tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/robert-mugabe-9722/articlesRobert Mugabe – The Conversation2023-09-08T14:22:22Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2117552023-09-08T14:22:22Z2023-09-08T14:22:22ZZimbabwe elections 2023: a textbook case of how the ruling party has clung to power for 43 years<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543488/original/file-20230818-29-34nlfh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Opposition supporters calling for free and fair elections outside the offices of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission in Harare in 2018.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jeksai Njikizana/AFP via Getty Images.</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Few were surprised as, near midnight on 26 August, the <a href="https://www.zec.org.zw/download-category/2023-presidential-elections-results/">Zimbabwe Electoral Commission</a> announced incumbent president Emmerson Mnangagwa’s reelection in yet another of Zimbabwe’s tendentious contests. His <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/snubbed-by-most-regional-leaders-emmerson-mnangagwa-parties-on-with-ex-adversaries-instead-20230904">inauguration</a> on 4 September sanctified his return to power.</p>
<p>Fewer still were shocked when South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, attended Mnangagwa’s <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/ramaphosa-warned-not-to-undermine-sadc-ahead-of-mnangagwas-inauguration-4fd42c99-fdf2-4070-be0c-69b5117b8962">inauguration</a> regardless of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) election observation team’s <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/87928/zimbabwes-troubled-election-might-southern-african-leaders-follow-the-example-of-their-observers/">critical report</a> and the absence of most of <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/mnangagwa-inauguration-ramaphosa-expected-to-attend-along-with-a-few-regional-leaders-20230903">his peers</a> from the SADC and the African Union.</p>
<p>Mnangagwa gained 52.6% of the 4,561,221 votes cast. Nelson Chamisa, head of the main opposition Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC), garnered 1,967,343 or 44%. Zanu-PF’s 136 of parliament’s 210 seats is just under the two-thirds needed to change the constitution. </p>
<p>I’ve observed and written about all <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/000203971404900106">Zimbabwe’s elections</a> since 2000, when Zanu-PF first faced strong opposition from the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) under <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-morgan-tsvangirai-heroic-herald-of-an-epoch-foretold-91845">Morgan Tsvangirai</a>. My <a href="https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/mugabes-legacy/">book</a> Mugabe’s Legacy: Coups, Conspiracies, and the Conceits of Power in Zimbabwe covers nearly 50 years of Zanu-PF’s propensity to gain power by any means - even <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-president-was-security-minister-when-genocidal-rape-was-state-policy-in-1983-4-now-he-seeks-another-term-211633">genocide</a>.</p>
<p>This election displayed many of these patterns. However, each election has registered variations as Zimbabwe hovers between open democracy and fully shut authoritarianism. Zanu-PF’s score, with contemporary variants, ranges from pre- and post-election intimidation to electoral “management” and playing off its regional neighbours. The CCC and civil society choirs also shift their tone in response: from outright rejection and court challenges to pleas for reruns and transitional governments.</p>
<h2>Long-term, immediate and post-election intimidation</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/99/article/703839">post-2017 coup period</a> foreshadowed many of Zanu-PF’s contemporary strategies. First was the soldiers killing at least six demonstrators (and bystanders) just after the <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-false-new-dawn-for-zimbabwe-what-i-got-right-and-wrong-about-the-mood-100971">mid-2018 elections</a>. In January 2019, a “stayaway” kicked in just after Mnangagwa announced a 150% increase in fuel prices. Planned chaos ensued as riots, looting and protests were encouraged by a multitude of unidentified forces. More than 17 people were killed. As many women were raped. Nearly 1,800 other bodily violations ensued amid <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv2s0jd56">mass trials and convictions</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-president-was-security-minister-when-genocidal-rape-was-state-policy-in-1983-4-now-he-seeks-another-term-211633">Zimbabwe’s president was security minister when genocidal rape was state policy in 1983-4. Now he seeks another term</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Since then, Zanu-PF has reminded many people not to engage in opposition. </p>
<p>By mid-2020 the targets moved towards <a href="https://africanarguments.org/2020/12/the-gendering-of-violence-in-zimbabwean-politics/">women in the MDC</a>. The case of CCC activist <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXsUkP00M9k">Moreblessing Ali’s</a> murder in May 2022 indicates a new variant on “silent murder”. Ali’s brother, Washington, a long-time MDC-CCC activist in the UK, gained the help of CCC MP and lawyer Job Sikhala to publicise his sister’s murder. Sikhala has been imprisoned since his campaign on <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/05/zimbabwe-conviction-and-sentencing-of-opposition-leader/">behalf of Ali</a>. </p>
<p>I examine this horrific assassination in the next issue of the journal <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/198">Transformation</a>. It illustrates how the move towards <a href="https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/18/sweets-for-the-people-zimbabwe-elections-housing-voters-lured-promises-land-barons-zanu-pf">land-baron-led gangsterism</a> in Harare connects with Zanu-PF hierarchies of power.</p>
<p>The August 2023 pre-election murder by stoning of <a href="https://www.voazimbabwe.com/a/7210805.html">CCC activist Tinashe Chitsunge</a> indicated this sort of politics running wild. </p>
<p>After the election, demonstrators and soldiers did not encounter each other <em>en masse</em>: no shootings. However, residents visiting pubs in “high density suburbs” encountered rough treatment from unidentified people with guns and brand-new uniforms. Later, Glen Norah councillor Womberaishe Nhende and fellow activist Sonele Mukuhlani were left naked after their abduction, whipping and injection with poison on 3 September. Their lawyers, Douglas Coltart and Tapiwa Muchineripi, were arrested when visiting them <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202309060001.html">in hospital</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-climate-action-plan-a-win-for-the-environment-health-and-energy-210655">Zimbabwe’s climate action plan: a win for the environment, health and energy</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The well-funded “Forever Associates of Zimbabwe” (FAZ) earned its keep by intimidating folks during the pre-election phases. FAZ is a <a href="https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/if-it-still-breaks-dont-fix-it-time-for-another-election-in-zimbabwe/">Zanu-PF</a> mix of semi-intellectuals and aspirant entrepreneurs. They are Mnangagwa enthusiasts needing connections to the Zanu-PF state. </p>
<p>They ran illegal <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/zimbabwes-vote-is-well-short-of-free-and-fair-standards-say-foreign-observers-20230825">“exit polls” at the stations</a>. FAZ’s members, purportedly <a href="https://nehandaradio.com/2023/03/11/wife-of-cio-boss-accused-of-terrorising-zanu-pf-and-cio-members/">paid by the Central Intelligence Organisation</a>, kept their promise to “dominate and saturate the environment while <a href="https://faztrust.com/">denying the same to opponents</a>” – including those within Zanu-PF during its primary <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/311011/zimbabwe-how-intelligence-and-military-are-running-the-upcoming-general-polls/">nomination contests</a>. </p>
<h2>Judicial and electoral ‘management’</h2>
<p>The clouds over liberal horizons darkened further in the legal spheres of repression. The “<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-patriotic-act-erodes-freedoms-and-may-be-a-tool-for-repression-209984">Patriotic Act</a>”, passed ahead of the elections, makes too much opposition-talk with foreigners treasonous. The still unsigned amendment to the Private Voluntary Organisations Bill promises to end all hints of civil society support for <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2023-01-23-zimbabwean-government-passes-law-designed-to-throttle-independent-civil-society/">opposition parties</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.veritaszim.net/node/6099">gerrymandered delimitation exercise</a> remapped mostly urban constituencies so they stretch to peri-urban and nearly rural areas. Zanu-PF hoped the majority would thus support it, as in the countryside. This tactic linked well to election day’s improprieties. Up to 75 urban polling stations experienced unexpected and unprecedented <a href="https://www.zawya.com/en/world/africa/polling-delays-and-extension-of-time-for-voting-zimbabwe-e39rl0b4">shortages of ballot papers</a>. This caused long and uncertain waits. Some stations extended voting to the next day. </p>
<p>In Glenview, a Harare suburb, hundreds of poor voters walked kilometres to vote by 7am. They waited – peacefully, fortunately – eight hours for the ballot papers. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-patriotic-act-erodes-freedoms-and-may-be-a-tool-for-repression-209984">Zimbabwe’s ‘Patriotic Act’ erodes freedoms and may be a tool for repression</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>At other stations, night-time voting added to voters’ roll problems due to the hasty delimitation exercise that left <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/mnangagwas-son-turned-away-from-polling-station-as-logistical-troubles-and-fear-mar-zim-voting-20230823">many in the wrong constituency</a>. They were advised to find the correct one. </p>
<p>Where voting continued to 24 August, how many returned? </p>
<h2>The V11 forms</h2>
<p>Widespread concerns about the <a href="https://www.veritaszim.net/node/6544">V11 forms</a> came on top of worries about the thousands of people giving up on the lost ballot papers. These sheets are posted on the outside walls of the 12,000 polling stations. They show all the votes. They are meant to enable anyone to keep score at the first polling stage. Then the official counting moves on to ward, constituency, and provincial counting centres, and finally to the national “command centre” where the presidential vote is tallied and announced. Suspicion runs rampant about what happens at the links in this chain.</p>
<p>Election NGOs and other organisations were collecting and tabulating images of the V11 forms for digital release. Too late: Zanu-PF conducted on-the-night <a href="https://paradigmhq.org/press-release-the-netrights-coalition-condemns-raids-of-digital-technologies-of-civil-society-actors-in-zimbabwe-during-the-2023-elections/">raids</a> as they were at work. </p>
<p>As the Institute for Security Studies’ southern Africa programme head Piers Pigou noted in conversation with me, if the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission was worried about the election’s legitimacy, the V11 forms would have been on its website immediately. But they are not there – or anywhere. </p>
<h2>Regional responses, CCC plans and democracy’s future</h2>
<p>As noted, the election observers’ reports do not paint a pretty picture of the election. The Citizens Coalition for Change hoped to exploit the split between the SADC observers and their <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/opinions/analysis/in-depth-zimbabwe-elections-analysts-on-why-sas-response-legitimises-an-authoritarian-regime-20230830">SADC masters</a>. But the SADC’s council of elders seems unable to help the CCC’s plans to arrange a rerun guided by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQQi1Xu_dts">an international committee</a>. South Africa’s enthusiasm for its neighbour gives little solace <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2023-09-05-ancs-fikile-mbalula-dismisses-talk-of-fresh-poll-in-zimbabwe/">to northern democrats</a>. Given Zimbabwe’s courts’ past biases on the legality of elections, the CCC did not bother taking <a href="https://zimfact.org/fact-check-has-chamisa-filed-an-election-court-challenge/">the judicial route</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/animal-farm-has-been-translated-into-shona-why-a-group-of-zimbabwean-writers-undertook-the-task-206966">Animal Farm has been translated into Shona – why a group of Zimbabwean writers undertook the task</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Mnangagwa’s inauguration has put all those plans to rest. No reruns. No new versions of government of “<a href="https://africanarguments.org/2013/07/review-the-hard-road-to-reform-the-politics-of-zimbabwes-global-political-agreement-reviewed-by-timothy-scarnecchia/">national unity</a>”, modelled after the disputed, violence-marred 2008 contest, or <a href="https://gga.org/please-sign-petition-for-a-transitional-government-in-zimbabwe/">transitional councils</a>. At most, the election observers’ reports portend further critique. The Zimbabwean democratic forces have to think again, and harder, about ways to a better future. </p>
<p>In sum, if Zimbabwe’s 2023 election foreshadows future battles between authoritarianism and liberal democracy, the former has gained the upper hand. Zanu-PF’S iron fist remains, with a velvet coating, albeit fraying. As a woman overheard discussing this election observed, the only hope may be Zanu-PF destroying itself as it almost did in 2017.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211755/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David B. Moore watched Zimbabwe's 2023 election as a non-accredited observer.</span></em></p>Zimbabwe’s 2023 elections look like their predecessors: stolen. But this one is a bit different. Opposition strategies and regional responses have changed too. What does this mean for the future?David B. Moore, Research Associate, Dept of Anthropology & Development Studies and Fellow, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2116332023-08-20T09:27:25Z2023-08-20T09:27:25ZZimbabwe’s president was security minister when genocidal rape was state policy in 1983-4. Now he seeks another term<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543031/original/file-20230816-17-eic0p6.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tafadzwa Ufumeli/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Trigger warning: this article contains accounts of sexual violence.</em></p>
<p>Zimbabwe will hold its elections on 23 August. The current president of Zimbabwe, <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-a-mnangagwa-presidency-would-not-be-a-new-beginning-for-zimbabwe-87641">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>, is running for re-election. This is despite his having oversight in the execution of the genocide of a minority group of Zimbabweans in the south-west region, as evidenced in my <a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">newly published study</a>. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hazel-Cameron-2">genocide scholar</a>, I have studied the nature, causes and consequences of genocide and mass atrocities, as well as the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41917771?seq=6">role of external institutional bystanders</a>. Since 2011, I have researched the crimes of the powerful of Zimbabwe. Much of this has involved an <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316020728_The_Matabeleland_Massacres_Britain%27s_wilful_blindness">analysis of official British and US government communications</a>. This has shed new light on what knowledge was available to the British and US governments about <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325887696_State-Organized_Starvation_A_Weapon_of_Extreme_Mass_Violence_in_Matabeleland_South_1984">atrocity crimes targeting the Ndebele</a> in the early post-independence years of Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>My <a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">latest study</a> explores a military operation, known as Gukurahundi, between 1983 and 1984 in Matabeleland and parts of the Midlands in Zimbabwe. Drawing on 36 in-depth interviews with survivors, my study provides new insights into <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7388214.stm">Operation Gukurahundi</a>. It identifies systematic patterns of rape and other forms of sexual violence in the operation. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/british-policy-towards-zimbabwe-during-matabeleland-massacre-licence-to-kill-81574">British policy towards Zimbabwe during Matabeleland massacre: licence to kill</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The study concludes that these patterns indicate a state policy of systematic genocidal rape in 1983 and 1984. This policy was deployed with the intent to destroy, in part, a specific ethnic group: the minority Ndebele of Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>My study acknowledges the immense suffering of the victims of the genocide and their descendants. It also illustrates that genocide creates victims across generations. Time cannot eliminate the trauma inflicted or the need for justice. </p>
<h2>The genocide</h2>
<p>In January 1983, the Zanu-PF government of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-27519044">Robert Mugabe</a>, in the newly
independent Zimbabwe, launched a massive security clampdown on the Ndebele. This was <a href="https://theconversation.com/british-policy-towards-zimbabwe-during-matabeleland-massacre-licence-to-kill-81574">both politically and ethnically motivated</a>. At the heart of the operation was a strategy of state-ordered terror. It was perpetrated by a 4,000-strong all-Shona Fifth Brigade of the Zimbabwean National Army led by <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-zimbabwe-minister-idUSKCN24U0MK">Perrance Shiri</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/why-a-mnangagwa-presidency-would-not-be-a-new-beginning-for-zimbabwe-87641">Mnangagwa</a> had oversight over both the army’s Fifth Brigade and the Central Intelligence Organisation in his role as minister of internal security and chairman of Zimbabwe’s <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/17/could-mnangagwa-be-zimbabwes-comeback-crocodile">Joint High Command</a>. He <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-11-27-op-ed-mnangagwa-and-the-gukurahundi-fact-and-fiction/">reported directly to Mugabe</a>. </p>
<p>Mnangagwa, however, has <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-11-24-00-gukurahundi-ghosts-haunt-mnangagwa/">denied accusations</a> he played an active role in Operation Gukurahundi.</p>
<p>The stated objective of the campaign was to <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jocelyn-Alexander/publication/250225505_Dissident_Perspectives_on_Zimbabwe%27s_Post-Independence_War/links/566858c308ae193b5fa0379f/Dissident-Perspectives-on-Zimbabwes-Post-Independence-War.pdf">rid the country of “dissidents”</a>. However, the overwhelming majority of those targeted by security forces were non-combatant Ndebele civilians. The government viewed them as supporters, or potential supporters, of the political opposition.</p>
<p>In 1983, the Fifth Brigade moved from village to village in Matabeleland North and some areas of the Midlands. Their presence led to <a href="https://www.pearl-insights.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/The-Matabeleland-Massacres-Britains-wilful-blindness.pdf">extreme violence</a>. The operation shifted to Matabeleland South in February 1984, where state-led atrocities and violence
continued. This included the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325887696_State-Organized_Starvation_A_Weapon_of_Extreme_Mass_Violence_in_Matabeleland_South_1984">orchestrated starvation of the Ndebele</a>. </p>
<p>Estimates vary on the number of non-combatant civilians massacred during Operation Gukurahundi. One conservative estimate is <a href="https://apnews.com/article/df5722c221bf4c5ca894e5e481413ca3">between 10,000 and 20,000</a>. However, Dan Stannard, the director internal of Zimbabwe’s Central Intelligence Organisation during Operation Gukurahundi, believed that between <a href="http://researchdata.uwe.ac.uk/104/240/roh-oh-sta-da1-appr.pdf">30,000 and 50,000</a> Ndebele may have been killed. </p>
<p>Although the peak of the violence occurred between 1983 and 1984, the operation didn’t end until December 1987 with the signing of a <a href="https://commonwealthoralhistories.org/explandict/unity-accord-of-1987/">national unity accord</a>. </p>
<h2>Rape and sexual violence</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">My research</a> reveals what has, until now, been omitted from criminological scrutiny: a state policy of rape and sexual violence that targeted the Ndebele people during Operation Gukurahundi. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://unictr.irmct.org/en/tribunal">International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda</a> made a <a href="https://www.refworld.org/cases,ICTR,40278fbb4.html">historic judgment</a> which established that rape and other forms of sexual violence could be acts of genocide as defined by the <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf#page=1">United Nations Convention on Genocide Article II</a>. The tribunal recognised how rape and sexual violence functioned to destroy the minority Tutsi group of Rwanda in 1994.</p>
<p>I gathered data for my <a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">study</a> from 36 in-depth interviews with male and female survivors in a representative sample of geographical locations across Matabeleland. While small in comparison to the sheer scale of the violence and the numbers who were victimised, this study nonetheless establishes reliable conclusions about the nature of events. </p>
<p>The patterns I identified include: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>public spectacles of multiple perpetrator rape targeting children and adults</p></li>
<li><p>people forced to witness the rape of female and male family members</p></li>
<li><p>rape and sexual violence followed by mass killing</p></li>
<li><p>forced intrafamilial rape</p></li>
<li><p>forced bestiality</p></li>
<li><p>forced nudity.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>These are acts that can be interpreted as “deliberately inflicting on the (Ndebele) group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”, a contravention of <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf#page=1">Article II (c) of the UN Genocide Convention</a>.</p>
<p>The systematic dehumanisation and degradation of the Ndebele through forced intrafamilial rape was a recurring pattern of state harm. It was pervasive in both Matabeleland North and Matabeleland South.</p>
<p>One of the people I interviewed, Bukhosi, who was 19 in 1984 and living in Matabeleland South, <a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">shared the cruelty</a> of knowing that the Fifth Brigade might force him to attempt to have sex with his relatives. They would threaten to shoot him if he refused. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>There were times we were afraid even to be in the company of our sister, even to go to the shop. Because I know when these guys come and see us together, they say ‘sleep with your sister’. Then you are afraid to go with your mother because something terrible would happen, they will say ‘do this to your mother’. You are afraid even to be with your brother at home, because they … these guys (Fifth Brigade), when they find the two of you. It is terrible … So we were all separated ….</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Such <a href="https://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/1996/Rwanda.htm">rituals of degradation</a> are found wherever a policy of genocidal rape is adopted. They cause shame and humiliation. They leave communities and individual families destroyed, their bonds crushed through the annihilation of social norms. </p>
<p>Forty years later, the intergenerational impacts of Operation Gukurahundi on the Ndebele group are profound. My interviewees widely reported mental health issues. Children born of survivors are angry and struggle to understand their family’s brutal history when questions about these painful experiences are met with silence.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543484/original/file-20230818-15-ngn1e6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Mnangagwa
with Senior Royal Prince William in November 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kingston Royal</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I also identified patterns of reproductive violence targeting males and females. These included:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>killing the foetuses of pregnant women</p></li>
<li><p>internment in concentration camps for sexual servitude (rape camps)</p></li>
<li><p>forced pregnancies </p></li>
<li><p>genital mutilation. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>Fifth Brigade officers targeted the wombs of pregnant women with knives, bayonets or through stamping.</p>
<p>These acts can be interpreted as “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the (Ndebele) group”, a contravention of <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf#page=1">Article II (d) of the Genocide Convention</a>. </p>
<p>Every participant in my study reported the presence of a military rank structure – and complicity of senior officers in mass rapes and sexual violence. There was no evidence of sexual predation by army personnel for personal satisfaction. </p>
<p>Another study participant, Phindile, was 37 and lived in Matabeleland South in 1984. There were 21 homesteads in her village. She told me there were three commanders in her area. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Those were the ones who were giving the instructions. Rape was done (by) daylight and darkness but most were done in the evening. The commanders would be there eating. The chief commander would be sitting at a distance and giving instructions on what to do. They used to do the raping according to their rank.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>My <a href="https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.13169/statecrime.12.2.0001">research</a> establishes that the policy of rape and other forms of sexual violence was systematic and predicated on the government’s intent to destroy the Ndebele in part. The policy reflects the ideology and strategic goals of those in high office. The fundamental human rights of many survivors remain affected <a href="https://www.zimlive.com/gukurahundi-the-election-dilemma-for-undocumented-victims/">to this day</a>. </p>
<h2>Swept under the carpet</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf">Prosecution for genocide</a> extends to those who plan, instigate, order, commit or aid and abet in its <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/genocide">planning, preparation or execution</a>.</p>
<p>In the early 1990s, reports of state-organised rape, the detention of women in rape camps, enforced pregnancy and other sexual atrocities trickled out of Bosnia and Croatia. Securing indictments became an <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-journal-of-international-law/article/abs/war-crimes-brutality-genocide-terror-and-the-struggle-for-justice-by-aryeh-neier-new-york-times-books-1998-pp-xiv-274-index-25-can35-between-vengeance-and-forgiveness-facing-history-after-genocide-and-mass-violence-by-martha-minow-boston-beacon-press-1998-pp-xiii-202-index-23/47336631C6CF464C84E5226AB62AD274">international political priority</a>. </p>
<p>Similar <a href="https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/revealed-british-diplomats-pressured-bbcs-jeremy-paxman-understand-true-perspective-massacres-zimbabwe-61535">reports had trickled out</a> of Zimbabwe a decade earlier but were <a href="https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/10023/16176/Cameron_2017_TIHR_BritainsWilfulBlindness_AAM.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">swept under the carpet</a>. </p>
<p>Intelligence on genocidal rape and other atrocities was <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316020728_The_Matabeleland_Massacres_Britain%27s_wilful_blindness">minimised by British representatives</a> in Zimbabwe. This was clearly politically influenced, as expressed in <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316020728_The_Matabeleland_Massacres_Britain%27s_wilful_blindness">numerous diplomatic cables</a> between Harare and London.</p>
<p>The crimes of genocide committed by the Third Reich in Nazi Germany, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia or the Hutu government of Rwanda were subjected to investigation, prosecution and judgment in international courts. </p>
<p>Yet, 40 years after the mass atrocities of Operation Gukurahundi, there has been no official investigation, prosecution or judgment. The most senior surviving person accused of overseeing the genocide and other crimes against humanity, the incumbent president of Zimbabwe, enjoys impunity. He is endorsed and flattered – for example, he was <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202304190012.html#:%7E:text=Emmerson%20Mnangagwa%2C%20President%20of%20Zimbabwe%20.&text=President%20Emmerson%20Mnangagwa%20has%20been,ceremonial%20home%20of%20Britain's%20monarchy.">invited</a> to the May 2023 coronation of King Charles III of the UK.</p>
<p>Rather than being subjected to a process of international justice before a court with the jurisdiction to try the mass crimes of Gukurahundi, Mnangagwa will stand for re-election on 23 August. The survivors will continue their <a href="https://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/memory-and-erasure">search for justice and accountability</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211633/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hazel Cameron received funding for this research project from Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland, the British Academy and a Principal’s Special Award, University of St Andrews. </span></em></p>President Emmerson Mnangagwa has not faced official investigation or prosecution over his role in Operation Gukurahundi – 40 years on.Hazel Cameron, Honorary Senior Research Fellow, University of StirlingLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2101992023-08-02T12:52:29Z2023-08-02T12:52:29ZZimbabwe’s rulers won’t tolerate opposing voices – but its writers refuse to be silenced<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539973/original/file-20230728-19-7tnmnb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">NoViolet Bulawayo, Zimbabwean author of the politically charged novels We Need New Names and Glory.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">David Levenson/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The ruling elite in Zimbabwe has always tried to <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/04/zimbabwe-43-years-independence-commemoration-marred-by-rapidly-shrinking-civic-space/">silence</a> opposing political voices and erase histories it does not wish to have aired. Although “democratic” elections have been held since 1980, the country has become what the scholar Eldred Masunungure <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24388181">calls</a> a state of “militarised, electoral authoritarianism”. </p>
<p>As Zimbabwe heads to the polls again in 2023, it’s worth considering the role that writers have played in engendering political resistance. Their voices have been important in challenging oppression, exposing social injustices and advocating for political change. </p>
<h2>The liberation struggle</h2>
<p>Literature was vital for raising awareness about the harshness of colonial rule. It was used to mobilise resistance against the white minority regime and garner international support for the liberation struggle. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover with an illustration of an African man against a spider's web, a needle stitching a wound on his forehead." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=905&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539976/original/file-20230728-27-n59hy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1137&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Heinemann African Writers Series</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Texts like <a href="https://www.hsrcpress.ac.za/books/voices-of-liberation-ndabaningi-sithole">Ndabaningi Sithole’s</a> foundational 1955 novel Umvekela wamaNdebele (The Revolution of the Ndebele) and <a href="https://theconversation.com/dear-dambudzo-marechera-the-letters-zimbabweans-wrote-to-a-literary-star-144299">Dambudzo Marechera</a>’s 1978 magnum opus The House of Hunger were instrumental. Many others like <a href="https://www.gale.com/intl/databases-explored/literature/charles-mungoshi">Charles Mungoshi</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/tsitsi-dangarembga-and-writing-about-pain-and-loss-in-zimbabwe-144313">Tsitsi Dangarembga</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jul/21/chenjerai-hove">Chenjerai Hove</a> produced texts that encouraged resistance against colonial rule. </p>
<p>These works showcased the resilience of Zimbabweans in the face of adversity, inspiring the population to continue their fight for freedom.</p>
<h2>Independence</h2>
<p>Since independence in Zimbabwe, there has remained little space for dissenting voices – first under the leadership of <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">Robert Mugabe</a> and then <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-three-barriers-blocking-zimbabwes-progress-zanu-pf-mnangagwa-and-the-military-89177">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.fairplanet.org/story/zimbabwes-genocide-an-open-wound/">Gukurahundi genocide</a>, which novelist <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Novuyo_Rosa_Tshuma/">Novuyo Rosa Tshuma</a> called the country’s “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/aug/09/house-of-stone-novuyo-rosa-tshuma-review">original sin</a>”, marked the first instance in which the state quashed opposing voices. Between 1982 and 1987, the government sent a North Korean-trained brigade to quell dissenters in the provinces of Matabeleland and the Midlands. An estimated 20,000 civilians were killed. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover with an illustration of an African woman looking directly ahead with traditional hairstyle." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1194&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1194&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539978/original/file-20230728-15-vc4suo.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1194&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The Women's Press</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Interestingly, despite the shrinking of the civic and political space in Zimbabwe, literary production has thrived in providing political resistance.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ajol.info/index.php/tvl/article/view/168612">My research</a> as a scholar of African literature has demonstrated that literature in Zimbabwe has highlighted diverse forms of state sponsored violence. Through their works, writers have raised awareness, sparked dialogue, and inspired readers to engage in opposition and activism.</p>
<h2>The turbulent ‘lost decade’ (2000-2010)</h2>
<p>From around 2000, Zimbabwe <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-zimbabwe-inflation-idUSL1992587420070919">experienced</a> economic meltdown, coupled with an increased shrinking of the civic space. The rise of a formidable opposition, the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Movement-for-Democratic-Change">Movement for Democratic Change</a>, in 1999 <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/election-violence-in-zimbabwe/movement-for-democratic-change-was-number-one-enemy-in-2000/2CB944ACBCDB63C2311FDAB85ACD8037">was met with violence</a> by the state. </p>
<p>This period also saw a flourishing in literary production. Fresh voices emerged, among them <a href="https://writersmakeworlds.com/brian-chikwava/">Brian Chikwava</a>, <a href="https://novioletbulawayo.com/about/">NoViolet Bulawayo</a>, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/e1fad84a-903e-44ec-b7c5-920e88a91eac">Petina Gappah</a>, <a href="https://www.poetryinternational.com/en/poets-poems/poets/poet/102-5757_Eppel">John Eppel</a>, <a href="https://www.icorn.org/writer/christopher-mlalazi">Christopher Mlalazi</a> and <a href="https://www.africanbookscollective.com/authors-editors/lawrence-hoba">Lawrence Hoba</a>.</p>
<p>Literature from this period captured the socioeconomic realities of the country. Gappah’s debut collection of short stories in 2009, <a href="https://soundcloud.com/faberbooks/petina-gappah-an-elegy-for">An Elegy for Easterly</a>, depicts the emotions experienced by Zimbabweans in the face of diverse challenges. Some characters express disillusionment and despair, while others maintain optimism and resilience, representing a complex reality.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover with illustrative fonts spelling the words " src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539979/original/file-20230728-24712-naw856.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Random House</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Bulawayo’s award-winning 2013 novel We Need New Names depicts the political situation through the perspective of its teenage protagonist, Darling. The story delves into the effects of political turmoil, economic challenges and societal changes on regular lives. Her 2022 novel <a href="https://theconversation.com/noviolet-bulawayos-new-novel-is-an-instant-zimbabwean-classic-185783">Glory</a> parodies a dictatorship, protesting the irrationality of a police state.</p>
<p>White Zimbabwean writers have also criticised autocracy in books like Catherine Buckle’s <a href="https://www.google.co.za/books/edition/AFRICAN_TEARS/haxhDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0">African Tears: The Zimbabwe Land Invasions</a> (2000) and Graham Lang’s <a href="https://www.google.co.za/books/edition/Place_of_Birth/TzCsAAAAIAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0&bsq=Place%20of%20Birth%20graham%20lang">Place of Birth</a> (2006). </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover with an illustration showing the portrait of a woman with butterflies instead of hair." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539980/original/file-20230728-3718-jawgb2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faber and Faber</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These novels portray the emotional effects of the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/zimbabwe/ZimLand0302-02.htm">Fast Track Land Reform Programme</a> on many white Zimbabweans, who found themselves dispossessed of their farms and their sources of income.</p>
<p>Writers from the 2000s have offered multifaceted portrayals, highlighting the interconnectedness of personal lives and political realities. The stories illuminate the human cost of political decisions and the resilience of ordinary people in the face of hardships.</p>
<h2>Literature in the Second Republic</h2>
<p>Literature after the <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-the-state-is-the-man-and-that-man-is-mugabe-a-new-era-begins-with-his-fall-87868">demise</a> of Mugabe and his four-decade regime – a period referred to as the Second Republic – has continued to grapple with Zimbabwe’s prevailing sociopolitical environment. In the book <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Zimbabwean-Crisis-after-Mugabe-Multidisciplinary-Perspectives/Mangena-Nyambi-Ncube/p/book/9781032028149">The Zimbabwean Crisis after Mugabe</a>, my colleagues and I contend that today’s Zimbabwe is similar to the Mugabe years in many ways.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539974/original/file-20230728-19-7nqol2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tsitsi Dangarembga was arrested in 2020 for staging a protest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Zinyange Autony/AFP/Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.batsiraichigama.com/">Batsirai Chigama</a>’s collection of poems Gather the Children captures the vicissitudes of contemporary life in Zimbabwe. In <a href="https://www.poetryinternational.com/en/poets-poems/article/104-29416_On-Chigama-8217-s-Gather-the-Children">his analysis</a> of this collection, literary scholar Tinashe Mushakavanhu explains: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Zimbabwe’s political crisis has been a different kind of catastrophe, one that has occurred in slow motion: its mechanisms abstract and impersonal, although the economic, physical, and psychological consequences have been very real and devastating. These strictures insinuate themselves into the ambience of everyday life and language, something that Chigama observes with careful attention. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In her poem Zimbabwe, Chigama writes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Like eating olives</p>
<p>we have acquired the taste of discomfort</p>
<p>over the longest time</p>
<p>it has gently settled on our tongues</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Her poems highlight how Zimbabweans have normalised the abnormal.</p>
<p>Other writers from the post-Mugabe period like <a href="http://www.panashechigumadzi.com/bio">Panashe Chigumadzi</a> and <a href="https://novuyotshuma.com/about">Novuyo Rosa Tshuma</a> grapple with similar issues and themes. Writer and academic <a href="https://brittlepaper.com/2023/03/siphiwe-ndlovu-on-the-rise-and-rise-of-zimbabwean-literature/">Siphiwe Ndlovu</a> explains that in contemporary Zimbabwean fiction</p>
<blockquote>
<p>there is anger, outrage, disappointment, disillusionment, hope (and the loss of it), but most importantly, there is a call for reckoning and change that the politics of the country have failed to successfully address.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The power (and limits) of literature</h2>
<p>Despite its power, reading remains a luxury that many Zimbabweans cannot afford. Books are extremely expensive and few people have disposable income to read for pleasure. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover with an illustration of birds flying into a tree and down into a red backdrop." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/539982/original/file-20230728-16223-8s27vs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ntombekhaya Poetry</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s for this reason that, since independence, the state has not banned the many novels which are critical of the situation in the country. Writer Stanley Nyamfukudza <a href="http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:240525/FULLTEXT02.pdf">explains</a>: “It has been suggested that one of the best ways to hide information in Zimbabwe is to publish it in a book.” </p>
<p>Literature can achieve greater effects if there is a robust culture of critical thinking and reading.</p>
<p>However, despite the continued oppression and the lack of a robust reading culture, Zimbabwean writers have been unrelenting in telling the world what is really happening in Zimbabwe. They have always spoken truth to power.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210199/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gibson Ncube does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Writers have challenged oppression, exposed social injustices and advocated for political change.Gibson Ncube, Lecturer, Stellenbosch UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2069662023-06-11T05:58:48Z2023-06-11T05:58:48ZAnimal Farm has been translated into Shona – why a group of Zimbabwean writers undertook the task<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530850/original/file-20230608-30-g3nm04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alan Hopps/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since independence in 1980, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Zimbabwe/Rhodesia-and-the-UDI">Zimbabwe</a> has in some ways become like <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Animal-Farm">Animal Farm</a>. Like the pigs in the classic 1945 novel by English writer <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/George-Orwell">George Orwell</a>, the country’s post-liberation leaders have hijacked a revolution that was once rooted in righteous outrage. In Zimbabwe, the revolution was against colonialism and its practices of extraction and exploitation. </p>
<p>The lead characters in Animal Farm have the propensity for evil and the greed for power found in despots throughout history, including former Zimbabwe president <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">Robert Mugabe</a>. Zimbabwe’s leaders have also acted for personal gain. They remain in power with no <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/04/zimbabwe-43-years-independence-commemoration-marred-by-rapidly-shrinking-civic-space/">accountability</a> to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-deepening-crisis-time-for-second-government-of-national-unity-122726">suffering</a> of the people they claim to represent. </p>
<p>Animal Farm’s relevance is echoed in celebrated young Zimbabwean author NoViolet Bulawayo’s recent novel <a href="https://theconversation.com/noviolet-bulawayos-new-novel-is-an-instant-zimbabwean-classic-185783">Glory</a>. Her satirical take on Zimbabwe’s 2017 coup and the fall of Mugabe is also narrated through animals. And visual artist <a href="https://zeitzmocaa.museum/artists/admire-kamudzengerere/">Admire Kamudzengerere</a> founded <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjpVCcDZARQ">Animal Farm Artist Residency</a> in Chitungwiza as a space for creative experimentation.</p>
<p>It’s within this context that a group of Zimbabwean writers, led by novelist and lawyer <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/nov/13/petina-gappah-zimbabwe-writer-interview">Petina Gappah</a> and poet <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/wait-is-over-for-muchuri/">Tinashe Muchuri</a>, have translated Animal Farm into <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Shona">Shona</a>, the country’s most widely spoken language. A dozen writers contributed to the translation of <a href="https://houseofbookszim.com/product/chimurenga-chemhuka/">Chimurenga Chemhuka</a> (Animal Revolution) over five years.</p>
<p>It’s clear to me, as a <a href="https://www.st-annes.ox.ac.uk/cpt_people/mushakavanhu-dr-tinashe/">scholar</a> of Zimbabwean literature, that too few great books are available in the country’s indigenous languages. This matters particularly because there are few bookshops and libraries where young people can access good writing. But Zimbabwe’s writers are taking matters into their own hands. </p>
<h2>The translation project</h2>
<p>Translating Animal Farm into Shona makes perfect sense. Historically, Shona novelists have used animal imagery to conjure up worlds of tradition and custom, and also to examine human foibles. Great Shona writers – such as <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Solomon-M-Mutswairo">Solomon Mutswairo</a>, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Patrick-Chakaipa">Patrick Chakaipa</a> and more recently <a href="https://munyori.org/2022/04/interview-with-ignatius-mabasa/">Ignatius Mabasa</a> – have written books that use allegory to respond to a range of crises in Zimbabwe. (Allegory is a literary device that uses hidden meaning to speak to political situations – such as using pigs instead of people in Animal Farm.) </p>
<p>Gappah kickstarted the <a href="https://pentransmissions.com/2015/10/22/on-translating-orwells-animal-farm/">translation project</a> in a private post on Facebook in 2015:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>A group of friends and I thought it would be fun to bring the novel to new readers in all the languages spoken in Zimbabwe. This is important to us because Zimbabwe has been isolated so much in recent years, and translation is one way to bring other cultures and peoples closer to your own.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover featuring an illustration of the imprint of a pig's hoof in blood." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530914/original/file-20230608-28-9rmwf5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The House of Books</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Eight years later, Chimurenga Chemhuka has come to life. It’s a big achievement, considering that publishing has not been performing well in a <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-economy-is-collapsing-why-mnangagwa-doesnt-have-the-answers-104960">dire Zimbabwean economy</a>. Gappah and her friends have ambitions to translate and publish Animal Farm in all indigenous languages taught in Zimbabwe’s schools. </p>
<h2>Chimurenga Chemhuka</h2>
<p>Though Chimurenga Chemhuka is mainly in standard Shona, its characters speak a medley of different Shona dialects – such as chiKaranga, chiZezuru, chiManyika – plus a smattering of contemporary slang. It’s a prismatic translation in one text. As leading UK translation theorist Matthew Reynolds <a href="https://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0206/ch6.xhtml">explains</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>To translate is to remake, not only in a new language with its different nuances and ways of putting words together, but in a new culture where readers are likely to be attracted by different themes.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The use of dialects activates the book in a comical way that also leaves it open to different interpretations and connections. For example, Zimbabwe’s president <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-mnangagwa-usher-in-a-new-democracy-the-view-from-zimbabwe-88023">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>, who does not have the same rhetorical gifts as his predecessor, has always tried to distinguish himself with his use of chiKaranga, a dominant dialect of Shona. He adopts a popular wailing Pentecostal style that rises and falls, raising laughter and dust among the rented crowds who attend his rallies.</p>
<p>The title, Chimurenga Chemhuka, is poignant and a direct reference to Zimbabwe’s <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/DC/renov82.10/renov82.10.pdf">liberation war</a>. Chemhuka (animal) Chimurenga (revolution) is not a literal translation of Animal Farm, but here the writers take liberties to connect the book to the country’s larger struggles for independence, commonly known as Chimurenga. </p>
<h2>Why this matters</h2>
<p>This translation project is a significant event in Shona literature. </p>
<p>It’s done by an eclectic group of writers who are passionate about language and literature. They use Orwell’s book and its satiric commentary as a way to creatively express themselves collectively. If this was a choir, the choristers Gappah and Muchuri do a good job of leading a harmonious ensemble.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/noviolet-bulawayos-new-novel-is-an-instant-zimbabwean-classic-185783">NoViolet Bulawayo’s new novel is an instant Zimbabwean classic</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>This is also the first of a series of Shona translations from <a href="https://houseofbookszim.com/">House of Books</a>, a new publishing house in Zimbabwe. The book is being promoted via social media platforms, where it is generating conversation about the need for more Zimbabwean translations of classic literature.</p>
<p>Translation was a major activity in Zimbabwe in the 1980s. It was a way for the newly emergent nation to reintegrate into the pan-African intellectual circuit. As Zimbabwe again reels from political and economic oppression, the translation of Animal Farm reveals to the country that what it’s going through is not new. It has happened before, and it will happen again.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206966/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tinashe Mushakavanhu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Novelist Petina Gappah’s call for translators on Facebook has resulted in the publication of Chimurenga Chemhuka.Tinashe Mushakavanhu, Junior Research Fellow, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2028582023-04-20T15:06:01Z2023-04-20T15:06:01ZZimbabwe’s ruling party vilifies the opposition as American puppets. But the party itself had strong ties to the US<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/521045/original/file-20230414-16-97marz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa addressing a rally in Bulawayo recently. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Zinyange Auntony/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Zimbabwe African National Union–Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF), which has governed Zimbabwe since independence in 1980, is well known for denouncing the United States’ role as a superpower that polices the world. </p>
<p>In a 2007 address at the United Nations, then Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-un-zimbabwe-mugabe/mugabe-slams-bush-hypocrisy-on-human-rights-idUSN2627903020070926">assailed</a> his American counterpart, George W. Bush. Mugabe charged:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>his hands drip with innocent blood of many nationalities. He kills in Iraq. He kills in Afghanistan. And this is supposed to be our master on human rights? </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Confrontation with the US, a recurrent feature of Zimbabwe’s political history since <a href="https://roape.net/2020/01/17/one-who-preferred-death-to-imperialism/">the 1960s</a>, surged after Washington adopted a bipartisan <a href="https://www.globalpolicyjournal.com/blog/07/11/2019/post-mugabe-zimbabwe-retreats-western-outreach-embraces-africa">sanctions package</a> in 2001. The European Union also imposed sanctions. </p>
<p>US officials have <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1158">repeatedly stated</a> that the sanctions target specific individuals or entities that have abused human rights or undermined democracy. <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20200924-zimbabwe-leader-tells-un-that-sanctions-hurt-development">Zanu-PF has responded</a> by pointing to UN reporting which notes that the sanctions have weakened the country’s economy and impeded national development.</p>
<p>I am a historian of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle. My <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Pan-Africanism-Versus-Partnership-Decolonisation-Rhodesian-ebook/dp/B0BSKNHMYH/ref=sr_1_2?qid=1681393772&refinements=p_n_publication_date%3A1250228011&s=books&sr=1-2">forthcoming book</a> focuses on its formative stages in the late 1950s and early 1960s. This was when Mugabe first became active in politics and the US got more involved in the politics of what was then Rhodesia, a British colony. In my view, the 21st century hostility obscures a nuanced historical relationship between the US and Zanu-PF.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/winky-d-is-being-targeted-by-police-in-zimbabwe-why-the-music-stars-voice-is-so-important-202246">Winky D is being targeted by police in Zimbabwe – why the music star's voice is so important</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>At first, the fledgling liberation movement valued American support. Zanu-PF <a href="https://www.africabib.org/rec.php?RID=18593742X">broke away</a> from the Soviet-aligned Zimbabwe African People’s Union (Zapu) in August 1963. Zanu-PF was originally known as Zanu, but adopted the “PF” suffix <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/zanu-pf-wins-first-free-elections-zimbabwe">ahead of elections in 1980</a>.</p>
<p>This context is relevant now because Zanu-PF efforts to consolidate both domestic and pan-African support selectively overlook more compatible aspects of its historical relations with the US.</p>
<h2>Zanu-PF’s anti-American bluster</h2>
<p>Zanu-PF has exploited sanctions to its advantage.</p>
<p>Emmerson Mnangagwa, previously Mugabe’s deputy, <a href="https://www.sardc.net/en/southern-african-news-features/sadc-mobilizes-anti-sanctions-day-25-october/">came to power</a> in a factional coup in late 2017. He has successfully mobilised pan-African support against sanctions.</p>
<p>Since 2019, the Southern African Development Community and the African Union have observed 25 October as <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/10/26/zimbabwe-regime-sanctions-zanupf">“Anti-Sanctions Day”</a> in solidarity with the Zanu-PF leadership.</p>
<p>Zanu-PF’s <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2019/10/25/thousands-in-zimbabwe-denounce-evil-western-sanctions">anti-American rhetoric</a> is not only deployed to win friends abroad. It is also a prominent campaign tactic at home. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/president-mnangagwa-claimed-zimbabwe-was-open-for-business-whats-gone-wrong-154085">President Mnangagwa claimed Zimbabwe was open for business. What's gone wrong</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>With general elections expected <a href="https://www.eisa.org/calendar2023.php">in July</a> or August, Zanu-PF is following the strategy again. It’s discrediting its leading opponent, Nelson Chamisa of the Citizens Coalition for Change, as a <a href="https://twitter.com/TafadzwaMugwadi/status/1631150059122221056">“US pawn”</a>. </p>
<p>His predecessor, Morgan Tsvangirai, faced <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-zimbabwe-election/mugabe-belittles-opponents-as-frog-and-puppet-idUSL2321227420080223">similar treatment</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man points ahead with his right index finger in front of banners bearing the acronym 'CCC'." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/521059/original/file-20230414-16-s56de3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Nelson Chamisa, leader of the opposition Citizens Coalition for Change party.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Zinyange Auntony / AFP via Getty Images)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Zimbabwe’s partisan state media routinely employ such terms as <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/us-president-exposes-puppets-in-zim/">“puppets”, “pawns” and “lackeys”</a> to describe Chamisa and his party. These jibes are intended to convince Zimbabwean voters that Chamisa would prioritise foreign interests.</p>
<p>The rhetoric conceals ZANU-PF’s own American ties.</p>
<h2>Zanu-PF’s American connections</h2>
<p>Historically, relations between the US and Zanu-PF have fluctuated. Mugabe formed a <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/a-walk-down-memory-lane-with-andrew-young/">close bond</a> with Andrew Young, the US ambassador to the UN during <a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-carters-african-legacy-peacemaker-negotiator-and-defender-of-rights-200744">Jimmy Carter’s presidency</a>. Carter’s government was the <a href="https://diplomacy.state.gov/encyclopedia/u-s-embassy-harare-zimbabwe/">first to open an embassy</a> in independent Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>Solid relations continued during the early years of the Reagan administration. Harare was one of the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1983/12/20/us-slashes-aid-to-zimbabwe-by-almost-half/e67886cf-9f52-4fde-beee-83ba1b40c3e0/">top three African recipients</a> of US aid in the early 1980s. </p>
<p>US vice-president <a href="https://www.upi.com/Archives/1982/11/18/Vice-President-George-Bush-arrived-today-for-talks-with/7630406443600/">George H.W. Bush travelled to Harare</a> in 1982. In 1997, first lady Hillary Clinton made a <a href="https://clintonwhitehouse6.archives.gov/1997/03/1997-03-11-first-lady-travels-in-africa-later-this-month.html">goodwill visit</a> to Zimbabwe.</p>
<p>Ties were even deeper in the early 1960s when the US government encouraged the party’s very establishment. Historian <a href="https://www.kent.edu/history/profile/timothy-scarnecchia">Timothy Scarnecchia</a>, who has mined records in the US national archives, has <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781580463638/the-urban-roots-of-democracy-and-political-violence-in-zimbabwe/">documented the ties</a> that Zanu forged with American officials 60 years ago. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/repression-and-dialogue-in-zimbabwe-twin-strategies-that-arent-working-122139">Repression and dialogue in Zimbabwe: twin strategies that aren't working</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The organisation’s core leadership in temporary exile in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (then Tanganyika), regularly consulted with US embassy officials in that country. Its leading representatives, <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9781137543462_5">including Mugabe</a>, lobbied the US government for funding. (There is no evidence that the new party received any directly.) </p>
<p>Zanu’s first president, <a href="https://www.sithole.org/biography.php">Ndabaningi Sithole</a>, received theological education in the US in the late 1950s. Archival records show that on the eve of Zanu’s formation he met with State Department officials in Washington DC who connected him to private American funders. In another archived account of a meeting with the US ambassador in Tanganyika (now Tanzania) in July 1963, Leopold Takawira, subsequently Zanu’s first vice-president, relayed that Sithole regarded the US as his second home.</p>
<p>Herbert Chitepo, who became Zanu’s national chair, visited the US in July 1963 and also met with American diplomats. According to a record of their conversation in the US national archives, Chitepo expressed his desire to accept US funding and defied</p>
<blockquote>
<p>anyone to call him an American stooge.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The 11 July 1963 issue of Zimbabwe Today, a periodical produced by Zapu in Tanzania, declared that following Sithole’s return from the US,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the American dollar and its ugly imperialist head is clearly visible in the actions of Mr. Sithole. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Zanu-PF’s assaults on Chamisa and his party’s supposed American connections is a repackaging of the very attacks Mnangagwa’s party faced from Zapu when it was formed 60 years ago. </p>
<h2>Double standards</h2>
<p>Although it has not been well documented, the US provided critical support during Zanu’s founding in 1963. It also helped the party consolidate its authority following independence in 1980. Since the US government imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe in 2001, these ties have been overshadowed. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-zimbabwe-finally-ditch-a-history-of-violence-and-media-repression-99859">Can Zimbabwe finally ditch a history of violence and media repression?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>As elections approach in Zimbabwe, the role of the US looms large. Zanu-PF overlooks historical aspects of its own relations with the US as it seeks to undermine its domestic opposition and appeal to continental allies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202858/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brooks Marmon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Zanu-PF’s anti-American rhetoric is not only deployed to win friends abroad. As elections approach, it is also a prominent campaign tactic at home.Brooks Marmon, Post-doctoral Scholar, Mershon Center for International Security Studies, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2007452023-02-27T15:11:03Z2023-02-27T15:11:03ZJimmy Carter: the American president whose commitment to Africa went beyond his term<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512423/original/file-20230227-633-v0xzc6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former American President Jimmy Carter. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Drew Angerer/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The office of former US president Jimmy Carter (98), who has been frail for some time, has <a href="https://cartercenter.org/news/pr/2023/statement-on-president-carters-health.html">announced</a> that he will no longer seek hospital treatment for his ailments. He has instead opted for hospice care at his modest home in the rural farming village of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/02/20/plains-georgia-jimmy-carter">Plains, Georgia</a>, close to where he was born.</p>
<p>His opposition to racism and his support for human rights are legendary, made more compelling by his life-long commitment to live among rural Georgians where segregation was severe and discrimination remains prevalent today. This enduring commitment to non-racialism and human rights at home also shaped his interest and engagement in Africa.</p>
<p>We discussed African affairs often during the nine years (2006-2015) when I directed the Carter Centre <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/peace/index.html">Peace Programmes</a>. My most frequent trips to Africa for the centre were to lead election observation missions, in which he was keenly interested.</p>
<p>His views on Africa can be assessed from three angles:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Africa policies pursued during his presidency, 1977-1981</p></li>
<li><p>Programmes in Africa with the Carter Centre while he was its leader, 1982-2015 </p></li>
<li><p>His moral determination to reckon with racism.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Africa policies</h2>
<p>In her book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">Jimmy Carter in Africa: Race and the Cold War</a> Nancy Mitchell, a professor of history at North Carolina State University, analyses in 900 pages how Carter’s leadership and core values, discussed in the third section, influenced his approach to southern African. But Michell reminds us that in the 1970s Africa was the hottest theatre of the Cold War. </p>
<p>The book’s subtitle, however, highlights a significant shift of emphasis skilfully effected by Carter and key to his success in helping liberate Rhodesia (today Zimbabwe) by treating all sides, even “Communists”, with <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/25/opinion/from-carter-to-mtg-what-a-peach-state-plummet.html%5D(https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/25/opinion/from-carter-to-mtg-what-a-peach-state-plummet.html">respect</a>. Carter’s behind-the-scenes role in supporting the 1979 <a href="https://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/5847/5/1979_Lancaster_House_Agreement.pdf">Lancaster House agreement</a>, which led to Zimbabwean independence, was among his greatest diplomatic achievements.</p>
<p>Many years later, I was told by a close advisor to longtime Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe that, had Carter won a second term, he said he would work to raise US funds to facilitate a key element of the peace accord, land reform based on ‘willing seller, willing buyer’.</p>
<p>The election of Republican Ronald Reagan in 1980, however, resulted in a very different US policy of “<a href="https://michiganintheworld.history.lsa.umich.edu/antiapartheid/exhibits/show/exhibit/students-take-campus--1984-198/national-context--president-re">constructive engagement</a>” in southern Africa. It was widely perceived among anti-aparthed groups in the US and presumably in Africa as helping to ease the pressure of the Carter era against White minority rule. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Power-Lines-Years-Africas-Borders/dp/0792241010">Southern Africa</a> remained Carter’s top priority, as Mitchell notes: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Given their druthers, the Africa specialists in the Carter administration would have devoted their full attention to resolving the problems of Rhodesia, Namibia and South Africa. (p. 253)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Carter told me several times that he spent more time pursuing peace in southern Africa than he did on the Middle East, and having read now declassifed files in the Centre library, I agree. </p>
<h2>Post-presidency</h2>
<p>Africa has claimed the lion’s share of resources and energy since President and Mrs Rosalynn Carter founded their <a href="https://cartercenter.org">centre</a> in partnership with Emory University 41 years ago, to work in poor nations, where colonialism and racism, had curtailed growth, opportunity and the sense of shared humanity. In 2015, their grandson Jason Carter, who lived in South Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer and speaks one of the country’s 11 official languages, isiZulu, was elected chair of the centre.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="An elderly man and a woman attach siding to the front of a Habitat for Humanity home." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512424/original/file-20230227-572-110fn1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former US president Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn Carter attach siding to the front of a Habitat for Humanity home in 2003 in LaGrange, Georgia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Erik S. Lesser/Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Africa remains the region of the <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/about/index.html">Carter Centre</a>’s biggest and most enduring commitments, under its motivating slogan “Waging Peace, Fighting Disease, Building Hope”. According to the <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/resources/pdfs/news/annual_reports/annual-report-21.pdf">2021 financial report</a>, the centre’s annual fundraising campaign raises about US$300 million annually. It now operates with a core staff in Atlanta of about 230 and field staff, mostly in Africa, of some 3,100. The centre also has an endowment fund in excess of US$1 billion.</p>
<p>The Carter Centre’s most significant contributions to development have been in the field of <a href="https://cartercenter.org/health/index.html">African public health</a>, to end, mitigate and prevent six diseases, among them malaria and river blindness. </p>
<p><a href="https://cartercenter.org/peace/democracy/index.html">Democracy</a> is the biggest of the peace programmes; election observation and support claim the greatest amount of resources and personnel. </p>
<h2>Carter’s moral compass</h2>
<p>Motivations for Carter’s interest in Africa are deeply personal. A brief address at a staff celebration of his <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/news/editorials_speeches/jimmy-carter-90th-birthday-remarks.html">90th birthday</a> revealed his own reckoning with race at home. This, I believe, may have driven his long involvement in Africa.</p>
<p>Having grown up in tightly segregated rural Georgia, he recalled that his family was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>completely surrounded by African-American children, with whom I played and worked in the fields and hunted and fished in the woods. And I got to know, eventually and slowly, the difference between a privileged group and the ones around us who were not permitted to vote, or to serve on a jury, or to go to a decent school.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He added:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think this, more than anything else, has shaped my life — partially because of the guilt I still feel in not having recognised that disparity between us early on. I took it for granted that if the Supreme Court and the Congress and the American Bar Association and the universities and the churches said it was OK for white people to be superior, that was OK with God. And I think that that experience has been the most overwhelming factor in shaping my life …</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Carter, as I discovered, can be a hard man to work for. He holds himself and those around him to extremely high moral and ethical standards. As president, he kept the peace, told the truth, and obeyed the law. Carter also promised never to profit from the presidency – a pledge, from my observation, that he has scrupulously honoured.</p>
<p>His record should remind all democrats, including those in Africa, to hold leaders accountable to similar standards. For as he declared during his <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2002/carter/lecture/">2002 Nobel Peace lecture</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The bond of our common humanity is stronger than the divisiveness of our fears and prejudices. God gives us the capacity for choice.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200745/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John J Stremlau does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The motivations for Carter’s interest in Africa are deeply personal. His record should remind all democrats, including those in Africa, to hold leaders accountable to high ethical standards.John J Stremlau, Honorary Professor of International Relations, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1857832022-07-27T14:52:14Z2022-07-27T14:52:14ZNoViolet Bulawayo’s new novel is an instant Zimbabwean classic<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475654/original/file-20220722-234-kbs6yj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Noviolet Bulawayo, Zimbabwean writer.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Leonardo Cendamo/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In Zimbabwean author <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/mar/19/noviolet-bulawayo-animal-farm-style-allegory-important-hope-zimbabwe-orwell-glory">NoViolet Bulawayo</a>’s new novel <a href="https://novioletbulawayo.com/books/glory/">Glory</a> – <a href="https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/prize-years/2022">longlisted</a> for the Booker Prize 2022 – animals take on human characteristics. Through this she explores what happens when an authoritarian regime implodes, using characters who are horses, pigs, dogs, cows, cats, chickens, crocodiles, birds and butterflies. </p>
<p>Bulawayo’s celebrated first novel, <a href="https://novioletbulawayo.com/books/we-need-new-names/">We Need New Names</a>, was a coming-of-age story about the escapades of a Zimbabwean girl named Darling who ends up living in America. Its hallmarks are accentuated in this new work: the troubled real world of class struggles, psychological dualities, colonial and postcolonial histories, war and the dog-eat-dog politics of contemporary Africa.</p>
<p>Glory is set in a kingdom called Jidada, which could be <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-gabriel-mugabe-a-man-whose-list-of-failures-is-legion-121596">Robert Mugabe</a>’s Zimbabwe, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Idi-Amin">Idi Amin</a>’s Uganda, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Hastings-Kamuzu-Banda">Hastings Banda</a>’s Malawi, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Mobutu-Sese-Seko">Mobutu Sese Seko</a>’s Zaire, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2021/12/1/the-hypocrisy-of-emmerson-mnangagwa">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>’s Zimbabwe or any other authoritarian regime in Africa, for there are many. The tropes Bulawayo makes fun of are so recognisable and familiar. </p>
<p>Perhaps as memorable as the names in her first novel (Bastard, Godknows) are those of these animal characters (Comrade Nevermiss Nzinga, General Judas Goodness Reza). There is also a Father of the Nation, Sisters of the Disappeared and Defenders of the Revolution, Seat of Power and the Chosen. And there’s the Soldiers of Christ Prophetic Church of Churches.</p>
<p>In fact, there is something almost playful about this book. When politics becomes a farce, it only requires a virtuoso like Bulawayo to marshal the faux pas into a memorable fictional narrative. </p>
<p>The novel fictionalises the real politics of Zimbabwe, from the removal of Mugabe to the rise to power of his former vice-president, Mnangagwa, in 2017 and the years since, during which Zimbabwe’s economy has suffered and the political promises of the “second republic” have gone unfulfilled. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A book cover in bright red and green with black animals illustrated - a horse, cow, dog and a pig on a yellow moon with the words 'GLORY'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475655/original/file-20220722-18-90zoy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chatto & Windus/Penguin Books</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But in order to transcend the particular, the novel is allegoric, capturing the essence of the matter as told by a bold, vivid chorus of animal voices that helps us see our human world more clearly. </p>
<p>In Jidada, the tyrannical Old Horse is ousted in a coup after a 40-year rule. At first there is excitement about the change that will come. But Tuvius Delight Shasha (a former vice-president) leads the country into despair. Destiny Lozikeyi Khumalo, a goat who returns to Jidada after a decade away, becomes a chronicler of her nation’s history and an advocate for its future. </p>
<h2>Humour as resistance</h2>
<p>In an interview in the immediate aftermath of the Zimbabwe <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2017/nov/15/zimbabwe-army-control-harare-coup-robert-mugabe-live">coup d’etat</a> in 2017, Bulawayo talked about attempting to write about the fall of <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">Mugabe</a> in nonfiction but <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/mar/19/noviolet-bulawayo-animal-farm-style-allegory-important-hope-zimbabwe-orwell-glory">abandoning that effort</a>. She found the novel to be a better form for political satire.</p>
<p>Bulawayo’s writing is distinctive. There is a lyricism to her prose, a poetics of language that mesmerises and surprises. This gives her fiction an applied, intense focus. </p>
<p>Translating a present-day political and cultural milieu is tricky. The political language of contemporary Zimbabwe is oppositional, underpinned in historically deep-seated ethnic “for or against” binaries. By refusing to limit her language, Bulawayo shows the shallowness and historical ignorance behind political power in her utopian African country. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-orwells-1984-and-how-it-helps-us-understand-tyrannical-power-today-112066">Guide to the classics: Orwell's 1984 and how it helps us understand tyrannical power today</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Bulawayo also knows how to use language to good effect by deploying irony and comedy. Her use of humour in the novel is a form of political resistance that splinters the make-believe world of an out-of-touch political class.</p>
<h2>Massacres</h2>
<p>Glory is an unforgettable book that goes beyond the obvious comparison to its inspiration, the UK author George Orwell’s 1945 classic <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Animal-Farm">Animal Farm</a>. His book reflects events leading up to the Russian Revolution of 1917 and provides a strong critique against <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Stalinism">Stalinism</a>.</p>
<p>Glory has a lively rhetorical idiom; it is full of colour and vigour. As <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/06/books/review/noviolet-bulawayo-glory.html">one reviewer</a> wrote: “Bulawayo is really out-Orwelling Orwell.” Both authors reference the disarray and traumatic conditions of the world in a distinct and powerful way. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-artists-have-preserved-the-memory-of-zimbabwes-1980s-massacres-143847">How artists have preserved the memory of Zimbabwe's 1980s massacres</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Bulawayo’s novel is also an epic that narrates the misdeeds and violent adventures of the past history of Jidada, such as the time of “Gukurahundi” when the rulers tortured, raped and executed the animals. The Gukurahundi was a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-artists-have-preserved-the-memory-of-zimbabwes-1980s-massacres-143847">genocide</a> that took place in Zimbabwe between 1983 and 1987 when more than 20,000 people were massacred in Matebeleland.</p>
<h2>A global story</h2>
<p>The challenge for Bulawayo, or any writer for that matter, was how to write about a coup still in progress that was described as <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-11-20-zimbabwe-when-is-a-coup-not-a-coup/">a-coup-not-a-coup</a>. How could one write about the events that started when Mugabe was overthrown with the promise of new Zimbabwe that is yet to come?</p>
<p>The end of his reign was a festival of dancing and singing for a generation that knew nothing else but his brutality. Young people posed for Instagram photos with friendly-looking gun-wielding soldiers. They welcomed back a disgraced former vice-president who – like Tuvius Delight Shasha – became the new “Ruler of the Nation and Veteran of the Liberation War, the Greatest Leader of Jidada, Enemy of Corruption, Opener for Business, the Inventor of the Scarf of the Nation, the Survivor of All Assassination Attempts…”</p>
<p>It’s a particular challenge to write about regimes that enforce everything with violence. And yet Bulawayo’s vibrant satire succeeds in telling a political parable that also reflects the times. </p>
<p>Glory is a tour de force. It is not a story about endings but about unravellings. It is not a book about the past, but a book about the present and the future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185783/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tinashe Mushakavanhu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Playing out in an animal kingdom, Glory is a devastating political commentary on Zimbabwe today.Tinashe Mushakavanhu, Junior Research Fellow, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1856482022-07-03T08:10:30Z2022-07-03T08:10:30ZBook on Zimbabwe strongman Robert Mugabe’s legacy has many flaws<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470799/original/file-20220624-17-oop0y4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe died in 2019. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Yeshiel Panchia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Development studies professor David Moore’s new <a href="https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/mugabes-legacy/">book</a>, Mugabe’s Legacy: Coups, Conspiracies and the Conceits of Power in Zimbabwe, attempts to understand the legacy of <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Robert_Mugabe">Robert Mugabe</a>, who led Zimbabwe from 1980 to 2017, when he lost power in a military coup. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/david-b-moore-285501">Moore</a> maintains that Mugabe’s legacy revolves around what he terms “the three Cs”: coups, conspiracies and conceits of political power. He shows that “the three Cs” have their origins in the perilous politics of the independence struggle, in which Mugabe was a key participant.</p>
<p>The book consists of a prologue and 10 chapters. The first chapter seeks “to erect a conceptual structure on which the Zimbabwe ‘facts’ will sit”. Chapters two to five set out “the making of Mugabe and his legacy” in the liberation struggle years. Chapters six to nine trace the independence time trajectory of Mugabe’s political career through to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-military-coup-is-afoot-in-zimbabwe-whats-next-for-the-embattled-nation-87528">2017 coup</a>. Chapter ten examines Zimbabwean politics after Mugabe’s fall from power and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-49604152">death in 2019</a>.</p>
<p>The scholars <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/10.4324/9781003026280/personality-cult-politics-mugabe-zimbabwe-ezra-chitando">Ezra Chitando</a>; <a href="https://www.ohioswallow.com/book/Robert+Mugabe">Sue Onslow and Martin Plaut</a>; <a href="https://www.press.umich.edu/11424894/mugabe">Stephen Chan</a>; and <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-47733-2">Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni and Pedzisai Ruhanya</a>, among others, have debated the legacies of Mugabe’s 37-year rule. </p>
<p>Moore largely ignores the contributions of these important contending studies about Mugabe’s legacies. This is subnormal academic practice. Consequently, the precise ways in which his book surpasses or buttresses competing works about Mugabe’s legacy are indistinct.</p>
<p>Bar an interview with the veteran nationalist politician Edgar Tekere (who had a mammoth lifelong axe to grind with Mugabe) in 2004, Moore did not interview anybody else in Zanu-PF who knew Mugabe well, or worked closely with him for an extended period. For that reason, the book is bereft of exceptionally revealing findings about Mugabe’s leadership, legacy and the politics of Zanu-PF. Moore’s main sources are unremarkable diplomatic cables in Western archives and material already in the public domain such as newspaper articles, NGO reports and published books. They do not make for a groundbreaking book.</p>
<h2>Missing the point</h2>
<p>We live in an age where the decolonisation of the knowledge agenda has, rightly, come to the fore in the academy. In light of this, I expected arguments about Mugabe’s leadership developed by black Zimbabwean scholars based in Zimbabwe to be central to Moore’s analysis. In place of debates about Mugabe by black Zimbabwean scholars, he has the thought of 20th century Italian Marxist intellectual-politician <a href="https://globalsocialtheory.org/thinkers/gramsci-antonio/">Antonio Gramsci</a> as his book’s central point of reference. </p>
<p>Moore invokes Gramsci <em>ad infinitum</em>, without ever properly contextualising his ideas or making clear their illuminating pertinence in debates about Mugabe’s legacy. Nor does Moore use his study of Mugabe’s legacy to extend and refine Gramscian theories. My comprehension of Mugabe, his legacy and Zanu-PF was not enhanced in any novel way after all that Gramsci. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=882&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=882&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=882&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1108&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1108&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/470798/original/file-20220624-22-lqecj8.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1108&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Discussion of real and imagined coups is an important theme in Moore’s book. This is presented as a key component of Mugabe’s legacy. But, Moore does not engage relevant coup and military rule literature in order to enhance our understanding of Zimbabwe’s 2017 coup, and for the coup to advance broader studies about the nature and effects of coups, such as work by <a href="https://yalebooks.co.uk/page/detail/?k=9780300040432">Samuel Decalo</a>, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/african-government-politics-and-policy/when-soldiers-rebel-ethnic-armies-and-political-instability-africa?format=HB&isbn=9781108422475">Kristen Harkness</a>, <a href="https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/10989/seizing-power">Naunihal Singh</a>, <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/10.1146/annurev-polisci-032211-213418">Barbara Geddes</a> and <a href="https://www.ohioswallow.com/book/In+Idi+Amin%E2%80%99s+Shadow">Alicia Decker</a>, among others.</p>
<p>Moore states that he finds coup literature “boring” because it consists of “conservative tracts on the primordial-like prebendal and neo-patrimonial coupishness of Africans” (page 164). Serious coup scholars will bristle at his characterisation of their work as “conservative”, and defined by a propensity to regard Africans as innately prone to coup making because of personalised patronage-based politics. </p>
<p>Moore cursorily engages the African studies scholar <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9248.1973.tb01413.x">Ali Mazrui’s 1973 article</a>, called Lumpen Proletariat and Lumpen Militariat: African Soldiers as New Political Class, about the consequences of coups, to underline why he finds coup literature “boring” and unhelpful.</p>
<p>The problem with this is that Mazrui’s article is dated and was hardly authoritative even in 1973. Moore depicts a crude caricature of a diverse, sophisticated, instructive and evolving coup and military rule literature.</p>
<h2>Portrayal of women</h2>
<p>Feminist scholarship has done much to challenge patriarchal erasure and trivialisation of women in political science. Moore’s book does precisely what feminist scholars have critiqued for decades now. It is laden with unquestioned patriarchal notions and gendered trivialisations that impoverish the study of politics.</p>
<p>Moore writes as if nothing can be gained analytically by treating women (Zimbabwe’s former <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Grace_Mugabe">first lady Grace Mugabe</a>, specifically) seriously. By this I mean methodically tracing, listening to and understanding women’s actual political incentives and experiences. </p>
<p>Moore employs sexist tropes when discussing Grace Mugabe’s role in politics and the 2017 coup. For example, he describes her as “the volatile former secretary”, “the woman who whipped her son’s girlfriend” and “incendiary Grace”. Yet there is no mention of the equally notable emotional volatility of the powerful political men – Mugabe, <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Constantino_Chiwenga">Constantino Chiwenga</a>, <a href="http://www.swradioafrica.com/Documents/Dzinashe%20Machingura.pdf">Dzinashe Machingura</a>, <a href="https://www.colonialrelic.com/biographies/joshua-nkomo/">Joshua Nkomo</a>, <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/samora-machel">Samora Machel</a> and <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Josiah_Tongogara">Josiah Tongogara</a> – who he discusses in his book.</p>
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
<p>Moore did not unearth any treasures in his research of Mugabe’s legacy. He has not even drawn a map that might lead us to an enhanced understanding of the making of Mugabe and his legacy, the politics of Zanu-PF, and coups and their corollaries.</p>
<p><em>Blessing Miles Tendi is the author of <a href="http://www.milestendi.com/books">The Army and Politics in Zimbabwe - Mujuru, the liberation fighter and kingmaker</a></em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185648/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Blessing-Miles Tendi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Moore did not unearth any treasures in his research of Mugabe’s legacy. He has not even drawn a map that might lead us to them.Blessing-Miles Tendi, Associate Professor in the Politics of Africa, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1799212022-03-28T15:11:42Z2022-03-28T15:11:42ZSynik uses hip-hop to discuss Zimbabwe’s issues despite the censors<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454319/original/file-20220325-19-1774bf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Visual Narphilia courtesy Synik</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.” This is how British Somali poet <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-writing-life-of-a-young-prolific-poet-warsan-shire">Warsan Shire</a> begins her now famous poem called <a href="https://seekersguidance.org/articles/social-issues/home-warsan-shire/">Home</a>. These words resonate with the experiences of many Zimbabweans who have been forced to leave their country in search of better opportunities elsewhere. </p>
<p>The beginning of the 2000s saw the rapid economic and political decline of the country, largely due to the inopportune <a href="https://stars.library.ucf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=5082&context=etd">land reform programme</a> instituted by the government of <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">Robert Mugabe</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://hiphopafrican.com/2018/04/11/who-is-synik/">Synik</a> (<a href="https://www.instagram.com/synikzim/?hl=en">Gerald Mugwenhi</a>) is an award-winning Zimbabwean hip-hop artist currently based in Lisbon, Portugal. His first album <a href="https://3-mob.com/entertainment/synik-syn-city-album-review/">SynCity</a> details some of the challenges that force Zimbabweans to leave their homeland. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An album cover with a photo of a dreadlocked man in a brown coat from behind. In front of him a train passes." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454322/original/file-20220325-21-1jttqpv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Synik Records</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>His latest album, <a href="https://www.greedysouth.co.zw/2022/03/new-album-travel-guide-for-broken-by.html">A Travel Guide for the Broken</a>, chronicles what it means to be Zimbabwean in a foreign country. Synik’s new album is a logical extension of his earlier themes. </p>
<p>I first began to explore the way music offers Zimbabweans a space to discuss social issues some years ago. I have argued in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/18125980.2017.1322470">my research</a> that hip-hop artists like Synik offer a self-reflexive space to decry the diverse issues afflicting contemporary Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>In a country where the public sphere is heavily censored by the state, music proposes an alternative space to discuss what is happening.</p>
<h2>Censorship</h2>
<p>In Synik’s time numerous artists in Zimbabwe have had their work censored or banned. For example, visual artist Owen Maseko was arrested and his politically-charged <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-artists-have-preserved-the-memory-of-zimbabwes-1980s-massacres-143847">art exhibition</a> was banned. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-artists-have-preserved-the-memory-of-zimbabwes-1980s-massacres-143847">How artists have preserved the memory of Zimbabwe's 1980s massacres</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Over the years numerous songs have been banned from the national airwaves for being critical of the government. This has included music by non-Zimbabweans. For example, South African group Freshlyground was <a href="https://www.wbur.org/radioboston/2011/06/27/freshlyground">banned</a> from performing in Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>Outspoken Zimbabwean writer Tsitsi Dangarembga explains in a <a href="https://codesria.org/IMG/pdf/Dangarembga_The_Popular_Arts-2.pdf">2008 lecture</a> that there “is practically no public sphere to speak of” in Zimbabwe:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Those who wish to parade peacefully for non-political issues … are refused permits … Those who do not comply with the refusal, and march or parade, are quickly broken up by the police.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Almost 15 years later, nothing has really changed. </p>
<h2>Difficult Zimbabwe</h2>
<p>Released in 2012, SynCity was Synik’s first album. The central theme is life in Harare – however, what happens in the capital city embodies what happens elsewhere in the country. For example, in the song Power Cut, he describes a party scene that is disrupted by an electricity outage, one of the daily struggles faced by Zimbabweans. These struggles, as he states in Marching As One, are man made.</p>
<p>In a more critical song, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/synikzim/videos/synik-greed/10153613199522083/">Greed</a>, Synik paints a grim picture of how greed is to blame for the various challenges bedevilling Zimbabwe. The first part of the song focuses on how a small ruling elite abuses its political power by amassing obscene wealth:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Steals from sanitation, from our homes and clinics</p>
<p>From our children’s education and the roads and bridges too</p>
<p>While they fly to foreign lands for their medical exams</p>
<p>Your folks are in the village dying without a plan</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Synik alludes to how those in positions of power steal from state coffers, so the basic infrastructure and healthcare needed by citizens is either non-existent or dilapidated. </p>
<p>This song ends on a didactic note as he proposes that “we got one world and its resources are limited, so we gotta check our greed if well all gonna live on it”. This is a recurring element in Synik’s songs. He calls for a change in the way people think and act.</p>
<h2>Diaspora blues</h2>
<p>On his <a href="https://synikzim.bandcamp.com/album/a-travel-guide-for-the-broken">new album</a>, Synik explains that although many problems cease when some move to foreign lands, they must deal with a set of new challenges there. </p>
<p>These include xenophobia, racism and racial profiling among many others. Dealing with them leads to a condition which Synik terms “diaspora blues”. In the song Underground he recounts some of these challenges:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Exploited daily, no unions rebuking the bosses</p>
<p>Who pay us half our wages to be boosting their profits</p>
<p>Working long shifts, modern enslavement in progress</p>
<p>Dependants back home is why we taking this nonsense</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He describes how foreigners are blamed for all the things that are wrong in the countries that they have adopted as home: “They are saying <em>kwerekweres</em> are the problem. They say we only there so we can rob them.”</p>
<p>While the diaspora offers economic possibilities, it remains an inhospitable place. In the song <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIBAbupfXok">Rukuvhute</a> (the umbilical cord), Synik refers to how Zimbabweans in the diaspora have to deal with numerous hardships:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Plodding through the hardest of terrains</p>
<p>Conscious of the strain of being estranged from where you came</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Music as critique and alternative archive</h2>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man stand with his hands in his jacket pockets, in a grey hoodie with dreadlocks; he looks deadpan into camera." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/454323/original/file-20220325-23-1gbcdh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo by Visual Narphilia courtesy Synik</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Although the diaspora is inhospitable, it offers security for musicians such as Synik to openly critique the government back home. Academic Isidore Okpewho <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3821157.pdf">explains</a> how migration can offer a productive space of “asking the kinds of questions that lay the foundations for a morally responsible order of existence in the future”.</p>
<p>The music of artists such as Synik is important for its analysis of contemporary Zimbabwean culture and society. Against a background of a stifled and censored public sphere, music presents an alternative public arena. </p>
<p>Through music, Synik and other musicians create a space in which topical political issues can be discussed. The creation of “other” spaces of free speech is important in making known things which the state would rather stifle and obfuscate. Synik’s music is transformed into a tool of documentation that creates an archive of narratives and discourses that are ordinarily sidelined from the public sphere.</p>
<p>The critique offered by this alternative space is central in enabling us to challenge the role of politics and politicians in shaping not just our lives but, importantly, individual and national identity and consciousness.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179921/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gibson Ncube does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Synik’s new album continues to shape identity and consciousness in a country with limited freedom of speech.Gibson Ncube, Lecturer, Stellenbosch UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1751452022-01-24T14:24:57Z2022-01-24T14:24:57ZFrom Algeria to Zimbabwe: how Africa’s autocratic elites cycle in and out of power<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441231/original/file-20220118-19-wv4nw9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe greets supporters massed at his party headquarters shortly before his ouster in 2017.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jekesai Njikizana/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 2021, coups d’état ousted four heads of state in sub-Saharan Africa. Army interventions in Chad, Mali, Guinea and Sudan halted a years-long decline in military takeovers. Some heralded this as the <a href="https://www.ispionline.it/it/pubblicazione/new-military-wave-africa-could-it-turn-tide-32718">comeback of the army</a> in African politics.</p>
<p>Elsewhere in Africa, elected leaders in <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/africa_tunisian-president-sacks-premier-suspends-parliament/6208718.html">Tunisia</a>, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/10/28/rights-groups-accuse-tanzanias-magufuli-over-rising-repression">Tanzania</a> and <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/internationalrelations/2020/07/29/autocratic-entrenchment-as-the-world-turns-a-blind-eye-towards-zimbabwe/">Zimbabwe</a>, among others, were accused of pivoting to authoritarian rule. Common authoritarian measures include suspending parliamentary assemblies, confining opposition leaders, extending term limits and violently repressing opposition and dissent. </p>
<p>Here lies an apparent paradox: despite decades in which democratic institutions have become prevalent across the continent, African states continue to be vulnerable to military takeovers and autocratic forms of power.</p>
<p>Multiple interpretations aim to explain this seeming contradiction. A popular explanation suggests that the world, and especially Africa, is entering a new phase of ‘<a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2015.1045884">democratic backsliding</a>’. This follows a decades-long era during which several leaders were ousted by popular movements. </p>
<p>Nowhere was this more evident than in North Africa. Here, the democratic aspirations of the 2011 Arab Spring were overshadowed by a return to authoritarianism and conflict. Yet, in many of Africa’s <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/competitive-authoritarianism/20A51BE2EBAB59B8AAEFD91B8FA3C9D6">competitive autocracies</a>, the removal of leaders is not associated with revolutionary change. In fact, there is a remarkable stability of senior elites and institutional practices across regimes. This seems to point to their resilience in the face of a supposed trajectory towards democracy.</p>
<p>The literature on <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/logic-political-survival">political survival</a> provides a more compelling narrative to explain political change in competitive autocracies. A leader’s survival is conditioned on the support of senior elites. Leaders can typically spread power among their ‘rival allies’ to keep it and co-opt enough of those elites in exchange for political support. </p>
<p>These actors can in turn leverage their collective power to secure greater influence and rewards from the centre. The concept of a ‘<a href="https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/projects/conflict-research-programme/political-marketplace">political marketplace</a>’ has aptly captured the transactional nature of regime strategies to determine association, loyalty and alliances with senior elites.</p>
<p>Drawing on these insights, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X21000240">our recently published paper</a> seeks to explain political change in African competitive autocracies using the notion of ‘regime cycles’. This framework, which produced rich insights into the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40060127">failed democratisation processes</a> of the post-communist states during the 1990s, suggests that elites must act collectively if they are to challenge the leader, identifying four stages within a regime cycle.</p>
<p>Our research seeks to explain political change in African autocracies by looking at the role of political elites, focusing on cycles of power between a leader and their rivals which determine their survival. In doing so, we propose an alternative conceptual framework to interpret dynamics of change in African autocracies.</p>
<h2>Four stages of the autocratic regime cycle</h2>
<p>Each stage of the cycle is determined by the nature of contestation between the incumbent and senior elites. The balance of power between these actors varies in each stage, according to the level of fragmentation of authority within and across those groups.</p>
<p>The four stages are accommodation, consolidation, factionalisation and crisis. But they do not necessarily follow a chronological order. </p>
<p>During the accommodation phase, leaders build coalitions by distributing rents and authority among senior elites. The intention of this stage is to reward loyalists and co-opt prospective allies. The incentive is integration and inclusion. </p>
<p>The narrowing of competitive influences leads to the consolidation stage. The leader seeks to assert authority over a coalition of ‘rival allies’. This phase coincides with the height of a leader’s authority, where the threat of being removed is lowest.</p>
<p>At this stage, the leader may be perceived to be excessively centralising power. One sign is, for example, replacing security chiefs with loyalists. This may be a threat to other elites. Senior elites may organise along factional lines to create opposition within the regime. This creates factions.</p>
<p>Factions can consist of rival senior elites, who tactically join forces to get the leader to spread power. The intention is not to depose the leader or split the regime, but rather to bargain the terms of inclusion. Leaders also use disorder to try to prevent elite cooperation to lessen the strength of senior elite coalitions.</p>
<p>However, a crisis may occur when factions decide to take advantage of a critical juncture to forcibly reshuffle the ruling coalition. The jostling for power among senior elites typically leads to such crisis moments. This can result in military takeovers, forced resignations, constitutional coups or power-sharing agreements. </p>
<p>Regime crises reshape the existing power structures by disposing of the old leader. They also reshuffle senior elites into a narrow ruling coalition.</p>
<h2>Culmination of ripened factionalism</h2>
<p>In <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-modern-african-studies/article/regime-cycles-and-political-change-in-african-autocracies/E9F73B8C9C658DB171BD44F9FBDA32A3">our paper</a>, we apply these observations to the removal of three of the longest-serving heads of state in Africa. </p>
<p>Between 2017 and 2019, Algeria’s Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir and Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe were ousted after a combined 90 years in power. Our analysis shows that their removal was the culmination of ripened factionalism. In each case, this had blossomed after the leaders’ attempts to centralise power. It was not a direct consequence of mass protests and economic downturns. </p>
<p>Senior military and security elites took advantage of the crisis moment to dispose of the leaders and their loyalists and reshuffle the regime. Naturally, they were once regime insiders and allies of the ageing autocrats. Stages of accommodation, consolidation, factionalisation and crisis preceded and followed the removal according to a cyclical logic.</p>
<p>Our analysis emphasises elite dynamics over the role of mass protests and popular opposition. True popular demonstrations can spark crises within a regime. But leaders and senior elites are more likely to produce significant and durable changes. </p>
<p>Democratic breakthroughs cannot be ruled out. But they are typically the product of a <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/421307">political stalemate</a>. They are not ideological preferences or public appeals for political change. </p>
<p>The forceful removals observed in 2021 seem to conform to this cyclical logic of political change. Senior elites took advantage of a crisis moment to seize power and reconfigure the regime to their own advantage.</p>
<p><em>This is a reedited version of <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/africaatlse/2022/01/13/what-causes-regime-change-in-african-autocracies-dictatorships-political-cycle/">this blog</a> first posted on January 13, 2022.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175145/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrea Carboni is affiliated with Mercy Corps, where he is a Humanitarian Analyst.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clionadh Raleigh receives funding from the European Research Council - ERC grant no. 726504. She is affiliated with ACLED, where she is the Executive Director. </span></em></p>Leaders typically spread power among their ‘rival allies’ to keep it and co-opt enough of those elites in exchange for political support.Andrea Carboni, Postdoctoral research fellow, University of SussexClionadh Raleigh, Professor of Political Geography, School of Global Studies, University of SussexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1624532021-06-10T14:44:35Z2021-06-10T14:44:35ZA new film about Zimbabwe’s 2018 elections is worth watching, but flawed<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/405442/original/file-20210609-14813-1i0akh7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A still featuring opposition leader Nelson Chamisa from the film President (2021).</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Louverture Films/President/Encounters South African International Documentary Festival</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Danish director <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1600828/">Camilla Nielsson</a>’s documentary <a href="https://www.encounters.co.za/film/president/#jp-carousel-242670"><em>President</em></a> (2021) is an up-close, intimate tale. It follows the election travails of Zimbabwe’s main <a href="https://www.mdcallianceparty.org">opposition party</a> the Movement for Democratic Change Alliance and its leader, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-44741062">Nelson Chamisa</a>.</p>
<p>Winner of the prestigious Sundance Film Festival’s Special Jury <a href="https://www.sundance.org/blogs/news/2021-sundance-film-festival-awards-announced">Award</a> for Verité Filmmaking, the film deploys an “in the moment” technique as it follows the lead-up to the 2018 <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-zimbabwes-first-elections-after-the-mugabe-ouster-are-so-significant-100505">general elections</a>. </p>
<p>It documents Chamisa’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-mdc-faces-a-leadership-contest-but-can-it-be-peaceful-112967">battle</a> against the governing Zanu-PF party leader and acting Zimbabwean president <a href="https://theconversation.com/mnangagwa-and-the-military-may-mean-more-bad-news-for-zimbabwe-87646">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>. Mnangagwa ousted Zimbabwe’s 37-year ruler <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">Robert Mugabe</a> in 2017. As the film’s promotional material explains: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>As the election looms closer, it becomes increasingly clear that … an election is no guarantee of a democratic outcome.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>If you have lingering hopes that the Zanu-PF soldiers’ coup replacing the doddering nonagenerian would leave <a href="https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/mugabes-legacy/">Mugabe’s legacy</a> behind, settle down for an intense viewing. </p>
<p>Your hopes will crash, with the opposition troops that <em>President</em> follows. They will die, shot down as brutally as the six demonstrators – and bystanders – displaying their anger at the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission’s delayed <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-false-new-dawn-for-zimbabwe-what-i-got-right-and-wrong-about-the-mood-100971">election tallies</a>.</p>
<p>But perhaps enough Zimbabwean politics-watchers in southern Africa can move the discussion beyond the liberal <a href="https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/president-sundance-review/5156629.article">good vs evil</a> <a href="https://variety.com/2021/film/reviews/president-review-sundance-1234895097/">platitudes</a> repeated by the film’s reviewers to date. A local audience should offer critical and nuanced views.</p>
<h2>Political thriller?</h2>
<p>A Fulbright graduate of visual anthropology and filmmaking at New York University, director Nielsson has several socially conscious films under her belt, often about the plight of children, in <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0408818/?ref_=nm_flmg_dr_8">Afghanistan</a>, <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2115303/?ref_=nm_flmg_dr_7">Darfur</a> and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1641626/?ref_=nm_flmg_dr_6">India</a>. Her <a href="https://variety.com/2014/film/festivals/film-review-democrats-1201361085/">famed</a> documentary <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4143306/?ref_=nm_flmg_dr_4"><em>Democrats</em></a> (2014) covered Zimbabwe’s 2010-2013 constitution-making excursion. </p>
<p><em>President</em> avoids feeding the audience a lot of background history and politics. Nielsson <a href="https://cineuropa.org/en/interview/397158/">says</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We … try to be there when things happen, instead of telling it all backwards and coming up with some sort of analysis. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The film is sold as a political thriller. But as Eric Kohn – perhaps the sole, though mild, critical voice – <a href="https://www.indiewire.com/2021/02/president-review-documentary-zimbabwe-election-1234614636/">writes</a>: the long meetings with Chamisa and company debating how to beat the unbeatable are “less thrilling than exhaustive, a kind of informational activism in feature form”.</p>
<p>Maybe 45 wasted minutes covering meetings could have been used to fill in some glaring gaps that local audiences will notice. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hthioiO6i0A?wmode=transparent&start=41" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The trailer for the documentary, released in 2021.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Classic documentary moments</h2>
<p>One such moment might have followed the (unnamed) academic <a href="https://www.plaas.org.za/staff/phillan-zamchiya/">Phillan Zamchiya</a>. (The film does not identify enough of its characters.) In a hotel room, Chamisa’s lawyerly team debates the next steps. It becomes starkly apparent that this election will go down the drain too. </p>
<p>The camera catches Zamchiya from behind. No polite critic, he <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03057070.2013.858546">argues</a> that Zanu-PF are military. They are guerrillas, he says:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If people are not prepared to die, to go to prison … you are not going to take power away from this regime, believe me or not. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>He might have qualified that Zanu-PF is especially so after the coup, when the pro-Mugabe ‘intelligentsia’ faction was dumped.</p>
<p>Once a student leader severely battered during the early struggles for Zimbabwe’s democracy – as is true for Chamisa, the film shows – Zamchiya knows of what he speaks.</p>
<p>The tortured polling agents filing affidavits about their beatings as they posted ballot reports speak eloquently of that plight. However, the film is silent about how ill-prepared they were for their crucial task. The deceased 1 August demonstrators, angry at the deliberately slow counting of the vote, speak for their last time. The timid <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/the-motlanthe-commissions-anniversary-of-shame">commission of inquiry</a> into their deaths muted them further.</p>
<p><em>President</em>’s filming of those moments is classic. It’s clear why a good documentary can beat the stills. Watch very closely as the officer claps the back of the soldier who shot at the dispersing crowd. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A chaotic street scene featuring half eight soldiers in camouflage and a policeman. One soldier has kneeled and is shooting his rifle. Behind him another has his hand up to slap him on the back, laughing." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/405624/original/file-20210610-15-inlvz8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A screen grab showing a soldier clapping the back of another who has fired on the crowd.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Louverture Films/President</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet Zamchiya’s challenge, if pursued, could have raised more questions of the film’s unfolding events.</p>
<h2>Ignored issues</h2>
<p>Like what other forces shaped this moment? During <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Rhodesia">Rhodesia</a>’s white rule the liberation armies’ military pressure forced the racist regime to the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/race-and-diplomacy-in-zimbabwe/0598BE6A7E9C4D1F0F1DCE36291EB473">negotiating table</a>. This would not have happened without the West because of the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Cold-War">Cold War</a>. But the West’s post-1989 enthusiasm for democracy-lite <a href="https://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/25597">waned</a>. By 2017 it seemed the once opposition-friendly Brits were <a href="http://africanarguments.org/2017/11/08/zimbabwe-the-uks-misguided-role-in-the-rise-and-fall-of-mnangagwa/">backing</a> the sluggish thug Emmerson Mnangagwa who took over the country. </p>
<p>Or the context of how the original opposition’s <a href="https://weaverpresszimbabwe.com/store/history,-politics-and-development/building-from-the-rubble-the-labour-movement-in-zimbabwe-since-2000-by-lloyd-sachikonye-et-al-detail">trade union</a> roots disappeared due to devastating de-industrialisation after the fast track land reform started in the early 2000s – leading to the opposition party’s takeover by lawyers and neo-liberal fantasies.</p>
<p>Lawyers do argue well. <a href="https://lawyersforlawyers.org/en/thabani-mpofu-released-on-bail/">Thabani Mpofu</a>’s valiant, expertly filmed, attempts at the Constitutional Court of Zimbabwe to challenge the vote counting amounted to nothing in the end. It was pleasurable, though, to watch electoral commission bosses and judges trying not to squirm. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/fantasy-that-mnangagwa-would-fix-zimbabwe-now-fully-exposed-110197">Fantasy that Mnangagwa would fix Zimbabwe now fully exposed</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But those who adored Nielsson’s previous film <em>Democrats</em> and its hero, the lawyer Douglas Mwonzora, will know that he has become a leader of a splinter opposition faction <a href="https://www.newzimbabwe.com/mwonzora-dumped-accused-of-duping-supporters-to-join-zanu-pf/">allegedly</a> working with Zanu-PF. They will wonder how long this move brewed. </p>
<p>The Movement for Democratic Change’s earlier splits, patched up in the alliance only as elections approached, are ignored too. So too Chamisa’s rapid and contested <a href="https://issafrica.org/iss-today/mdc-t-does-succession-the-zanu-pf-way">moves</a> to the top of the party after former opposition leader <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-morgan-tsvangirai-heroic-herald-of-an-epoch-foretold-91845">Morgan Tsvangirai</a> died.</p>
<p>Those 45 minutes could have offered much more meaning. Aside from avoiding Chamisa’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6hfvMP7IE8">religious side</a> <em>President</em> could have screened its footage of Chamisa’s press conference in the wake of Zanu-PF’s chaotic <a href="https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/mugabes-legacy/">coup consolidator</a>, as 2019 began. </p>
<p>Dead: at least 17 demonstrators and bystanders. Raped: the same number. Meanwhile, Zanu-PF ‘youth’ set the opposition headquarters alight. The charred walls said it all. They would answer the question of why Chamisa’s pursuit of free and fair elections will not go far in 2023, but also why there are no other choices.</p>
<p><em>President</em> zooms in on the moment at the cost of the big picture. Zooming out could have helped.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>President opens the <a href="https://www.encounters.co.za">Encounters</a> South African International Documentary Festival in Johannesburg on 10 June and then plays in select South African cinemas from 11-21 June.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/162453/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David B. Moore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The award-winning documentary - now on in South Africa - follows opposition leader Nelson Chamisa. But it spends too much time in meetings instead of giving insight into the bigger picture.David B. Moore, Fellow, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge; Professor of Development Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1546632021-02-08T14:15:02Z2021-02-08T14:15:02ZDefeating Museveni can’t be achieved through international pressure alone<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382709/original/file-20210205-21-1td24pu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Joseph Kazibwe, with his wife Magere, listen to radio updates of the Uganda presidential election result in January 2021. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Photo by Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the past few months, Western media and academia have placed unprecedented, and somewhat bewildering, focus on Uganda’s 2021 general elections. It is puzzling because throughout the 2000s and 2010s, most Western commentators either painted a positive image or took a largely lukewarm interest in the deepening tenor of Yoweri Museveni’s 35-year-long authoritarian rule. </p>
<p>The fact is Museveni’s military dictatorship has been draped in civilian garb for a long time. As a routine ritual, Museveni purports to seek legitimation every five years through elections. These elections are scarcely <a href="http://africaworldpressbooks.com/controlling-consent-ugandas-2016-election-edited-by-j-oloka-onyango-and-josephine-ahikire/">free, fair or credible</a>. This has been <a href="https://nai.uu.se/news-and-events/news/2021-01-08-musevenis-rule-by-violence-sends-clear-message-to-opponents.html">particularly true</a> since at least 2001 when Museveni first faced a serious challenge to his stay at the helm. </p>
<p>At a personal, idiosyncratic level Museveni loathes political competition. He has expressed indignation for electoral rules that should apply to all actors. Because he holds an exaggerated sense of <a href="https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/magazines/people-power/museveni-s-changing-stance-on-retirement--3259884">messianic mission for Uganda and Africa</a>, he feels irritated having to subject himself to the motions of electioneering. </p>
<p>As Museveni’s rule has become more repressive, public opinion and media coverage in the West have shifted dramatically against him. In the 2021 elections, many in the community of pro-democracy advocates and activists in Africa found reason to overtly and proactively support Museveni’s main challenger for the presidency, the pop star and member of parliament Robert Kyagulanyi, more popularly known as Bobi Wine. </p>
<p>However, the obsession with Bobi Wine is problematic. This is because it fails to grasp the complex conditions around Museveni’s stay in power and the daunting dilemma of freeing the country from his firm grip. Museveni is a ruler whose primary source of power is the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/%20us-uganda-politics/ugandanspecial-forces-accused-ofejecting-mps-from-parliamentidUSKCN1C41RX">bullet</a> – not the ballot.</p>
<p>Resisting and defeating such an entrenched authoritarian ruler cannot be achieved through pressure from Western powers alone. The forces and fuel that can prudently take down Museveni – in a way that advances the cause of genuine democracy and freedom – must necessarily evolve and emerge from Uganda and among Ugandans. </p>
<p>It is my argument that the outsized role of external agitators might in fact hurt rather than help the struggle for liberation from what is now a decayed, moribund and personalised system of rule. </p>
<h2>It’s not enough to chase out Museveni</h2>
<p>The Western media made the recent election about Bobi Wine as a person rather than what is critically at stake for Uganda and Ugandans. This meant that they handed Museveni a free pass to smear and discredit his opponent. He has sought to portray Bobi Wine as nothing more than an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/jan/11/yoweri-museveni-bobi-wine-uganda-election">agent of foreign interests</a> – a front for the same old imperial interests Museveni repeatedly claims are seeking to weaken Africa.</p>
<p>External agitation and pressure may sound like a benign and welcome ingredient to take down a brazen dictator. In practice, however, it can inadvertently promote nationalist mobilisation and jingoism in the service of entrenching the dictatorship. This happened in <a href="https://www.eurospanbookstore.com/media/pdf/extracts/9781626370760.pdf">Zimbabwe</a> when Robert Mugabe dug in deeper to hold on for so long.</p>
<p>For those keen to advance democracy and freedom in Uganda, the starting point is to take in the lessons of history. Externally instigated regime change tends not to happen the way it is expected to – and often leads to <a href="https://www.belfercenter.org/sites/default/files/files/publication/Kuperman%20policy%20brief%20published%20version%202.pdf">disastrous outcomes</a>. </p>
<p>Bringing about meaningful change is not as simple as chasing out an autocrat and installing a new figure with populist appeal. It is also wrong to construe opposition figures as angels embodying democracy and deserving uncritical embrace. To see Museveni as a devilish dictator and his opponents as angelic democrats is a misleading dichotomy. Today’s ‘pro-democracy’ opposition figures can easily turn into tomorrow’s authoritarian rulers.</p>
<p>Uganda is a deeply socially complex society. The scale of the country’s socioeconomic problems and crisis of its politics cannot be overemphasised. It will be a herculean task to forge a new Uganda of peace and prosperity. The issue is not merely one of saving Ugandans from a ruthless dictator. It is also about understanding how a post-Museveni Uganda can be pursued and prudently implemented. </p>
<p>Here, the Western journalist, the academic, the democracy advocate and activist, the diplomat and politician need to pause and appreciate that principled partnership with Ugandans might help. But old-type paternalism won’t. The agency of Ugandans is what can make a true and durable difference.</p>
<h2>More humility, less hubris</h2>
<p>I propose more humility and less hubris for foreign actors genuinely concerned and fired up for freedom and liberation of suffering Ugandans. The possibility of social disintegration in the country is real. Its social fabric is fragile. The youth bulge presents a <a href="http://fontes.no/foundation/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Michael-Pletscher_Youth-unemployment-in-Uganda.pdf">daunting task</a>. Land conflicts easily portend the most important source of social disharmony and violence. The country’s democratic experiment requires a total rethink. </p>
<p>To start tackling these and other endemic problems, Uganda urgently needs a candid and concerted national conversation to turn the corner away from Museveni’s misrule, to reimagine a new Uganda. </p>
<p>The country wants to free itself from Museveni’s mess, but Museveni too needs to be liberated from his own trap of power. There is a delicate and difficult negotiation to be navigated here. It needs thoughtfulness and perceptiveness, not just fancy slogans and foreign pressure. </p>
<p>The prospects for forging a post-Museveni Uganda any time soon may very well be undercut by actions of overzealous and overbearing foreign actors. There is no magic wand of a popular figure that will easily sweep away Museveni without the efforts of coherent, coordinated and combined change seeking forces inside the country.</p>
<p><em>A longer version of this article was published in <a href="https://codesria.org/IMG/pdf/3-_khisa_codbul_online_21.pdf">CODESRIA Bulletin No.3</a>, January 2021</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154663/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Moses Khisa is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at North Carolina State University, a columnist for Daily Monitor newspaper, a research associate with the Centre for Basic Research in Kampala and a member of the Pan-African Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa in Dakar. </span></em></p>For those keen to advance democracy and freedom in Uganda, the starting point is to take in the lessons of history.Moses Khisa, Assistant Professor of Political Science, North Carolina State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1540852021-01-31T14:55:02Z2021-01-31T14:55:02ZPresident Mnangagwa claimed Zimbabwe was open for business. What’s gone wrong<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380858/original/file-20210127-21-12mklr4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa meets his Chinese counterpart President Xi Jinping in Beijing, in 2018. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Lintao Zhang / POOL</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In November 2017 Zimbabwe’s military <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2017/11/20/africa/zimbabwe-military-takeover-strangest-coup/index.html">replaced</a> Robert Mugabe as head of state with his long-time confidante Emmerson Mnangagwa. He declared Zimbabwe <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/24/zimbabwe-is-open-for-business-new-president-emmerson-mnangagwa-tells-davos.html">“open for business”</a>, linking foreign relations with economic policy. As he <a href="https://irp-cdn.multiscreensite.com/ff7b7050/files/uploaded/HE%20INAUGURATION%20SPEECH.pdf">stated</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>We look forward to playing a positive and constructive role as a free, democratic, transparent and responsible member of the family of nations.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>International expectations (more so than those among local people) looked forward to <a href="https://www.odi.org/blogs/10581-zimbabwe-after-mugabe-three-reasons-hope">translating these promises into policy</a>. This was despite the fact that Mugabe’s departure had been anything but democratic.</p>
<p>But there have been few if any changes in Zimbabwe’s political trajectory. A <a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-shattered-economy-poses-a-serious-challenge-to-fighting-covid-19-135066">deepening economic crisis</a> combined with a brutal crackdown on the government’s domestic opponents has resulted <a href="https://theconversation.com/fantasy-that-mnangagwa-would-fix-zimbabwe-now-fully-exposed-110197">in disappointments</a>.</p>
<p>On the foreign policy front Mnangagwa has fared no better. In a recently published <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021909620986579">analysis</a> we examine the status of Zimbabwe’s foreign policy. We identify what’s gone wrong in its efforts at rapprochement with Western countries in a bid to get sanctions lifted, and why its efforts at cosying up to China haven’t gone to plan either. </p>
<p>We conclude that Mnangagwa’s hopes of reorienting Zimbabwe’s foreign policy have been confounded by his government’s own actions. Its repressive response to mounting economic and political crisis increased rather than diminished its isolation. The more the Mnangagwa government <a href="https://theconversation.com/repression-and-dialogue-in-zimbabwe-twin-strategies-that-arent-working-122139">fails to engage democratically</a> with its own citizens, the more it will negate any prospect of re-engagement. </p>
<h2>Relations with its neighbours</h2>
<p>Since the <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-gabriel-mugabe-a-man-whose-list-of-failures-is-legion-121596">Mugabe</a> era the African Union and Southern African Development Community (SADC) have been tolerant of the Zanu-PF regime’s politics.</p>
<p>SADC’s annual summit in 2019 demanded an <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-49386829">end to Western sanctions</a>.
But the continued repressive nature of Mnangagwa’s regime is not making this loyalty easy.</p>
<p>Tensions have begun to show. In August 2020, South Africa <a href="https://theconversation.com/repression-in-zimbabwe-exposes-south-africas-weakness-144309">dispatched official envoys</a> to Harare to press for restraint on the Mnangagwa government in its actions against opposition figures. The envoys weren’t greeted warmly. Instead they were subjected to a presidential harangue and <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-08-11-mnangagwa-blocks-ramaphosa-envoys-from-meeting-opposition-leaders/">denied the opportunity to meet the opposition</a>. </p>
<p>A subsequent mission by South Africa’s governing party the African National Congress (ANC), acting as a fellow liberation movement, was as <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/zim-not-a-province-of-sa-zanu-pf/">shoddily treated</a>.</p>
<p>South Africa’s patience may be wearing thin. But, for its part, the Southern African Development Community has preferred to officially ignore developments by remaining silent. But while “business as usual” translates into continued political loyalty, it does not translate into increased economic collaboration.</p>
<h2>The West</h2>
<p>Two decades ago the US and European Union imposed sanctions on those linked to the government in <a href="https://academicjournals.org/journal/AJPSIR/article-full-text-pdf/AB5078E40670">response to human rights abuses</a>. Mugabe’s regime reacted by blaming its economic woes on the West. <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-41995876">Mnangagwa</a> decried sanctions as western attempts to bring about <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/202008280420.html">“regime change”</a>.</p>
<p>Unimpressed by the rhetoric, the US extended restrictive measures against targeted individuals and companies <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2779/text">in August 2018</a>. In March 2019, US sanctions <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-zimbabwe-sanctions-idUSKCN1QM01Q">were renewed</a>.</p>
<p>In contrast, the EU demonstrated more willingness to reengage with Harare. In October 2019 the EU announced an aid package, bringing support during the year to €67.5 million. Aid to Zimbabwe since 2014 stood at <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_19_6170">€287 million in 2020</a>. This made the EU Zimbabwe’s biggest donor. To ease the woes of the COVID-19 pandemic, it added another €14.2 million humanitarian assistance <a href="https://www.enca.com/news/eu-gives-zimbabwe-nearly-r14-billion-aid">in 2020</a>.</p>
<p>Mnangagwa, however, continued to blame the West for sanctions he compared with cancer. Responding to criticism <a href="https://www.newsday.co.zw/2019/10/we-aint-moved-by-march-eu-us/">the EU declared</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>Zimbabwe is not where it is because of the so-called sanctions, but years of mismanagement of the economy and corruption.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Similarly, the US Ambassador <a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/analysis/zimbabwe-s-anti-sanctions-march-much-ado-about-nothing/1652712">dismissed</a> “any responsibility for the catastrophic state of the economy and the government’s abuse of its own citizens”. </p>
<p>US Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Jim Risch called upon the Southern African Development Community’s 16 members states to </p>
<blockquote>
<p><a href="https://www.newsday.co.zw/2019/10/we-aint-moved-by-march-eu-us/">focus their energies on supporting democracy, not kleptocratic regimes</a>. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Looking East</h2>
<p>The deterioration of Zimbabwe’s relations with the West coincided with growing Chinese interest in access to African resources for its own rapidly expanding industries. Zimbabwe’s growing isolation offered a convenient entry point. </p>
<p>But, China’s greater involvement was spurred less by solidarity than by self-interest. And it’s singular importance in throwing a life-line to the Zimbabwean regime in need gave it enormous influence in directing the collaboration. Failure to mend relations with the West and other global institutions leaves Zimbabwe with no other partners for development and cooperation, thus <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0974928417749642">vulnerable to manipulation by China</a>.</p>
<p>An initial honeymoon started at the turn of the century, after Zimbabwe became isolated from the West through its <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03056244.2019.1622210">fast-track land reform</a> of 2000, and the increased repression of the political opposition. But China became increasingly concerned about Mugabe’s <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329144700_The_Indigenisation_Policy_and_Economic_Emancipation_in_Zimbabwe_A_Case_Study_of_the_Zimunya-Marange_Communities">indigenisation policy</a>. With Chinese companies the largest foreign direct investors, the announced enforcement of the 51% Zimbabwean ownership in assets exceeding US$ 500,000 from April 2016 <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2016/04/26/chinas-pains-over-zimbabwes-indigenization-plan/">caused discomfort</a>. </p>
<p>Mnangagwa’s elevation to the presidency may have received China’s blessing as the best option available. Nonetheless, strains soon appeared. When it became increasingly apparent that Zimbabwe was unable to service its debts, China wrote off some of the liabilities <a href="https://www.news24.com/fin24/Economy/china-writes-off-zims-debt-report-20180405">in 2018</a>. </p>
<p>What particularly rankled Beijing was that Harare’s incapacity to pay its debts was deemed to be due to the government’s misappropriation or misuse of Chinese funds. Accordingly, there was need to tighten controls. This culminated in the signing of a currency swap deal <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1786207/chinas-currency-swap-deal-with-zimbabwe-could-backfire/">in January 2020</a>.</p>
<p>Back in mid-2019 China’s embassy in Harare had already <a href="http://zw.china-embassy.org/eng/gdxws/t1677101.htm">stressed</a> that development relied mainly on a country’s own efforts. It expressed hope that the Zimbabwean side would continue to create a more favourable environment for all foreign direct investment, including Chinese enterprises.</p>
<p>Indications suggest that China’s patience with the ailing Zimbabwean “all weather friend” is <a href="https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3037104/will-china-ever-tire-zimbabwes-corruption-and-bad-debt">wearing thinner</a>. The new economic challenges following the COVID-19 pandemic might have shifted priorities in global supply chains. This is also affecting the <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-massive-belt-and-road-initiative">Belt and Road Initiative</a>, China’s massive global infrastructure project. This might reduce interest in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/26937614?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">what Zimbabwe has to offer</a> by way of natural resources. </p>
<h2>No stability, no money, few friends?</h2>
<p>Zimbabwean foreign policy remains locked in the parameters of recent times past: looking to regional solidarity, estranged from the West, and increasingly dependent on China. </p>
<p>Yet China has its own very clearly defined interests. These focus on resource extraction in mining and agriculture for its own domestic economy. As a strategic and developmental partner, Zimbabwe is of <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/polp.12373">minor interest</a>. </p>
<p>Chinese-Zimbabwean relations serve <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021909619848783">an elite in the Zanu-PF government</a>. They are accused of <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/03/zimbabwe-opposition-leader-wants-to-give-china-investors-the-boot.html">“asset stripping”</a>. They exclude any oversight, civil society involvement, and lack transparency and accountability. The absence of visible benefits for ordinary Zimbabweans has engendered <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0975087820971443">anti-Chinese sentiments</a>.</p>
<p>Having failed to restore friendly relations with the West, and its “look east policy” not bearing fruits, has left the Mnangagwa regime with few options. Russia has entered the arena, showing increased interest in the extractive industries, arms trade and <a href="https://saiia.org.za/research/russias-resurgence-in-africa-zimbabwe-and-mozambique/">political fraternisation</a>.</p>
<p>This sounds not much like an alternative to the current ties with China. The bedfellows remain more than less of the same. And an old adage comes to mind: with friends like these one does not need enemies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154085/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The more President Mnangagwa’s government fails to engage democratically with its own citizens, the more it will negate any prospect of re-engagement with the West.Henning Melber, Extraordinary Professor, Department of Political Sciences, University of PretoriaRoger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1225862020-09-17T08:01:03Z2020-09-17T08:01:03ZThousands of unidentified Zimbabweans lie in secret mass graves – and I want to find them<p>One of my earliest memories is of violence and death. It happened in Harare in 1984 when I was about seven years old. I was supposed to meet a friend to play at a dump site together. He got there before me and started playing with what turned out to be a hand grenade. The bomb exploded in his hands. He died. I was lucky to survive but I have no doubt that the incident shaped who I was to become.</p>
<p>The device, from my understanding now, had been left by either Rhodesian soldiers or guerrilla fighters during the <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-tribute-to-zimbabwean-liberation-hero-dumiso-dabengwa-117986">war of liberation</a> which raged between 1966 and 1979. Death from grenades and <a href="http://www.the-monitor.org/en-gb/reports/2017/landmine-monitor-2017/casualties.aspx.">landmines</a> was commonplace in Zimbabwe during and after the struggle against colonial rule. </p>
<p>My next exposure to serious violence came when I joined the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) as a constable in 1998. I was trained by former liberation war fighters and soldiers whom we suspected had been redeployed from the notorious “<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-zimbabwe-mugabe-violence/mugabes-legacy-thousands-killed-in-rain-that-washes-away-the-chaff-idUSKCN1VR18H">5th Brigade</a>”. This army unit was responsible for the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/19/mugabe-zimbabwe-gukurahundi-massacre-matabeleland">murder of thousands</a> of Ndebele speaking people and supporters of the Zimbabwe African People’s Union in the 1980s. I joined the police partly due to the lack of employment opportunities and the influence from my stepfather who was a police sergeant. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=861&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=861&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=861&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1082&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1082&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352525/original/file-20200812-18-ijqr9t.PNG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1082&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">ZRP officer Keith Silika in the late 1990s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The police trainers would subject recruits like me to various forms of torture, including water boarding and battering the soles of our feet with rifle butts and sticks. There were other “endurance exercises” that went way over the top. For example, recruits would be ordered to lie down and forced to roll over repeatedly until we were dizzy and throwing up. Apparently, this was done to strengthen us – both physically and mentally – and to get rid of “civilian weaknesses”, as one trainer put it. I spent most of my post probation period with the Police Protection Unit – the agency responsible for the protection of prominent state ministers, judges and other VIPs.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This article is part of Conversation Insights
<br><em>The Insights team generates <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218">long-form journalism</a> derived from interdisciplinary research. The team is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects aimed at tackling societal and scientific challenges.</em> </p>
<hr>
<p>But I only really began to realise the extent of the systemic violence in my home country when I left Zimbabwe and started looking up texts, documentaries and meeting surviving victims of atrocities. In the last 50 years, <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/289331331_When_a_state_turns_on_its_citizens_60_years_of_institutionalised_violence_in_Zimbabwe">five main conflicts</a> have taken place in Zimbabwe. The liberation war (1966-1979), political violence (1980-present day) and the Matabeleland democides (1981-1987) – this is also known as Gukurahundi which is a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shona_language">Shona</a> word meaning “early rain that washes the spring chaff”. </p>
<p>Finally there were the violent <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/jun/02/zimbabwe.andrewmeldrum">farm invasions</a> and the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/panorama/hi/front_page/newsid_9556000/9556242.stm">Marange diamond massacre</a>. Hundreds of thousands of people who were caught up in these conflicts have been killed and gone missing – their deaths covered up and brushed under the carpet by the state.</p>
<p>By 2005 I had joined the police in the UK. But despite my new life I couldn’t stop thinking about how, when and where people were being kidnapped, killed and concealed back home. This had a profound influence on what I chose to do with the next chapter of my life in academia and research. I enrolled for a degree in Forensics and Criminology, pursued a master’s degree in Crime Scene Investigation and then a PhD in Forensic Archaeology.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15740773.2020.1729614#metrics-content">My research</a> has brought me full circle and taken me back to those dangerous playgrounds which I drifted in and out of as a child. I wanted to use my skills as a forensic investigator to find the secret mass graves, the clandestine burial spots. I wanted to know where “the missing” were being hidden. I realised that no systematic forensic investigation of that kind had ever been undertaken.</p>
<p>I was interested in forensic identification, exhumation and the cultural aspects of burial. I interviewed over 60 witnesses – including current and former MPs, human rights defenders and victim family members. I had to keep the identity of my witness a secret to protect them, as many were in fear of their lives. Speaking out can be fatal in Zimbabwe.</p>
<p>Some of what I discovered during my journey was startling. The sheer scale of the killing was shocking – so were the methods of torture. Some burial locations seemed to be selected at random, some were opportunistic interment while others took forethought and planning. The burial methods were dependent on which arm of the state had done the killing and when. Despite this, my research was able to uncover the tactics used by the state to hide thousands of bodies. Tactics including, stacking multiple bodies on top of each other at cemeteries, dumping bodies in mortuaries and burying them in forests, near schools, hospitals and in disused mine shafts. </p>
<h2>‘Fallen heroes’</h2>
<p>I discovered – mainly through witness testimony – that the Fallen Heroes Trust (FHT), which is aligned to the ZANU-PF government, has been on the forefront of dubious exhumation and identification practises since the early 1980s. It used approaches which made it almost impossible to find anyone accountable for the deaths. The <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1372034/Zimbabwes-killing-fields-Mass-grave-600-bodies-shaft.html">Monkey William Mine exhumation</a> of over 600 human remains in Chibondo is one such example. Here, standard anthropological identification methods where ignored. And when human remains are discovered, state <a href="https://www.news24.com/News24/Zim-mass-grave-becomes-propaganda-20110401">propaganda machinery</a> goes into overdrive. </p>
<p>Supporters of then President Robert Mugabe claimed the bodies were those of people killed between 1966 and 1979 under the regime of former president Ian Smith – the last white prime minister of the former colony of Rhodesia. Forensic tests and DNA analysis were not carried out. Instead, Saviour Kasukuwere, a government minister at the time, told the media that traditional African religious figures would perform rites to invoke spirits to identify the dead.</p>
<p>Mr Kasukuwere, <a href="https://africabriefing.org/2020/06/former-zimbabwe-minister-saviour-kasukuwere-says-coup-plot-allegations-laughable/">who is now in exile</a>, said the Chibondo remains were discovered in 2008 by a gold panner who crawled into the shaft. But spirits of war dead had long “possessed” villagers and children in the district. He said: “The spirits have refused to lie still. They want the world to see what Smith did to our people.”</p>
<p>I spoke to an anthropologist who attended the exhumation as an observer who told me that some of the bodies were wearing contemporary clothing which did not exist during the liberation war. Amnesty International advised the government to halt exhumation, pending <a href="https://www.voazimbabwe.com/a/exhumation-of-bodies-at-chibondo-mine-causes-controversy-as-organizations-call-for-government-to-end-process-119348439/1458156.html">forensic investigation</a>. But this advice was ignored. </p>
<p>My research also found that the state of the human remains in Chibondo pointed to the presence of <a href="https://www.news-medical.net/life-sciences/What-are-Lipids.aspx#:%7E:text=Lipids%20are%20molecules%20that%20contain,not%20made%20up%20of%20protein.">lipids</a>, blood and decaying flesh. It is highly likely that these bodies are the remains of supporters of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and former Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) cadres. Since its formation 1999 hundreds of supporters have been killed, injured or <a href="http://mdc-youthassembly.blogspot.com/p/roll-of-honor.html">disappeared</a>.</p>
<p>The FHT routinely exhumes remains without following accepted and professional forensic approaches. For example, <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/humus/">black humus soil</a> was incorrectly attributed to human remains found at an exhumation at Castle Kopje farm in Rusape according to one witness I spoke to. During a different exhumation, another witness told me: “One member of the FHT picked up a walking stick and assigned the remains to the individual next to it.” No other identification was used to ascertain identity, according to my witness.</p>
<p>The FHT also claims to have exhumed over 6,000 bodies around the country using “<a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/man-with-a-rare-calling/">spirit mediums</a>” – who are seemingly deemed more effective than forensic science.</p>
<h2>‘Blood soaked human remains’</h2>
<p>One witness I spoke to described how they were detained at Bhalagwe Camp, which is south of Bulawayo where the 5th Brigade set up a <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/correspondent/1852133.stm">concentration camp</a> in 1985. The source, aged only 14 at the time, witnessed a daily routine of dead bodies <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7388214.stm">being dumped</a> into the disused Antelope mine shafts 5km away. They were dumped in the old gold mine after they had been tortured and killed in the camp. The man, now in his 50s, told me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I used to be selected, often to assist in dragging blood soaked human remains from the campsite to be deposited into toilet latrines or transported into nearby disused mineshafts.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another male victim I interviewed recalled how he was seized from a bus travelling from Kezi to Bulawayo at a roadblock. He was 20 at the time and was forced off the bus by the 5th brigade and made to stay at a makeshift detention centre.</p>
<p>It was here, he told me, that he saw a pile of human flesh decomposing and later set alight by soldiers. “Most were killed on the false allegation of harbouring and supporting army deserters or dissidents”, he said. This was quite a common narrative at the time. Up until the present day, vital documents and information about the <a href="https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/MURDER.HTM">democide</a> are not known due to the continued obfuscation of information surrounding the massacres by the government.</p>
<h2>State brutality</h2>
<p>Police are seen by some as being just another partisan arm of the state. But Human Rights Watch <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2008/zimbabwe1108/7.htm">has reported</a> that people “routinely” die in police custody. Human Rights Watch and my own interviews found that the police and Zimbabwe’s Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) often refuse to transfer the bodies of the dead through normal burial processes and sometimes even refuse victims access to their deceased relative. There have also been cases where they denied further investigation. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, the army has been killing people on behalf of the state with impunity since 1980. Witnesses <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9Bk5VIhjiY">have reported</a> seeing the army digging mass grave in Dangamvura cemetery and piling the human remains inside them. On one occasion, a witness saw the army using prisoners to dig the graves.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/k9Bk5VIhjiY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The state intelligence services are much more elusive and wield authority over other security departments. They have more resources and can use other apparatus to <a href="https://www.thestandard.co.zw/2019/09/01/history-abductions-assassinations/">transfer abductees or human remains</a>. They own properties for training and logistics and some of these locations are are believed to have been used for torture and even burial of human remains, according to <a href="https://www.thezimbabwean.co/2011/10/cio-offices-torture-centres-exposed/">surviving witness testimony</a>. This was also confirmed with a witness I spoke to.</p>
<p>Another witness I interviewed went to the Marange diamond fields at the height of government operation in 2008 – <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/epic/gemd/5644252/Zanu-PF-and-Zimbabwe-military-profiting-from-diamond-massacre.html">Operation Hakudzokwi</a> (“do not return” in Shona). He travelled all the way to Marange, about 120 miles from Chitungwiza, with three friends and got introduced to a syndicate leader who turned out to be a police officer. They were then given a map and some equipment and were directed where to go. He told me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We spent three days in the fields playing cat and mouse with security details. We often heard gunshots in the night. In the day we would see police officers collecting bodies in metal coffins.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Since 2000, there have been more than 5,000 abductions by the state with about 49 abductions recorded in 2019 alone, <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=25944&LangID=E">according to the UN</a>. I spoke to three witnesses who were abducted, tortured, stripped naked and then dumped near lake Chivero, which is 37km south-west of Harare. One said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I was bundled into a Toyota Land Cruiser vehicle after being trailed by the unmarked vehicle in Harare. When we arrived near the lake they started beating me up with boots and fists.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The man said the thugs were demanding to know what the opposition plan was on an upcoming demonstration. When he could not confirm anything, they left him to walk naked to the main road for help.</p>
<h2>What happened to the dead?</h2>
<p>According to my study of the Gukurahundi killings, bodies were thrown down mine shafts in Antelope, Chibondo, Silobela, Filabusi and Nkayi. Human remains have been found at schools, hospitals, river banks, dams and caves. They have been dumped near business centres, disused airports and at former detention centres like Bhalagwe and Sun Yet Sen, which were set up during elections by war veterans and ZANU-PF youths. In 2011, for instance, a mass grave containing the remains of 60 people collapsed on a field while <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/oct/05/mass-grave-found-zimbabwe-school">children played football</a>. Victims who are not claimed at mortuaries are given pauper burials. This makes the search and recovery process even more difficult. </p>
<p>The use of cemeteries, like Hanyani and Kumbudzi, for stacking bodies in mass graves, is a particularly nefarious method. Cultural myths associated with the dead mean people very rarely venture into cemeteries. There is a belief that the spirits of the dead roam those places.</p>
<p>The victims of the Marange fields atrocities were killed by criminal syndicates attached to certain military personnel. They were either buried in the mines or taken away. Those taken away were buried by prisoners in cemeteries in Dangamvura, which is 22km away from the mining fields. The army dug two mass graves in Dangamvura cemetery in 2008 and <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2009/06/26/diamonds-rough/human-rights-abuses-marange-diamond-fields-zimbabwe">buried over 60 bodies</a> there.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Missing person Miriam Gonzo" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354860/original/file-20200826-7352-abrr8i.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1010&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Miriam Gonzo, 50, from Rushinga, Zimbabwe, listed as missing by Interpol.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.interpol.int/en/How-we-work/Notices/View-Yellow-Notices#2019-104770">Interpol</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Many of these things are common knowledge in Zimbabwe. Yet despite the alarming number of deaths and kidnaps, the official missing person database for Zimbabwe with Interpol currently stands <a href="https://www.interpol.int/en/How-we-work/Notices/View-Yellow-Notices">at just 15</a>. It includes my cousin, <a href="https://www.interpol.int/en/How-we-work/Notices/View-Yellow-Notices#2019-104770">Miriam Gonzo</a>, who went missing in South Africa. </p>
<p>Curiously it excludes people missing from the various democides, including journalist and human rights defender <a href="https://www.amnestyusa.org/journalist-and-activist-disappeared-in-zimbabwe">Itai Dzamara</a> who was kidnapped by state agents in broad daylight in 2016 while having a haircut. </p>
<h2>Clouded in secrecy</h2>
<p>Another layer of deception that emerged during the Mugabe era was the issuing of death certificates for the Gukurahundi democide. The vice president at the time, Phelekezela Mphoko, started a programme of issuing <a href="https://www.voazimbabwe.com/a/zimbabwe-government-gukurahundi-atrocities/4868914.html">death certificates</a> to surviving families without any investigation. Such processes will add to the conundrum of trying to identify and reconcile records of the missing in future.</p>
<p>The state often denies all killings and blames them on “insurgents”, “malcontents” and “third parties”. This is the narrative that was offered for the January and August 2019 state killings that saw over 18 people murdered by men in army uniforms. A subsequent <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/zimbabwe/motlanthe-commission-s-anniversary-shame.">inquiry</a>, led by former South African president, Kgalema Motlanthe, concluded that the army was culpable – but there are still no prosecutions as a result.</p>
<p>Despite the death of Mugabe, the government continues to mislead the population. In May three women, including MP Joana Mamombe, said they <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/10/zimbabwe-charges-activists-with-lying-about-police-torture">were kidnapped</a>, tortured and sexually assaulted by state agents. Not only did the state deny the abductions but they charged the women with breaking COVID-19 lockdown regulations and presenting false information to police.</p>
<p>In 2018 President Emmerson Mnangagwa enacted the <a href="http://www.nprc.org.zw/">National Peace and Reconciliation Act</a>: legislation that facilitated the formation of a commission to look into previous human rights abuses. In addition, the Zimbabwean Parliament is debating the <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/coroners-bill-tightens-noose-on-cops-zpcs-and-doctors/">Coroners Act Bill</a> which will establish the office of the coroner to investigate suspicious deaths.</p>
<p>There is a pressing need for human rights groups to compile a comprehensive missing persons database. An independent regulatory authority must oversee this whole process. International organisations, such as the <a href="https://oic.icmp.int/index.php?w=mp_reg">International Commission for Missing Persons</a>, could help.</p>
<p>I hope my research will support this effort and help correct the <a href="http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0259-01902018000100003">inaccurate historical record</a>. More importantly, I want to help grieving relatives bury their loved ones and finally achieve some sort of closure. </p>
<p>When I finished my research, the image of my school friend was even more ingrained in my consciousness. It is for people like him, that investigations like mine must be allowed to continue.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>For you: more from our <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Insights series</a>:</em></p>
<ul>
<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/searching-for-misha-the-life-and-tragedies-of-the-worlds-most-famous-polar-bear-137344?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Searching for Misha: the life and tragedies of the world’s most famous polar bear</a></em></p></li>
<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/how-thomas-cromwell-used-cut-and-paste-to-insert-himself-into-henry-viiis-great-bible-143765?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">How Thomas Cromwell used cut and paste to insert himself into Henry VIII’s Great Bible</a></em></p></li>
<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/is-humanity-doomed-because-we-cant-plan-for-the-long-term-three-experts-discuss-137943?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Is humanity doomed because we can’t plan for the long term? Three experts discuss</a></em></p></li>
</ul>
<p><em>To hear about new Insights articles, join the hundreds of thousands of people who value The Conversation’s evidence-based news. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/the-daily-newsletter-2?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK"><strong>Subscribe to our newsletter</strong></a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122586/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Keith K Silika does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A forensic archaeologist and former Zimbabwe police officer uses his investigative skills to find the missing and the dead in his homeland.Keith K Silika, PhD Candidate in Forensic Archaeology, Staffordshire UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1438472020-08-04T15:24:33Z2020-08-04T15:24:33ZHow artists have preserved the memory of Zimbabwe’s 1980s massacres<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/350897/original/file-20200803-14-1vcb9b8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A scene from a play about the Gukurahundi genocide, 1983 The Dark Years, performed in Harare in 2018.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">JEKESAI NJIKIZANA/AFP/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Let people vent,” lamented performing artist and television personality <a href="http://almasiartsalliance.org/category/kudzai-sevenzo/">Kudzai Sevenzo</a> in a <a href="https://twitter.com/KudzaiSevenzo/status/1288407558097641472?s=20">tweet</a> as Zimbabweans on social media reacted to the death of <a href="https://apnews.com/7afe3ad83057f11f793dd54228e8e8d9">Perence Shiri</a>. Shiri was the Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/profile/zenzele-ndebele">Zenzele Ndebele</a>, an investigative journalist, also spoke out in a <a href="https://twitter.com/zenzele/status/1289075563236413441?s=20">tweet</a>: “Shiri gets to be buried like a hero. We never got a chance to mourn our relatives who were killed by the 5th Brigade.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.thesouthafrican.com/news/zimbabwe/who-is-perrance-shiri-black-jesus-dead-29-july-2020/">Shiri</a> was a military man who commandeered a praetorian army that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/19/mugabe-zimbabwe-gukurahundi-massacre-matabeleland">killed</a> over 20,000 civilians in the provinces of Matabeleland and the Midlands between 1983 and 1987. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2b5iVGCDs0">Gukurahundi</a> saw his North Korean-trained unit, the <a href="https://gijn.org/2018/12/03/digging-up-zimbabwes-gukurahundi-massacre-dossier/">Fifth Brigade</a>, descend on provinces inhabited by the Ndebele people to quell dissent. <a href="https://bit.ly/2Po03WA"><em>Gukurahundi</em></a> is a Shona term referring to the early summer rains that remove chaff and dirt from the fields.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1289075563236413441"}"></div></p>
<p>The death of Shiri on 29 July 2020 has kindled flames of debate that the ruling party has tried to shut down for many years. </p>
<p>I argue, in a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021989415615646">paper</a> on Gukurahundi, that writers and artists have left behind a richly textured memory on what writer <a href="https://www.novuyotshuma.com/">Novuyo Rosa Tshuma</a> has called the country’s “<a href="https://www.theelephant.info/features/2018/12/06/old-faces-new-masks-zimbabwe-one-year-after-the-coup/">original sin</a>”.</p>
<h2>Enforced ‘collective amnesia’</h2>
<p>In the aftermath of Gukurahundi, <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-gabriel-mugabe-a-man-whose-list-of-failures-is-legion-121596">former president</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-gabriel-mugabe-a-man-whose-list-of-failures-is-legion-121596">Robert Mugabe</a> enforced collective forgetting of this period in Zimbabwe’s history. He referred to it simply as a “<a href="https://www.politicsweb.co.za/documents/mugabes-moments-of-madness">moment of madness</a>” and suggested that discussing the events would undermine attempts to nurture national unity. </p>
<p>His successor, <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-mnangagwa-usher-in-a-new-democracy-the-view-from-zimbabwe-88023">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>, Minister of State Security at the time of the Gukurahundi <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml">genocide</a>, has also implored Zimbabweans to “let bygones be bygones”. At his 2017 <a href="https://bit.ly/2PqhhSY">inauguration</a> he said that the past cannot be changed, but “there is a lot we can do in the present and the future to give our nation a different positive direction”.</p>
<p>However, as l contend in another <a href="https://journals.assaf.org.za/index.php/tvl/article/view/1548">paper</a>, silence on Gukurahundi has not led to any national cohesion. Instead, it has been a part of what’s responsible for the culture of state violence and impunity in Zimbabwe since independence in 1980. </p>
<h2>Writing against forgetting</h2>
<p>Yet, a rich body of literary and visual artworks has emerged thematising the genocide. There have been books in indigenous languages such as <em><a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Uyangisinda_lumhlaba.html?id=U80JAQAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">Uyangisinda Lumhlaba</a></em> (This world is unbearable) in Ndebele by Ezekiel Hleza and <em><a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/Mhandu_dzorusununguko.html?id=jBAkAQAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">Mhandu Dzorusununguko</a></em> (Enemies of independence) in Shona by Edward Masundire. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1126&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1126&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351046/original/file-20200804-24-11pe3tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1126&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Farrar, Straus and Giroux</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There has been an even bigger corpus of texts written in English. Among them is the late Yvonne Vera’s 2002 novel <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781466806061"><em>The Stone Virgins</em></a>. It details the horrors faced by villagers from a ruthless army. In <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/16/zimbabwe-running-with-mother-robert-mugabe"><em>Running with Mother</em></a>, a 2012 novel by Christopher Mlalazi, a child narrator, Rudo, recounts the arrival of the Fifth Brigade in her village.</p>
<p>Peter Godwin’s largely autobiographical <a href="https://www.orwellfoundation.com/book-title/mukiwa-a-white-boy-in-africa/"><em>Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa</em></a>
in 1996 gives a picture of Gukurahundi from the eyes of a young white journalist. And <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/books/review/house-of-stone-novuyo-rosa-tshuma.html"><em>House of Stone</em></a>, the 2018 novel by Novuyo Rosa Tshuma, tells the story of an orphaned young man trying to explore his past. He’ll find out that his father is Black Jesus (a name by which Shiri was known). Tshuma’s descriptions of the genocide are detailed, graphic and ghastly. </p>
<p>Literary creativity has made it possible to remember, commemorate and document experiences that otherwise would have been forgotten or dispersed through wilful omission. In doing so, literary texts create narratives of Zimbabwe’s history and national identity. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351049/original/file-20200804-22-1gyina7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">W. W. Norton & Company</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“To write is to banish silence,” writes Vera in her 1995 <a href="https://ocul-yor.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01OCUL_YOR/q36jf8/alma991010694059705164">doctoral thesis</a> on colonialism and narratives of resistance. “As a writer, you don’t want to suppress history, you want to be one of the people liberating stories.” </p>
<p>She explains that “to write is to engage possibilities for triumphant and repeated exits, inversion and recuperation of identity”. In this line of thinking, writing can offer victims of Gukurahundi a voice which the state continues to deny them. </p>
<h2>Art of torture</h2>
<p>Visual artworks have also engaged with Gukurahundi, such as in the exhibition <em>Sibathontisele</em> by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/apr/04/zimbabwe-artist-arrest-mugabe-censorship">Owen Maseko</a>, which has stood for years as a material text-under-erasure in Zimbabwe. <em>Sibathontisele</em> is a Ndebele word meaning “we drip it on them”. It refers to an infamous torture technique used by the Fifth Brigade in which they dripped hot and melted plastic on victims.</p>
<p>Unlike literary texts, which have remained unbanned and uncensored, Maseko’s 2010 exhibition was banned by state security a day after its opening at the <a href="http://www.nationalgallerybyo.com/">National Arts Gallery</a> in Bulawayo and the artist was arrested. Visual art, it appears, is deemed more subversive than written texts. In spite of such restrictions, Maseko’s exhibition has been hosted outside Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>The artist explains in this <a href="http://archive.kubatana.net/docs/artcul/osisa_trials_tribulatn_of_artist_110630.pdf">article</a> that art, justice and human rights are intricately interrelated. Visual art plays a role in bringing to the surface narratives on Gukurahundi, which have been buried for almost three decades.</p>
<h2>The rich memory</h2>
<p>Writers and visual artists are able to create alternative spaces for marginalised and forgotten stories. And Zimbabwe’s artists have created a rich memory and archive that counters the culture of forgetting and criminalising open discussion of Gukurahundi. </p>
<p>Through their works, histories are revisited so that they can be better understood and can be accorded their rightful recognition. They have opened new spaces of discussion and have gestured towards the importance of remembering and learning from the past.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143847/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gibson Ncube does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Artists are filling the state’s silence by revisiting history so that it can be discussed.Gibson Ncube, Associate Professor, University of ZimbabweLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1421952020-07-26T09:52:15Z2020-07-26T09:52:15ZEternal mothers, whores or witches: being a woman in politics in Zimbabwe<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349183/original/file-20200723-29-8mzr6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Grace Mugabe at the funeral of former president Robert Mugabe.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">JEKESAI NJIKIZANA/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The political arena in Zimbabwe is a de facto male space in which women play very peripheral and insignificant roles. <a href="https://www.theindigopress.com/these-bones-will-rise-again">Author</a> and scholar Panashe Chigumadzi sums the situation up in an op-ed <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/02/opinion/zimbabwe-elections-mugabe-fear-women.html">article</a>, writing that </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Politics in Zimbabwe remains a man’s game, and virility is a measure of one’s ability to rule over others. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>It is not the place of women to rule, especially over men. Women who dare to aspire to rule are considered to be wild and unruly.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-30307333">Grace Mugabe</a>, the former first lady of Zimbabwe, is one such woman, I <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10130950.2020.1749523">argue</a> in a paper on the tropes used to describe women in politics in the southern African country. </p>
<p>Grace rattled political cages in 2019 in her bid to replace her ageing <a href="https://theconversation.com/mugabe-is-dead-but-old-men-still-run-southern-africa-123611">husband</a>, both as leader of the ruling <a href="https://www.qeh.ox.ac.uk/events/zanu-pf-history-1963-2017">ZANU-PF</a> party and also possibly as president of the country. </p>
<p>But instead of focusing on the merits and demerits of her political interests, the recurring comment was that she was a sex-starved <em>hure</em> (a Shona word for “whore”). This sexist slandering has not been used to describe just Grace Mugabe. It has been used systematically to <a href="https://www.newsday.co.zw/2018/06/mudslinging-sexism-scath-female-politicians/">denigrate women</a> who aspire for any political positions.</p>
<h2>From ‘gold-digger’ to mother figure</h2>
<p>Grace became a public figure in 1996 when she married Robert Mugabe after the death of his first wife. She had previously been his personal assistant. At the time of the marriage, she was defamed for having an affair while his first wife, Sally, was terminally ill. </p>
<p>Moreover, Grace was labelled a gold-digger because she had married a rich and powerful man who was 40 years her senior. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349196/original/file-20200723-21-aerk5c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sally Mugabe (1931-1992), former first lady.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>She was often compared to Sally, the latter characterised as womanly, motherly and homely. Sally was a saint, according to public opinion, partly because she had assumed a more ornamental role as first lady. </p>
<p>However with time, Grace was embraced as the proverbial mother of the nation and the endearing appellation of <em>Amai</em> (mother) was bestowed on her.</p>
<p>In 2014, she took her first steps in politics when she was elected president of the women’s league of the ruling Zanu-PF party. She was fronted as the face of the Generation 40 faction within the ruling party. Generation 40 was a group of young party members who felt there was need for a change of power from the old guard that had waged the liberation war. Grace began a series of rallies across the country. The rallying call at these events was the Shona phrase <em>Munhu wese kuna Amai</em> (Everyone, side with Mother). </p>
<p>She used the rallies to <a href="https://www.newsday.co.zw/2017/11/g40-plots-anti-mnangagwa-demo/">attack</a> not just members of the opposition but more importantly members of the competing faction which was headed by current president <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-mnangagwa-usher-in-a-new-democracy-the-view-from-zimbabwe-88023">Emmerson Mnangagwa</a>. Her outbreaks were far from diplomatic, they were blunt, <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/zimbabwe/mugabes-launch-scathing-attack-on-vp-mnangagwa-20170911">scathing and contemptuous</a>.</p>
<h2>From mother figure to ‘whore’</h2>
<p>It was around the time of the countrywide interface rallies that the name <em>Amai</em> was gradually replaced by the tag of <em>hure</em>. Academic and writer Rudo Mudiwa in the <a href="https://www.africasacountry.com/2017/11/on-grace-mugabe-coups-phalluses-and-what-is-being-defended">article</a> <em>On Grace Mugabe: coups, phalluses, and what is being defended</em>, explains how Grace came to be called <em>hure</em> and shows how the name was linked to the November 2017 “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/11/15/zimbabwe-when-a-coup-is-not-a-coup/">coup that was not a coup</a>”:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Grace, already branded a harlot, was considered a threat to the nation-state on the basis that she was improperly influencing Mugabe, weaponising their pillow talk to sway a senile old man. Her speeches, nakedly ambitious, only seemed to confirm that it was she who was in power in Harare. The phallus had been deposed.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The <em>hure</em> label was used because Grace had subverted the image of the domesticated first lady who was not interested in politics. In Mudiwa’s argument, the soft coup that overthrew Mugabe was actually a defence of patriarchy and a counter attack against the anxieties that Grace was causing men in politics. The military intervention could thus be read as the protection of male dominance which had been challenged by a woman who had left behind her decorative role as a silent, domesticated and thus respectable woman.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/349181/original/file-20200723-15-ztomms.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Grace Mugabe addresses a religious gathering and rally in 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">JEKESAI NJIKIZANA/AFP via Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What this tells us</h2>
<p>Grace Mugabe’s short stint in politics has shown that women are far from being afforded a place in Zimbabwean politics. </p>
<p>Sexist and misogynistic slurs such as <em>hure</em> point to how women continue to be sexualised and objectified. The treatment of women in politics is no different from how women in general are regarded in the country, because their competencies are often disregarded or unnoticed. Emphasis is placed rather on their bodies and sexualities.</p>
<p>In the few instances that women are accorded a space in politics, they are used as pawns in factional battles within political parties, as Grace was. </p>
<p>When she attacked other women politicians like former vice president <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-35708891/joice-mujuru-mugabe-s-new-rival-in-zimbabwe-my-hands-are-clean">Joice Mujuru</a>, she was not considered dangerous. However, when her verbal attacks targeted men like Mnangagwa she was deemed to be treading treacherously. When the coup that toppled Mugabe was in progress, the men in the Generation 40 faction clandestinely left the country, leaving Grace alone to deal with the military.</p>
<h2>The future of women in Zimbabwean politics</h2>
<p>As long as safe and conducive spaces are not created for women in Zimbabwe, they will continue to be sidelined from positions of political power and authority. As Zimbabwe continues to aspire towards democracy and democratic ideals, despite the odds, more needs to be done to level the political playing field.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mugabe-is-dead-but-old-men-still-run-southern-africa-123611">Mugabe is dead, but old men still run southern Africa</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Women who do choose to venture into the field of politics will need to do so fully aware of the multifarious challenges that lie in wait. They will need to be strategic in their actions and how they navigate a space that is slanted heavily against them.</p>
<p>For as long patriarchal societies, such as Zimbabwe, do not recognise the vast potential women have as knowledgeable politicians and skilled decision-makers, an equitable society cannot be realised.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/142195/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gibson Ncube does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Sexist slandering has been used not just to describe Grace Mugabe, but to denigrate any women who aspire to political positions.Gibson Ncube, Associate Professor, University of ZimbabweLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1369252020-04-30T12:12:24Z2020-04-30T12:12:24ZRefugees tell stories of problems – and unity – in facing the coronavirus<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331157/original/file-20200428-110757-g6j7db.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A group of refugees living on the pavement near the Cape Town Central Police Station on the first day of a national coronavirus lockdown, March 27, 2020 in Cape Town, South Africa. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/general-view-of-a-group-of-refugees-living-on-the-pavement-news-photo/1208565415?adppopup=true">Getty/Nardus Engelbrecht/ Gallo Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Across the globe, refugees are trying to settle into new surroundings and are running into new challenges thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. </p>
<p>But too often news coverage of refugee issues doesn’t include the people’s own voices. <a href="https://fletcher.tufts.edu/people/karen-jacobsen?personkey=3923141C-E683-40A6-B7CB-CAE5E77BA514">We</a> <a href="https://www.refugeesintowns.org/people">coordinate</a> the <a href="https://www.refugeesintowns.org/">Refugees in Towns</a> project, which is a network of refugee researchers and humanitarian workers who we train to conduct research and then write about their experiences in the cities where they live. </p>
<p>We asked members of our network to tell us how the COVID-19 pandemic was affecting their lives. Here are dispatches from South Africa, Serbia, Zimbabwe, Costa Rica, Denmark and Jordan, written by our refugee researchers and aid workers. </p>
<h2>Denmark</h2>
<p><em>Denmark hosts <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/statistical-yearbooks.html">39,000 refugees and asylum seekers</a>, from countries such as Syria, Iraq and Somalia. Abdullah, a Syrian refugee in Aarhus, wrote:</em></p>
<p>The Ministry of Health has published fliers and educational videos in multiple languages to help refugees understand the new rules (ed: about the coronavirus). The Danish Refugee Council used Facebook to help refugee students with their homework by matching them with local volunteers. Refugees took initiatives … through social media groups created to translate information, news and new rules.</p>
<p>Refugee parents with kids in school experience new challenges with remote teaching, and try to use the (refugee council) groups to help. My friend Reem told me about her difficulties communicating with her daughter’s school through the school app because it is in Danish.</p>
<p>The refugees and the Danes say the coronavirus crisis is creating a kind of unity among people. It shows how the world is interconnected and everybody learns lessons about taking care of each other. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0nwnYjANOGM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">In this video from the U.N.’s High Commission on Refugees, the students of Za’atari refugee camp in Jordan continue their education despite the closure of the 32 schools in the camp to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Zimbabwe</h2>
<p><em>In recent years, some of the people who fled Zimbabwe during then-<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/06/obituaries/robert-mugabe-dead.html">President Mugabe’s dictatorship</a> have begun returning. But the economy, power supply and health care system <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/04/08/830205827/lockdown-ordered-in-zimbabwe-where-the-economy-and-health-care-already-suffer">are all in desperate straits</a>. Tash came back to “Zim” 17 years after her family was forced to leave their farm during <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1152276/zimbabwes-white-farmers-kicked-out-by-mugabe-will-be-compensated-by-mnangagwa/">Mugabe’s expulsions of white farmers</a>. She wrote from Harare:</em></p>
<p>Zim has been in lockdown now for three weeks and only critical industries like food stores and farming are allowed to operate. The government is applying the rules to both formal and informal sectors, which is a relief. Many people are concerned about our dilapidated health system, but I think we could prevent a major outbreak if people continue to take the lockdown seriously – which they have been doing, amazingly. Social media has reached the rural population.</p>
<p>Perhaps because our economy is so broken, shutting down has not had such a big impact. Our private sector is good at self-regulating and caring for their employees. Many businesses gave hand sanitizer and masks to their workers and some even closed before the lockdown so their staff wouldn’t have to risk travel on public transport. Businesses and money transfers don’t require physical transactions – things continue through WhatsApp. If anything, the shutdown has made life easier, with less pressure on ZESA (Zimbabwe Electrical Supply Company), we have had power all week!</p>
<p>Most people don’t have the means to panic-buy so the shops are still in good stock. People don’t stress about finding fuel (we are only allowed within 5 km radius; the police check and arrest people who go beyond) and many people are walking as they have the time. However, I feel removed living in the “suburbs” with a pantry full of food.</p>
<h2>Serbia</h2>
<p><em>Serbia has almost <a href="https://data2.unhcr.org/en/documents/download/75271">9,000 refugees</a>, mostly from Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan and Bangladesh, who are seeking to move deeper into Europe but are stuck in Serbia. Our Serbian researcher, Teodora, wrote from Belgrade, with a description of how aid organizations, known as NGOs, stopped working after the pandemic began:</em></p>
<p>Almost all humanitarian NGOs withdrew from the field, the Commissariat and one NGO in Belgrade are the only ones working. MSF (Doctors Without Borders) have also withdrawn – they were providing showers and laundry for migrants who live outside reception centers. Migrants in reception centers have water and soap, but not gloves and masks (except what they sew themselves). Lots of people live in a same room (up to 10). They are completely isolated and not able to go anywhere. There are often demonstrations and sometimes violent protests organized by migrants in reception centers. They don’t understand that Serbian people are in quarantine too, and the shops are closed. So, they are angry, thinking that they are simply victims of racism (which is not completely untrue).</p>
<h2>Canada</h2>
<p><em>Canada has resettled <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/19/canada-now-leads-the-world-in-refugee-resettlement-surpassing-the-u-s/">thousands of Syrian refugees</a>. One of them, Noor, reflected on what the pandemic and lockdown is like for refugees living with past trauma and psychosocial problems:</em></p>
<p>It’s not like the war; the war was easier. When we were in Syria, we knew where the attacks would be, and we could move or hide. Not with a virus … We can’t see it. We don’t know where the danger is. During the war we didn’t isolate (ourselves).</p>
<h2>South Africa</h2>
<p><em>South Africa <a href="http://reporting.unhcr.org/node/37">hosts almost 273,000 refugees and asylum seekers</a> from different African countries, including Zimbabwe, Somalia and Eritrea. Barnabas, a Zimbabwean university student living in Makhanda, wrote:</em></p>
<p>The best decision I made this year was to move out of the university residence. When President Cyril Ramaphosa announced South Africa’s lockdown the university administration ordered those in residence to vacate in less than 24 hours. International students were ordered to leave even though there were hardly any flights and some countries were already under lockdown. There was panicking and anxiety among us, even though we were eventually allowed to stay.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331142/original/file-20200428-110785-e7vrzr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Refugees sleep on a sidewalk in Cape Town, South Africa, Friday, March 27, 2020, after South Africa went into a nationwide lockdown for 21 days.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Virus-Outbreak-South-Africa/23a905b96a9b4ed8832aace172385692/1/0">AP/Nardus Engelbrecht</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Since the lockdown, I have remained holed up at my place. Videos of soldiers and the police kicking those who have dared to walk on the streets during the lockdown have been circulating on social media. As an immigrant, I would not want to be on the streets.</p>
<p>Many immigrants work as Uber drivers and waiters, but Uber service is barred, and those depending on tips have no income. Most spaza shop (an informal convenience store) operators in the townships are Somalis and Ethiopians. However, when the Minister of Small Business Development announced which shops should remain open, it was only shops owned by South African nationals, and only they would be compensated for losses. That means immigrants will struggle to raise money to rent the premises they occupy in townships.</p>
<p>It’s interesting how unity has emerged among Zimbabweans here. They are usually a divided community, but now they are mobilizing resources using social media groups like ‘Zimbabweans in Cape Town’ and helping each other buy food and pay rent.</p>
<h2>Costa Rica</h2>
<p><em><a href="https://www.unhcr.org/5d08d7ee7.pdf">Costa Rica officially has 37,000 refugees and asylum seekers</a>, but so-called “<a href="https://migrationdataportal.org/themes/irregular-migration">irregular migrants</a>,” many from African countries, fly to a South American country, then travel north and transit Costa Rica en route to the U.S. On March 18, the government closed its borders and began enforcing strict controls. Michelle, an aid worker in San Jose, wrote:</em></p>
<p>I’m pretty annoyed with border controls and government double talk, it’s obvious that when they close borders many migrants are going to transit through the blind spots. The president has ordered that any migrant resident that leaves the country in the next months will lose [their residence] condition, i.e. permission to be in the country.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/331154/original/file-20200428-110761-g4nge8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Nicaraguan and Cuban homeless migrants demonstrate outside the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees office, demanding help amid the new coronavirus pandemic, in San Jose on April 21, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/nicaraguan-and-cuban-homeless-migrants-demonstrate-outside-news-photo/1210615140?adppopup=true">Getty/Ezequiel Becerra / AFP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As of March 22, the migration police have deported 511 migrants across the northern border with Nicaragua. At the southern border with Panama, the government accepted 2,600 African and Haitian migrants and took them to a detention center in the north, because Costa Rican authorities apparently could not contain the flow.</p>
<h2>Jordan</h2>
<p><em>Jordan hosts some <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/jo/12449-unhcr-continues-to-support-refugees-in-jordan-throughout-2019.html">745,000 mostly Syrian refugees</a>. This is a high number, but not as high as Lebanon, which hosts some 1.5 million Syrian refugees. More than 80% live outside refugee camps, in Jordan’s towns and cities. Ruby, a Jordanian aid worker in Amman, writes:</em></p>
<p>Prices of essential items have increased with serious consequences for both refugees and poor Jordanians. The Jordanian government has set price ceilings for essential goods like groceries and announced penalties for noncompliance. Some landlords show understanding and have accepted delaying rents for the current month. Some restaurant owners provide free meals for volunteer youth … Students continue their education through the electronic platforms launched by the Ministry of Education, and through the private TV channel, but some Syrians struggle to pay for internet cards.</p>
<p>[<em>Get facts about coronavirus and the latest research.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=upper-coronavirus-facts">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter.</a>]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/136925/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From getting schooling for their children through an app in the wrong language to trouble finding gloves and masks, refugees across the globe face different challenges in dealing with the coronavirus.Karen Jacobsen, Henry J. Leir Chair in Global Migration, Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy, Tufts UniversityCharles Simpson, Program Administrator, Feinstein International Center, Tufts UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1236132019-09-19T12:08:26Z2019-09-19T12:08:26ZXenophobia puts South Africa’s moral authority in Africa at risk<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/292949/original/file-20190918-187980-3pvu0k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">South African civil society and private citizens march in protest against xenophobic violence in Johannesburg.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Yeshiel Panchia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>South African President Cyril Ramaphosa was <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-Africa/2019-09-16-watch-ramaphosa-booed-at-mugabes-funeral-in-zimbabwe/">heckled</a> during the recent funeral service of Zimbabwe’s erstwhile leader Robert Mugabe. It was easy to guess why. When he stood to speak, Ramaphosa apologised for weeks of violence in his country <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-a-new-narrative-could-tackle-anti-migrant-crisis-123145">targeted</a> at non-national Africans. </p>
<p>Immediately after this apology, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4en12UC9to">heckling turned into cheers</a>. His apology, a stroke of ingenuity, defused the tension. But it didn’t answer the key question that philosopher and political theorist <a href="https://www.nrf.ac.za/content/professor-achille-mbembe">Achille Mbembe</a> <a href="https://africasacountry.com/2015/04/achille-mbembe-writes-about-xenophobic-south-africa">once asked</a> in relation to xenophobic violence in South Africa:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>When we say ‘South Africa’, is ‘Africa’ an idea or simply a geographical accident? </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Pan-Africanism</h2>
<p>To many, the answer appears pretty obvious: recent events that have seen people baying for the blood of “foreigners” makes the meaning of Africa in South Africa meaningless.</p>
<p>Importantly though, xenophobia is not a uniquely South African phenomenon. Nor is it simply a question of violence against non-national Africans. It is the consequences of the historical burden that colonialism has bequeathed the continent. This refers to colonially determined borders. </p>
<p>These borders separated African people into different nationalities. They were maintained after Africa’s independence. This spawned nationalisms. Xenophobia is the function of the contests of these nationalisms. As the British social scientist Michael Billig explains in his book, <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Banal_Nationalism.html?id=Y5A7CgAAQBAJ">Banal Nationalism</a>, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>the triumph of a particular nationalism is seldom achieved without the defeat of alternative nationalisms and other ways of imagining peoplehood.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Xenophobia negates the spirit of <a href="https://theconversation.com/sobukwes-pan-africanist-dream-an-elusive-idea-that-refuses-to-die-52601">pan-Africanism</a>, especially its laudable ideal that Africans share a mutual bond regardless of their geographical location. </p>
<p>That xenophobic incidents are increasing in post-apartheid South Africa is unexpected. In its formative years as a democracy since 1994, the country had assumed the leadership of the <a href="http://archive.unu.edu/unupress/mbeki.html">African Renaissance cause</a>. It was championed by former South African President of Thabo Mbeki who advocated pan-African <a href="Http://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/file%20uploads%20/10.1.1.548.1968.pdf">“cohesion of economics, culture, growth and development”</a>. </p>
<p>Mbeki eloquently <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=eYmUDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT235&lpg=PT235&dq=atomistic+nation-state,+zero+sum+%5Btheir%5D+sovereignty,+and+%5Brecognise+their+interdependence&source=bl&ots=NM8GXUpN2L&sig=ACfU3U1cyA7bFXvt2F2rESQwT_svhMXmKQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjk-si44tfkAhXeSxUIHSo9BasQ6AEwAHoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=atomistic%20nation-state%2C%20zero%20sum%20%5Btheir%5D%20sovereignty%2C%20and%20%5Brecognise%20their%20interdependence&f=false">stated</a> that, for African countries to assert their influence in global affairs, their governments should</p>
<blockquote>
<p>(forego their) “atomistic nation-state, zero sum sovereignty, and recognise their interdependence”.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Why then do impulses of aggressive patriotism exist in the post-apartheid South Africa? Shouldn’t this pan-African disposition have foregrounded the term “Africa” in “South Africa” as an idea. Shouldn’t it even have shaped the country’s nation-building and state formation project?</p>
<h2>South Africanness and Afrophobia</h2>
<p>Xenophobia and pan-Africanism are antinomies. They have opposite implications on state formation and nation-building. </p>
<p>Xenophobia is a function of insularity – lack of interest in others’ culture, outside one’s own experience. South Africa’s insularity was facilitated by the fact that it was a pariah state for many years. The apartheid system’s strong border control played a role, too. The country internalised the intolerance of difference. This explains its social disorientation, suspicious of foreigners as <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/books/1133-mapping-the-%20nation">“unknown others”</a>. </p>
<p>In many instances, non-national Africans <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/files%20uploads%20/10.1.1.548.1968.pdf">are the primary target of this suspicion</a>. They are, therefore, more likely to be on the receiving end of xenophobic violence. </p>
<p>An appropriate term for this is afrophobia. This is the dehumanising of people of African descent, and in the diaspora, because of their physiques, colour of their skins and behaviours. </p>
<p>The post-apartheid project of nation-building is the by-product of the contradiction of insularity agitating for “South Africanness”, and the African Renaissance as an all-embracing crystallisation of the consciousness of the whole of Africa’s people.</p>
<p>A system of organising society in which individual rights and freedoms are protected, and the markets are left to their own devices, spawned insular nationhood. This trumps the pursuit of a common African identity. It is because of this that, as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-research-reveals-about-drivers-of-anti-immigrant-hate-crime-in-south-africa-123097">socio-economic grievances of the nationals</a> increase, largely because of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.co.za/economic-growth-first-quarter-of-2019-2019-6">economy’s poor performance</a>, nationalism morphs into jingoism. The non-nationals become scapegoats. </p>
<p>Often, the consequences of this, as laid bare in the streets of Gauteng province, are pernicious. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, because of this, South Africa’s moral authority, which it earned after it became a democracy by playing a prominent role in Africa, is at stake. Hence its government is at pains to accept that <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2019-09-10-government-details-anti-crime-plan">xenophobia exists</a>, and that it has been on the rise in the post-apartheid South Africa. </p>
<p>Of course, in some instances this phenomenon is opportunistically used to obscure the criminal activities of some non-national Africans in the country. But the suggestion by some in government that attacks on foreign nationals are sheer criminality rather than xenophobia is not cutting ice. </p>
<p>Some South Africans <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2019/09/10/10-of-12-xenophobia-victims-were-south-african-mapisa-nqakula">also became the victims</a> in <a href="https://theconversation.com/xenophobia-time-for-cool-heads-to-prevail-in-nigeria-and-south-africa-123053">retaliatory attacks</a>.</p>
<p>Coupled with calls that South Africa should be shunned, all these beget a cycle of internecine hostilities. These fracture economic, political and social relations. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, dissociation is not a solution. It’s a cop-out. If South Africa were to become a pariah state – again – whose interest would be served, and to what end? Wouldn’t it be those who, in the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/berlin-conference">Berlin Conference of 1884-1885</a>, negotiated the rules about the scramble for Africa? </p>
<p>Their borders that balkanised Africa continue to stoke interstate acrimony. The xenophobic flare-ups in South Africa should be understood as the cumulative effect of this <a href="http://ukznpress.bookslive.co.za/blog/2012/01/17/read-an-excerpt-from-adekeye-adebajos-the-curse-of-berlin/">historical burden</a>.</p>
<h2>What needs to happen</h2>
<p>Ramaphosa sent special envoys to the countries whose citizens were mostly affected by xenophobic violence – Nigeria, Niger, Ghana, Senegal, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia – <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/ramaphosa-deploys-special-envoys-to-african-heads-of-state-over-tensions-in-south-africa-20190915">to mend relations</a>. This is a good diplomatic gesture.</p>
<p>However, this shouldn’t simply be a charm offensive, but instead a deliberate pursuit to give meaning to the term “Africa” in “South Africa”, which has waned after Mbeki’s presidency. South Africa should reclaim its leading role in Africa’s renaissance.</p>
<p>Re-imagining the future of Africa requires true commitment to pan-Africanism, anchored in the African philosophy of <em>ubuntu</em> (humanism), which <a href="https://www.ttbook.org/interview/i-am-because-we-are-african-philosophy-ubuntu">decrees</a> that</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I am because we are. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The pan-Africanism spirit shouldn’t be fostered only in the African leadership and diplomatic circles, and used for political expediency. It should be part of the psyche of society and become a lived daily experience.</p>
<p>Xenophobia is a function of attitude. It thus requires the intervention of social institutions, such as universities, to mainstream pan-Africanism as a philosophy in their curricula and teaching. </p>
<p>It is important to shape the characters of students, who are future leaders, to understand that human co-existence is not a function of nationality, but of humanity. This should be part of the decoloniality agenda in Africa.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123613/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mashupye Herbert Maserumule received funding from the National Research Foundation(NRF) for his postgraduate studies. He is the chief editor of the Journal of Public Administration and the former President of the South African Association of Public Administration and Management(SAAPAM). The Journal he edits belongs to this learned society. </span></em></p>Xenophobia negates the spirit of pan-Africanism, especially its ideal that Africans share a mutual bond, regardless of their geographical location.Mashupye Herbert Maserumule, Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1236112019-09-17T12:32:18Z2019-09-17T12:32:18ZMugabe is dead, but old men still run southern Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/292643/original/file-20190916-19030-ryoxe2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa at the funeral of his predecessor, Robert Mugabe.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Aaron Ufumeli</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The death of Robert Gabriel Mugabe (95) saw another of the first-generation leaders of newly independent southern African states leave the world stage. </p>
<p>Southern Africa was the last region on the continent to obtain majority rule. The independence of Zimbabwe (1980), Namibia (1990) and democracy in South Africa (1994) ended white settler minority regimes. They were <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24487678?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">replaced in power by liberation movements</a>. The Zimbabwe African National Union (Zanu, later Zanu-PF), the South West African People’s Organisation (Swapo) and the African National Congress (ANC) have been in government since then. </p>
<p>Mugabe’s death invites a look at the succession – or lack of – in these three countries.</p>
<p>Despite the cultivation of heroic narratives and patriotic history, the first-generation freedom fighters who took over the state offices are not immortal. <a href="https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/gerontocratic">Mugabe’s</a> male-dominated leadership structures based on liberation struggle credentials remain entrenched.</p>
<p>In all three countries a second struggle generation is gradually entering the higher echelons of party and state. But the “born free” – people who were born after liberation – as well as women have hardly made significant inroads into the meritocratic, male-dominated core structures of power. </p>
<p>The question is how much longer the “old men syndrome” will remain alive and kicking in the three countries, despite growing frustration among the politically powerless.</p>
<h2>Zimbabwe</h2>
<p>Celebrated by many as an <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/Zimbabwe/obituary-zimbabwes-robert-mugabe-a-revolutionary-20190906">icon of the anti-colonial struggle</a>, Mugabe was nevertheless an autocratic ruler who overstayed his time in office. The military finally replaced him with his longtime confidante Emmerson Mnangagwa in <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/africaatlse/2017/11/16/understanding-the-military-takeover-in-zimbabwe/">a soft coup</a> in November 2017.</p>
<p>Mnangagwa’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/06/zimbabwe-robert-mugabe-vice-president-emmerson-mnangagwa-grace-mugabe">sidelining</a> was initiated by Mugabe’s younger wife Grace (born in 1965, she was 40 years his junior) to hijack the succession of her husband. She led a group of Zanu-PF members, dubbed the <a href="https://www.zimbabwebriefing.org/single-post/2018/07/13/Thinking-after-Zimbabwe%E2%80%99s-ConCoup-Now-Then-and-Then-Again">G40</a> (for Generation 40). The name referred to a constitutional clause that everyone above the age of 40 qualified as a presidential candidate. But, the military and security apparatus and its leadership was still firmly rooted in the struggle generation and opted for <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/11/21/what-is-behind-the-military-coup-in-zimbabwe/">“Team Lacoste”</a> named after “the Crocodile”, which is Mnangagwa’s nickname. </p>
<p>This ended the political careers of the G40. So far, the “elders” remain in charge and in firm control.</p>
<p>Morgan Tsvangirai (born 1952) founded the <a href="http://democracyinafrica.org/zimbabwe-went-wrong-mdc/">Movement for Democratic Change-Tsvangirai</a> in 1999. The opposition party has been denied electoral victory several times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/14/obituaries/morgan-tsvangirai-zimbabwe-dead.html">since 2002</a>. </p>
<p>After Tsvangirai’s death earlier this year the much younger Nelson Chamisa (born in 1978) won the internal party <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/mdc-t-endorses-nelson-chamisa-as-morgan-tsvangirais-successor-13558886">power struggle</a>. He challenged Mnangagwa in the elections in July last year. </p>
<p>Thanks mainly to rural area results, Zanu-PF recorded a landslide victory in the <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/zimelections2018-full-details-of-parliament-results-16378869">parliamentary elections</a>. Mnangagwa also secured a (disputed) and much more narrow first term in office as elected head of state. </p>
<p>This is partly due to a continued stricter social control in rural areas. Political interaction and activities in villages can be much more easily monitored than in urban areas. But it also suggests that traditional values – such as respect for elders – remain alive. This gives the generation in power a comparative advantage over younger competitors. </p>
<p>Similar generational constellations also benefited the governing parties in Namibia and South Africa.</p>
<h2>Namibia</h2>
<p>Namibia has had three state presidents <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/290429183_From_Nujoma_to_Geingob_25_years_of_presidential_democracy">since independence in 1990</a>. Sam Nujoma, co-founder of Swapo in 1960, was its president until 2007 and the country’s first head of state for three terms until 2005. In May he celebrated his 90th birthday in seemingly good health. Though he remains influential, he has been less visible lately.</p>
<p>In a heavy-handed inner-party battle he ensured that his crown prince Hifikepunye Pohamba (born 1936) followed for <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/33326">two terms</a>. Pohamba was succeeded by Namibia’s first Prime Minister Hage Geingob (born 1941).</p>
<p>After a <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2002-09-01-geingob-out-in-the-cold-before-demotion">clash with Nujoma</a>, Geingob left Namibia to <a href="http://ahibo.com/ticad/en/LP2_8GlobalCoalition_E.pdf">head the Global Coalition for Africa</a> in Washington. Returning to Namibia’s parliament, he made a comeback under Pohamba. Reappointed as Prime Minister <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-12-07-namibias-geingobs-comeback-paves-way-for-swapo-moderates">in 2012</a>, he became state president in 2015 and party leader in 2017.</p>
<p>Geingob is tipped to be reelected as head of state for another five-year term in the next presidential and parliamentary elections <a href="https://www.nbc.na/news/namibias-general-elections-be-held-27-november.20811">in November</a>. His current Vice President <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axBhO1aqECg">Nangolo Mbumba</a> is the same age. In the Swapo electoral college on 7 September he secured another top ranking on the party’s candidate list for the National Assembly and will remain in the inner circle of <a href="https://www.namibian.com.na/82885/read/Geingobs-loyalists-win-big-at-the-pot">“Team Hage”</a>.</p>
<p>Five years ago the delegates, in a surprise move, ousted some of the old party cadres. But the elders remained <a href="https://academic.oup.com/afraf/article-abstract/116/463/284/2760214">dominant in cabinet</a>. This time the expected further <a href="https://www.namibian.com.na/82880/read/Swapo-concludes-electoral-college">generational shift did not happen</a>.</p>
<p>Party president Geingob could also fill ten secure seats on the electoral list and brought some of those seniors back, who <a href="https://www.nbc.na/news/president-geingob-throws-old-guard-party-list-lifeline.23864">did not make the cut</a>. As the head of state <a href="http://www.tfd.org.tw/export/sites/tfd/files/publication/journal/155-173-How-Democratic-Is-Namibias-Democracy.pdf">he can appoint</a> another eight non-voting members to parliament. This will allow him to retain several more of the trusted old cadres.</p>
<p>Despite this, Namibia’s second struggle generation (those who went into exile in the mid-1970s) is gradually taking over. </p>
<h2>South Africa</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nelson-rolihlahla-mandela">Nelson Mandela,(1918-2013)</a> served only one term as state president. His successors <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/thabo-mvuyelwa-mbeki">Thabo Mbeki</a> and <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/jacob-gedleyihlekisa-zuma">Jacob Zuma</a> (both born 1942) were recalled by the ANC and did not survive the full two terms in office. </p>
<p>Zuma was succeeded by <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/cyril-matamela-ramaphosa">Cyril Ramaphosa</a>. Born in 1952, he is ten years younger than his predecessor.</p>
<p>Inter-generational tensions have begun to show in South Africa. In the latest national elections young South Africans, or “born frees”, showed their disdain for the ANC’s old guard and agenda by staying away from the polls as a <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1614389/south-africa-election-young-voters-stay-away-from-polls/">form of protest</a>. </p>
<p>This younger generation has shown its frustration with the limits to liberation. Many <a href="https://theconversation.com/study-shows-young-south-africans-have-no-faith-in-democracy-and-politicians-118404">dismiss formal politics</a>. Their preference is to engage in social movements or other parties.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/study-shows-young-south-africans-have-no-faith-in-democracy-and-politicians-118404">Study shows young South Africans have no faith in democracy and politicians</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>One such choice is to support Julius Malema (born 1981) and his Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) which was <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/economic-freedom-fighters-eff">founded in 2013</a> and appeals to a smaller pan-African segment of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-eff-excellent-politics-of-props-and-imagination-59918">younger generation</a>. But the party’s election results remained behind its expectations and kept it in a distant third place, garnering <a href="https://www.elections.org.za/NPEDashboard/App/dashboard.html">only 10,80% in the latest polls</a>.</p>
<h2>The future</h2>
<p>For obvious reasons, the first-generation freedom fighters, who took over the state offices after liberation, continue to place a high value on seniority in age. </p>
<p>Younger generations of leaders and women make only limited inroads into the structures of power, and the “born free” are not represented. </p>
<p>Rather, the second struggle generation is moving upward to take over, maintaining a system which leaves little room for renewal beyond the confines of individual credentials within the ranks of the former liberation movements.</p>
<p>The continued cultivation of a heroic narrative and patriotic history includes the internalised conception that freedom fighters never retire. Theirs is a lifelong struggle. <em>“A luta continua”</em> remains alive as long as they are. </p>
<p>But this is a backward looking perspective, nurtured by a romanticised past. It blocks new ideas and visions by younger generations contributing to governance, which would create ownership and make them feel represented. It prevents rather than creating a common future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123611/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Henning Melber has been a member of Swapo since 1974. </span></em></p>It remains to be seen how much longer the ‘old men syndrome’ will persist in Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa, despite growing frustration among the politically powerless.Henning Melber, Extraordinary Professor, Department of Political Sciences, University of PretoriaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1215962019-09-06T09:08:13Z2019-09-06T09:08:13ZRobert Gabriel Mugabe: a man whose list of failures is legion<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287334/original/file-20190808-144862-11u42pa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Robert Mugabe, former President of Zimbabwe, addressing media in Harare, in July 2018.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE/Yeshiel Panchia</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>One wishes one could say “rest in peace”. One can only say, “may there be more peace for Zimbabwe’s people, now that <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/robert-mugabe">Robert Gabriel Mugabe</a> has retired permanently”. Zimbabwe’s former president <a href="https://theconversation.com/robert-mugabe-as-divisive-in-death-as-he-was-in-life-108103">has died</a>, aged 95.</p>
<p>His failures are legion. They might start with the 1980s Gukurahundi massacres in Matabeleland and the Midlands, with perhaps <a href="https://www.sithatha.com/books">20 000 people killed</a>. Next, too much welfare spending <a href="http://weaverpresszimbabwe.com/reviews/59-becoming-zimbabwe?start=10">in the 1980s</a>. Then crudely implemented <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/289336044_The_Economic_Structural_Adjustment_Programme_The_Case_of_Zimbabwe_1990-1995">structural adjustment programmes</a> in the 1990s, laying the ground for angry war veterans and the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), a strong labour union and civil society based opposition party.</p>
<p>In 1997 Mugabe handed out unbudgeted pensions to the war-vets and promised to really start the “fast track land reform” that got going <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/287199114_The_impact_of_land_reform_in_Zimbabwe_on_the_conservation_of_cheetahs_and_other_large_carnivores">in 2000</a>, when the MDC threatened to defeat Zanu (PF) at the polls. That abrogation of property rights started the slide in the Zimbabwean dollar’s value.</p>
<p>From 1998 to 2003 Zimbabwe’s participation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s second war cost US$1 million a day, creating a military cabal used to getting money fast. Speedy money printing presses led to <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/file%20uploads%20/hany_besada_zimbabwe_picking_up_the_piecesbook4you.pdf">unfathomable hyperinflation</a> and the end of Zimbabwe’s sovereign currency, still the albatross around the country’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48757080">neck</a>. </p>
<p>In 2008, the MDC’s electoral victory was reversed with a presidential run-off when at least 170 opposition supporters were murdered. Hundreds more were beaten and <a href="http://archive.kubatana.net/docs/elec/rau_critique_zec_elec_report_090612.pdf">chased from their homes</a>. Even Mugabe’s regional support base could not stand for that, so he was forced to accept a <a href="https://africanarguments.org/2013/07/15/review-the-hard-road-to-reform-the-politics-of-zimbabwes-global-political-agreement-reviewed-by-timothy-scarnecchia/">transitional inclusive government</a> with the MDC.</p>
<p>Over the next decade, Mugabe was unable to stop his party’s increasing faction fighting. His years of playing one group off against the other to favour himself <a href="https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:f05aec20-6d98-425a-8d82-56688ea93246/download_file?file_format=pdf&safe_filename=State%2Bintelligence%2Band%2Bthe%2Bpolitics%2Bof%2BZimbabwe%2527s%2Bpresidential%2Bsuccession.pdf&type_of_work=Journal+article">finally wore too thin</a>. When in early November 2017, at his wife Grace’s instigation, he fired his long-time lapdog Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa, the generals with whom he’d colluded for decades turned on him. A <em>coup petit</em> ensued and returned Mnangagwa from exile, soon to be elevated to the presidency and heavily indebted to his comrades.</p>
<p>Where did Mugabe gain his proclivity for factionalism? And how did he learn to speak the language all wanted to hear – only to make them realise they had been deluded in the end? </p>
<h2>The beginning</h2>
<p>Mugabe and many other Zimbabwean nationalists were jailed in 1964. Ian Smith was preparing for the Unilateral Declaration of Independence, and the first nationalist party had split into Joshua Nkomo’s Zimbabwe African People’s Union and Ndabaningi Sithole’s Zanu. Mugabe had been Nkomo’s Publicity Secretary. </p>
<p>As far back as 1962, Mugabe was registering on the global scales: Salisbury’s resident British diplomat <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/de/book/9781137543448#aboutAuthors">thought Mugabe was</a> “a sinister figure” heading up a youthful “Zimbabwean Liberation Army … the more extreme wing of Zapu”. </p>
<p>But almost as soon as Mugabe was imprisoned, a man in her majesty’s employ travelled down from his advisory post in newly free Zambia to visit the prisoner. Dennis Grennan returned to Lusaka having <a href="http://archive.kubatana.net/html/archive/opin/080120dm.asp?sector=OPIN&year=2008&range_start=571">promised</a> to look after Mugabe’s wife Sarah, known as “Sally”. Grennan and people like Julius Nyerere’s British friend and assistant <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3518465.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A4d7659d7e9f1b2a3dd3124c9a249a47c">Joan Wicken</a> played an important role in Mugabe’s rise. </p>
<p>The Zimbabwean nationalists emerged from Salisbury’s prisons late in 1974, as Portugal’s coup led to Angola and Mozambique emerging from colonialism into the Soviet orbit. The fifties generation of Zimbabwean nationalists were to participate in the Zambian and South African inspired détente <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1975/03/25/archives/mr-vorsters-detente.html">exercise</a>. This inspired much competition for Zanu’s leadership: Mugabe arrived in Lusaka after ousting Ndabaningi Sithole, Zanu’s first leader. </p>
<p>Samora Machel, freshly in Mozambique’s top office, wondered if Mugabe’s quick rise was due to a <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/40201256.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A1d1f7a14b762adff6a6007321af29132">“coup in prison”</a>. Herbert Chitepo’s March 1975 <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/3557400.pdf">assassination </a> (which got many of Zanu’s leaders arrested and its army kicked out of Zambia) was only one marker of the many fissures in the fractious party that by 1980 would rule Zimbabwe.</p>
<p>In late 1975 the <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/Vashandi_"><em>vashandi</em></a> group emerged within the Zimbabwean People’s Army. Based in Mozambique’s guerrilla camps, they tried to forge unity between Zimbabwe’s two main nationalist armies and push a left-wing agenda. They were profoundly unsure of Mugabe’s suitability for <a href="https://nehandaradio.com/2016/08/08/heroes-day-review-dzino-memories-freedom-fighter/">leadership</a>.</p>
<p>When Mugabe found his way to Mozambique also in late 1975, Machel put him under house arrest in Quelimane, far from the guerrilla camps. In January Grennan helped him to London to visit a hospitalised Sally. He made contacts around Europe and with a few <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03057078008708020">London-based Maoists</a>.</p>
<p>Soon after Mugabe’s return the young American congressman Stephen Solarz and the Deputy Head of the American embassy in Maputo, Johnnie Carson, wended their way to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02589001.2014.956499">Quelimane</a>. Mugabe wowed them.</p>
<p>Solarz and Carson reported back that Mugabe was “an impressive, articulate and extremely confident individual” with a “philosophical approach to problems and … well reasoned arguments”. He claimed to control the “people’s army”. Yet by January 1977, he persuaded Samora Machel to imprison the young advocates of unity with Zapu. His many reasons included their initial refusal to support him at a late 1976 conference in Geneva organised by the British, helped immeasurably by Henry Kissinger, the American Secretary of State. </p>
<p>At a hastily called congress in March 1977 to consecrate his ascension, Mugabe uttered his leitmotif: those appearing to attempt a change to the party’s leadership by “maliciously planting contradictions within our ranks” would be struck by the <a href="http://www.aluka.org/action/showMetadata?doi=10.5555/AL.SFF.DOCUMENT.nuzn197707">“the Zanu axe”</a>.</p>
<p>This was Mugabe’s strategy, embedded at an early stage: tell foreign emissaries what they wanted to hear, use young radicals (or older allies) until their usefulness subsided, and then get rid of them. All the while he would balance the other forces contending for power in the party amid a general climate of fear, distrust, and paranoia. </p>
<h2>Dealing with dissent</h2>
<p>It is not certain if Margaret Thatcher knew about this side of Mugabe when they met less than a month after his April 1980 inauguration. He seemed most worried about how Joshua Nkomo’s Zapu – which he had dumped from the erstwhile “Patriotic Front”, and the violence against which had put Zimbabwe’s election in some doubt – was making life difficult for the new rulers. He <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03056244.2016.1214116">warned</a> that he might have “to act against them soon”.</p>
<p>In as much as Zapu was linked with the South African ANC and Thatcher and her colleagues tended to think the ANC was controlled by the South African Communist Party, Zapu intelligence chief <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-tribute-to-zimbabwean-liberation-hero-dumiso-dabengwa-117986">Dumiso Dabengwa’s</a> perspective might be more than conspiracy theory. Perhaps Thatcher’s wink and nudge was a green light for the anti-Soviet contingent to eliminate a regional threat. Gukurahundi <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07075332.2017.1309561">followed</a>. It was certainly the biggest blot on Mugabe’s career and created the biggest scar over Zimbabwe. The scar is still there, given the lack of any effort at reconcialitation, truth, or justice.</p>
<p>Four years later the ruling party’s first real congress since 1963 reviewed its history. Mugabe tore the Zipa/Vashandi group that had annoyed him eight years before to shreds. “Treacherous … counter-revolutionary … arms caching … dubbed us all <em>zvigananda</em> or bourgeois”. Thus it “became imperative for us to firmly act against them in defending the Party and the Revolution… We had all the trouble-makers detained”. </p>
<p>The great helmsman recounted the youthful dissenters’ arrest and repeated the axe phraseology. </p>
<p>But few saw these sides of Mugabe’s character soon enough; those who did were summarily shut up. </p>
<h2>The end</h2>
<p>After he’d been ousted, Mugabe could only look on in seeming despair over the ruination he had created. Sanctimonious as ever he wondered how his successor, current President Emmerson Mnangagwa, had become such an ogre. At his 95th birthday, February 21 2019, a few weeks after Mnangagwa’s troops had killed 17 demonstrators, raped as many women, and beaten hundreds more in the wake of his beleaguered finance minister’s methods to create <a href="https://theconversation.com/fantasy-that-mnangagwa-would-fix-zimbabwe-now-fully-exposed-110197">“prosperity from austerity”</a>, Mugabe <a href="https://bulawayo24.com/index-id-news-sc-national-byo-156949.html">mused to his absent successor</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We condemn the violence on civilians by soldiers … You can’t do without seeing dead bodies? What kind of a person are you? You feed on death? </p>
</blockquote>
<p>He only had to look into his own history to see what kind of people he helped create.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121596/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David B. Moore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Robert Mugabe’s years of playing one group off against the other to favour himself finally wore too thin in 2017.David B. Moore, Professor of Development Studies, University of Johannesburg, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1081032019-09-06T05:39:36Z2019-09-06T05:39:36ZRobert Mugabe: as divisive in death as he was in life<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/291235/original/file-20190906-175663-u64qs1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Robert Mugabe during his swearing-in ceremony in Harare, 2008. The former Zimbabwean president has died aged 95.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA-EFE</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Robert Mugabe, the former president of Zimbabwe, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/09/06/377714687/robert-mugabe-veteran-president-of-zimbabwe-dead-at-95">has died</a>. Mugabe was 95, and had been struggling with ill health for some time. The country’s current President Emmerson Mnangagwa announced Mugabe’s death on Twitter on September 6:</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1169839308406054912"}"></div></p>
<p>The responses to Mnangagwa’s announcement were immediate and widely varied. Some hailed Mugabe as a liberation hero. Others dismissed him as a “monster”. This suggests that Mugabe will be as divisive a figure in death as he was in life.</p>
<p>The official mantra of the Zimbabwe government and its Zimbabwe African National Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) will emphasise his leadership of the struggle to overthrow <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ian-Smith">Ian Smith’s</a> racist settler regime in what was then Rhodesia. It will also extol his subsequent championing of the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00358530500082916">seizure of white-owned farms</a> and the return of land into African hands.</p>
<p>In contrast, critics will highlight how – after initially <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt24hd4n.7?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">preaching racial reconciliation</a> after the liberation war in <a href="http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Rhodesian_Bush_War">December 1979 </a> – Mugabe threw away the promise of the early independence years. He did this in several ways, among them a <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=zi-tWekXbD8C&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=%22the+early+rain+which+washes+away+the+chaff+before+the+spring+rains%22&source=bl&ots=dWX2SIUj7r&sig=0aDLpmmQfN93e_RNJuKcBmGGEYI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioi-joj6LWAhWE7hoKHRF_C7wQ6AEIOTAD#v=onepage&q=%22the%20early%20rain%20which%20washes%20away%20the%20chaff%20before%20the%20spring%20rains%22&f=false">brutal clampdown</a> on political opposition in <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=zi-tWekXbD8C&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=%22the+early+rain+which+washes+away+the+chaff+before+the+spring+rains%22&source=bl&ots=dWX2SIUj7r&sig=0aDLpmmQfN93e_RNJuKcBmGGEYI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioi-joj6LWAhWE7hoKHRF_C7wQ6AEIOTAD#v=onepage&q=%22the%20early%20rain%20which%20washes%20away%20the%20chaff%20before%20the%20spring%20rains%22&f=false">Matabeleland in the 1980s</a>, and Zanu-PF’s systematic <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-are-elections-really-rigged-mr-trump-consult-robert-mugabe-68440">rigging of elections</a> to keep he and his cronies in power. </p>
<p>They’ll also mention the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321704136_The_Curse_Of_Corruption_In_Zimbabwe">massive corruption</a> over which he presided, and the <a href="https://www.cgdev.org/publication/costs-and-causes-zimbabwes-crisis">economy’s disastrous downward plunge</a> during his presidency.</p>
<p>Inevitably, the focus will primarily be on his domestic record. Yet many of those who will sing his praises as a <a href="https://allafrica.com/stories/201709220815.html">hero of African nationalism</a> will be from elsewhere on the continent. So where should we place Mugabe among the pantheon of African nationalists who led their countries to independence?</p>
<h2>Slide into despotism</h2>
<p>Most African countries have been independent of colonial rule for <a href="https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/august-2010/weighing-half-century-independence">half a century or more</a>.</p>
<p>The early African nationalist leaders were often regarded as gods at independence. Yet they very quickly came to be perceived as having feet of very heavy clay.</p>
<p>Nationalist leaders symbolised African freedom and liberation. But few were to prove genuinely tolerant of democracy and diversity. One party rule, nominally in the name of “the people”, became widespread. In some cases, it was linked to interesting experiments in one-party democracy, as seen in Tanzania under Julius Nyerere and Zambia under Kenneth Kaunda. </p>
<p>Even in these cases, intolerance and authoritarianism <a href="https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/people/doorenspleet/opd/">eventually encroached</a>.
Often, party rule was <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/159875?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">succeeded by military coups</a>.</p>
<p>In Zimbabwe’s case, Mugabe proved unable to shift the country, as he had wished, to one-partyism. However, this did not prevent Zanu-PF becoming increasingly intolerant over the years in response to both economic crisis and rising opposition. Successive elections were shamelessly perverted. </p>
<p>When, despite this, <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-08-10-00-zim-2008-election-taken-by-a-gun-not-a-pen">Zanu-PF lost control of parliament</a> in 2008, it responded by rigging the presidential election in a campaign of unforgivable brutality. Under Mugabe, the potential for democracy was snuffed out by a brutal despotism.</p>
<h2>A wasted inheritance</h2>
<p>Whether the economic policies they pursued were ostensibly capitalist or socialist, the early African nationalist leaders presided over <a href="https://journals.openedition.org/poldev/78">rapid economic decline</a>, following an initial period of relative prosperity after independence. </p>
<p>In retrospect, it’s widely recognised that the challenges they faced were immense. Most post-colonial economies were underdeveloped and depended upon the export of a small number of agricultural or mineral commodities. From the 1970s, growth was crowded out by the International Monetary Fund demanding that mounting debts be surmounted through the pursuit of <a href="https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/structural-adjustment/">structural adjustment programmes</a>. This hindered spending on infrastructure as well as <a href="http://www.globalissues.org/article/3/structural-adjustment-a-major-cause-of-poverty">social services and education</a> and swelled political discontent.</p>
<p>In contrast, Mugabe inherited a viable, relatively broad-based economy that included substantial industrial and prosperous commercial agricultural sectors. Even though these were largely white controlled, there was far greater potential for development than in most other post-colonial African countries. </p>
<p>But, through massive corruption and mismanagement, his government threw that potential away. He also presided over a disastrous downward spiral of the economy, which saw both industry and <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/Zimbabwe/a-seized-zimbabwe-farm-is-returned-but-uncertainty-reigns-20180301">commercial agriculture collapse</a>. The economy has never recovered and remains in a state of acute and persistent crisis today.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-economy-is-collapsing-why-mnangagwa-doesnt-have-the-answers-104960">Zimbabwe's economy is collapsing: why Mnangagwa doesn't have the answers</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Reputation</h2>
<p>On the political front, the rule of some leaders – like <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/milton-obotes-lasting-legacy-to-uganda/a-19191275">Milton Obote in Uganda</a> and <a href="https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/somalia-fall-of-siad-barre-civil-war/">Siad Barre in Somalia</a> – created so much conflict that coups and crises drove their countries into civil war. Zimbabwe under Mugabe was spared this fate – but perhaps only because the political opposition in Matabeleland in the 1980s was so brutalised after up to <a href="https://theconversation.com/british-policy-towards-zimbabwe-during-matabeleland-massacre-licence-to-kill-81574">30 000 people were killed</a>, that they shrank from more conflict. Peace, then, was merely the absence of outright war.</p>
<p>Some leaders, notably Ghana’s <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Kwame-Nkrumah">Kwame Nkrumah</a> and <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/former-tanzanian-president-julius-nyerere-dies">Julius Nyerere</a> in Tanzania, are still revered for their commitments to national independence and African unity. This is despite the fact that, domestically, their records were marked by failure. By 1966, when Nkrumah was <a href="https://www.eaumf.org/ejm-blog/2018/2/23/february-24-1966-dr-kwame-nkrumah-overthrown-as-president-of-the-republic-of-ghana">displaced by a military coup</a>, his one-party rule had become politically corrupt and repressive. </p>
<p>Despite this, Nyerere always retained his reputation for personal integrity and commitment to African development. Both Nkrumah’s and Nyerere’s ideas continue to inspire younger generations of political activists, while other post-independence leaders’ names are largely forgotten.</p>
<p>Will Mugabe be similarly feted by later generations? Will the enormous flaws of his rule be forgotten amid celebrations of his unique role in the liberation of southern Africa as a whole? </p>
<h2>A Greek tragedy</h2>
<p>The problem for pan-Africanist historians who rush to praise Mugabe is that they will need to repudiate the contrary view of the millions of Zimbabweans who have suffered under his rule or have fled the country to escape it. He contributed no political ideas that have lasted. He inherited the benefits as well as the costs of settler rule but reduced his country to penury. He destroyed the best of its institutional inheritance, notably an efficient civil service, which could have been put to good use for all.</p>
<p>The cynics would say that the reputation of <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/patrice-emery-lumumba">Patrice Lumumba</a>, as an African revolutionary and fighter for Congolese unity has lasted because he was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jan/17/patrice-lumumba-50th-anniversary-assassination">assassinated in 1961</a>. In other words, he had the historical good fortune to die young, without the burden of having made major and grievous mistakes.</p>
<p>In contrast, there are many who would say that Mugabe simply lived too long, and his life was one of Greek tragedy: his early promise and virtue marked him out as popular hero, but he died a monster whom history will condemn.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108103/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Roger Southall receives funding from the National Research Foundation </span></em></p>Where should we place Mugabe among the pantheon of African nationalists who led their countries to independence?Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1227262019-09-05T09:02:06Z2019-09-05T09:02:06ZZimbabwe’s deepening crisis: time for second government of national unity?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/290911/original/file-20190904-175686-v3skdk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Many Zimbabweans have turned to hawking to keep the wolf from the door as the economic crisis in the country deepens. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Zimbabwe is going through its worst socio-economic and political crisis in two decades. Crippling daily power outages of <a href="https://www.biznews.com/africa/2019/08/05/zimbabwe-tipping-point-economic-crisis">up to 18 hours</a> and erratic supply of clean water are just some of the most obvious signs. Meanwhile, an inflation rate of over 500% has put the prices of basic goods beyond the reach of most people.</p>
<p>Hopes that the end of President Robert Mugabe’s ruinous rule in November 2017 would help put the country on a new path of peace and prosperity have long <a href="https://theconversation.com/fantasy-that-mnangagwa-would-fix-zimbabwe-now-fully-exposed-110197">dissipated</a>. Efforts by his successor President Emmerson Mnangagwa to <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/zimbabwe-is-open-for-business-says-mnangagwa-12913367">attract foreign investors</a>, who are critical in reviving Zimbabwe’s ailing economy, have also largely failed.</p>
<p>The situation has not been helped by the rejection of the 2018 presidential election results by the main opposition party. The Movement for Democratic Change Alliance (MDC-A) claims the governing Zanu-PF stole the elections even though the results were <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/news/africa/Regional-observers-Zimbabwe-election-free-and-fair/4552902-4692254-e75fje/index.html">endorsed</a> as free and fair by the African Union and Southern African Development Community (SADC). Only the European Union observers were somewhat circumspect <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/Zimbabwe/eu-observers-say-zimbabwe-election-fell-short-on-fairness-20181010">in their assessment</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/fantasy-that-mnangagwa-would-fix-zimbabwe-now-fully-exposed-110197">Fantasy that Mnangagwa would fix Zimbabwe now fully exposed</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The opposition alliance has been calling for Mnangagwa’s government to relinquish power, and a <a href="https://www.openparly.co.zw/chamisa-calls-for-national-trasitional-authority/">national transitional authority</a> appointed to run the country for at least two years, or until the 2023 general elections.</p>
<p>How individuals who will sit on the national transitional authority will be chosen and by whom, is not clear. But the party and <a href="https://www.theindependent.co.zw/2019/03/01/towards-the-national-transitional-authority/">some academics</a> believe such a transitional authority would normalise Zimbabwe’s highly polarised political situation and help it revive its relations with the West.</p>
<p>The opposition may have a point on re-engagement with the West. This is key to helping end the investment drought that started in earnest <a href="http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.908.3003&rep=rep1&type=pdf">between 2000 and 2003</a> under sanctions imposed by Western countries for human rights violations linked to Zanu-PF’s violent land reform seizures and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/jun/03/zimbabwe.andrewmeldrum">election rigging</a>.</p>
<p>But the transitional authority idea is doomed to fail because of lack of buy-in by Zanu-PF. So, it’s time to consider a more viable alternative path to peace for Zimbabwe.</p>
<h2>Clamping down</h2>
<p>For now, the government has dismissed talk of a transitional authority as unconstitutional. Instead, in May it launched its own platform, called the <a href="https://www.panafricanvisions.com/2019/zimbabwe-mnangagwa-launches-the-political-actors-dialogue-to-address-long-term-economic-challenges/">Political Actors Dialogue</a>. The forum comprises 17 small political parties that participated in the 2018 elections. </p>
<p>The main opposition party is boycotting the process on grounds that Mnangagwa is an illegitimate president. Recently, it attempted to <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwi-gdPunLfkAhXfSBUIHdWZCeIQFjAEegQIBBAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fnews%2Fworld-africa-49366224&usg=AOvVaw0fkr2f1y4BV0-4W2SlJHGY">embark on public protests</a> in the hope of bringing the government to its knees. The protests fell flat after being blocked by the courts and the police.</p>
<p>It boggles the mind why the MDC-A, led by Nelson Chamisa, insists on marches when previous attempts were crushed with brute force. These led to deaths in <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=21&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwingbiQ87TkAhVsZhUIHWexAsIQFjAUegQICBAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.news24.com%2FAfrica%2FZimbabwe%2Fzimbabwean-generals-deny-troops-shot-and-killed-6-protesters-20181113&usg=AOvVaw02nyk1uLwat64nJso2EImF">August 2018</a> and <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwicyIfl87TkAhV9SBUIHXzrAC4QFjAAegQIAhAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fmg.co.za%2Farticle%2F2019-01-30-zim-army-responsible-for-murders-rapes-report&usg=AOvVaw1fiTJ2kraC9xNiMyQ4TBM6">January 2019</a>. </p>
<p>The Zanu-PF regime has always clamped down heavily on perceived threats to its rule since 1980. Why then does the MDC-A continue to endanger people’s lives through this deadly route as a way of resolving Zimbabwe’s socio-economic and political crises?</p>
<p>I firmly believe that the opposition needs to change tack and focus on entering into dialogue with the government. </p>
<h2>Dialogue and unity government</h2>
<p>Zimbabwe’s ongoing crisis requires the two leading political protagonists - Mnangagwa and Chamisa - to enter into serious dialogue. Both leaders need to soften their hard-line stances towards each other and put the people of Zimbabwe first.</p>
<p>There’s a precedent for this. Ten years ago, then South African President Thabo Mbeki managed to bring then President Mugabe and Movement for Democratic Change opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai to the <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=11&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiMheeVnrfkAhVXShUIHeBIDw04ChAWMAB6BAgAEAE&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.france24.com%2Fen%2F20080721-mbeki-harare-mediate-talks-zimbabwe-political-crisis&usg=AOvVaw2pLPeTVwBEVrH2TSAcW5e3">negotiation table</a>. </p>
<p>The talks culminated in the formation of the government of national unity that ran Zimbabwe from February 2009 to July 2013, with Mugabe as the President and Tsvangirai as the Prime Minister. The unity government was fairly successful and managed to <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=10&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiv9PjanrfkAhUUTBUIHQR0D0cQFjAJegQIABAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theindependent.co.zw%2F2013%2F07%2F11%2Freflecting-on-positive-zimbabwe-gnu-moments%2F&usg=AOvVaw25plQQHFWt-5PTjI9_Fi6J">stabilise the economy</a>.</p>
<p>Two decades of suffering have shown that it is not the threat of protests or sanctions from the West that can move Zanu-PF to change, but neighbouring countries under the aegis of <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=11&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwia1fucj7HkAhWnRhUIHcY8Dvc4ChAWMAB6BAgAEAI&url=https%3A%2F%2Flibrary.fes.de%2Fpdf-files%2Fbueros%2Fmosambik%2F07874.pdf&usg=AOvVaw2PSzn2eTrgI53Cnw2yrI2t">SADC</a>. South Africa is pivotal in this regard as the region’s strongest economic and military power. </p>
<p>It’s time to experiment with a second government of national unity for Zimbabwe. But for this to happen, SADC and South Africa must have the appetite to intervene in Zimbabwe. This is currently lacking. </p>
<h2>Dialogue in Zimbabwe’s history</h2>
<p>Historically, dialogue has moved Zimbabwe forward as a nation during its darkest hours. </p>
<ul>
<li><p>A year before independence in 1980, battle-hardened guerrilla commanders agreed to talk to the then Rhodesian Prime Minister, Ian Smith, to end Zimbabwe’s liberation war even though they were convinced that they were winning. </p></li>
<li><p>In 1987 Joshua Nkomo, who was the leader of the main opposition party, the Zimbabwean African People’s Union, agreed to talk to his political nemesis, then Prime Minister Mugabe. Yet before this, he had been hounded out of the country by Mugabe in the mid-80s, and <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=zi-tWekXbD8C&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=%22the+early+rain+which+washes+away+the+chaff+before+the+spring+rains%22&source=bl&ots=dWX2SIUj7r&sig=0aDLpmmQfN93e_RNJuKcBmGGEYI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioi-joj6LWAhWE7hoKHRF_C7wQ6AEIOTAD#v=onepage&q=%22the%20early%20rain%20which%20washes%20away%20the%20chaff%20before%20the%20spring%20rains%22&f=false">thousands of his supporters killed</a>. </p></li>
<li><p>More recently in 2009, Morgan Tsvangirai agreed to enter into a unity government with Mugabe, despite winning the first round of the <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2012-08-10-00-zim-2008-election-taken-by-a-gun-not-a-pen">2008 elections</a>. The unity government briefly resuscitated and stabilised Zimbabwe’s fragile economy. Hyperinflation was tamed, basic commodities became available again and people regained purchasing power.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>The way forward</h2>
<p>Given the MDC-A’s positive contribution during its brief stint in the 2009-2013 unity government, the party should be expending its energies on dialogue. The main opposition party can enter into a second government of national unity, but continue building and strengthening its own support.</p>
<p>In the same vein, Zanu-PF also needs to realise that without the involvement of the MDC-A, its attempts to revive the economy and end the strife in the country, on its own terms, are destined to fail.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122726/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tapiwa Chagonda has previously received funding from the National Research Foundation (NRF). </span></em></p>It’s time for a new approach as it becomes increasingly clear that protests won’t topple the Zanu-PF government.Tapiwa Chagonda, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1221392019-08-21T09:42:34Z2019-08-21T09:42:34ZRepression and dialogue in Zimbabwe: twin strategies that aren’t working<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288885/original/file-20190821-170927-slrpli.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Zimbabwe's crisis is deepening on all fronts.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">globalnewsart.com/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since the November 2017 coup that toppled Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe and the elections in 2018, the regime of President Emmerson Mnangagwa has forged two forms of rule. These have been based on coercion on the one hand, and on the other dialogue.</p>
<p>Following the 2018 general elections and <a href="http://solidaritypeacetrust.org/1800/Zimbabwe-the-2018-elections-and-their-aftermath/">the violence that marked its aftermath</a>, the Mnangagwa regime once again resorted to coercion in the face of the protests in January 2019. The protests were in response to the deepening <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-08-06-zimbabwe-hikes-fuel-prices-by-26-percent/">economic crisis in the country</a>, and part of the opposition strategy to contest the legitimacy of the government. </p>
<p>The response of the state to the protests was swift and brutal. Seventeen people were killed and 954 jailed nationwide. In May the state turned its attention to civic leaders, arresting seven for “subverting” a constitutional government. The repressive state response was felt once again on 16 and 19 August, when the main opposition Movement for Democratic Chance (MDC) and civic activists were once again prevented from marching against the <a href="https://www.thezimbabwemail.com/main/police-soldiers-deploy-in-zimbabwe's-bulawayo-as-opposition-challenges-protest-ban/">rapid deterioration of Zimbabwe’s economy</a>. </p>
<p>These coercive acts represent a continuation of the violence and brutality of the Mugabe era.</p>
<p>At the same time Mnangagwa has pursued his objective of global re-engagement and selective national dialogue. This is in line with the narrative that has characterised the post-coup regime.</p>
<p>In tracking the dialogue strategy of the Mnangagwa government, it is apparent that it was no accident that key elements of it were set in motion in the same period as the agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on a new staff monitored programme. </p>
<p>The purported objective is to move the Zimbabwe Government towards an economic stabilisation programme. This would result in a more balanced budget, in a context in which excessive printing of money, rampant issuing of treasury bills and high inflation, were the <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2019/05/31/Zimbabwe-Staff-Monitored-Program-Press-Release-and-Staff-Report-46952">hallmarks of Mugabe’s economic policies</a>. </p>
<p>The dialogue initiatives also took place in the context of renewed discussions on re-engagement with the European Union (EU) in June this year.</p>
<p>But, Mnangagwa’s strategy of coercion and dialogue has hit a series of hurdles. These include the continued opposition by the MDC. Another is the on-going scepticism of the international players about the regime’s so-called reformist narrative.</p>
<h2>Dialogues</h2>
<p>Mnangagwa has launched four dialogue initiatives. </p>
<ul>
<li><p>Political Actors: This involves about 17 political parties that participated in the 2018 elections. They all have negligible electoral support and are not represented in parliament. The purported intent is to build a national political consensus. The main opposition party, the MDC, boycotted the dialogue, dismissing it as a public relations exercise controlled by the ruling Zanu-PF. </p></li>
<li><p>The Presidential Advisory Council: This was established in January to provide ideas and suggestions on key reforms and measures needed to improve the investment and business climate for economic recovery. This body is largely composed of Mnangagwa allies. </p></li>
<li><p>The Matabeleland collective: This is aimed at building consensus and an effective social movement in Matabeleland to influence national and regional policy in support of healing, peace and reconciliation in this region. But it has come in for some criticisms. One is that it has been drawn into Mnangagwa’s attempt to control the narrative around the <a href="https://africanarguments.org/2019/06/04/gukurahundi-zimbabwe-mnangagwa/">Gukurahundi massacres</a>. These claimed an estimated 20 000 victims in the Matabeleland and Midlands regions in the early 1980’s. Another criticism is that it has exacerbated the divisions within an already weakened civic movement by regionalising what should be viewed as the national issue of the Gukurahundi state violence. </p></li>
<li><p>The Tripartite National Forum. This was launched in June, 20 years after it was <a href="http://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/building-from-the-rubble">first suggested by the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions</a>. The functions of this body set out in an <a href="https://www.greengazette.co.za/documents/national-gazette-42554-of-28-june-2019-vol-648_20190628-GGN-42554">Act of Parliament</a>, include the requirement to consult and negotiate over social and economic issues and submit recommendations to Cabinet; negotiate a social contract; and generate and promote a shared national socio-economic vision.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>The establishment of the forum could provide a good platform for debate and consensus. But there are dangers. The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions warned of the long history of the lack of “broad based consultation on past development programmes”. It <a href="https://www.newzimbabwe.com/tnf-launched-20-years-later-amid-visible-tensions">insists that</a> </p>
<blockquote>
<p>reforms must never be deemed as tantamount to erosion of workers’ rights.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The strategy</h2>
<p>In assessing the central objectives of the various strands of Mnangagwa’s dialogue strategy, three factors stand out.</p>
<p>The first is that the Political Actors Dialogue, the Presidential Advisory Council and the Matabeleland Collective were developed to control the pace and narrative around the process of partnership with those players considered “reliable”. Major opposition and civic forces that continued to question the legitimacy of the Mnangagwa boycotted these processes.</p>
<p>Secondly, the formal establishment of the long awaited Tripartite National Forum may serve the purpose of locking the MDC’s major political ally, the Zimbabwe Council of Trade Unions, into a legally constructed economic consensus. The major parameters of this will likely be determined by the macro-economic stabalisation framework of the IMF programme.</p>
<p>When brought together, all these processes place increased pressure on the political opposition to move towards an acceptance of the legitimacy of the Mnangagwa regime, and into a new political consensus dominated by the ruling Zanu-PF’s political and military forces, thus earning them the seal of approval by major international forces.</p>
<p>The MDC has responded with a combined strategy of denying Mnangagwa legitimacy, protests as well as calls for continued global and regional pressure. The MDC believes that the continued decline of the economy will eventually end the dominance of the Mnangagwa regime. </p>
<p>As part of its 2018 election campaign, the MDC made it clear it would accept no other result than a victory for itself and Chamisa. That message has persisted and is a central part of the de-legitimation discourse of the opposition and many civic organisations. The MDC has regularly <a href="https://www.newzimbabwe.com/sikhala-mnangagwa-faces-overthrow-through-citizen-mass-protests/">threatened protests since 2018</a>.</p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>The MDCs strategies have not resulted in any significant progress. The hope that the economic crisis and attempts at mass protests to force Zanu-PF into a dialogue are, for the moment, likely to be met with growing repression. Moreover, the deepening economic crisis is likely to further thwart attempts to mobilise on a mass basis.</p>
<p>The EU, for its part, is still keen on finding a more substantive basis for increased re-engagement with Mnangagwa and will keep the door open. Regarding the US, given the toxic politics of the Trump administration at a global level, and the ongoing <a href="https://www.thezimbabwemail.com/main/trump-administration-condemns-latest-govt-abductions-and-torture-of-opposition-in-zimbabwe/">strictures of the US on the Zimbabwe government</a>, there has been a closing of ranks <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/sadc-declares-anti-sanctions-day/">around a fellow liberation movement</a> in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. </p>
<p>Mnangagwa’s <a href="https://www.herald.co.zw/sadc-declares-anti-sanctions-day/">recent appointment</a> as Chair of the SADC Troika on Politics, Peace and Security in Tanzania will only further cement this solidarity.</p>
<p>There is clearly a strong need for a national dialogue between the major political players in Zimbabwean politics. But there is little sign that this will proceed. Moreover, the current position of regional players means that there is unlikely to be any sustained regional pressure for such talks in the near future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122139/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Raftopoulos is affiliated with a Zimbabwean NGO Ukuthula Trust. </span></em></p>The Mnangagwa regime’s coercive acts are a continuation of the violence and brutality of the Mugabe era, while he seeks global re-engagement and selective national dialogue.Brian Raftopoulos, Research Fellow, International Studies Group, University of the Free StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1179862019-05-30T11:07:31Z2019-05-30T11:07:31ZA tribute to Zimbabwean liberation hero Dumiso Dabengwa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/278494/original/file-20190607-52748-jxtqi0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A fitting way to pay tribute to Zimbabwean liberation war hero <a href="https://www.polity.org.za/article/sacp-sacp-expresses-its-heartfelt-condolences-to-the-dabengwa-family-the-people-of-zimbabwe-and-southern-africa-for-the-great-loss-encountered-2019-05-24">Dumiso “DD” Dabengwa</a>, who has died aged 79, is to depict a snapshot history of the late 1970s and the 1980s that shows the stresses of his job during and just after Zimbabwe’s war of liberation.</p>
<p>As the head of intelligence for <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Zimbabwe-Peoples-Revolutionary-Army/dp/1436361559">Zimbabwe African People’s Revolutionary Army</a>, the armed wing of Zimbabwe African People’s Union (Zapu), he faced two enemies in the late seventies: the Rhodesian forces and those of Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwean African National Union (Zanu), the nationalist party that split off from <a href="https://www.academia.edu/38948000/The_split_of_ZAPU_2_">Zapu in 1963</a> and would eventually lead Zimbabwe. In the 1980s South Africa and the United Kingdom joined those antagonists. </p>
<p>Only psychologists could discern how Dabengwa maintained his legendary composure. He kept his head while everyone was losing theirs: a necessary trait for an intelligence supremo. </p>
<p>This tribute is inspired by a picture – probably taken in 1981 at the New Sarum airfield outside what was Salisbury – that’s making social media rounds following Dabengwa’s death. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1131547396960399361"}"></div></p>
<p>Dabengwa is shown standing with Rex Nhongo, commander of the newly integrated Zimbabwean military forces. The two young soldiers symbolise the unity to be forged out of Rhodesia’s and the two nationalist parties’ security forces as they entered Zimbabwe’s democratic dispensation. </p>
<p>That task’s difficulty is shown by the possibility that the two were on their way to Entumbane to calm the battles raging between the two nationalist armies, in which over 300 soldiers <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/27/obituaries/dumiso-dabengwa-dead.html">were killed</a>. But they would fail in these efforts and would land on different sides of Zimbabwe’s post liberation story. Dabengwa would be jailed by his erstwhile comrades. Nhongo would retire early, rich and still a power-broker in his party – until his fiery death in mid-<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/331776137_Political_Accidents_in_Zimbabwe">2011</a>.</p>
<h2>Internecine violence</h2>
<p>About five years before 1981, an effort <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02589001.2012.639655">emerged</a> to create a united “people’s army” out of Zanu’s guerrilla forces, Zanla and Zipra.</p>
<p>Nhongo had once been a Zipra soldier, but left during Zapu’s devastating internecine disputes in the early 1970s. With Zanla’s commander in Zambia’s jails suspected of <a href="https://allnewsnetwork.wordpress.com/2011/03/12/who-killed-josiah-tongogara-and-herbert-chitepo/">murdering the national chairman of Zanu, Herbert Chitepo</a>, Nhongo was by 1976 at the head of Zanla. Thus he became the commander of the Zimbabwe People’s Army (Zipa), supposedly an attempt to unite the two nationalist armies. </p>
<p>But his heart was not in it. He ordered his soldiers on engaging the Rhodesian forces to <a href="https://academic.oup.com/hwj/article/57/1/79/675840">kill Zipra fighters first</a>. There were battles between the two armies in training camps. What should Dabengwa have done?</p>
<p>Zipra withdrew a good number of troops, but adhered to the agreement to unite the armies. As it happened, before too long Robert Mugabe (on his way to the top) and Nhongo sidelined the group that really believed in the unity project. Dabengwa told one of us (Moore) many years later that Zipa was too militaristic, ignoring democratic processes. He took a wait and see approach.</p>
<p>With the adherents to unity gone, Zanu’s anti-Zapu sentiments opened further. The party’s <a href="http://www.archives.gov.zw/">1978 political education</a> tract claimed that Zipra forces planned to let Zanla smash Rhodesia’s “racist state machinery” single-handedly. Once victory was achieved, Zipra would “crash (sic) Zanla and seize political power…” </p>
<h2>Gukurahundi</h2>
<p>These and <a href="https://cul.worldcat.org/title/march-11-movement-in-zapu-revolution-within-the-revolution/oclc/13564369">other Zanu-related imbroglios</a> made life very difficult for Dabengwa, a man entrusted with Zapu’s intelligence. </p>
<p>Yet with “freedom” – hastened by <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03057070.2017.1275108">Soviet assistance to ZPRA</a> – Zimbabwe became even more central to Cold War and South African intrigue. As Zimbabwean political scientist Miles Tendi <a href="https://www.zimlive.com/2019/05/27/dumiso-dabengwa-a-military-czar-without-peer-in-making-of-the-zimbabwean-state/">attests</a>, Dabengwa and Josiah Tongogara, then the top Zanla general, played a key role with the “Patriotic Front” (another effort at unity between the two main liberation parties) at the late 1979 <a href="https://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/5847/5/1979_Lancaster_House_Agreement.pdf">Lancaster House negotiations </a> that led to Zimbabwe’s new dispensation. </p>
<p>Dabengwa himself said in a <a href="http://www.cite.org.zw/videos/interview-with-dumiso-dabengwa/">mid-2018 interview</a> that he and Tongogara thought they could push the unity idea beyond an agreement to maintain unity at diplomatic negotiations, but remaining separate for all other purposes. They wanted <em>political</em> unity. They carried out research among the soldiers, who indicated agreement. Yet Tongogara’s <a href="https://bulawayo24.com/index-id-opinion-sc-columnist-byo-152947.html">suspicious death</a> as he drove to a Mozambican camp only days later killed that dream: <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=zi-tWekXbD8C&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=%22the+early+rain+which+washes+away+the+chaff+before+the+spring+rains%22&source=bl&ots=dWX2SIUj7r&sig=0aDLpmmQfN93e_RNJuKcBmGGEYI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioi-joj6LWAhWE7hoKHRF_C7wQ6AEIOTAD#v=onepage&q=%22the%20early%20rain%20which%20washes%20away%20the%20chaff%20before%20the%20spring%20rains%22&f=false">Gukurahundi</a> mass killings and atrocities in Matabeleland were only steps away. </p>
<p>Dabengwa’s interview leaves little doubt about Gukurahundi’s roots:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>At independence the British had already made a decision with Mugabe to carry out this genocide. (They) had already decided to ensure that that no one of the Ndebele nation would be allowed to be leader in this country. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Conspiracy and persecution</h2>
<p>On 9 May 1980, just weeks after Zimbabwe’s 17 April freedom celebrations, Mugabe visited British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He <a href="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-%20guides/prime-ministers-office-records/">complained that</a> “some” in Zapu did “not accept the new situation”. They wanted to continue the fight and the government might have to act against them soon.</p>
<p><a href="http://researchdata.uwe.ac.uk/104/240/roh-oh-sta-da1-appr.pdf">Danny Stannard</a>, Rhodesia’s Special Branch director, stayed on during the new era. With then Minister of State Security Emmerson Mnangagwa, he organised the transition of Zimbabwe’s security services – precisely to keep the region Communist-free, Stannard told one of us in 2014. He thought Mnangagwa was the perfect man for that job. Stannard held Dabengwa in venomous disregard and was dead certain that in February 1982 his Soviet allies were rolling to the Entumbane barracks. </p>
<p>In March the Zapu cabinet ministers, Dabengwa, deputy armed forces commander Lookout Masuku, and four other Zapu officials were arrested and charged with <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1983/03/25/world/a-fateful-trial-witty-ex-guerrilla-v-zimbabwe.html">treason</a>. Arms caches had been “discovered” on Zapu properties. </p>
<p>In December 1982 a Whitehall officer wondered if the British should reconsider support for a régime seemingly hell-bent on eliminating Zapu and its potential supporters. No, he wrote, “if we refuse military sales and aid” Mugabe might approach the USSR – albeit reluctantly. Other reasons to keep Mugabe on side included selling arms and jet fighters, as well as paving the road to Namibian and South African <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/07075332.2017.1309561">settlements</a>. </p>
<p>Treason charges for all but Dabengwa were dismissed in early April 1983. But, as he and the others walked out of court they were jailed again under the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1983/03/25/world/a-fateful-trial-witty-ex-guerrilla-v-zimbabwe.html">Emergency Powers Act</a>. </p>
<h2>Peacemaking</h2>
<p>By this time, the Fifth Brigade had been in Matabeleland for several months: Gukurahundi was underway with its terror, mass starvation, and murder. When they were released in 1986 Zapu had to stop the carnage, agreeing to be absorbed into Zanu (PF). Dabengwa’s reluctant agreement was essential; it took his authority, and that of Zapu leader <a href="https://pindula.co.zw/Joshua_Nkomo">Joshua Nkomo</a>, to persuade the Zipra ex-combatants and the Zapu youth to merge.</p>
<p>The Cold War was on its last legs. Zanu (PF) had won its war for a one-party state. During the 1990s, with Nkomo as vice-president in the revised Zanu (PF) government, Dabengwa took on posts ranging from Home Affairs minister to managing the long-gestating but never funded <a href="https://www.theindependent.co.zw/2011/01/06/matabeleland-zambezi-water-project-urgent/">Matabeleland Zambezi Water Project</a>. </p>
<p>He left government in 2000. In 2008 he abandoned the Zanu (PF) politburo and revived Zapu. </p>
<p>There cannot be a man deserving more to rest in peace than Dabengwa.</p>
<p><em>David Galbraith, a retired Professor of English at University of Toronto and who spent the early 1980s in Matabeleland, contributed to this article</em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/117986/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Only psychologists could discern how Dumiso Dabengwa maintained his legendary composure, a necessary trait for an intelligence supremo.David B. Moore, Professor of Development Studies and Visiting Fellow, Clare Hall, University of Cambridge, University of JohannesburgNqobile Zulu, Lecturer in Development Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1129672019-03-11T14:18:25Z2019-03-11T14:18:25ZZimbabwe’s MDC faces a leadership contest. But can it be peaceful?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262465/original/file-20190306-100793-m9f32.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Supporters of MDC's Nelson Chamisa believe he could win Zimbabwe's 2023 elections.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EFE-EPA/Aaron Ufumeli</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Movement for Democratic Change-Alliance, Zimbabwe’s largest opposition party, has announced that it will hold its elective congress in May 2019. The announcement has stirred interest – inside and outside the party. This is because there could be an intriguing contest for the presidency of the party between the incumbent <a href="https://informationcradle.com/africa/nelson-chamisa/">Nelson Chamisa</a> and the secretary-general <a href="https://pindula.co.zw/Douglas_Mwonzora">Douglas Mwonzora</a>. The two have a history of rivalry.</p>
<p>Mwonzora is Chamisa’s political nemesis. In 2014 Mwonzora unexpectedly won a contest for the position of secretary-general even though Chamisa, as organising secretary, was in a position to influence party structures in his favour and had been nominated by 11 out of 12 provinces. One theory is that the MDC’s former leader Morgan Tsvangirai, who died of cancer in <a href="https://www.enca.com/africa/zimbabwean-opposition-leader-tsvangirai-dies">February 2018</a>, engineered Mwonzora’s victory by influencing the voting patterns of congress delegates. The reason given for this is that he wanted to curtail Chamisa’s political ambitions because of his perceived role in the MDC’s surprising poor showing in the 2013 national elections.</p>
<p>After his defeat, Chamisa was relegated to an ordinary party member, until Tsvangirai brought him back into the MDC’s executive. The speculation is that Tsvangirai did this because he sensed that Chamisa was still popular within the party’s structures, especially among younger members. </p>
<p>A Mwonzora victory is worrying for some of Chamisa’s most fervent supporters. This is because they believe Chamisa is the future of the party. He’s only 41 years old. Also, they believe he gave Zanu-Pf candidate Emmerson Mnangagwa a run for his money in the 2018 presidential elections. Chamisa’s camp believes he’s better placed to defeat Mnangagwa in the 2023 elections because of his <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/2018zimelections-who-is-nelson-chamisa-16237399">widespread national appeal</a>. </p>
<p>Mwonzora too has his fair share of supporters. He’s also widely respected within the MDC because of his easy going temperament. </p>
<p>What this all adds up to is that a victory by either candidate could split the party for the umpteenth time. Even a contest carries risks because the MDC has a chequered history in which violence has been used regularly against opposing factions. If the two do contest the party presidency in May – and Mwonzora in the past few days has <a href="https://www.zimbabwesituation.com/news/i-will-be-tougher-for-zanu-pf-says-mwonzora/">hinted that he might</a> – their supporters’ tactics could heighten the danger of violence and intimidation. This could further divide or damage the party and set Zimbabwean democracy back after decades of authoritarian rule. </p>
<h2>Troubled past</h2>
<p>Tsvangirai’s MDC had a “T” at the end – which stood for Tsvangirai himself. This was to distinguish his MDC from the <a href="https://www.pindula.co.zw/MDC-Welshman_Ncube">Welshman Ncube MDC</a> which had cut ties with Tsvangirai. Ncube was the founding secretary-general of the MDC. </p>
<p>Just before he died Tsvangirai had agreed to bring back former “rebels” who had been founding members of the party. This included Welshman Ncube, Tendai Biti and Job Sikhala. For his part, Chamisa agreed to accommodate and rope in his former “comrades-in-arms” into his election campaign. </p>
<p>The coalition under their umbrella became known as <a href="https://www.news24.com/Africa/Zimbabwe/zim-chamisa-forced-to-register-mdc-alliance-as-a-political-party-amid-squabbles-20180616">the MDC-Alliance party</a> just before Zimbabwe’s 2018 elections. The reason for the name change was that former MDC member Thokozani Khupe was arguing in the courts that her formation was the bona fide MDC-T. </p>
<p>A succession puzzle was created in the MDC-Alliance when Tsvangirai, as president and before his death, appointed Chamisa as head of policy and research and then as one of three deputy presidents of the party. This muddying of the waters appears to have been deliberate. It meant that Tsvangirai could easily play his deputies against each other if he felt threatened by any one of them. </p>
<p>But having three vice-presidents – Chamisa, Elias Mudzuri and Thokozani Khupe – didn’t do the party any favours. After Tsvangirai’s death a bloody battle for succession ensued, and led to another split in the party.</p>
<h2>The contest hots up</h2>
<p>The MDC’s May congress has inevitably sucked in the ruling Zanu-PF. The two have been at loggerheads since 1999 when the <a href="https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6ad8338.html">original MDC was formed</a>. A succession of bruising electoral contests, including the highly disputed 2008 elections which the MDC-T was <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-are-elections-really-rigged-mr-trump-consult-robert-mugabe-68440">widely believed to have won</a>, galvanised the ruling Zanu-PF party into resolving to weaken, if not destroy, the MDC brand. </p>
<p>It’s against this backdrop that Zanu-PF is being accused of having a role in the unfolding MDC-Alliance drama ahead of the impending congress. </p>
<p>Some top MDC-Alliance leaders in Chamisa’s camp have been claiming that the governing Zanu-PF has set aside between US$ 4 million to US$6 million to pay MDC delegates to vote for Mwonzora <a href="https://nehandaradio.com/2019/03/03/zanu-pf-pouring-millions-to-influence-mdc-congress/">at the party congress</a>. Biti, who is currently the party’s vice-chairperson, has said he will reject any candidates sponsored by Zanu-PF.</p>
<h2>Best case scenario</h2>
<p>As party leader Chamisa has the opportunity to foster peace, tolerance and democracy. He should make sure that the lead up to the congress is violence- free and that party members who are in good standing can contest any post without being intimidated.</p>
<p>He needs to be wary of political sycophants within his party who want to turn him into a demigod, as was the case during Mugabe’s long reign as the leader of Zanu-PF. Chamisa has already shown that he has nothing to fear from a fair contest.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112967/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tapiwa Chagonda has previously received funding from the National Research Foundation (NRF). </span></em></p>Nelson Chamisa has the opportunity to foster peace, tolerance and democracy within Zimbabwe’s main opposition party.Tapiwa Chagonda, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.