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Dr Masimba Mavaza
Zimbabweans have of late seen a crop of people who pledge to soil their country. We have seen people who are so dedicated to make Zimbabwe look evil in the eyes of the world.

But on the top of the list of such subversive and treasonous acts is Hopewell Chin’ono, who knows no other words, but to vilify and insult Zimbabwe.

Chin’ono has a vendetta against Zimbabwe and he actually dares the police to arrest him so that he gets some a form of recognition where he will be portrayed like a hero.

In a way best described as treason, Chin’ono recently vomited profane and perverted utterances against Zimbabwe, while he was outside the country.

He did this to please his handlers and he knew his lies would likely earn him a cell in a jail upon his return.

When he arrived back home, he expected drama, but he has been ignored and his handlers are in a quagmire.

It is now well documented that Chin’ono had hoped to be given a very high post by the Government of Zimbabwe. This he was doing so that he becomes a planted agent of the enemies of Zimbabwe.

In 2017, Chin’ono twitted in response to the late Dehwa Mavhinga: “I am still shocked that there are Zimbabweans who are not political enough to know and understand that sanctions against Zimbabwe will not affect Emmerson Mnangagwa, but their mothers and fathers in the townships and villages scattered around the country.

“When a government is denied a line of credit and fails to raise foreign currency to import fuel, it is ordinary Zimbabweans that will sleep in fuel queues, not Emmerson Mnangagwa.

“We are currently for diaspora’s vote to be granted so that our compatriots abroad can exercise their rights to vote. How do you expect a sitting President not allowed to go and campaign in the diaspora due to ZIDERA sanctions to grant that right.

“I just couldn’t wrap my head around Dewa Mavhinga’s request to the US government to retain the current foreign policy around Zimbabwe, a foreign policy which is anchored on the Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act of 2001 which has punitive economic sanctions against Zimbabwe.”

Chin’ono at this time he was seeing sense or was he?

After this attack on Mavhinga, Chin’ono approached the second highest office in the Republic promising to shed more light on how treacherous people like opposition figures Tendai Biti and Nelson Chamisa were.

The appointment was approved since every public office in the new dispensation government operates on open door policy mantra.

It is now already known that it is at this meeting when Chin’ono begged for a high post either at the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation or Zimpapers.

But there was need for security checks first, and Chin’ono could have probably failed these.

He took no time before he started to join hands with the same people he once had described as enemies of the State.

So, it is clear that Chin’ono is not only a liar, but a bitter and unpatriotic person.

If Someone enters the public arena and makes a living by scandalising his country and others, they trigger people to scrutinise them.

Many would be acquainted with Chin’ono’s virulent criticism of the Government of Zimbabwe under the new dispensation.

Some will also be acquainted with his insatiable appetite for cohabitating with the detractors of our country, particularly the West.

The natural product of his illicit relationship with the West is not only that he has become their distinct mouthpiece, but more worryingly he has trampled over principle and patriotism to reach out to the funding of his handlers.

Chin’ono is earning a livelihood by attacking not only the institutions of our country and some of its finest citizens, but by also attacking the credibility of their characters, their programmes and their motivation.

While some may be hoodwinked or even convinced by his narratives and seducing antics, it is fair to let the nation see who he really is and what his motivations are.

Chin’ono is best described by who he is not, than what he is.

He is not a democrat. He is not a fighter for human rights. He is not even concerned about ordinary Zimbabweans.

As a matter of fact, he does not even believe an ounce of what he says and writes about Zanu PF or its leaders.

In fact, Chin’ono is a man of no principled conviction. In the core of his character, behaviours and actions must be discerned a sense of greed and most unnatural selfishness.

I would take three fundamental aspects of his commentary and purported convictions that graphically illustrate his breath-taking hypocrisy.

Commentary on foreign issues:

On 13 December 2017, Chin’ono wrote an article which was published by The Sunday Mail.

He made the following remark on the illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the US and the EU: “When a government is denied a line of credit and fails to raise foreign exchange to buy fuel, it is the ordinary citizens that sleep in fuel queues, not Emmerson Mnangagwa”.

In the same article and reffering to Mr Dewa Mavinga (an incorrigible and shameless US mouthpiece himself), Chin’ono stated: “I just couldn’t wrap my head around Dewa Mavhinga’s request for the US government to retain its current foreign policy around Zimbabwe…”.

Chin’ono’s ideas on foreign and domestic policy were clear and logical when he wrote this article.

He is at a remote place now, from where he was then. His grand departure from his previous position is only explicable on the basis of a most deplorable hypocrisy.

Chin’ono, at the time of writing his article for The Sunday Mail, had rational views about US led sanctions imposed against Zimbabwe.

He needs to explain himself to Zimbabweans as to why and how the beautiful butterfly degenerated into an ugly caterpillar.

Chin’ono had similarly rational and progressive views on domestic policy.

For example, on the diaspora vote he wrote, in the same article,: “how do you expect a sitting President not allowed to go and campaign in the diaspora due to ZIDERA sanctions to grant that vote?”

Chin’ono had unsparing and sharp views about the opposition as he wrote in the same article appropriately decrying, “Biti and his gang” failure to engage the government of Zimbabwe and rushing to denigrate the country in the US.

Clearly, Chin’ono knows and appreciates the values and virtues of engagement and collaboration which he touted in that article.

Today, he is the very opposite of an engager. He is an agitator.

The article he wrote and the views he expressed, although logical and sane, were obviously not driven by patriotism or by any decency at all.

Chin’ono could have designed and penned the article purely as a bait for a job at The Herald or ZBC. Therefore, the Tweet was an insincere act in auditioning.

His new forms of hypocrisy and insincerity are underpinned by a clear and profound spirit of vengeance against Zanu PF and against the government following his failure to get an automatic job.

To me, the man appears to have a childish sense of entitlement and he handles himself as if the country owes him a living.

He has found himself a home in the bed of Zimbabwe’s detractors where he is prostituting himself for fame and fortune.

The nation, therefore, must see Chin’ono for what he is: a mercenary who will shamelessly make U-turns while casting himself as a valiant sacrifice.

It is fortunate that very few Zimbabweans have been fooled by Chin’ono’s antics, many have seen through his empty rhetoric and are beginning to ask tough questions about his standing.