Mliswa goes beyond the limit to a threat of National security скачать в хорошем качестве

Mliswa goes beyond the limit to a threat of National security

Mr. Mliswa, I have read your remarks. I have read them carefully, and I have decided they cannot go unanswered not because you have wounded me, but because you have been careless with things that matter, and carelessness of that kind, left unchallenged, becomes dangerous. You do not speak for the military. You never did. You are a politician. A vocal one I grant you that. But your familiarity with soldiers does not make you a soldier. And your proximity to power does not qualify you to lecture men who spent their entire adult lives in uniform about what the chain of command means, what respect for the Commander-in-Chief looks like, or what it costs to earn the right to speak on matters of national security. I earned that right. Thirty years of service earned it. The men you are attacking earned it in the trenches of the liberation struggle before you were old enough to understand what liberation required. Do not come to us with a politician's tongue and instruct us on military protocol. On the question of the Reserve Force. You raise the Reserve Force as though it were a leash. As though the possibility of recall is meant to silence us. Let me educate you, Mr. Mliswa, since you have invited this conversation into the public square. A soldier's oath is to Zimbabwe and its Constitution not to any individual, not to any faction, and certainly not to any self-appointed political enforcer operating on social media. The Reserve Force exists to serve the Republic. It is not a mechanism for intimidating retired officers who exercise their constitutional right to speak. If you believe otherwise, I suggest you revisit Section 61 of the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of expression including to men in or associated with the defence establishment and Section 67, which protects every citizen's right to participate in political life. Threatening retired generals with recall as a consequence of public comment is not loyalty to the Commander-in-Chief. It is the behaviour of a bully who has mistaken proximity to power for power itself. On "inconsequential accolades." You described the credentials of retired generals as "inconsequential accolades." I want you to sit with those words, Mr. Mliswa. Really sit with them. The men whose accolades you dismiss so casually commanded brigades, built institutions, buried colleagues, and held this country together in moments of crisis that you read about in newspapers while we lived them. What are your accolades, Mr. Mliswa? A parliamentary seat you lost? A record of public controversy that stretches the length of this country? A habit of shouting loudest in whatever direction the political wind is blowing? Do not speak to us about inconsequential. You accuse retired generals of playing politics while using their military credentials. I will tell you what is actually dangerous and it is not retired officers engaging in constitutionally protected civic discourse. What is dangerous is a political actor using the threat of military consequences to suppress legitimate voices. That is the road to authoritarianism, Mr. Mliswa, and I will not pretend otherwise simply because the target of that suppression happens to be people I know.Soldiers who speak from conscience are not a threat to this Republic. Politicians who weaponise the military against conscience those are the threat. I have served under the Commander-in-Chief. I respect the office. I respect the man's longevity in public service that is not in dispute. But respect for the President does not require silence from citizens. @TembaMliswa