sikhosana Bambazonke
There was a time when Themba “Bhuru” Mliswa thundered through the corridors of Norton and the youth activism scene.
The man who founded Youth Advocacy for Reform and Democracy (YARD) promised accountability, mobilised young voices, and built a no-nonsense reputation as a reformist bull in Zimbabwe’s treacherous political landscape.
Now, well, let just say common sense has taken a permanent sabbatical.
His latest month-long tirade reads like a hangover of incoherence.
He has accused Vice President Constantino Chiwenga of funding factional fights while simultaneously praising the very crooks he once condemned — Kuda Tagwirei, Wicknell Chivayo, and Scott Sakupwanya — even going so far as to baptise himself “Mabviravira.”
There is no evidence, no logic, just a rant stretched thinner than the country’s patience.
The nation didn’t RSVP to his drama; he ended up alone with egg on his face and hashtags for company.
Then he took foolishness one notch higher by demanding that Chiwenga’s wife, Colonel Miniyothabo Baloyi-Chiwenga, be fired from the army — a call that exposed not courage, but confusion.
Themba’s political journey has become a tragicomedy — from being expelled from ZANU PF in 2015 for “indiscipline,” to winning the Norton seat as an Independent in 2018 promising accountability, only to morph into a loud defender of ZANU PF corruption.
Between 2023 and 2025, his political career completed its final transformation — from Parliament to Twitter theatre, where shouting replaces strategy and tweets substitute substance.
His story now reads like Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart — a tale of potential undone by ego, contradictions, and opportunism.
He attacks Chiwenga and Baloyi-Chiwenga, yet kneels before the likes of Kuda Tagwirei, calling him “a visionary businessman” and floating the idea that Tagwirei could succeed Mnangagwa.
That’s not political principle — that’s survival by wallet proximity.
Over the years, Mliswa has been linked to one controversy after another.
He has faced allegations of illegal mining and cyber-bullying at Rengwe Conservancy, been accused of scheming to lure ex-minister Walter Mzembi back to Zimbabwe for murky political purposes, and recently saw his Shurugwi home torched amid factional tensions — conveniently timed for another sympathy headline.
And as if irony wasn’t done with him yet, the once-vocal Independent MP who roared about reform now holds the title of village head in Shurugwi.
From Parliament to pasture — the bull has been domesticated.
Zimbabwe doesn’t need louder populists chasing likes, hashtags, and livestreams.
It needs consistent, principled actors who fight corruption without fear or favour.
But Mliswa has become the caricature of everything he once condemned: a political weather vane spinning wherever the money blows, a man whose loyalty is measured in transactions, not convictions.
So when Bhuru rants through his Twitter paddock, tagging ghosts and shadowboxing for validation, the nation must ask: is this performance activism or just a bull tired of hearing his own echo?
Until ordinary masses tire of swallowing silence, True Patriots, we will keep watching a thousand-tweet protest led by one man chasing relevance — the tragic, noisy fall of Bhuru.
