THE CONTEMPORARY POLITICS OF ZIMBABWE AND OPTIONS FOR THE FUTURE: JULIUS SAI MUTYAMBIZI-DEWA
There is a difference between democracy and the majoritarian principle. Democracy goes beyond winner take all elections and encompasses the rights of minorities among other issues such as rule of law and pertinent issues of national interest are set before the whole country in a referenda. In a majoritarian set up the winner takes all and minorities are crowded out. Democracy listens to and involves divergence
The problem we have in Zimbabwe is the absence of both majoritarian rule and democratic rule. There is neither at the moment, the majority is not in charge so there is no group that can be identified as the oppressive majority. At the same time the rights of minorities are not encompassed. The truth is the single largest ethnic group, Shona-speaking Zimbabweans are oppressed together with the second largest group, Ndebele-speaking Zimbabweans and so are Zimbabwe's minorities such white Zimbabweans, Kalangas, Vendas, Nambyas, Tongas, Chewas, Asian-Zimbabweans, mixed-race Zimbabweans and many others.
As a nation this is the reality that confronts us, we are where we are because we have refused to come to terms with some stubborn truths about our country. This has been so for generations. We have failed to understand that we are a multi-racial and multi-ethnic country that ought to exist as a unit; no race or tribe should ever exist in the shadows of another. Zimbabwe must be a composite unit not just a sum-total of its cultures. There has been a failure to heed this to our own detriment. In 1965, whilst his idea of declaring independence from the British through UDI was not really bad on the face it, it was meant to impose a Rhodesia where blacks and other races existed in the shadows of their white compatriots. This is why I personally welcomed the demise of Rhodesia, because they were advancing a dangerous policy of racism that could not be allowed in a modern society.
Post-1980 the Government of President Robert Mugabe has not done much to make every Zimbabwean enjoy being part of this beautiful country. They behave like an irresponsible opposition not the governing party. They deliberately promote reverse racism and encourage disunity among teh citizenry. It is important for the resumption of order in our country which will start by an unequivocal acknowledgement of diversity as we move towards the creation of a composite unit. Zimbabwe must move towards creating a happy Kalanga, Ndebele, Shona, Nambya, white Zimbabwean, Tsonga, Chewa, Asian Zimbabwean, Venda, Tonga, Nambya, mixed-race Zimbabwean etc as a move towards creating a Zimbabwe in which everyone feels confident to belong.
But such a composite unit will only be realised with the emergence of composite thinking and the birth of a truly composite organisation whose sole aim is to bestow to Zimbabwe a society that we can all be proud of. It will assume a character beyond the sum-total concept but will seek to build on the diversities a unique unit that is capable of defining itself as one country and culture but at the same time letting its constituent members retain their unique and individual characteristics. It will be an organisation that seeks to redefine and give confidence to even the most basic institution of society; the family. It will be the ultimate symbolism; taking Zimbabwe to another level; rebutting the inferiority presumption and restating the agenda of the country and continent as accolade-deserving not accolade-ululating.
Zimbabwe deserves to be high up there among the other nations but we have defined ourselves as a SADC country. Zimbabwe must be a world player, a serious world player. We already have standing monuments to point at: Lake Kariba and Great Zimbabwe, these monuments are a constant reminder of what we can do if we are working together as a nation. We conquered the world with both and we can still conquer the world today. It takes time but the foundations are laid now. I am tired of Afro-centric statistics, I am tired of being SADC's number 2 or Africa's number what...Zimbabwe was not created to be a player in a closet. It is a country in the world and it has to position itself to be a serious player in the whole world.
Contemporary political parties in Zimbabwe are not the best platform for delivering to Zimbabwe the virtual nation which will restore the pride that we had when we constructed Great Zimbabwe and when we gave the world the largest man-made lake in Lake Kariba. The concept of ultra-super Zimbabwe is beyond all of the contemporary political parties because it is beyond contemporary politics. It is beyond the humiliating finger-pointing that we currently witness almost daily since the formation of the GNU. It is beyond ZANU PF because the party has clearly run of ideas. They have been saying the same things since 1985.
They have surrendered their own fate and invested their own future in an old man who they cannot free and allow him the grace of being with his own family. Ironically that family includes his wife who is also called Grace. Investing one’s future in a person who looks more at the past is clearly a wrong strategy. No wonder why in every speech President Mugabe has not spared a minute in reminding Zimbabweans rightly about a bad past under Ian Smith but his often very interesting humour-filled speeches have not offered anything for the future. ZANU PF is a party of the past hey dwell on the past and use the past to scare away forward looking Zimbabweans. It is sad that 30 years after independence ZANU PF still talks of a ghost called Rhodesia; a country which no longer exists but thanks to ZANU PF there is a nationality called Rhodesian. A party that fears its own citizens and fails to come to terms with the fact that it is the government can only be entrusted with the future at our detriment.
The same is true of the Movement for Democratic Change. Their policies are not innovative in character but are reparative. MDC is very good at repairing damage. Their presence in the GNU has evidently done a lot in repairing the damage that ZANU PF had done. But MDC is not growth-oriented they are a current party, a party that fixes current damage. They too do not believe in an all conquering Zimbabwe. They are comfortable and therefore focus at being South Africa’s number two in SADC. They were happy with our literacy records in Africa. A strategy that looks at fixing damage is not sustainable because it retains the wear and tear which continues to haunt the country forever. It will manage to arrest decline and may succeed in taking Zimbabwe to where it was in the year 2000 but this is not what Zimbabwe should aim at. Certainly Zimbabwe was not in the same position as is now but it was not rich either. There must emerge an organisation that will confront the future with the aim of utilising all our resources so that we become a rich nation and join the world as an important player whose tag is not developing but developed country.
We all celebrated the resurgence of ZAPU, but as we have come to realise ZAPU is also a party of corrections not innovation. They have looked at what has gone wrong during the governance of ZANU PF and indeed the GNU and they seem to be keen on correcting that. This is not good strategy because it lacks innovation. The future belongs to the galvanization of all our phases, asking about our past beyond the GNU or ZANU PF’s advent to power and also looking beyond contemporary issues and approaching the future with innovation and facing the challenges with the belief that the seemingly unachievable can be achieved. So far ZAPU has not yet told Zimbabweans that it will be abandoning or maintaining the Marxist ideologies of its main liberation war sponsor the then Soviet Union.
The organisation that will deliver Zimbabwe will not be a reproaching organisation. It will look at the good and the bad of every given period and it will also look at other systems and countries and how they have succeeded. As it encourages its peoples not to live in the shadows of one another it will also encourage Zimbabwe not to live in the shadows of other countries or its past. Our colonial past cannot be allowed to stand in the way of our development anymore. We are not the only country to be colonised. The USA, India, Canada, Australia, China, New Zealand and indeed the UK are all former colonies. The Mwene Mutapa and the Rozvi were both major empires that subjected people as far afield as Tanzania and Angola to some form of colonisation with Zimbabwe as the centre of their power.
The dosage our current political parties are feeding us is very dangerous. They still talk of the west and bigger countries. They are collective agents of our re-colonisation. Day in day out they are subjecting our minds to the wrong picture of the west which is supernatural. According to them The West causes our disasters and the West is our salvation. This is what they have told us. Some of us who have had the chance to live in western nations know that this is untrue. Western countries are normal countries whose own citizens also eat, sleep and drink and do the same menial jobs that we do in own countries. Zimbabwe deserves to be a player in the world. The emergence of China, India and Brazil as world players is evidence that with the right policies developing countries can emerge to be developed and successful. Zimbabweans are fed up with political parties that frighten us and discourage us to tackle the future.
By its own mistakes ZANU PF has surrendered its political leadership of SADC to South Africa. A country that in its early years looked so much up to us is now the one now mediating on our warring parties despite the fact that its own democracy is supposed to be 16 years younger than ours. The diplomatic landscape has been altered forever and it is South Africa and other countries which include even Senegal that are forwarding their names for consideration into the Security Council. We are now viewed in the same light at countries that are at war and we no longer have the respect we deserve. Zimbabweans have been left pointing at the past when seeking glory because their contemporary world is an ugly beast they cannot look in the face. An organisation shall emerge that seeks to correct the perception of Zimbabwe as a pariah state and give not only meaning, but strength and respect to the country’s moral, political, social and economic fibre. Such is an organisation whose birth I keenly await and hopefully together with most of us, we will all feel free to belong and with it be geared to change our country forever!
Until then;
BE JUDGE
Julius Sai MUTYAMBIZI-DEWA is the Chairman of Communities Point, a Zimbabwean Pressure Group. He writes in his own capacity and he can be contacted on mutyambizidewa@yahoo.co.uk or 07401182271 or 07529705413
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