IF anybody ever doubted that President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s regime came to power through myths and propaganda, here is further evidence to that: they have suspended for a year trading of shares across different stock exchanges by three counters which are fully fungible on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, that is Old Mutual Limited (OMU.zw), which is the most liquid of them all on the ZSE, PPC Limited (PPC.zw) and Seedco International Limited (SCIL.zw), purportedly to combat rising market speculation and arbitrage (grappling with symptoms, not root causes, of the disease).

At least 51 percent of the listed shares have to remain on the Zimbabwean register.  This means they have stopped the companies’ stocks fungibility; their tradability on different bourses, on the ZSE (Zim), JSE (SA) and LSE (UK) in this case.

This matters for Zimbabwe and investors because it speaks to the growing hostility of the business environment. It shows the business climate is becoming increasingly hostile as the economy continues to catastrophically implode.

The decree is pregnant with political meaning. It marks a dramatic retreat to the Rhodesian era siege economy mentality; so instead of reform command economics is holding sway. And it further debunks all the myths and narratives about the Mnangagwa regime.

Here are some of the lies told to justify this regime’s seizure of power through a coup: that Robert Mugabe’s wife Grace was just about to take over; that Mnangagwa is reformist and also business-friendly, hence he will be ‘Zimbabwe’s own Deng’, and indeed that the coup marked the dawn of a new dispensation in which Zimbabwe would be open for business and will rise from the ashes like a phoenix.

Some of us, at the risk of being seen as cynical (not that we care, but simply for professional reasons), openly rejected these myths and narratives before, during and after the coup.

It was clear the Mugabe’s regime die-hard enforcers and executors were never going to be able to institute any reforms and change, but the euphoria of the coup, in which the masses protested under military cover celebrating on top of personnel armoured carriers and tanks, taking selfies with soldiers and naively dancing with them, clouded the majority of people’s thinking and ability to see the obvious: that Mugabe’s removal through a coup that way simply meant giving Zanu PF a new lease of life and perpetuation of Mugabeism.

Truth is the coup-plotters were mainly motivated by self-preservation and protecting their ill-gotten gains. Sadly, Zimbabwe’s opposition, civil society, professionals, media and intellectuals were complicit. Just as some had been since 1980.

Now the regime’s latest directive on the three ZSE counters’ stocks fungibility further tells you that the more things change, the more they remain the same or get worse. And indeed it will certainly get worse before it gets better.

This is a story which the media need to keep monitoring to properly interpret what is happening now and help set a new agenda, not reaffirm the myths and recycle the propaganda and lies, also ironically perpetuating Mugabeism in the name of reform and change.

Dumisani Muleya is a Zimbabwean journalist