By Cde Patriot Sunungura

Welcome to 2026, fellow Zimbabweans and True Patriots!

Indeed it is a happy new year, do you remember that that brighter future we were promised at midnight on 31 December.

Ironically we are now watching the Second Republic deliver exactly what it has specialised in for decades which is grand-scale corruption, factionalism, and social misery served with a side of patriotic rhetoric.

The Second Republic continues to “deliver” with the consistency of a broken clock that only tells corruption time. 

Under the stewardship of His excellency Cde Ruka Chivende, grand-scale looting has not merely survived but flourished, becoming the defining policy framework of the government. 

ZANU PF, the self-styled revolutionary party, has remained admirably loyal to factionalism, internal warfare, and elite self-preservation, proving once again that while administrations may change, appetites do not.

It may be a new year, but ZANU PF, unlike a chameleon, has never shown interest in changing its colours. 

Its ideological palette remains firmly stuck on patronage green, cartel grey, and corruption gold. 

The party’s unofficial slogan might as well be “alooter continua,” because the revolution, it seems, was never about liberation but about inheriting the keys to the vault.

As the nation debated the menace of Zvigananda, those well-connected cartels allegedly draining state coffers. President Ruka Chivende found time to usher in the New Year in the warm embrace of his beloved “son,” Cde Wicknell Chivhayo, at the latter’s rural home in Mapanzure, Zvishavane. 

While ordinary Zimbabweans counted cents and prayed for fuel, Chivhayo counted selfies with the Head of State and promptly unleashed them onto social media, perhaps as a gentle reminder to law-enforcement agencies that some citizens are constitutionally untouchable.

Chivhayo’s name has not appeared in the public discourse by accident. 

Investigative journalism, leaked dossiers, and whispered briefings have linked him and other politically connected businessmen to multi-million-dollar procurement scandals, particularly involving elections and energy projects. 

Despite repeated allegations and public outrage, accountability has proven elusive, reinforcing the widely held belief that anti-corruption institutions exist less as watchdogs and more as ornamental scarecrows — present, visible, and utterly ineffective.

Within ZANU PF itself, infighting remains the party’s most consistent tradition. 

Acting President Constantino Chiwenga, possibly reborn as an anti-corruption evangelist, continues to sermonise against graft at every public appearance. 

His speeches, heavy with moral urgency, have become a familiar soundtrack to Zimbabwean politics, even as many suspect they serve less as reformist calls and more as coded messages in an ongoing succession chess match.

Indeed, 2026 promises to be another year of elite theatre, with a looming political showdown between Cde Ruka Chivende’s camp and Cde Guvheya’s faction expected to dominate headlines. 

As usual, these internal battles are framed as ideological struggles but are widely understood as turf wars over access to state resources, patronage networks, and future immunity.

As the elephants of power fight, dance, and occasionally mate, the grass continues to suffer in silence. 

Hospitals resemble abandoned warehouses, stripped of medicines and basic equipment. 

Teachers, nurses, and civil servants have been reduced to civil slaves, earning salaries that collapse before reaching the end of the month. 

Inflation, unemployment, and currency instability remain stubborn companions, while official speeches insist that prosperity is just around the corner, a corner Zimbabweans have been turning since 1980.

Looking ahead, the familiar questions return like unpaid bills. 

Will the much-talked-about 2030 agenda materialise, or is it merely another constitutional gymnastics routine designed to extend political comfort for a select few? 

Will the opposition awaken from its prolonged slumber and mount a serious challenge to ZANU PF’s dominance, or will it remain a footnote in a one-party monologue? 

For now, the only certainty is that ZANU PF will continue delivering, not development, not dignity, but the same old chaos, repackaged for another year.