THE Zanu PF politburo on Wednesday took a jab at nurses and we know the meaning of what the party bigwigs were trying to say — intimidation and harassing of health workers. This is the same party that blasted journalist Hopewell Chin’ono at a press conference for exposing the shenanigans of some members of the First Family. The next thing he was arrested and is suffering harassment at courts for allegedly “breaking” the law. Now, they have gone too far by targeting nurses. Zanu PF acting spokesperson Patrick Chinamasa labelled the Zimbabwe Nurses Association as opposition activists for standing up for their rights, bluntly labelling them unpatriotic. What was their transgression to warrant such vitriol from a ruling party? For daring to demand that government pays them better salaries and hold its end of an agreement for better working hours? Nurses, just like doctors and other medical practitioners, have been at the mercy of a militant government that thinks every problem needs military aggression to resolve. It is the same government that threatened to fire teachers and replace them with soldiers and unqualified teachers just to make a point. The same people threatened doctors and frogmarched a handful to Munhumutapa offices, their citadel of power, to force an apology. It is not every problem that needs that kind of approach. It is a classic case study of how not to address challenges. Nurses have always been clear on what they need and that is, they deserve better from their employer. And why does Zanu PF see an enemy in everyone who has a genuine problem? Remember the same Zanu PF has accused the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, a group of legal experts fighting for human rights in Zimbabwe, of working with the opposition. The same opposition tag was put on the Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association and it is a cause for concern when a government that should be taken seriously does that. Why seeing shadows? Why involving politics in issues apolitical? There is nothing political about nurses demanding better working conditions and personal protective equipment just as there is nothing partisan about doctors and teachers demanding the same. Stop seeing ghosts and address the problems. This has become a government that always justify its failures by pointing at imagined conspiracies instead of coming up with solutions. It is the same government that blamed everything from sanctions, drought, climate change to COVID-19 and an imaginary G40 cabal for its disastrous efforts to turn around the economy. Forcing civil servants to line up and apologise, parading them before national television cameras for exercising their constitutional rights to challenge silly and ill-thought government decisions is about as sad as it gets. Is this where we have reduced the country to? When the leopard wants to eat its cubs, it first accuses them of smelling like goats. Be a responsible employer and stop the idiocy, please. Replicating such 1970s antics for cheap public sympathy shows the depth of government’s depravity and super-being