ruggle for independence. Oppression remains oppression no matter what the skin or ethnicity of the oppressor. It doesn’t become more palatable simply because one recognises their tongue or skin in the dictator. Independence failed to bring us any closer to the realisation of freedom, equality, individual liberties and democracy.
We witnessed in Zimbabwe diabolical practises of ethnic cleansing targeted at white minority groups (during the illegal farm invasions of 2000); Ndebele people (the infamous Gukurahundi); and urban cleansing targeted at poor people (Operation Murambatsvina).
The period before, during and after the parliamentary and presidential elections of 2000 and 2002 also witnessed gruesome atrocities being committed against members of the opposition mainly MDC supporters. A substantial number of people lost their lives whilst scores of women were raped and hundreds of both women and men were beaten up, tortured and had their property destroyed. Talent Mabika, Tichaona Chiminya, Trymore Midzi, Matthew Pfebve are some of the people who lost their lives during the aforesaid period. What of Patrick Nabanyama and many others who disappeared on account of the struggle for a free, just and democratic Zimbabwe?
It is quite disturbing to note that a substantial number of people still benefit from the suffering of the many. Imagine all this happening 27 years after ‘independence’. One must either be with the struggling people or with the oppressing government. There are no other choices.
I believe our struggle must result in the re-birth of Zimbabwe, the coming of her second independence that, in effect, will be her first independence. What we will endure in our struggle can’t possibly be worse than what we are enduring now.
In conclusion, just like any other contribution I have made before, this contribution is not motivated politically but, rather, in order to begin to reclaim our dignity.
MUTSA MURENJE, Harare
Global conference plan
EDITOR – Zimbabwe needs cool heads and a long-term global approach. In the Diaspora, the “way forward” should be a non political drive:
1. Co-ordinating Zimbabweans in the Diaspora, leading to a Global Conference, pulling leaders from all corners of the world. This gala will define new vision and elect a General Council representing various regions. The first Global Conference will be held on 7 and 8 December 2007 in Johannesburg and thereafter annually in various cities across the world.
2. Setting up a Diaspora Development Chamber which will draw a development plan to mould Zimbabwe into first world development, control a Diaspora Fund to finance Zimbabweans in the Diaspora into manufacturing, assist Diaspora companies to raise mega-finance for infrastructure projects in Zimbabwe.
3. Creating a non-partisan database of Zimbabweans in Diaspora. The pilot, under the management of Mass Public Opinion Institute (SA) and Unisa, is complete.
4. Starting training programmes.
Please support this initiative by publicising it to family and friends, or contributing to the required funding (email for bank details),
By email, zimcsoforum@yahoo.co.uk
Artist needs assistance
EDITOR – I am an artist living in Gweru, Zimbabwe. I have been invited to attend a residency programme in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. I am having difficulties in getting sponsorship. I thought perhaps you could you help me find contacts or organisations that could help me with travel and two-week-stay costs. I have been offered free accommodation.
I have worked with Tapfuma Gutsa in Shurugwi and curator Raphael Chikukwa and have exhibited a number of times in Harare, Bulawayo and in South Africa. I also did a project on xenophobia in South Africa (Google my name). Most recently, I coordinated an exhibition held in Gweru.
I feel this could be my chance to learn, and explore new techniques in sculpture-making such as the bronze foundry on offer.
COSTER MKOKI, Gweru
Writer heroes omitted
EDITOR – The MDC believes that Zanu (PF) has twisted the notion of a “national hero” for political ends. The MDC is right.
To recognise our country’s real heroes, they have published a roll of honour of Zimbabweans who have made contributions across all sectors. How sad that this roll was composed by people who apparently have not read a single book in their lives. How else to explain the absence of a single writer or journalist from the list of people who made a contribution to Zimbabwe?
Where are our women of letters, Joyce Simango, the first black woman to publish a book in Rhodesia; Kristina Rungano, the first black woman to publish a book in English? Where is Barbara Makhalisa, where are Yvonne Vera and Tsitsi Dangarembga, award-winning novelists who have been read around the world and brought honour to our country?
Where are our men of letters, Solomon Mutswairo, the novelist and poet who wrote the moving words of our national anthem, Stanlake Samkange, Ndabezinhle Sigogo, TK Tsodzo, Aaron Chiundura Moyo?
Where are Chenjerai Hove, Shimmer Chinodya, Chirikure Chirikure, Albert Nyathi, Cont Mhlanga? Charles Mungoshi? Where is Dambudzo Marechera, the writer most associated with the spirit of rebellion to which the MDC lays claim?
Where, for that matter, are the journalists? Ray Choto, also a fine novelist? And Trevor Ncube, journalist, entrepreneur, and defender of freedom? Where is Geoffrey Nyarota? Where is John Mauluka, the photo-journalist whose photograph of leaping women on Independence Day captured for generations to come the mad joy of that historic moment?
An MDC government, it is clear, will have no value for the country’s writers, who were weighed in the scales of heroism and found unworthy. Unlike, for example, Alick Macheso.
PETINA GAPPAH, Geneva, Switzerland
MDC members to blame
EDITOR – The people put their faith in the MDC in 2000 when we were unknown and a very young party. So many people have died for the cause. The split in the party is the direct result of the incumbent leadership, prior to the split, being weak and not carrying out their party duties as required.
If Morgan and his cronies got above themselves, you the members allowed that situation to develop. All those party members that have now split away are just as much to blame as any other, and both groups have without doubt deserted those who are in their hour of greatest need.
Sit down, pack away your egos, shut the leaders away in a room and only allow them out once there is agreement to return to the only thing the party was formed for and the reason we have been so well supported by the masses since 2000. Let us remember those that have died for the cause, step back and get on with the only thing that matters for the majority of Zimbabweans.
Remove Mugabe and Zanu (PF) – in the memory of those that have paid the ultimate price for our cause.
TIM S, South Africa
Blaming colonials futile
EDITOR – Blaming the colonials, the West, the world for the current ills of
Zimbabwe will not solve the problems.
What is important now is to agree that the situation in the country is unacceptable and that something must be done about it. Then it will be time to examine what mistakes the Zimbabwean people and their leaders made that brought about this situation, so that they may learn from those mistakes and perhaps prevent it happening again.
SUE MCCORMICK, United Kingdom
Promote tribal harmony
EDITOR – Public mood has it that the days of Mugabe’s dictatorship are nearing an end, and we are looking at how to revive the economy, restore the rule of law, and live in harmony in the post-Mugabe era.
Events in Zimbabwe and elsewhere in Africa have shown that a lot of blood is needlessly shed due to political differences along tribal lines (some reports suggest many people paid with their lives for failing to converse in Shona during Gukurahundi).
There seems to be an element of mistrust between the Ndebele and Shona. This is worsened by opportunistic politicians who capitalise on this to gain favour from a section of the nation.
Previous elections have seen Zanu (PF) doing well in predominantly Shona areas while suffering heavy defeats in Ndebele ones. The latter areas have had stagnant growth as a result.
My dream is a future Zimbabwe where these two groups co-exist as one. I therefore propose that, to achieve this in the long run, the future government should work towards eliminating language and cultural barriers. It should make it compulsory for both languages to be taught in every school. Cultural exchanges should be enhanced.
This, I believe, would encourage oneness in the youth, and eventually oneness in the nation as whole. Perpetual harmony would be thus achievable.
SINIKIWE N. (KEZI), Zimbabwe
Bill kills free speech
EDITOR – Freedom of expression is guaranteed under the Zimbabwean Constitution which expressively states that, Except with his own consent or by way of parental discipline, no person shall be hindered in the enjoyment of his freedom of expression, that is to say, freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information without interference, and freedom from interference with his correspondence.
Zimbabwe’s MPs have passed a law to allow the government to monitor e-mails, telephone calls, the internet and postal communications. The Bill obliges Internet service providers (ISPs) to install equipment, at their own expense, which will allow a monitoring service to intercept e-mails. The communications minister will be able to issue warrants for interception.
The Bill contradicts the whole concept of freedom of expression and freedom of privacy. This is one the desperate moves being implemented by the government of Zimbabwe in order to strengthen the iron-fist rule of Mugabe and his cronies. It means they will have the powers to open your emails and your letters; they will have the powers to listen to your telephone conversations.
All this is done under the umbrella of national security. It is just a smoke screen to say it’s for national security when it is to monitor the opposition of Zanu (PF).
This new telecoms Bill will go against the principles of protection of peoples’ rights as contained in the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights (Article 9), and many other international protocols and declarations which Zimbabwe is signatory to.
China is apparently providing Zimbabwe with some of its web-monitoring technology. There is better technology, beneficial to the Zimbabwe, which I think the Chinese government may provide – like agricultural equipment, life-saving equipment such as ambulances, fire fighters and medication for HIV.
LUKA PHIRI, Zimbabwe
Coup not the solution
EDITOR – Some people believe that the solution to the country’s crisis is for army generals to take over. According to media reports, among the alleged proponents of this solution are Trevor Ncube and Ibbo Mandaza.
I do not subscribe to this view because of a number of factors. The first being that, in all countries where there was a coup, the soldiers eventually became worse than the deposed civilians.
The soldiers, especially the generals, are part of the current political and economic malaise, hence there is no way they can provide a solution to the problems they have been part of for years.
The generals include characters like Mujuru, Zvinashe, Chiwenga and Jocelyn, Shiri and a host of other officers who have benefited from Mugabe’s patronage or have been his henchmen against opposition.
My mistrust of the army is rooted in the many examples of generals who took over power promising to help the people, but never did – Musharraf, Gaddafi, Rawlings, Abacha, etc.
It also stems from my mistrust of all people who come to power through the barrel of a gun because they eventually mutate into worse monsters than those they deposed. Examples are Taylor, Kagame, Museveni, etc.
We need change, real change. Allowing generals and/or other Zanu (PF) thugs to remain in power is creating a situation where there is change without change.
NYENGETERAI GIDI, Zimbabwe
We did not speak out
EDITOR – Mike Rook (Letters, 9 August) complains that the recent victims of looting and price controls have had their heads buried in the sand since the farm invasions, and goes on to recycle the famous Nazi Germany quote, “first they came for the farmers and they did not speak out because they were not white farmers”, etc.
I’m afraid I nearly choked on my breakfast, reading this. Excuse me … they did not first come for the farmers! What about the 20,000 Ndebele’s who were murdered, raped, burned alive and thrown down mineshafts during the terrible Gukurahundi? And what of the thousands of others Zimbabweans terrorised by the Fifth Brigade, the CIO and the army during the ’80s and ’90s?
People were murdered and routinely disappeared but we all said nothing because we were all too busy enjoying the good life.
From the stance of Mr Rook’s letter, I guess he himself was a farmer and so I have to say that the single thing that fed the crocodile and made him strong and powerful was Zimbabwean agriculture during the ’80s and early ’90s. But of course we were all too busy having fun, enjoying the fishing holidays, overseas trips and forex accounts to think about the beast we were feeding.
The white Zimbabwean policy of having nothing to do with politics suddenly backfired. For years, we all repeated the mantra “they’ll never touch the goose that lays the golden egg”, thinking that agriculture would be left alone as it was the backbone of the economy. How wrong we were.
We’re all accountable for the mess that Zimbabwe is in – we all share the blame. Let us acknowledge that and stand together to rid Zimbabwe of this tyranny.
BARABBUS VERWOED, South Africa
A connivance to blame
EDITOR – There it was, for all to see, on Sky TV recently – Zimbabweans being hunted down like wildlife by scores of heavily built, vigilante white farmers in neighbouring, independent, South Africa – beyond belief!
It was not a level playing field. Malnourished, demoralised and exhausted men and women running for their lives, being chased by well-nourished and determined detractors in motorised vehicles.
With all of the African continent free from the colonial yoke, who would have thought such shameful scenes would be broadcast around the world in 2007? And who really are the guilty parties here? Both the fleeing Zimbabweans and the vigilante SA farmers are victims of an unholy political connivance between their two leaders.
SA is soon to hold the World Cup, playing host to teams and fans from all corners of the globe. It should therefore pay heed to the gathering swell of international condemnation concerning Mbekis’ persistent and ineffective quiet diplomacy.
MIKE ROOK, United Kingdom
World demands, resign!
EDITOR – The world calls for the Resignation of Mugabe. Bow out and be remembered as a gentleman and not as a senile dictator hanging onto every inch of power that you think you still have left!
Mugabe how DARE you live off the fat of the land while Zimbabweans are starving and suffering?
Mugabe how DARE you instil fear into the Zimbabwean nation and have elections rigged in your favour?
You and your puppets will be tried before a court for human rights abuses and violations in Zimbabwe.
The world has sent out an ultimatum.
Morgan Tsvangirai has my vote.
GLORYA ALFREDS, Cape Town
Moyo’s view is not
‘national consensus’
EDITOR – “The national consensus now is that neither Mugabe nor Tsvangirai can take Zimbabwe forward. The feeling from across the political divide is that both need to put Zimbabwe first ahead of their personal interests.” This was the writing of political turncoat Jonathan Moyo on Newzimbabwe.com recently.
Is ‘national consensus’ whatever is going on in the know-all head of the good professor at any particular time?
If 30,000 people go to Morgan Tsvangirai’s rally on a Sunday, enduring police intimidation and beatings, while Moyo is at home chatting to another professor over tea, elbows rested on a few volumes on ‘How to Manage Mass Information’, how can Moyo write the following day that “the national consensus is that Morgan Tsvangirai cannot take Zimbabwe forward”? When and where would he have measured it?
I would have thought the national consensus can only be measured by organizing transparent national elections and then seeing who wins those elections. Instead Moyo, together with his five colleagues (the ones who have always spewed out a rehearsed line about how Tsvangirai supposedly lacks leadership qualities – Trevor Ncube, Pius Ncube, Welshman Ncube, Fletcher Dulini-Ncube and Nkosana Moyo, all facilitated by the openly biased Newzimbabwe.com) continually repeat their line about Tsvangirai in the Goebbels-like hope that we will all finally come to internalise what they are saying.
The purpose of elections is for a country to measure its national consensus. Before the elections, the national consensus now is that this cannot be substituted by six self-serving commentators, who must put Zimbabwe ahead of their personal interests. Icho!
RITA, Zimbabwe
What unity, Mutambara?
EDITOR – The demand for unity by the Arthur Mutambara breakaway is a well-calculated move. These political opportunists are now singing the tune of unity, yet they walked away from the crowds a few years ago in pursuit of the Zanu (PF) Senate project.
What is the unity for now? The electorate is united. People know very well whom they are going to vote for. The people are aware of those who promoted Zanu (PF) projects in Parliament at the expense of their welfare. The people have been watching how Zanu (PF) romanticized particular candidates when MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai and other comrades were brutally attacked during the Highfields protests.
The people are aware of the sell-outs who allegedly accepted bribes from Zanu (PF) in the form of tractors, other farming implements, houses and Toyota Fortuners. They criticize Zanu (PF) in the media, but seek Zanu (PF) favours under the cover of darkness.
These chaps intend to ride to victory in next year’s elections on the back of Tsvangirai’s huge popularity, in the name of unity of purpose. What purpose? Where was this purpose when they walked away to form a rival MDC within MDC? Now that they are about to face the wrath of the people for betraying their struggle for freedom, these guys are now trying to hoodwink Tsvangirai with an offer of a sole candidature.
Mutambara is trying to play the ‘good-guy role’ by announcing his so-called principled decision of not standing against Tsvangirai. He obviously intends to contest for a parliamentary seat, because he knows very well that he would hardly pull 22 votes in the presidential race.
What is clear is that by May next year, the Mutambara faction would have been swept out of Parliament because people are very angry with them. Welshman Ncube, Gibson Sibanda, Gabriel Chaibva, Priscilla Misihairahwi, Job Sikhala and the like will be history by May 2008. Their only salvation could be Zanu (PF). People are aware that Zanu (PF) might rig elections in some constituencies on behalf of the Mutambara faction in order to frustrate the genuine opposition.
SIBANENGI D., by email
V-chancellor failing UZ
EDITOR – Vice-Chancellor Levi Nyagura has failed University of Zimbabwe and the nation at large. Conditions continue to deteriorate day in, day out, with the man put in charge doing nothing to correct the chaos.
Toilet facilities have not been working, there is litter is everywhere, a poor standard of lecturers as well as out-of-date textbooks.
Nyagura will surely go down in the history of the university as the most failed vice- chancellor of all times. He seems to have only perfected the art of victimising students who have challenged him.
Nyagura, let all and sundry know that you have failed us. You are on record saying that you do not mind if all hostels are closed forever. Shame on you.
Our own vice-chancellor, who was supposed to show parental care and love, decided to make students destitute overnight. Nyagura shall be held responsible for anything that befell any student during that period of desperation. I wonder how and why they ever made him a church elder at S.D.A Highlands.
Security personnel at his instructions wantonly beat up students to accept charges of having destroyed property as well as to give the whereabouts of the SRC members.
Remember history shall judge you – and when it judges in absentia, it judges harshly.
STUDENT, Zimbabwe
Some hero
EDITOR – I wonder who compiled the list of MDC heroes of a new Zimbabwe. (The Zimbabwean, 9-15 August, 2007). Dumiso Dabengwa is an interesting inclusion.
On page 423 of her new book Through the Darkness, Judy Todd mentions how former loved ones and Chimurenga heroes have changed over the years (allegedly because of the influence of Robert Mugabe) and writes on page 423: “The once respected and loved leader, Dumiso Dabengwa, went as far as to meet a group of war veterans arriving in Bulawayo and toyi-toyied with them through the streets as they went on their loudly proclaimed mission to torch the MDC offices.”
If that’s the sort of thing that makes you an MDC hero, what do you have to do to become an MDC anti-hero?
TREVOR GRUNDY, Kent UK
Nationalism an honour
EDITOR – Trudy Stevenson the Member of Parliament for Harare North recently circulated an email titled ‘Myth and Reality’ which I received. I must say such straw grasping tactics are regrettable.
She tables 20 questions all calculated to demonize Morgan Tsvangirai, most of which are childish and expose her political immaturity. One serious matter is that she belittles the liberation struggle and I am afraid I cannot help but see hidden racism.
She says Tsvangirai ‘s Zanu (PF) background is regrettable. Stevenson needs some serious background briefing about our independence. She has to know that at one time all Zimbabweans were either Zanu (PF) or PF ZAPU, and it was not a crime to belong in either one of these organizations.
To pour scorn over our independence and nationalist movement is deeply regrettable for someone who sits in parliament. It shows disrespect for people who fought for this country.
The liberation war was about removing a minority white government that was racist and exploitative. The nationalist movements were called terrorists, communists, saboteurs, foreign sponsored and Marxists – the same thing Stevenson called Tsvangirai.
Participating in the liberation war and being a member of any of the nationalist movements was an honour.
I am deeply disturbed by Stevenson. Is she really fighting for the emancipation of Zimbabweans? It would seem her true allegiance is not with this country.
ASHER TARIVONA MUTSENGI, Canada
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