The Arnold Farm Tragedy: The Deficiencies of Zimbabwe’s Fast-Track Land Reform. Dewa Mavhinga*

Within the Reconfigured Political Economy

The ever-recurring Arnold Farm fiasco pitting the ‘new farmers’ and the ruling elites (including the First Family) points to the deficiencies of Zimbabwe’s Fast-Track Land reform. The evictions of the poor residents in favour of the ruling elites are not an isolated case but represents the many under-reported stories out there, the continued politics of impunity and ultimately point to the inherent and latent insecurity of tenure underlying fast-track related land. The above three points indicate some of the fundamental points that government, researchers, opposition political parties and civil society needs to pay attention to as we go into the 2018 elections. In some of its previous issues, Gravitas and GravitasLite, flagged the debate on the nature of the reconfigured economy and its likely implications to the 2018 electorate and this piece seeks to expand that debate by giving a narrative account of the emerging forms of social discontent within ‘the reconfigured political economy’. In as much as the Fast-Track Land Reform has reconfigured the political economy, there still exists many maladies within it such that the theory and practice of land reform in Zimbabwe continues progressing in a conflictual and tangential development. Ultimately, it is the object of this piece to call for a re-examination of the so-called successes of the Fast-Track Land Reform and ask hard questions regarding the liberatory claims of the programme. It seems Salif ‘Lion of Mansa’ Keita’s caution is instructive to the early celebrations: “It is not Yet Uhuru”.  

Fig 1.0 Harvest Time at Arnold Farm[i]

17 Years After Fast-Track: Not Yet Uhuru

17 Years after the parceling of land to its supporters, the ruling-party political underclass is slowly discovering that it is not yet freedom as they have to constantly fight the political greed and corruption of their leadership. The land was taken in the name of redressing colonial injustices but also what has been happening are systematic and latent processes of self-enrichment exercises by Zimbabwe’s ruling elite. The Arnold Farm case represents a microcosm of the underlying problem and the details are instructive. In the words of Livingstone Musanhi, a leader in the Arnold Farm Residents Association that represents the families under siege, their nightmare began on the 17^th of March 2017 when armed and uniformed police from the Support Unit ordered them to leave the farm ostensibly because it was private property owned by ‘Mother’ Amai Grace Mugabe. The police told Musanhi and others, “This place belongs to Mother [First Lady Grace Mugabe], she now wants to use her property. You must all leave and find somewhere else to go.” With that the police began to demolish the homes of some 200 families, forcing the people onto police trucks together with whatever belongings they had and driving off to dump them along Mvurwi road, some 40km away.

Without warning, over 800 people were labelled illegal trespassers on land they had called home for the last 17 years since they occupied the farm in 2000 at the behest of the ruling ZANU-PF party when it embarked on the fast-track land reform programme. When I visited some of the embattled families in Mazowe last month, the Chairperson of the Arnold Farm Residents Association, Dennyboy Chaparadza, said to me: “We are suffering and we have no-one to turn to because the matter involves Amai Grace Mugabe. We live in fear. We did not expect this kind of treatment from our party leadership and our government; they are treating us like wild animals, and not like people with rights. We want to speak to Amai Grace Mugabe about our plight, but we are afraid to seek audience with her since she is the one giving the orders for our eviction. Our party ZANU-PF used us, we were encouraged to invade this farm, now we are being chased away like dogs; where do we go now?”

Remembering History

A brief background to Arnold farm is that from 2000, as part of ZANU-PF orchestrated nation-wide farm invasions, hundreds of families moved onto the farm just behind the Mazowe dam, measuring some 1300 hectares. Arnold farm was part of a block of farms previously owned by Anglo-American, but leased to local company Interfresh involved in citrus farming and a game park. When the government officially announced the fast track land reform programme in July 2000, all invaded farms were gazetted State land in terms of the Agricultural Land Settlement Act [Chapter 20:01]. Between June 2000 and February 2001, a national total of 2,706 farms, covering more than six million hectares, were gazetted for compulsory acquisition. Standard practice was that the government would issue an ‘offer letter’ to the farm invaders to formalize occupation of the land. But the families at Arnold farm never received offer letters to occupy that farm. It appears that, much like thousands of others on invaded farms, they occupy that land at the pleasure of the ZANU-PF leadership, and, if a leader covets the land, or if they fall out of favour, as often happens because of factional infighting in the party, then they can easily lose the land.

At the height of the land invasions, the courts repeatedly ruled that the process was chaotic and unconstitutional and directed the police to stop the invasions and remove the invaders. But, in total disregard of the rule of law, the police refused to do anything to stop the invasions. Eventually some war veterans and ZANU-PF supporters turned to independent judges, harassed and haunted them out of office. Even when the SADC Tribunal ruled in favour of Ben Freeth and Mike Campbell barring the government from evicting them from their farms, that was of little help. The government simply ignored the ruling, and instead pushed for the Tribunal to be disbanded. President Mugabe publicly dismissed the SADC Tribunal ruling as “nonsense” and “of no consequence” (Ben Freeth, Mugabe and the White African, Lion Hudson, 2011).

Africans Don’t Need Property Rights?

The plight of the Arnold farm families lays bare the illusion of a successful land reform programme as naively portrayed by writers like Joseph Hanlon, Jeanette Manjengwa, and Teresa Smart (Zimbabwe Takes Back Its Land, Kumarian Press, 2013). The ZANU-PF government may have forcibly taken the land from some 4, 500 white commercial farmers, but it has not given that land to the landless black majority. It continues to use the land as a political weapon to temporarily reward supporters, but wielding power to take away that land to give to its leaders, or to punish those who may have turned their backs against the party. A closer look at the unlawful and tragic evictions ongoing at Arnold farm helps to lay bare and expose the fallacy of Zimbabwe’s chaotic land reform and how president Mugabe and ZANU-PF may have deployed his political genius to use the highly emotive and unresolved land reform question for political gain.

Fig 1.1 Demolitions Amidst Harvest Time

The Arnold farm tragedy is a clear indicator that there is no security of ownership for those who invaded land, because there are no ownership title deeds, and the ruling party decides who gets to keep or to move off the occupied farms.  The government land audit report, the 2003 Charles Utete report, claims some 134,452 families benefited from the fast-track land reform process. But it is evident that those so-called beneficiaries, like the Arnold farm families, are extremely vulnerable to internal displacements and evictions because the entire process remains under the control of an erratic ruling party and greedy leadership. The fast-track land reform process appears to have been deliberately chaotic, and hurried to short-circuit legal procedures, and keep families on land on which there is no security of tenure. The authors of Zimbabwe Takes Back Its Land concede that the issue of secure land tenure remains largely unresolved and that with just an ‘offer letter’ most families are still “squatting” on the land they occupy. The biggest failure of Zimbabwe’s fast track land reform programme, which exposes it as nothing more than a fraud and a sham, is its failure to ensure security of tenure to all land holders regardless of any social class or political power. It continues inculcating the politics of impunity, perpetuates lawlessness in law enforcement agencies and ultimately fails to accord all citizens equal protection before the law. Like the Arnold farm families, people have invested energy and money on this land over the last 17 years, only for someone higher up in the ZANU-PF command to come and displace them without any compensation, without an alternative land, and virtually with nowhere to go. The question that remains unanswered is; “Why is the state not interested in giving titled security to the farmers”?

When the Revolution Turns Cannibal

In October 2008, the then responsible Minister Didymus Mutasa issued an offer letter for Arnold farm to Matthews T Kunaka, but later withdrew the offer letter following protests from the families at Arnold farm.  Sometime in 2015, the government, through the Ministry of Finance, reportedly paid Interfresh compensation for loss of income with regards to the acquisition of Arnold farm. Martin Dinha, the Minister for Provincial Affairs in Mashonaland Central Province (where Arnold farm is located), in an interview published in the State-owned Herald newspaper on the 21st of March 2017, said the government offered Arnold farm to Amai Grace Mugabe and “requested the First Lady to utilize the land as a way of attracting investment.” He said the people on Arnold farm are not farmers but illegal gold panners who had been told to move to make way for the First Lady’s investment project which could include setting up a wildlife conservancy next to her other ventures including an orphanage, High School, and hospital that she set up along Mazowe road. In court documents, the police claimed Arnold farm is private property owned by the First Family, but it is unclear whether Grace Mugabe has any concrete, legal proof of ownership of the farm leading many to question the basis upon which Dinha appears to be playing political football with the families at Arnold farm.

A House Built on Sand

For a legal perspective, on the 5th of May 2017, I met the lawyer that Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights deployed to represent the Arnold farm families, Moses Donsa-Nkomo, my former classmate at the University of Zimbabwe. He explained to me that when Support Unit police began unlawful demolitions and evictions at Arnold farm, he approached the High Court for an order to protect the families and stop the unlawful evictions. On the 24th of March 2017, the High Court granted an order in favor of the Arnold Farm families, which the Commissioner-General of Police, Augustine Chihuri, and the Minister of Lands did not oppose. The court order, which was by consent, was that the Police would restore possession of the plots on Arnold Farm back to the families; stop harassing the families at the farm, and stop demolishing their houses or trying to evict them without a court order, or alternatively without issuing the families offer letters in respect of other land for them to occupy. In other words, the police had acted unlawfully by demolishing homes and evicting Arnold farm residents without a valid court order, and the High Court had intervened to clarify the law and protect the families.

But, incredibly, instead of complying with the court order, on the 24th of March 2017, the Police Officer Commanding Support Unit, Senior Assistant Commissioner Dr. Angeline Guvamombe deployed 18 police officers to Arnold farm, where they set up a base camp, to continue with orders to evict the families.

Fig 1.3 Fast-Track Tenurial Insecurity in Pictures

The police cordoned off the farm and set up check points on all main roads to the farm. On the 30^th of March 2017, Donsa-Nkomo went back to the High Court for a contempt of court order, that the police had not respected the previous court order. Justice Lavender Makoni issued another order against the police and the minister of lands  which said: (i) The police are hereby ordered and directed to immediately stop participating, assisting or supporting, in the demolition of the properties of the families at Arnold Farm or in their unlawful eviction, (ii) The police are ordered and directed to remove all their officers and vehicles, and refrain from associating themselves with the illegal eviction of the families at Arnold Farm. Again, the police ignored the court order. Country-wide farm invasions succeeded because the government conducted them outside the rule of law as characterized by the police repeatedly ignoring court orders when it suited them as is the case now at Arnold farm. As it was at the height of farm invasions, so it is today at Arnold farm, the partisan police act with impunity, as if they are above the law. 

There is utter disregard for the rule of law, and families have no protection, even when the courts have ruled in their favour. The ignoring of court orders by law enforcement agencies is not new in Zimbabwe in cases involving the political elite and dates back to the days of Chief Justice Gubbay when war veterans under the leadership of Chenjerai Hunzvi invaded live court sessions in the name of the revolution with impunity. The Fast-Track Land Reform from the lens of tenurial security is a house built on sand and this presents a lacuna in our legal and law enforcement system that needs the attention of government and political parties as we move into the 2018 elections.

We Need to Invest in Rule of Law and Not Men

When I visited Arnold farm last month, Support Unit police were on the farm patrolling, demolishing homes, and ordering families off the farm. I witnessed demolitions by Support Unit police, and interviewed several people whom the police had beaten on the soles of their feet.

Fig 1.4 Results of the Rule of Men

I spoke to several families who said they had nowhere to go, had no shelter, and were living in fear, their property destroyed, and each time they built temporary plastic shelters for protection from the rain and cold, the police would come and burn or destroy the shelters. I spoke to another leader of the Arnold Farm Residents Association, Innocent Dube, who told me that after armed and uniformed anti-riot police forced his family onto a truck, together with some of their belongings, and dumped by the roadside some 40km away on the 23rd of March 2017, he had hired private transport to return to the farm on the strength of the court order. But the police had again demolished the plastic temporary structures he had built for his family. The police told him, “Court Orders do not matter because we follow orders from our own leaders. We will not stop coming back to destroy any temporary shelters until everyone leaves the farm. Go back to wherever you came from in 2000 when you invaded the farm.”

If the government is willing, the problems at Arnold farm and many other cases of post-fast track internal displacement can be solved. All people involved, including the police, should respect the rule of law, and comply with High Court orders. The families at Arnold farm must not be evicted without a valid court order, and alternative land for them. Unfortunately, at present there is no political will to resolve the Arnold farm issue, and consequently, the land question in Zimbabwe. The question of tenurial security for Zimbabwe’s new land owners remain unresolved and offers one avenue for the democratic opposition to challenge ZANU PF’s nationalist authoritarianism.

*Dewa Mavhinga is a Human Rights Lawyer and Southern Africa Director for Human Rights Watch. He holds an LLBS (University of Zimbabwe) and LLM (Essex, UK). He writes in his personal capacity.

Notice from Editors.

We are currently engaged in a process of rebranding and improving the quality of Gravitas and GravitasLite. Therefore, the two publications have changed to monthly publications instead of the usual fortnightly publications.

We are calling for articles interrogating Zimbabwe’s Fast Track Land Reform Programme. Articles should have a policy inclination and not longer than 2000 words. Please, may you send your articles to gravitas@ipazim.com by 1300hrs Wednesday, 14^th of June 2017.

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[i][i] Credit to Dewa Mavhinga and Human Rights Watch for all the photos used in this edition.

Of Contending Economic Paradigms and 2018 Elections, Stolen Youth Dreams and Resurgent Democratic Opposition

The Limitations of Zimbabwe’s Contending Political Economy Paradigms and the 2018 Elections. Dr Tinashe Nyamunda*

The Contending Paradigms.

As the 2018 elections in Zimbabwe draw near, the political contest on which political party is best suited to steer the country towards a better future will be dominated by the economic agenda during campaigns. The kind of language that both ZANU PF and the opposition coalition led by the MDC (M) will use to persuade the electorate has become all too familiar.

On the one hand will be the nationalist/patriotic discourse celebrating land reform and advancing the programme for indigenisation and economic empowerment. Inherently connected to that is a sharp criticism of global imperial machinations against Zimbabwe through sanctions against a party determined to defend the fruits of its economic transformation following the fast track land reform programme. Underlying this discourse is the argument that Zimbabwe is using local economic transformation to challenge the worst excesses of enduring global imperialism. ZANU PF will again depict the opposition, particularly the MDC, as a movement that is severely compromised by collusion with the imperialist west to the extent that it will struggle to balance local national interests against those of the British and American governments.

Offering an alternative narrative to this discourse is opposition politics that will claim that the more immediate struggle is against nationalist authoritarianism. Making reference to the unending economic crisis, the opposition will argue that the ruling party presided over a poor human rights record, economic collapse characterised by high deindustrialisation, record unemployment, the informalisation of the economy and hyperinflation in the period between 2000 to 2009; as well as its contrasting current excesses of severe illiquidity. The suggested alternative will be re-engagement with the global economy through attracting investment and creating jobs for all.

The Utility of the Paradigms?

Both strategies are influential and very effective to respective constituencies of the political parties, but are also limited in terms of their capacity to sustainably develop a vibrant economy in the context of the complex global political economy. This is especially true as Zimbabwe has experienced tremendous changes in the nature of its society and economy, all of which have been shaped by the trajectory that its politics has followed. At the attainment of independence and for the better part of the first two decades, the political narrative followed the contours of the now infamous patriotic history narrative deployed to steer the power dynamics of the post-colony. Towards the turn of the century and influenced by a number of political and economic changes, the government shifted from its early collusion with colonial and foreign capital (the reconciliation of Zimbabwe with Rhodesia) towards a kind of decolonial turn characterised by the politics of radical economic redistribution of land and commercial resources. The shift, forced as it was by forces outside the corridors of power but ultimately shaped by consideration of political survival, represented a kind of exhausted nationalism. In fact, the patriotic narrative was criticised for elevating the record of the ruling party as one of the sole authority on liberation, transformation and empowerment while failing to call the state to account for the crisis it presided over since the 2000s.

Remembering History: The Nuances

Historians of Zimbabwe have indeed taken up the challenge to demonstrate that history is not limited to a narrative about “armed men liberating the land from white settlers”, that “the Zimbabwe crisis is by no means simply a land crisis. It is best understood as ‘a complex set of historically specific, interrelated and mutually reinforcing crises that need to be unpacked and analysed in relation to one another’”. Historians cautioned that reducing history to political agendas results “in the flattening of difference; the privileging of certain voices over others; and the identification of hegemonic nationalism as the bearer of improvement and progress”. This is not to discredit the nationalist nuances of Zimbabwe’s history, but to call for more holistic and inclusive histories. Such an approach decentres politics and incorporates other perspectives in the search for a more sustainable challenge to the colonial legacies that we still face today.

It was in this context that the politics of democratic change emerged, promising to repair the economic damage caused by the government’s radical turn. The MDC and its various splinter factions’ main criticism about economic collapse was that ZANU PF had failed to manage it and lost the confidence of foreign investors.

Not Walking the Talk: Mugabe Enjoy Foreign Crisps at his Birthday

Although the ruling party never sounds a trumpet to acknowledge this criticism, some its senior members accept that the country is in crisis. But they offer a different explanation. In their view, the radical changes to the economic structure from one based on the colonial distribution of land and other resources were critically overdue and required redress.  To them, such a marked shift in racial-economic relations upset the diplomatic relations between Zimbabwe and the imperial west resulting in sanctions. But the critical economic imbalance was still overdue and was confronted by the deployment of big man authoritarian politics, requiring a stalwart figure that could stand up to western condemnation. But in spite of the limits of the nationalist party’s patriotic narrative and the democratic discourse’s appeal, the country became split between the various emerging interests. The economy, once formally based, anchored on agrarian development and white monopoly and foreign capital, enjoying high employment and a vibrant secondary industry was gradually transformed into one where the mass of the unemployed exploited a vent within an informal economy arising out of formal economic collapse and a reconstructed agrarian base. In this new narrative, the patronage based politics of ZANU PF is pitted against the democratic and formal economic recovery discourse of opposition politics whose main challenges is representing workers in an economy dominated by informality and a dwindling labour base.

Counting the Opportunity Cost of Reform

But they represent a very specific local political and economic dynamic that does not adequately confront a much broader issue in Zimbabwe’s global economic context.  The nuanced character of Zimbabwe’s economy is that interests have become widely disparate, depending on economic access to resources.

ZAR200 Million Mansion: Allegedly Bought from Diamond Proceeds

The main issues being addressed, and indeed for political expediency, are temporal. The nationalist party’s discourse of transformation was land, but this had not adequately yielded the expected transformative outcomes as poverty still reigns and the economy struggles. The brief moment of the GNU and its currency stabilisation, on the other hand, failed to persuade the nation to fully back the political change, democracy and economic recovery discourse as the 2013 elections demonstrate. Certainly, the concerns of Zimbabwe’s electorate are much more nuanced and disparate than initially envisaged. For example, the concerns of the beneficiaries, at lower level of the value chain, of land reform are their continued and undisturbed access to this resource, just as is the case with people whose livelihoods have been based on state grants for small businesses in trade, fisheries and other trades. This includes, higher up the value chain, tenderpreneurs and politicians who have benefited from national resources, for example in the mining in diamonds, platinum and gold. To convince these beneficiaries of the imagined progressive alternative of democracy politics would be difficult. On the other hand, to convince the suffering middle class, mass of unemployed youths and informal traders that the exclusive ZANU PF project can sustainably address the national economic challenges has proved inadequate.

The Limitations of the Redistributive or Radical Narrative

For me, the political philosophy of Zimbabwe is too narrowly confined. We tend to forget that any economic transformation, redistributed or not, if limited in scope to the national context will not have a sustainable long term effect on the economy. In my view, the discourse needs to incorporate broader geo-political-economic considerations. For example, to what extent can external markets determine the fortunes of our economy? I could argue that the best example on how a state can sustain a formal vibrant national economy can be derived from the UDI Rhodesian experience. Despite global sanctions against the colony, the Rhodesian Front government managed to keep their heads above water, managing to even prosper more significantly in comparison to our entire postcolonial experience. But of course, the crucial benefits were for the minority white constituency while Africans were kept at the periphery of this economy. This is among the reasons why the liberation war was waged, to rid the country of this discrimination, but the point is that the Rhodesians economic coordination machinery worked to their advantage.

At independence, much the same structures were maintained, in which the markets, especially the external markets which Zimbabwe was re-integrated into, influenced the direction of politics to a significant degree. This partially explains why the ZANU PF government could not immediately implement radical economic changes. As they were pushed into a corner, the changes emerged from outside the state, from landless people seeking land, workers suffering collapsing standards of living, war veterans demanding compensation, indigenous business people unhappy with exclusion from the mainstream economy. The opposition rode this wave of mass discontent to challenge nationalist rule. In response, the state was forced to implement radical changes to appease pockets of the discontented through land reform, compensating war veterans and instituting programmes of indigenisation and economic empowerment. But this had the adverse effect of affecting the markets, and the result was economic plunge, most manifest in hyperinflation and demonetisation.

The Global Markets: The Missing Link

But all political formations, although disagreeing on the process, concur that many of these changes were necessary. Yet they all regret the response of the markets and desire a return to reengaging them. Therein lies the problem. The discourse of attracting investment needs to consider the power that these markets have in determining the political course of the nation. Markets have complex relationships with developing countries, anchored as they are on highly nuanced operations. The financial investments on stock markets, money markets, bonds markets etc, depend on a very specific model of economy. Whatever the economic reconfigurations within Zimbabwe and despite who leads it; beyond temporal constituency appeasement, my main worry is the ability and extent to which the markets will take us back to the beginning. This concern is never seriously considered in our political discourse but needs some level of attention. It should not just be about retaining power or political change, but should prompt active imaginations about how to confront a fast-changing global economy that has the power to direct how economies integrated into it operate. For me, economic transformation limited to domestic considerations is inadequate and can be rendered hopelessly unsound if they fall out of line with what investors expect if they are to realise profitable returns. Not that we should comply with market demands, far from it, we should understand how they work so that we are able to navigate them and derive optimum benefit without compromising the balanced aspiration of the disparate interests of those who constitute what can become the nation of Zimbabwe. At present, we are too fractured on competing visions of what the nation should be and the type of economy that should support it, but I will urge all the leaders to consider imagining this local/global economy nexus as part of their very crucial strategies towards appeasing their various constituencies in terms of the immediate demands placed on them.

*Dr Tinashe Nyamunda is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with the International Studies Group, University of the Free State, South Africa.

Born-Free but Not Free: The Dilemmas of the Post-Independence Generation. Sharon Wekwete*

Not Yet Uhuru: Chasing the Shadows of Freedom

I know I am still young but sometimes I feel so old. I was born free but, for most of my life, I have had to carry the weight of the world on my shoulders. Granted, I have enjoyed some of the benefits that came with independence from colonial oppression but the fruits of liberation seem to have left a bad, sour taste in my mouth.

As a young girl, I enjoyed a measure of blissful ignorance in the “new” Zimbabwe of the early 80s. I remember playing games like switi, stuck in the mud, and piggy in the middle. Some days I literally chased every yellow butterfly I saw. Little did I know that later in my life, I would be jumping up and down but ultimately getting nowhere. That I would find myself truly stuck in the mud, and constantly feeling like that piggy in the middle, vainly dodging blows from balls being thrown at me from different angles at once.

It seems like all I am chasing are the shadows of my dreams – reaching out but never quite grasping them.

The Dream Deferred or Stolen?

Many of my fellow “born free” millennial comrades share my sentiments – there is a sense of having been cheated somehow. We sit in our homes and try to piece together broken promises while disillusionment sets in like a chilling dampness, even as we strive daily to shake its hold off our lives.

Our individual and collective growth and development as young Zimbabweans seems to be stunted. Opportunities that were almost ripe for us to pick have fallen to the ground and are rotting.

All Seeking Escape: Queuing for Visas at SA Embassy in Harare

Meanwhile, colleagues in the diaspora are maximising their potential and experiencing career growth in leaps and bounds – not all of them, but many of them. Not that we are any different from them, but just that the environment they operate in welcomes their participation, supports their ideas and rewards them for raising their hand.

We, however, are spending the prime of our lives trying to make ends meet, in spite of our much-exalted education. Unable to keep up with school fees. Unable to give our children a better life than we had. Unable to support our parents adequately. Unable to keep a business afloat. Unable to plan beyond three months. Unsure of what tomorrow holds. Unconvinced by newspaper headlines attempting to paint a rosy picture with glowing reports of government’s hollow exploits.

So-called professionals are professional vendors. Instead of working for a living, many are hustling…or worse. The question that begs: Is this what freedom means?

We Have the Power to Claim Our Future

If anyone asks me what I want for Christmas in 2018, this is it: I want my future back. I just want a fair shot at achieving the highest and best expression of myself, whatever that may look like. Not only do I want it, but my country needs it, and from all of us. In the words of African American poet June Jordan, made famous by Alice Walker, “we are the ones we have been waiting for”.

Perhaps you feel the same way. I hope so.

The question remains, however, what are going to do now? We must play a part in getting our own future back. We must have “skin in the game” now. For too long, we have been not-so-innocent bystanders, unwilling to own up to our complicity in the situation we find ourselves in.

Merely crying about our problems is largely unproductive and only wastes our energy. Rather let us channel that energy towards actively working to bring about the Zimbabwe we want. The Zimbabwe that supports the aspirations of its people. The Zimbabwe that our children and grandchildren will thrive in. The Zimbabwe that has a reputation for not just hard work and education, but creativity, integrity, diversity, productivity, prosperity and even political maturity.

Turning the Tide of History to the Future

We are forever grateful to a generation of liberators who made enormous sacrifices to bring us to where we are today. However, they have taken us as far as they can. The only way to preserve the past is by securing the future. The current environment, locally and globally, requires new ways of thinking, drawing on the wisdom and learning from the mistakes of those that have gone before us. Bridges must be built to allow a generation of nation builders to cross over, to rise up and take their place in history. One of my dreams is to see all our leaders, past, present and future, converge to strategise and find ways to move this great nation forward. I believe this can happen if selfishness can be put aside. We need to find each other and do so genuinely.

The spoils of wars that were fought before I even took my first breath are rightfully mine by virtue of being a daughter of this soil. There is no doubt that Zimbabwe belongs to me, and it belongs to you too. We are citizens, after all.

The Answer Lies in Active Citizenship

So how do we lay claim to our inheritance?

We can begin by practising everyday citizenship. Sometimes small things done deliberately can create big changes. Here are just a few off the top of my head:

Volunteer for a community service project or start one in your neighbourhood

Learn to overcome your fear to speak out and stand for what is right, even in the most trivial circumstances. Everyone has a voice – use yours wisely.

Silvanos Mudzvova Taking Protest to Parliament

Attend a few Parliamentary hearings and send in your submissions

Know what the Constitution of Zimbabwe says

Fill a pothole near your home/school/office

Pick up litter when you see it lying around

Pay for someone else’s fare on the kombi when you have a little extra

Get to know your local councillor and MP. Ask them the hard questions, have crucial conversations and hold them accountable.

Become the local councillor or MP in 2018 – you only need to be 18 years old and a Zimbabwean citizen to qualify

Register to vote

Vote

Find something positive to do in this country

Whatever form that action takes, we each have to play our “small but necessary part”.

African Freedom Day Amidst Nationalist Tyranny

As we commemorated Africa Day on May 25th, I wondered to myself how and what other young people on this continent are celebrating. Do we know enough about our own history? Do we know and understand or appreciate the complexities of the struggle for the right of self-determination? The struggle was to liberate us from any form of oppression and injustice whether from white or black as the legendary Josiah Magama Tongogara remarked: “We are fighting to see that this oppressive system is crushed…But I am dying to see a change in the system. That’s all and that’s all. I would like to see the young people enjoying together, black and white. Enjoying together in a New Zimbabwe and that’s all”.  It follows, that as Africa’s young we appreciate that Africa Day’s marks an important history of the continent and as we celebrate it, take stock of the dream of independence stolen by the nationalist elites.

Whither the Youth: Unemployed Graduates Are on the Rise

An ever-increasing youth bulge on the African continent means amidst no clear strategies and deliberate policies to address unemployment and livelihood questions means we will reach unprecedented levels of unemployment by 2030. Former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo says that this is a powder keg waiting to explode. It is no longer sufficient to talk about employment in the traditional sense. We have to understand the future of work – not just jobs - in the context of a globalised world where the rate of change is accelerating. As young Zimbabweans, we have to interrogate the policies of our government and whether they will deliver the 2 million jobs promised or whether it is just puffing hot air. All we can expect is more smoke and mirrors to keep us distracted while the hard work of looting continues. Already, it is claimed that the Beitbridge-Chirundu Highway is going to create 300000 jobs - a statistic just thrown around to excite us and to create a semblance of hope as the spin gains momentum towards the 2018 elections. These are the “lies, damned lies and statistics” that Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli warned against. Young people in Zimbabwe need to listen attentively and analyse these figures being thrown around to avoid being deceived.

Those who, through colonialism and apartheid, oppressed our fathers and mothers long ago banked on them remaining divided and weak. But they realised that they shared a common enemy and united towards one destiny of a free and prosperous Africa, hence we commemorate Africa Day. So, it is today, where we are confronted by a similar challenge of oppression not from the white men but from our own people. But even as they had a choice to make, we also have to make a choice and this responsibility we cannot subcontract to anyone or defer to any other generation. In fact, it is a historic mandate.

Never Wait for a Revolution: The Whole is Greater than the Sum of its Parts

We could remain trapped in the vicious cycle of blaming, pointing fingers, accusing, complaining, being angry and - worst of all – apathetic. – Or we could choose to be victims no more.

I propose that instead of simply imputing blame, we take responsibility. That is what true leadership is about. By coming together with like-minded people who share our patriotism and our passion for national development, I am convinced that we can start to turn things around. A critical mass of concerned citizens can be very disruptive, but in a good way. Let us not wait for some far off revolution because all small actions count and the sum of the number is greater than the whole. Instead, let us do something small where ever we are and seek to collaborate with others who share our values in the quest for a better life. As one wise man in Zimbabwe has stated, you start with a trickle, then it becomes a stream, then a river then a flood.

*Sharon Wekwete is a concerned Zimbabwean citizen, a lawyer and Humphrey Fellow with interests in institutional reform, anti-corruption, youth leadership & political participation as well as international development. She is also the founder of the Institute for the Development of African Leadership (IDEAL). Contact her on sharonwekwete@gmail.com   

The Resurgence of the Democratic Movement in Zimbabwe. Morgan Richard Tsvangirai*

The Democratic Opposition on the Rise

It might have taken long in coming but the past few months have seen the much-awaited resurgence of the democratic movement in Zimbabwe.

For a long time, this is what the people of Zimbabwe have been clamouring for; in the hope that such a convergence would provide the much-needed fillip for change in a country now tottering on the brink of becoming a failed State.

The pace might not be breath-taking, but slowly, the convergence of the country’s democratic forces is becoming a reality. It is pertinent to state from the outset that as a party, we have played our part in this congregation of the democratic forces.

Indeed, contrary to the misinformed refrain by our detractors, we have shown that it has never bandied ourselves the big boys of the democratic movement. In the past few months, we have shown that we truly believe that everyone has a part to play in the democratization of our country, notwithstanding the stubborn fact that that of all the democratic forces, we have the biggest representation both in Parliament and in local government where we control major cities, towns and rural district councils.

However, we have not allowed these unstinting facts to stand in the way of the urgent need for all the democratic forces in the country to coalesce and mount a formidable challenge in the next election.

Convergence of All Progressive Forces is the Way

We were the first through the resolutions of our 4th national Congress in October 2014 to come up with two important resolutions. The first was urging all people to come under one big tent; the second was to publicly call for the coalition of like-minded groups in order to liquidate the palpable mis-governance and cluelessness that has overwhelmed the seat of government.

Since then, we have been up and running up until our national council gave legs to the Congress resolutions by adopting principles and a framework to guide the process of alliance building.

After all, working with others runs in our blood. The formation of the MDC was in itself a product of the alliance of the labour movement, the constitutional movement and the student movement. Hence, our commitment in 2014 to working with others was simply a restatement of our totem!

Following the adoption of the principles guiding the alliance-building process by the national council, I then began a nation-wide consultation with ordinary Zimbabweans including traditional chiefs, headmen, village heads, civic groups, housewives, vendors, students and women’s groups in all the provinces. It was important to de-elitize the alliance-building discourse by devolving it to the people; to the villages, the farming communities and the town halls so as to tap into the wisdom of the ordinary people.

As the one mandated by my party to lead the process of alliance building, I can say with confidence that I found the consultations very enriching as I received further direction from the ordinary people, who expressed their wish to see the broader democratic movement working together.

From Hwange, Binga, Plumtree, Beitbridge, Gokwe to Bikita, Chimanimani, Mudzi, Mount Darwin and Nyamakate, they were all very emphatic on the need for a huge national coalition for change. I know because I personally engaged the people. And I heard them.

As a party, we have been engaging others in the broader democratic movement, far much more than those with whom we have signed MOUs in line with the directive from the people. We have been very clear from the outset that the alliance we seek goes beyond just political parties to include networks such as the church, war veterans, students, vendors, traditional leaders and women’s groups whose sonorous instructions are still ringing in my mind.

Indeed, we want to build a huge coalition for change that goes beyond party slogans; a coalition rooted in the people in their various social stations where they continue to slug it out under very difficult circumstances.

As we prepare for the voter registration exercise, we must encourage each other to register and determine our own future. This election is no longer about Morgan Tsvangirai, Robert Mugabe, Welshman Ncube, Amai Mujuru, Simba Makoni or any other political leader for that matter. This election is about us as a people and it has now become a national obligation for all of us to turn out in our large numbers and use the opportunity of 2018 to poise the country for positive change.

The Task Ahead: Convergence on Transformative Policy Agenda.

Once we have built this alliance---and we are well on course—we must agree on a credible policy agenda as a key signpost to the positive change we seek.

We must not only have a pre-election pact about seats and other relatively petty matters but we must agree on the fundamentals of the policy agenda that we will embark on after the next election.

Given the comatose state of our industry, our dilapidated infrastructure and the country’s despicable and tenuous predicament, it has become imperative that we embark on a transformation and not a recovery agenda. Recovery is an understatement of what we need to do. We simply need to start afresh.

Passengers at Harare Station: NRZ Used to be First Choice of Travel

Indeed, our predicament is now well beyond any patchwork. It is now about the massive transformation of all facets of our economy. It behoves upon the nation to appreciate that the new administration faces a really daunting task. Yet it is a task that must be done.

All alliance partners need convergence on that transformative policy agenda that must yield a people’s manifesto with details on the key tenets for transformation, not recovery. As I have already stated, given our parlous state, we simply need to start on a new slate. Even in our once-thriving industrial sector that has since collapsed, the technology has simply advanced way beyond the archaic, idle and obsolete machinery that we still have in the country. I say this because we cannot commit the same grievous mistake made by our colleagues when they came into office in 1980. They thought the attainment of independence was the destination when in fact 1980 actually marked the beginning of a critical phase of the struggle. They came in without a cogent plan but we have to be very clear about what we will do well ahead of the next election.

Our colleagues failed to realize that political independence, while it was important, was insufficient. It is always the stretch beyond liberation and political independence where the real work lies. The magnitude of the mammoth work beyond a people’s liberation must not be lost in the excitement of the fall of the strongman! In our case, it is not just about consigning Mugabe and Zanu PF to the dustbins of history. The real work begins the morning after and we have to be very clear from the outset what we will to do. And because time is not on our side, we need to agree on that transformative agenda now so that after the next election, it is all about implementing an agreed programme of action.

Indeed, discussions around this issue are taking shape, tapping into the knowledge of sharp policy minds in the country and on the continent as well as the experience of other countries that have at some point hit rock bottom, as we have done.

Despair Not Zimbabweans: There is Light Beyond the Darkness

Fellow Zimbabweans, I wish to restate that we are on course, even though the pace might appear slow. The broader democratic movement has awakened and is slowly coming together.

In my case, I have met with the church, political leaders from across the spectrum, the army, war veterans, civil servants and leaders of various social networks and civic groups who all converge on the need for a positive trajectory for this country that we love.

We are very much aware, of course, that the stakes are high and that the regime will invest scarce national resources into nothing else but power retention.

Part of the Fleet of Cars Allegedly Bought from Treasury Loot

We must be ready for them, armed with no other weapon except our sheer unity and a collective resolve for change. All we need is a formidable unity that spans from the top to the very grassroots of our nation.

And we are getting there!

The huge task ahead is to ensure that the people freely express themselves in a credible election. To that end, we have shattered our petty differences in the democratic movement. We have found each other and we are now working together under one huge banner of the Zimbabwe National Electoral Reform Agenda (ZINERA). The aim is to ensure that the people’s free expression truly holds and that the country undergoes a peaceful transition where no one must feel their life is endangered.

The change we seek will be good for every Zimbabwean, even for those who have tenaciously fought and frowned upon any prospect for change over the years. I wish to restate that we mean no harm to anyone and none of us should feel endangered by the change we seek.

For some us, the debate around the next election should never be about positions but about conditions! Who holds what position in the new administration is a petty debate being foisted on the nation by small minds, opportunists and detractors of our people; the true sell outs of the people’s struggle.

The next election has always been about Zimbabwe and its urgent quest to move forward, without tainting that clear discourse with a needless debate about positions and personalities.

We in the broader democratic movement are all agreed on one thing; that we cannot let this one chance slip or else future generations will not forgive us for letting them down.

The democratic movement is on the resurgence and indeed, a new Zimbabwe beckons on the horizon.

*Morgan Richard Tsvangirayi is Former Prime Minister of Zimbabwe and the Current President of MDC-T

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