If there was ever any doubt, an incident in
court on Thursday shows that the State completely disregards the rule of law
in Zimbabwe. A public prosecutor, Andrew Kumire, was sentenced to five days
in jail for contempt of court, by Harare Magistrate Chioniso Mutengi, but
managed to evade the prison cells by filing a bail application through
another Magistrate, Mishrod Guvamombe, and was granted bail immediately,
without the State opposing.
Kumire is the prosecutor in the trial of
human rights lawyer Alex Muchadehama, who is accused of having secured the
"unlawful release" on bail of freelance journalist Andrison Manyere and MDC
officials Chris Dhlamini and Gandhi Mudzingwa on 17th April, in 'collusion'
with Constance Gambara, the Clerk of High Court Justice, Chinembiri Bhunu.
The three individuals had spent several months in jail following their
abduction by state security agents in December 2008. Muchadehama, who has
successfully represented several other victims of state-sponsored abduction
and torture, is standing trial for alleged contempt of
court.
Kumbirai Mafunda, Communications Officer for the Zimbabwe Lawyers
for Human Rights (ZLHR), said there was drama in court when the prosecutor
disrespected the magistrate, who had repeatedly told him not to ask leading
questions of one of the State witnesses. Magistrate Mutengi had also asked
him not to bring up issues which had not been raised during cross
examinations, but the law officer continued to disobey orders and shockingly
made a rude sound (kuridza tsamwa) at the magistrate.
Mafunda said:
"Magistrate Mutengi actually said the court felt insulted by the sound that
Mr Kumire made, which she said is contemptuous of the court."
Despite
being ordered not to leave the court, Kumire is said to have 'bolted' out of
the courtroom when the magistrate had gone to look for prison guards to
arrest him. The prosecutor is alleged to have fled to the Attorney
General's Office to consult with his colleagues. The ZLHR communications
officer said prison guards went there and brought him back to the Rotten Row
Magistrates' court, where he was detained in the holding cells.
Later
in the afternoon, Kumire bypassed Magistrate Mutengi who had committed him
to prison, and personally applied for bail before Magistrate Mishrod
Guvamombe, who immediately granted him bail. The ZLHR Communications Officer
said: "In many circumstances the State has objected to the granting of
bail. The State did not even appeal the granting of this bail. So we feel
this is the most brazen selective application of the
law."
Muchadehama's trial was postponed to the 17th November.
Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai was scheduled to meet the
Democratic Republic of the Congo President Joseph Kabila on Thursday, on the
third leg of his five nation tour of SADC states.
Tsvangirai's
shuttle diplomacy is part of a strategy to get key SADC leaders fully
appraised of the situation in the unity government, after his party
disengaged from ZANU PF last week Friday.
Apart from the MDC leader's
whirlwind tour, high ranking party officials in Harare have initiated a
daily programme of interacting with diplomats stationed in the capital, as
part of the diplomatic offensive the party is now mounting to build regional
and international pressure on Robert Mugabe.
An MDC official told us the
exercise is to convince regional governments that Mugabe remains the biggest
threat, not only to Zimbabwe, but to the whole region. On Wednesday,
President Jacob Zuma of South Africa said his country was concerned about
the situation in Zimbabwe and that the country 'should not be allowed to
slide back into instability.' Zuma had met Tsvangirai in Cape
Town.
SADC's Troika on politics, defence and security co-operation is
expected to convene a meeting next week Thursday to try to iron out the
differences between Tsvangirai and Mugabe. This date was set following talks
on Tuesday in Chimoi, Mozambique, between Tsvangirai and President Armando
Guebuza, the current chair of the troika.
Mugabe has since last year
failed to implement the power sharing deal he agreed with Tsvangirai and
Arthur Mutambara, leader of the other MDC formation.
The unity
government remains shaky as a result of outstanding issues and
non-compliance by Mugabe, that continue to impede the transitional
government. ZANU PF and the MDC-M are also pushing for the three principals
to the GPA to meet and discuss the issues, outside the realm of a full SADC
summit or Troika meeting.
Welshman Ncube, secretary-general of the
Mutambara faction, said on Wednesday the three leaders were due to meet by
the end of the week in crisis talks to resolve the current
problems.
Sources in the MDC-T told us they doubted such a meeting will
be held anytime soon because Tsvangirai has grown tired of 'lies and
promises 'from Mugabe since the formation of the unity
government.
'The Prime Minister is mobilising the region to solve this
crisis once and for all and he has been promised that the Troika will look
into it. So there's no way he will compromise that position by talking to
Mugabe before the Troika meeting,' a source said.
After Tsvangirai's
scheduled meeting Thursday with President Kabila, the MDC leader is expected
to visit Botswana and Angola for talks with Jose Eduardo dos Santos and Ian
Khama.
Harare,
October 22, 2009 - The Affirmative Action Group (AAG) Vice President Themba
Mliswa has threatened to confront and force Ministers of Finance and
Economic Development Tendai Biti and Elton Mangoma to release funds to new
farmers who benefited from the Robert Mugabe land reform.
He said the two ministers were sabotaging the inclusive government by
refusing to channel $500 million acquired from the IMF towards
agriculture.
"The two ministers are sabotaging the successful land
reform programme. They are reluctant to disburse the IMF funds towards
agriculture. We want to warn them that we are not going to let them
sabotage the economy by refusing to give farmers loans, we are definitely
going to take action against them ...", he said. "We want these politicians
not to politicise the issue of agriculture because it's a national food
issue."
"Farmers do not have anything to give banks as collateral
because they have not been making profits over the past five years because
of illegal sanctions."
The AAG has also warned to take over
Nestle Zimbabwe if it continues to refuse to buy milk from First Lady, Grace
Mugabe.
Meanwhile farm equipments distributed last year by Reserve
bank Governor Gideon Gono to the Police Protection Unit (PPU), are lying
idle at Tomlinson Depot as the beneficiaries have nowhere to put
them.
PPU is responsible for escorting the Presidential motorcade
guarding diplomats and Zanu PF ministers and senior party
officials.
To persuade them to remain loyal last year the Reserve
Bank Governor gave each one of them an ox-drawn scotch-cart, generator, a
harrow, ox-drawn plough and knapsack sprayer. All these are lying idle in
the police camp. According to police officers who benefited from
that programme, they were just given the farm implements without
soliciting for them.
"Everyone in the PPU department was given a
full set of the equipment. Most of us sold the implements because we had
nowhere to put them. We do not have farms and the Government bribed us
with these irrelevant things," said one police officer who is left with
a scotch cart which has no wheels.
"Last year was a
difficult year and we benefited from selling the equipment, which we
traded at give away prices to real farmers who were supposed to
benefit.Scotch cart wheels were sold to car owners and I am planning to sell
the scotch cart body to the members of the apostolic church who are
bothering me," said another police officer who is part of the
presidential guard at state house.
South Africa's main political opposition, the Democratic Alliance
(DA), on Thursday said Robert Mugabe cannot be part of Zimbabwe's road to
democracy, saying the dictator must be offered an 'exit strategy' for the
country to ever recover.
The party presented its 'Roadmap to
Democracy in Zimbabwe' in the South African parliament on Thursday morning,
as a response to the MDC's decision to disengage from ZANU PF in the unity
government. DA Parliamentary Leader Athol Trollip told SW Radio Africa that
the 'neutral and objective' document is the best basis for a new course of
action for Zimbabwe's future, saying "it will allow for a clear path towards
the establishment of democracy."
The roadmap, Trollip explained, is very
simple with only four primary objectives that need to be achieved. These
are: an agreement to hold fresh elections, the formation of an interim
government, the formation of a new, people driven constitution, and
ultimately free, fair, democratic elections. Trollip explained that while
these steps are obvious, "it is the way in which they are implemented that
will determine whether or not Zimbabwe succeeds."
Trollip continued
that there are two fundamental issues that need to be addressed if the
roadmap is to succeed, with the first being that Robert Mugabe cannot be
part of the process.
"The position he currently holds is illegitimate
and, as a result, his interests and the interests of those close to him have
compromised the current arrangement," Trollip said. "One cannot build a
democracy on a series of first principles that are fundamentally
tainted."
The DA parliamentary leader said an effective exit strategy
must be established so that Mugabe willingly steps down from power. But he
argued this will only happen with a 'united front' behind the proposal. He
explained that the second fundamental issue is that international, and in
particular regional leaders, must pledge to oversee the roadmap's
success.
"The Southern African Development Community (SADC), the South
African government and the United Nations must show willingness to use force
if Zimbabwe's political parties stray from this roadmap," Trollip
said.
Trollip acknowledged that here-in lies the biggest challenge for
the roadmap's success, and he criticised SADC and the ANC led government in
South Africa for not applying pressure on Mugabe and ZANU PF to adhere to
the Global Political Agreement. Trollip argued that South Africa missed a
critical window of opportunity to be tough with Mugabe while Zuma was still
SADC chair, but he expressed anger that Zuma has now adopted the notorious
policy of 'quiet diplomacy' to Zimbabwe.
"Before he was elected as
the country's president, Zuma was making all the right noises about
Zimbabwe," Trollip explained. "But those noises have now become a whimper,
just mist on the water."
Written by The Zimbabwean
Thursday, 22 October 2009 13:09 South Africa's main opposition party,
the Democratic Alliance, is today launching a 'roadmap to democracy' for
Zimbabwe. They believe, if a properly functioning and legitimate democracy
is to be established in Zimbabwe, then a new course needs to be
plotted.
That course needs to be objective and neutral and not
determined by the vested interests of any of the parties in Zimbabwe. The
DA believe s its roadmap meets these criteria: it is a neutral course of
action which, if agreed to, allows for a clear path towards the
establishment of a democracy. A statement today from the party
reads: We believe this to not only be in the interest of the Zimbabwean
people, who have suffered for decades at the hand of a repressive
undemocratic regime, which has held their interests to ransom and
systematically eroded away their democratic rights, but in the interest of
South Africa, the SADC region and Africa more broadly. Only if Zimbabwe is
restored as a democratic state, can it recover and grow.
The
roadmap is simple. It consists of four broad steps: An agreement to
hold fresh elections; The formation of an interim government;
The formation of a new constitution; Democratic
elections.
These steps, no doubt appear obvious, but it is the
way in which they are implemented and the particular processes followed in
making each of them a reality that will determine whether or not Zimbabwe
succeeds. The devil, as they say, is in the details. The
accompanying document sets out many of these requirements in some detail.
Two points are particularly important: First, Robert Mugabe cannot be
part of the process. The position he currently holds is illegitimate and, as
a result, his interests and the interests of those close to him have
compromised the current arrangement. One cannot build a democracy on a
series of first principles that are fundamentally tainted. The roadmap
proposes that an agreement be reached whereby Robert Mugabe willingly steps
down from power. This exit package in turn, will only work if there is a
united front behind it. Those inside and outside Zimbabwe must agree that
this is the right course of action and unite behind this purpose.
Second, and in much the same fashion, should the roadmap be accepted, it is
essential that all parties back up their commitment to it with action. This
action must centre around the sustained use of all mechanisms at the
disposal of the regional and international community to achieve its purpose.
Ultimately, if the roadmap is adopted, and it is subsequently sabotaged, as
a final and last resort, we believe the regional and international community
must be willing to resort to force, to achieve the desired
outcome.
It immediately becomes apparent the critical role that
South Africa will play in this process. Not only does it need to
use every mechanism at its disposal to get the roadmap adopted, but it then
needs to be willing to use what leverage it has to make sure it is adhered
to. It needs to lead on this matter. The time for accommodating the
undemocratic behaviour of Robert Mugabe and Zanu-PF is over and the focus
needs to shift from appeasement, to outcomes. It is important too, to
explain the role that the Global Political Agreement (GPA) will play in this
process. The DA believes the GPA is the only mechanism able to negotiate (in
conjunction with the regional and international community) an exit package
for Robert Mugabe and the other steps contained in the roadmap. We believe
this mechanism should shift its focus from attempts to agree to a
constitution that is contested and warped by political interests, towards a
series of steps that will result in a constitution that best represents the
will of the Zimbabwean people. One final point is worth making: The
roadmap we present today is an ideal. It is similar to the ideas that
underpin a constitution. It is not an analysis but a plan of action. In this
sense it is only as strong as the political will vested in it. This
is the second such roadmap proposed by the Democratic Alliance. In 2003
former leader of the DA Tony Leon proposed a similar such idea. That,
however, was before the last round of elections and the creation of the GPA.
The difference between then and now is two fold, on the one hand, in the
GPA, we have a mechanism through which a roadmap can be worked towards and
adopted; on the other hand, the situation in Zimbabwe has continued to
deteriorate and the suffering of the people in Zimbabwe has
intensified. Now, more than ever, we need a clear plan of action on
Zimbabwe. We need the regional and international community to unite and we
need the South African government to play a defining role in this regard. We
believe this roadmap is the mechanism around which those with an interest in
seeing a democratic Zimbabwe should unite and, perhaps more importantly, we
believe it is the only credible and acceptable way to establish a
functioning and legitimate democracy in a country that has had its
democratic dignity systematically eroded away.
A demonstration in Harare by a group of farm and factory workers,
representing almost a thousand employees who have not been paid by an
industrial parastatal, came to an end this week after an agreement was
reached with the corporation's management.
The representative group
of workers travelled to the capital on Sunday to confront the Industrial
Development Corporation (IDC) over non-payment of salaries for almost a
year. The workers, from IDC farms and the BonneZim agro-packaging factory in
Chegutu, told SW Radio Africa correspondent Simon Muchemwa this week that
they were demanding to be paid in full, backdated for seven months. The
group had been sleeping in trucks in the capital since Sunday night trying
to reach an agreement with IDC management, who originally had only offered a
partial pay out.
The IDC meanwhile in a press statement denied that any
demonstration had taken place, refuting our report on Wednesday that
detailed the workers' plight. In its statement the IDC said it "has always
been solvent and has never failed to pay its staff salaries."
"There
was some industrial relations unrest at BonneZim due to, amongst other
issues, non-payment of salaries to factory workers and other issues which
arose due to mismanagement at the company. The reason why the workers
committee visited the IDC offices on Monday was to try and understand what
actions the Corporation was taking to recover any losses from the reckless,
improper or criminal conduct by some BonneZim directors, management and
employees. There was absolutely no demonstration or protestations at our
offices as you will note that these factory workers are not on our direct
payroll," the statement read.
But our correspondent Muchemwa
explained that he was turned away by the same authors of the statement, when
he tried to get comment from them earlier this week. Muchemwa reported on
Thursday that the IDC management had finally come to an agreement with the
workers, who had returned to their homes.
Our report on Wednesday
meanwhile had wrongfully suggested that the IDC had taken over Kondozi farm
in 2006. To clarify; the parastatal had been given authority by the
government to revive the broken down horticultural estate, two years after
it had been left destroyed in the process of the so called land reform
program. IDC then purchased BonneZim from industrial company Murray &
Roberts, as it was believed this was the key to reviving Kondozi. But
apparently the IDC plans never materialised.
Instead Kondozi was taken
over by the Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA), which
sources have alleged was a front for the farm to be taken over by the then
transport Minister, Chris Mushohwe. Mushohwe, currently the governor of
Manicaland, is still in control of the land.
Kenyan
Prime Minister Raila Odinga has urged Robert Mugabe to 'relinquish power'
saying the ZANU PF leader alone was 'responsible for the political
stalemate' in Zimbabwe. Speaking in France during a joint press conference
with the French Foreign Affairs Minister, Odinga did not mince his words,
bluntly saying; 'In Zimbabwe Mr. Mugabe is not part of the solution to the
political problem; he himself, is the problem.'
Odinga urged the
international community to act fast in trying to convince Mugabe to step
down, arguing this would be better for Zimbabweans who have already suffered
enough. "Moreover it's high time these political compromises were stopped,
that in our countries allow losers to remain in power," Odinga said. Kenya,
like Zimbabwe, was the first to have a power sharing government that
accommodated both the winners and losers of a controversial election which
was marred by violence and many deaths.
Last week Thursday, Botswana's
President Ian Khama warned that Zimbabwe's power sharing government was on
the verge of collapse. Speaking to the AFP news agency on the sidelines of a
rally in Botswana, ahead of elections which he eventually won, Khama said of
the coalition; 'It is limping along and there is a real danger that the
whole thing could collapse.' Khama made it clear if the coalition did
collapse they would not recognize a ZANU PFonly government headed by Mugabe
because 'he certainly did not win the presidential election last
year.' Meanwhile prominent newspaper, the New York Times, has issued a hard
hitting editorial, accusing Mugabe and his party of trying 'to blow up the
power-sharing arrangement ever since neighboring states put it together last
year.' The paper says SADC must demand that Mugabe finally abide by the
terms and spirit of the power-sharing deal. 'If he refuses, the community
should withdraw recognition from his government and insist on new,
internationally supervised elections.' This supervision was important to
ensure 'democracy, not intimidation' determined the outcome of the
elections. While SADC dallies around what to do with Zimbabwe, the
Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), showed how it's done by
moving swiftly to impose an arms embargo on the military junta-ruled Guinea,
for mass human rights violations. After the massacre of over 150 people at
an opposition rally ECOWAS called an emergency summit in Nigeria last Friday
and suspended the country. Another member, Niger, was also suspended by the
group after its president went ahead with elections in violation of
constitutional provisions permitting only two terms in office.
By KITSEPILE NYATHI, NATION
Correspondent Posted Thursday, October 22 2009 at 13:09
HARARE,
Thursday
The rift between Zimbabwe's coalition parties has spilled into
the country's polarised parliament after legislators from President Robert
Mugabe's party walked out protesting against critics of the veteran
leader.
Zimbabwe was plunged into a fresh crisis last week after Prime
Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change started
boycotting cabinet and council of ministers meetings.
Mr Tsvangirai's
party said it was suspending cooperation with Mr Mugabe's Zanu PF eight
months after they formed the unity government because it was not happy over
delays in the implementation of their power sharing agreement.
The
dramatic pull out was triggered by the jailing of MDC treasurer general Mr
Roy Bennett on terrorism and banditry charges.
Mr Bennett whom the MDC
says is being targeted for being white was released on bail last weekend
pending the commencement of his trial next month.
A Zanu PF legislator
torched another protest in parliament on Wednesday when he accused the MDC
of disengaging from cabinet and the council of ministers because "white
ex-commercial farmer Roy Bennett has been indicted for trial in the High
Court on terror related charges."
The MP said the disengagement was not
consistent with Mr Mugabe's speech at the official opening of parliament two
weeks ago where he called for national reconciliation.
But an MDC MP
hit back saying Mr Mugabe's speech was only fit for people at mental
institutions.
This prompted a mass walkout by the Zanu PF legislators who
accused the MDC of disrespecting the president.
Only two Zanu PF MPs
remained in the house.
The parliamentary session, which resumed on
Tuesday after a two month break has so far been characterised by heated
exchanges as MPs from across the political divide heckled each
other.
Meanwhile, the three principals in the unity government are likely
to meet as soon as President Mugabe returns from an ongoing summit in Uganda
at the weekend.
According to Zimbabwe's power sharing agreement, Mr
Mugabe, Mr Tsvangirai and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara share
executive authority and if any of the parties pull out, the country would be
plunged into a constitutional crisis.
"The principals need to talk to
each other and agree on things that they agree on and disagree on things
that they disagree on," said Industry and Commerce Minister, Professor
Welshman Ncube who is also secretary general of the smaller faction of the
MDC.
"But more importantly they need to find a way of living with what
they disagree on and continue to talk about those things."
There were
also reports that Southern African Development Community
(SADC) leaders
will on October 29 hold talks with Zimbabwe's estranged leaders in an effort
to break the deadlock.
SADC and the African Union are the guarantors of
the political settlement that sought to end Zimbabwe's decade old political
and economic problems.
Members of the SADC troika on politics, defence
and security - South Africa, Angola and Mozambique - were mandated to deal
with the Zimbabwe crisis.
Mr Tsvangirai who is on a regional tour to
appraise the leaders of the latest developments has already been to
Mozambique and South Africa.
On Wednesday, he met President Jacob Zuma
whose office issued a statement that the South African leader had "expressed
concern at the situation in Zimbabwe."
Mr Zuma who is regarded as an
important asset in resolving conflict in the region said "Zimbabwe should
not be allowed to slide back into instability."
Reporters Without Borders today condemned mistreatment by
Zimbabwean intelligence agents of two journalists working for Arab satellite
TV station al-Jazeera. Cameraman Austin Gundani was physically assaulted
and then held for three hours, with his reporter colleague Haru Mutasa, at
the presidency where they had arrived on 20 October to cover a cabinet
meeting from which Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai had pulled
out.
The worldwide press freedom organisation said the incident
demonstrated that "worrying tensions between President Robert Mugabe and his
power-sharing government can have harmful consequences for the work of
journalists".
Austin Gundani had been filming the arrival of Zimbabwean
ministers at the offices of President Mugabe when he was brutally
arrested.
The two journalists were then locked up in a cell and
interrogated, according to information obtained by Reporters Without
Borders.
The incident came on the day Zimbabwe had improved its position
on the organisation's just-published 2009 world press freedom index compared
with the previous year.
"The government has announced the return of
the BBC and CNN, but it has to be said that it remains difficult for the
international media to work in Zimbabwe without encountering trouble", the
organisation said.
It also comes a week after an independent
photo-journalist, Anne Mpalume, was arrested in Manicaland in the east of
the country where she was reporting on illegal diamond mining. The
authorities accused her of not having permission. She was released on bail
and will appear in court on 26 October.
AS Zimbabwean Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai embarks
on yet another emergency regional tour, searching for help, he must be
wishing that his troubled country was in West Africa, where He must have
read with envy at the weekend the news that the Economic Community of West
African States had imposed an arms embargo on the military junta-ruled
Guinea for "mass human rights violation".
Even as he headed for South
Africa for the first in a series of meetings he hopes to hold with regional
leaders, Tsvangirai would have known that there was no hope of the Southern
African Development Community adopting a stance against Zimbabwean President
Robert Mugabe as tough as the one taken by Ecowas on Saturday against the
leaders of Guinea and Niger.
In case you have missed your continental
news, here is an update.
Following the massacre of, reportedly, more than
150 people at an opposition rally in Guinea last month, Ecowas convened an
emergency summit in Abuja on Friday.
But unlike those "crisis
summits" we have become accustomed to in the southern part of Africa, the
Ecowas meeting was no talking-shop.
West African leaders, headed by
Nigeria's Umaru Yar'adua, reacted by slapping Captain Moussa Dadis Camara's
regime with an arms embargo.
They also mandated Yar'Adua to lobby the
African Union, the European Union and other international bodies to do the
same.
In a statement issued after the summit, Ecowas described the
state-sponsored violence in Guinea as a "real threat to the peace, security
and stability" of the entire West African region.
"All steps must be
taken immediately to stop the spate of killings of innocent Guineans who are
yearning for immediate restoration to constitutional order," Yar'Adua later
said.
The summit also threatened to impose "full sanctions" on Niger if
President Mamadou Tandja went ahead with his unconstitutional plans to serve
a third term as head of state.
Now contrast all of that with the
SADC's pussyfooting around Mugabe, who continues to give regional leaders
the middle finger. For that is what he has done by plunging the
SADC-sponsored and shaky Zimbabwean government of national unity into a
fresh crisis.
If he were serious about making the unity government work,
Mugabe would have stopped his foot soldiers from harassing Tsvangirai's
close ally and the MDC's deputy minister-designate, Roy
Bennett.
Bennett's most recent detention was calculated to provoke
Tsvangirai and the MDC into pulling out of the unity government. But the
collapse of the unity government would not only be a blow to those within
Zimbabwe seeking peace and stability, it would leave the SADC - especially
South Africa - with much egg on its face.
For years, the region has
successfully persuaded the rest of the world that it should not intervene in
the Zimbabwean crisis because the SADC leaders were the best placed to
resolve the conflict.
Then, a year ago, it seemed that the SADC - and
especially former president Thabo Mbeki - would be vindicated, as Tsvangirai
and Mugabe concluded a historic power-sharing deal.
But it has been
downhill ever since, with the Zanu-PF leader reneging on key components of
the agreement.
Despite calls for help from a desperate MDC, the SADC has
done very little to ensure that Mugabe meets his end of the
bargain.
Would Ecowas have allowed such total disregard of its authority
by a member state? I think not.
Academic Adekeye Adebajo once said
that bodies such as Ecowas and the SADC need "local hegemons like Nigeria
and South Africa" to provide leadership. Nigeria is now doing just this for
West Africa, while we in the south are left asking: Where is South
Africa?
The
Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) will meet a Delegation from Munich
City, Germany today the 22nd of October 2009. The meeting is as a
result of the long standing relationship between the Munich City and CHRA. The
Delegation consists of the Mayor of Munich City, Munich city Council officials
and representatives of HAMUPA.
The
delegation comes at a time when the residents of Harare are facing a myriad of
challenges in service delivery especially water supplies, health and waste
management. The meeting will be a platform for CHRA and the delegates to
exchange ideas on local governance issues as well as to explore ways by which
Munich can work together with the City of Harare and CHRA to resuscitate and
improve municipal service delivery in Harare. Meanwhile, the CHRA team has
already met the delegates at a reception that was conducted at Town House on the
20th of October 2009. The CHRA team also accompanied the delegates on a tour of
the Morton Jeffery Water works as well as the City’s Kevin Waste Management
Depot. The tour was an eye opener for the delegates as they had first hand
experience of the challenges that the City of Harare is facing in terms of the
critical equipment that is needed for the resuscitation of waste management
projects as well as water and sewer reticulation. The meeting with the delegates
is one of the numerous efforts by CHRA towards engaging different partners in
addressing service delivery challenges in Harare.
CHRA
remains committed to advocating for good and transparent local governance as
well lobbying for quality and affordable municipal services.
The theme for this year’s Peace and
Justice Studies Association (PJSA) annual
conference, held from October 8 to 10 at Marquette University in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, could not have been more apropos. Phrased as “The Power of
Nonviolence,” it compelled me to think about the ways in which Nonviolence
theory and praxis could be brought to bear in the search for solutions to one of
Africa’s most intractable puzzles, the case of Zimbabwe. No sooner had the
conference ended and we had all returned to our respective bases than Zimbabwe
shot up onto the world headlines once again. The Tsvangirai faction of the
Movement for Democratic Change’s (MDC-T)) Agriculture Deputy Minister-designate
Roy Bennett was indicted and remanded to jail on Wednesday October 14, to await
his trial on charges believed by many to be politically motivated. He is being
tried on charges of “possessing weapons for the purposes of insurgency and
banditry,” according to the Zimbabwe
Times. High Court Justice Charles Hungwe
restored Bennett's bail two days later, on the same day that Prime Minister and
MDC-T president Morgan Tsvangirai announced that the MDC-T was disengaging from
the Government of National Unity.
The Last Straw
News reports
described the Roy Bennett issue as the last straw that broke the GNU’s back,
despite Tsvangirai’s clarification that the disengagement was not a direct
result of the Bennett trial. The Zimbabwe
Times quoted Tsvangirai as telling reporters:
“Let me emphasise this . . . this decision has not been made because of Bennett
as some might want think. This has purely nothing to do with Bennett but with
the collapse of trust in our Zanu PF partners in government.” Rumors that the
MDC-T were contemplating pulling out of the Government of National Unity
predated the events of this past week. The Financial Gazette titled its
Friday October 2 comment
“No to MDC Pull Out”, and urged the MDC-T to explore other ways of resolving the
problems dogging the GNU, other than withdrawing from the eight-month marriage
of convenience.
The statement from Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai
announcing the “disengagement” offered the context for the decision as the culmination of “outstanding,
non-compliance and toxic issues” that continued “to impede the transitional
government”, eight months after it was implemented. “Despite countless meetings
among the Principals, despite countless press conferences, despite numerous
correspondence and trips to SADC and SADC leaders and despite a SADC summit, the
above issues remain outstanding,” said the statement issued on Friday, October
16. It laid out a litany of breaches, intransigence and recalcitrance from the
ZANU-PF side: provincial governors had still not been appointed; the
appointments of Governor of the Reserve Bank and the Attorney General had not
yet been rescinded, despite their illegality; the deputy minister of Agriculture
had not yet been sworn in; and the Global Political Agreement had not yet been
reviewed, way past the 6-month point as was the agreement.
Tsvangirai
went on to point out how ZANU-PF had failed to enact a paradigm shift to reflect
the spirit of the Global Political Agreement (GPA), abusing and disrespecting
it. More ominously, he cited “the extensive militarization of the countryside
through massive deployment of the military and the setting up of bases of
violence that we saw after the 29th of March 2008.” ZANU-PF had imposed more
than 16,000 youth functionaries onto government payroll, who had been imposed on
the government payroll, and there was continuation of “selective and unequal
application of the rule of law”. ZANU-PF’s mouthpieces, The Herald
newspaper and the Zimbabwe Broadcasting
Corporation “continue to treat the MDC and our leaders in government as if they
were a third-rate treasonous and sell-out element instead of a genuine and equal
partner in the transitional government.”
In what was probably a painful
acknowledgement of what many had already known about the marriage of
convenience, Tsvangirai turned the scathing critique inward:
“On our
part, we have papered over the cracks and have sought to persuade the whole
world in the last eight months that everything is working. We have sought to
persuade our constituencies that the transitional government was on course and
was the only business in town. In the process, we have put at stake the
reputation, credibility and trust of our movement and to ourselves as leaders.
We have done everything in order to make this government work and we have done
so purely for one reason, the need to restore hope and dignity to our people;
the need to give our people a new start and a new
beginning.”
Tsvangirai’s tone was very assertive, emphasizing how it was
the MDC that was supposed to be the dominant partner in the inclusive
government: “The truth of the matter is that it is our Movement that won the
election of 29 March 2008. It is our Movement that has the mandate of the people
to govern this country. It is our Movement that has strategically compromised on
that mandate by executing the GPA and by entering into the transitional
government. It is our Movement upon which the hope and future of millions of
Zimbabweans is deposited.”
In September this year the MDC started
consulting its membership and support base about the idea of whether to hang in
there and try to work things out. On the MDC’s website, a poll started on September 24 asked if the party should
abandon the inclusive government. As of October 17, 54.5 percent of 393
respondents advised against pulling out, over 45.5 percent who voted yes.
According to the Mail and Guardian of South
Africa, Tsvangirai asked for an emergency meeting with Mugabe following the
indictment and jailing of Bennett on Wednesday. Mugabe is said to have refused.
Tsvangirai in turn refused to convene a scheduled cabinet meeting. The Sunday Times of October 18
described rumors about a meeting between President Robert Mugabe and Prime
Minister Morgan Tsvangirai hours after Tsvangirai’s announcement on Friday, in
addition to earlier rumors that Mugabe had been frantically attempting to meet
Tsvangirai. Following the decision to disengage from the inclusive government,
the MDC-T ordered all its cabinet ministers to pack up and leave their
government offices and operate from their party’s headquarters, according to the
Zimbabwe Times.
For many, it was just a matter of time before this
unraveling was to get underway. For others, it is a disturbing trend of events
for an arrangement that, however inconvenient and undesirable, had began to bear
tangible fruit on the ground inasfar as the living conditions of ordinary
Zimbabweans. The Zimbabwe crisis has not suffered a shortage of detailed,
impassioned proposals and suggestions for how to resolve it. These have ranged
from military options, from both inside agitation and outside Zimbabwe, to
political settlements, such as the inclusive government, insisted upon by the
Southern African Development Community (SADC), which both ZANU –PF and the two
MDC factions ended up agreeing upon. The monumental events of this past week are
likely to unfurl that process all over again. Tsvangirai said it was now time to
“assert and take our position as the dominant party in Zimbabwe,” even as the
MDC-T were ceasing all collaboration with the ZANU-PF. It remains to be seen how
this assumption of the MDC’s rightful place in government is going to be
implemented.
Among the many proposals offered as potential ways of
ending the Zimbabwe impasse, there has not been much said about nonviolent
action. With the exception of a special report published in 2003 by the Washington DC-based United States Institute for Peace (USIP),
none of the major think tanks and interested third parties have ever mentioned,
or let alone paid attention to the issue of nonviolence as a plan of action
capable of being a viable solution to the Zimbabwe crisis. This is at once
curious and yet not surprising. Curious because not only has nonviolent action
been successfully used in difficult contexts of political repression around the
world, it has actually been adopted as a strategy by a number of groups in
Zimbabwe, including the MDC itself, in its first six years. But it is also not
surprising because despite the success nonviolent resistance has registered in a
number of cases of repression around the world, it has not been as celebrated as
military campaigns have, and continue to be. With the exception of Mahatma
Gandhi’s nonviolent movement in the first half of the century, first in South
Africa and later in India, and Martin Luther King Jr.’s Civil Rights Movement in
the United States of the 50s and 60s, methods of resistance to political
repression that rely on means other than violence receive less attention in the
mainstream media.
The 2003 special report issued by the United States
Institute for Peace was titled “Zimbabwe and the Prospects for Nonviolent
Political Change.” The report was commissioned by USIP’s Research and Studies
Program, and was written by three scholar-analysts who were living and working
in Zimbabwe at the time. Their names were not provided, for reasons of their
personal safety. With the term “Nonviolent Political Change” prominently gracing
the title, the report offered a detailed description of events in 2003, most
notably the strategies that the MDC and its partners had undertaken to
pressurize Mugabe’s ZANU-PF into democratic reforms. The report stated that when
civil society groups began to emerge in the 1990s, their main tactic was to use
strategies of nonviolence to bring about change in Zimbabwe. Most of these
strategies took the form of mass stay-aways, which paralyzed economic activity
in some of Zimbabwe’s major cities. Beyond these mass stay-aways, however, it
was not clear how these civil society coalitions and the MDC approached the
concept of nonviolence in both its theoretical and strategic considerations. The
report offered no definitions of what it termed ‘nonviolence’, nor did it cite
any particular Zimbabwean proponents of nonviolence spelling out what specific
approaches they would use, other than mass stay-aways.
Violence and
Nonviolence in Zimbabwe
The most compelling evidence that there were
Zimbabweans who espoused nonviolence as both principle and strategy appeared in
an article written by Senator David Coltart and published on the news site
NewZimbabwe.com in September 2006. The
article was picked up by The New African in their May 2007 issue, which had a
17-page supplement dedicated to presenting various sides to the Zimbabwe story.
The sponsored supplement of the May 2007 issue of the New African dedicated six
articles to the issue of violence in Zimbabwe, two of them written by two
members of the MDC affected by the violence from within their own ranks.
David Coltart is an MDC-M member of parliament from the Mutambara
faction who has since become Zimbabwe’s Minister of Education, Sports and
Culture. Citing both Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., Coltart wrote
that the best way to deal with Mugabe’s authoritarianism was through nonviolent
techniques. He traced his personal commitment to nonviolence to two brutal wars
he had experienced. First was the war for independence, and second was the
Gukurahundi, the massacre of Ndebeles in what Mugabe called a war against
rebels, in the mid-1980s. “These experiences made me vow that I would do all in
my power to prevent further conflict in Zimbabwe,” he wrote. Coltart pointed out
that violence was endemic to Zimbabwean society, going back to the wars of the
19th century.
"Violence was used by Lobengula to suppress the Shona.
Violence was used to colonise and the threat of violence was used to maintain
white minority rule. Violence was used to overthrow the white minority. And
since independence, violence as been used to crush legitimate political
opposition."
Coltart added that a culture of impunity had taken hold, in
which violence was used to achieve political ends, and the perpetrators were
thriving on those victories won through violence. “As a result, violence is now
deeply embedded in our national psyche. Political violence is accepted as the
norm.” The MDC was different from other Zimbabwean political parties because of
its commitment to ending political violence and promoting nonviolence as a
principle, wrote Coltart. MDC members had at various times debated as to whether
the brutality of Mugabe’s government could be encountered through nonviolence,
however the MDC always maintained a “broad consensus that this was the only
course open to us if we were to act in the long national interest.”
Coltart was anguished by the violence that was being perpetrated by
members of the MDC, a development he argued was undermining the entire
nonviolent strategy. On September 28, 2004, MDC youths were said to have
attempted to murder Peter Guhu, MDC Director of Security. While this incident
shocked Coltart, he was even more disturbed to learn that senior MDC officials
were part of the attempted murder plot. An inquiry was carried out, but no
action was taken against the members who had plotted the attempted murder. More
violence was to follow in May 2005, when the same MDC youth were sent to assault
other MDC members. In July 2006 MDC youth from Tsvangirai’s faction seriously
injured a member of Mutambara’s MDC faction, Trudy Stevenson, stoning her in the
head and breaking her arm. They also damaged the car Stevenson and other party
members were traveling in. Other cases of political violence perpetrated by the
MDC involved petrol bombings of police officers, some of whom incurred severe
burn injuries.
Coltart wrote that if the MDC were to transform Zimbabwe
into a better place, “we simply have to break this cycle of violence. We will
find that if we do not stamp out violence in our ranks now, it will come back to
haunt us.” The reason why ZANU-PF’s political violence had reached the
proportions it had was because of the century-old trend, repeating itself and no
one seemed to have learned the lesson that violence begets more violence.
Coltart said that violence played right into the hands of ZANU-PF, whose sole
purpose had been not only to intimidate but also to “provoke the opposition into
a physical fight. The regime desperately needs a pretext to use all the power at
its disposal.” Whatever mass-action the MDC and its partners were to plan needed
to be “carefully organized by people who have a deep-rooted commitment to and
understanding of nonviolent techniques,” he wrote.
The MDC are not the
only group espousing nonviolent techniques in Zimbabwe. The women’s group
Women of
Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) state in their mission
statement that their goals are “based on the principles of strategic
nonviolence.” When the group organized a protest to commemorate this year’s
International Day of Peace on September 21 in Bulawayo, they were brutally
attacked and dispersed by the police. Some onlookers threatened the police with
physical violence in retaliation, but the group’s leaders stepped in and
asserted the group’s nonviolent approach: “we are non-violent activists and any
history should write that the people who disturbed the peace with violence were
Zimbabwe Republic Police officers, not peaceful human rights
defenders.”
Given the history of Zimbabwe and the role violence has
played for more than a century, the idea of nonviolence would not be an easy
one. One interesting irony is that even Robert Mugabe himself once read Mahatma
Gandhi, and for a while contemplated nonviolent resistance, according to Mugabe
biographer Heidi Holland (2008) in her book Dinner with
Mugabe. The belief that Zimbabwe’s freedom
could only be won through armed struggle was pervasive, probably given the
brutality of the racist regime of Ian Smith. Speaking to Bill Sutherland and
Matt Meyer in a 1992 interview for their book on Pan-Africanist peace
perspectives, then Minister of Foreign Affairs Nathan Shamuyayira said the
question of nonviolence as a tactic for Zimbabwe’s independence struggle was out
of the question. Many felt that the victories Gandhi had achieved for India and
Martin Luther King Jr. for civil rights in the United States could not be used
as examples for Zimbabwe, whose context was far different. But according to
Coltart, the MDC did view nonviolence as a viable response to ZANU-PF’s
violence, even when members of the MDC did not always adhere to nonviolent
principles.
That Senator David Coltart became the new Minister of
Education, Sport and Culture in February 2009 was a particularly promising sign
in light of the expectation for a new curriculum and a reformed educational
system. Nonviolence education requires an intellectual framework to guide
practical training and discipline, under a broader Peace Education curriculum
and pedagogy. Several African countries have embarked on the incorporation of
Human Rights Education into their school systems, through the efforts of
educational Non-Governmental Organizations. Perhaps the most significant
breakthrough came in September when seven African Ministers of Education met in
Mombasa, Kenya, to discuss the incorporation of Peace Education into their
school systems. While seven countries were able to attend the conference, the
original invitation went to twelve countries, under the auspices of the
Association for
the Development of Education in Africa
(ADEA). The twelve countries were Angola, Cote D’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of
Congo, Kenya (Host), Madagascar, Mozambique, Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sierra
Leone, South Africa, Sudan, and Uganda. Zimbabwe was curiously not on the list,
although the conference was open to any interested country on the African
continent. Handled carefully and properly, the introduction of Peace Education
into the school systems of African countries could be the one deciding factor
that might transform the educational landscape and make the school system
responsive and relevant to actual African contexts.
Incorporating Peace
and Nonviolence Education into the school systems of Zimbabwe and other African
countries, not to say the rest of the world, is a long-term project requiring
meticulous planning, consultation and deliberation. But Zimbabweans are looking
for solutions for the immediate crisis also. Long term planning need not wait
for immediate solutions first, nor can immediate solutions be considered a
substitute for long term planning. If the nonviolence approach adopted by the
MDC, WOZA and other Zimbabwean groups is going to bear fruit, there will be an
urgent need to pay serious attention to lessons from other contexts where
nonviolence had been attempted, learning from both the successes and
failures.
Gandhi Today
Although not a mainstream ideology,
nonviolent theory and practice are not new in Africa. As Desmond Tutu writes in
the preface to Guns and Gandhi in Africa: Pan African Insights on Nonviolence,
Armed Struggle and Liberation in Africa (Sutherland & Meyer, 2002), it was
in South that Mahatma Gandhi developed his concept of Satyagraha, variously
understood as a soul force that seeks truth through nonviolent action.
Nonviolent action has therefore been a part of the strategies that South
Africans have used to end apartheid since the late 19th century. In his
autobiography titled Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah (1958) discussed how Gandhi’s concept
of nonviolence influenced the strategies that Ghanaians used to win their
independence in 1957 as the first country in Sub-Saharan Africa to do so.
Uniquely called Positive Action, Nkrumah trained members of his party in
nonviolent techniques, and won Ghana’s independence without resorting to
violence. Zambia’s first president Kenneth Kaunda was also a proponent of
nonviolent action, and wrote a book about the predicament of nonviolence for
independence movements faced with brutal, racist violence. Tanzania’s first
president Julius Nyerere was also a proponent of nonviolence, as were other
Pan-Africanist movements which adopted various nonviolent techniques even as
they also flirted with violence when they deemed it necessary.
The
morning of Saturday October 10th, the last day of this year’s PJSA annual
conference, started with a plenary session. The session was titled ‘Gandhian
Traditions’, and brought together three distinguished scholar-activists who
study and teach Gandhian nonviolence. The first panelist to speak was Dr. Veena
Rani Howard of the University of Oregon, who pointed out that in today’s world
Gandhi’s values were considered ascetic, and were dismissed as quaint, and
merely symbolic. The second speaker was Fr. Cedric Prakash, SJ, Director of the
Jesuit Centre for Human Rights, Justice and Peace in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India.
Fr. Prakash spoke about the challenges of mainstreaming the concept of Ahimsa,
or nonviolence, in Gandhi’s own backyard which today is wracked by various kinds
of violence. The panel’s third and last speaker was Dr. Michael Nagler from the
Metta
Center for Nonviolence Education, in
Berkeley, California. Dr. Nagler pointed out that there had been a major shift
in our thinking about nonviolence today. He said approximately 3.6 billion today
lived in a region of the world where a major nonviolent event had occurred. He
said this shift could also be seen in the study of science, with a noticeable
turn toward the study of positive psychology in neuroscience. Nonviolence was
now being taught in institutions across the world, and even the PJSA had made
Nonviolence the theme for this year’s conference, observed Dr. Nagler.
As I write, the Gandhi-King
Conference on Peacemaking will be underway
next week in Memphis, Tennessee, an annual gathering, since 2004, of peace
scholars and practitioners, activists and community leaders. Georgia congressman
and former student leader during the Civil Rights Movement, Representative John
Lewis is pushing legislation through congress to enact a bill named H.R. 3328:
the Gandhi-King Scholarly Exchange Initiative Act of 2009. If passed, the bill
would fund research and collaboration amongst scholars and students in both
India and the United States to promote peace and nonviolence around the world.
Another bill also aimed at promoting peace and nonviolence in the United States
and abroad is H.R. 808, initiated by Congressman Denis Kucinich for the
establishment of a cabinet level Department of Peace and Nonviolence. Adding to
the shift, the PBS television documentary series titled A Force More Powerful,
produced by Steve York and Jack DuVall, and the accompanying book edited by
Peter Ackerman and Jack DuVall, catalogued no less than six major nonviolent
revolutions, going back to the early 1900s up to the close of the century. That
project helped tell the larger, if not less often told story of how nonviolent
social change has been an important factor in 20th century struggles to end
political repression.
If Dr. Nagler is indeed right about this shift, and
there is good reason to believe he is, would it be too idealistic to imagine the
role that nonviolence can play in seeking peaceful resolutions to some of the
most difficult problems of violence and war that we are faced with today? And
having seen the evidence for the presence of attempts to use nonviolent
techniques in addressing the problems Zimbabwe is undergoing, what lessons might
we draw from these attempts?
Lessons of Nonviolence
There are
several tenets of nonviolent theory and practice that can help us begin
answering the above two questions. There are noticeable differences between
approaches that have suggested nonviolent strategies, and those that have not.
The suggestion to use violent means to end the Zimbabwe impasse has gained
traction, understandably so, given the frightening levels of violence that
ZANU-PF has unleashed on members and supporters of the MDC and critiques alike.
As Senator Coltart has pointed out, retaliation for this violence has played
right into ZANU-PF’s philosophy of violent repression, a key lesson that
nonviolence theory and practice teaches.
As Senator Coltart has also
argued, cycles of violence repeat themselves endlessly, even over hundreds of
years. Nonviolent theory and practice, under the broader framework of Peace
Studies, emphasizes the importance of studying the root contexts of problems in
order to know how to address them. The Zimbabwe case has created such a
revulsion for Robert Mugabe that to suggest a role for historical factors in
leading to the present crisis has become passé. As Mahmood Mamdani observed in
an essay in the London Review of Books in December 2008, the discourse on
Zimbabwe turned into a dichotomous contention between two options: one either
adored Mugabe, or one abhorred him. In his attempt to free the debate from such
a binary, Mamdani suffered the fate of many who have made the argument for
historical understanding of the roots of the problem, being dismissed as someone
who was defending Robert Mugabe. Thus when Heidi Holland wrote her
psychobiography of Mugabe, attempting to provide both a historical context and a
psychoanalytical interpretation of why Mugabe turned from a hero to a villain,
the result was a book whose description of the context that created Mugabe
became something of a rare breath of honesty and a break from the vilification
and demonization, which was nevertheless not totally absent.
Holland
published an op-ed in the New York Times at the time her biography of Mugabe,
Dinner With Mugabe, came out. The op-ed was titled ‘Make Peace with Mugabe,’ in which she
pointed out that Robert Mugabe’s real quarrel was with the British, arising out
of promises they had made, and had then reneged on. “Indeed, he told me that he
was prepared to sacrifice the welfare of his country to prove his case against
Britain,” wrote Ms. Holland, a point Mr. Mugabe buttressed in his recent CNN
interview with Christian Amanpour in September 2009, when Mugabe told Amanpour
one does not leave power because an imperialist has demanded thus: “You dig in.”
Ms. Holland went on to suggest that for someone who was prepared to destroy his
country just to make a point against an opponent, estranging and vilifying him
the way the West was doing was equally reprehensible. “That he has an arguably
justifiable complaint against a major Western power — namely the repudiation of
the land reform pledge — is doubtless an embarrassment in the West. But that
Britain and others choose to shun Mr. Mugabe rather than attempt to settle these
differences is quite frankly reckless.”
As evidence of that
recklessness, much has been said about “Smart sanctions,” whose devastating
effects on the Zimbabwean economy, as a combination with economic mismanagement
by ZANU-PF, have little that can be said to be smart about them. Not much is
said about the Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act (ZIDERA), passed in
the US Congress and Senate in January 2001 as S.494. Dismissed by much of the
White liberal left and African critics of Mugabe as irrelevant to Zimbabwe’s
economic crisis, that bill effectively prohibited the biggest international
financial institutions and traditional bilateral donors from entering into any
economic and financial relationships with the government of Zimbabwe. As
provided in Section 3 of the Act, the terms “International Financial
Institutions” and “Multilateral Development Banks” include all the global
financial institutions that most African and other developing regions of the
world have long depended on for loans, development aid and the day to day
running of their governments. Included in these categories are the African
Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank, as well as the European Bank for
Reconstruction and Development. The Act also recommended requesting the
compliance of the European Union, Canada and “other appropriate foreign
countries” in maintaining the sanctions stipulated in the Act.
Love Thy
Enemies, Including Robert Mugabe
Ms. Holland’s advice to the West may
have been premised on the politics of realism and pragmatism, but it also points
toward an important principle in nonviolent theory and practice. Both Gandhi and
King preached that at the heart of principles of nonviolence was love;
nonviolent activists protested against oppression and injustice whilst still
being able to love and respect the perpetrator of those vices. Nonviolence
strategies did not aim to defeat and humiliate an opponent, a piece of wisdom
that allowed the British to leave India without ill feelings. It was this
philosophy that also enabled the wider mainstream American public to understand
and appreciate the Civil Rights struggle, leading to both the Voting Rights Act
and the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and 1965 respectively. Former Archbishop
Desmond Tutu extended this philosophy, framed in the African concept of uBuntu,
as it facilitated the extension of forgiveness from Black South Africans toward
White South Africans, and enabled a transition from White minority rule to a
democratic dispensation that opened up political participation for all South
Africans.
It is not very easy for many people to consciously imagine
themselves forgiving Robert Mugabe and facilitating a new process of engagement
with him, but neither does Mugabe show signs of a capability to do that himself.
But therein lies one of the hardest principles of nonviolent theory and action
as bequeathed to us by Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, Nelson Mandela and
Desmond Tutu. Seeing nonviolence as both principle and strategy opens up new
possibilities in thinking differently about the causes of the Zimbabwe crisis,
and envisioning new solutions that represent a break from the intractable
impasse that has clouded the minds of many. Zimbabwean peace activists have a
lot to teach us about nonviolence, given the realities of what they go through
every day. Nonviolent theory and practice teaches that local activists have a
much better chance of effecting change in their own locality than activists
coming in from outside, with no deeper knowledge of the issues and ties to the
community. This does not mean outsiders have no role to play; rather it means
outsiders need to show their solidarity based on respect of local knowledge, a
consciousness and awareness of historical wrongs and their own complicity in
that history, as well as a readiness to learn from the people of the
area.
What Gandhi and King Would Advise
We can only imagine what
Gandhi’s and Martin Luther King Jr.’s advice would have been toward dealing with
the question of Zimbabwe. However several factors highlighted in this article
offer key concepts in nonviolence theory and practice as a compelling
alternative towards attempts to better understand and resolve problems of
violent conflict anywhere in the world. Some of the biggest struggles to end
repression in the 20th century and at the beginning of the 21st century have
been carried out using largely nonviolent means. One such untold story is how my
own country Malawi waged a largely nonviolent struggle between 1992 and 1994 to
rid itself of an entrenched thirty-year dictatorship.
In Zimbabwe, the
MDC, WOZA and such other groups are keeping the traditions of nonviolent
struggle alive, even as they learn new lessons about what works and what does
not. Entrusting a crucial Ministry of Education, Sport and Culture to a strong,
respected advocate of peace and principled nonviolence is a major step that has
the potential to transform the role of education in how Zimbabweans and other
African nations envision the future. The spirit of uMunthu/uBuntu is not
completely dead in Southern Africa; in fact it offers a new framework for
uMunthu-based peace education and nonviolence, built on endogenous
epistemologies that transform themselves with changing times. Handled with the
requisite care and sensitivity, the recent ADEA conference in Mombasa, Kenya, by
seven African Ministers of Education to lay the foundation for a peace education
curriculum in African school systems will be a major step in envisioning a
different future for Africa.
The purple blossoms of jacaranda trees decorate Harare's avenues and distract
the viewer from the increasing grime and crime in Zimbabwe's capital city.
(GlobalPost)
Purple blooms in Harare mask the rot in Mugabe's
capital.
By Zimbabwe
Correspondent (author cannot be identified because of Zimbabwe's press
restrictions)
Published: October 22, 2009 07:01 ET
HARARE, Zimbabwe — Mention Zimbabwe and the listener will think of chaos and
decay. But in October, with jacaranda trees displaying their striking purple
blossoms, the nation’s capital, Harare, could easily be described as
charming.
White British settlers imported the trees from South America at the end of
the 19th century. Whole avenues are awash with masses of mauve blooms.
Their appearance heralds the arrival of summer, which in Zimbabwe arrives on
the dot at this time of year. And as the heat increases so does the prospect of
rain.
There is nothing more dramatic than a highveld thunderstorm as lightning
bolts zigzag down to earth. Within a few weeks the arid countryside is
transformed into a sea of green.
The coming of the rains marks the end of the jacaranda’s brief reign. It is
soon replaced by flame trees whose flowering branches provide a scarlet-red
canopy across the city.
Postcards from the 1960s show a prosperous and well-laid-out town with
flowerbeds and tidy streets. Statues of colonial founders stare down from their
pedestals, a breed confident in the perpetuity of their rule.
Times have changed. Harare has not escaped the impact of population growth
evident everywhere in Africa. Zimbabwe has burgeoned from 5 million to 12
million in a generation. Every nook and cranny is now occupied as rural folk
drift to towns to seek, if not their fortunes, then jobs and subsistence.
Vestiges of the old city can be seen here and there. But the remains are sad
to behold. Bicycle tracks are overwhelmed by rogue shrubs, some street lights
haven’t worked for years and sidewalks contain pot holes that would comfortably
consume an unsuspecting pedestrian. Indeed, some have.
But viewed from the perspective of the hill that overlooks the city, it is a
pretty and well-ordered town laid out in a grid pattern. The statues have, of
course, been relocated. But students of “contemporary” (1950s) architecture may
be pleased to know that the main artery through the city center contains some of
the finest examples of '50s street lamps surviving in Africa including their
“Chinese hats.” And some of them actually work.
Here the great mining, banking and insurance companies had their headquarters
in the boom years of the Federation of the Rhodesias and Nyasaland — today
Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi. All three countries experienced post-colonial
economic collapse but none so dramatic as Zimbabwe.
A few banks remain but mostly the businesses have migrated to office parks on
the periphery of the city. And with their departure the city has succumbed to
crime and grime. Piles of rubbish occupy street corners. And street kids beg at
traffic lights.
President Robert Mugabe is universally blamed for the blight of a
once-beautiful city.
Irresistible demographics have played a role but change has not been well
managed. An energetic, business-minded mayor has the daunting task of putting
the city back together again. He’s unlikely to succeed. But some pot holes have
been filled.
“One thing he [Mugabe] can’t take from us is the weather,” one old timer
chuckles.
It is true that Harare has one of the finest climates in the world. At 5,000
feet it is never too hot or humid and the winter months of May, June, July and
August are filled with cloudless blue skies as the rain keeps a discreet
distance.
Zimbabwe has a well-developed tourism infrastructure and an impressive range
of wildlife. But the resorts are empty with hotels reporting 30 percent
occupancy. The customer is king. There is no problem with comfort or security at
the country’s main resorts. From its mountains in the east and national parks in
the west, to the stunning Victoria Falls and tranquil Lake Kariba, Zimbabwe
offers a range of sights for the visitor.
But the tourists won’t be coming back just yet. Like the rest of us they are
waiting for the main obstacle to change being removed from the road ahead.
Foreigners and Zimbabweans alike hope that it won’t be too long now.