Zimbabwean Army of Reconstruction
In our weekly Kubatana email newsletter we asked our subscribers to tell us what they think of our politicians going on fund raising trips when revenues from our natural resources are corruptly (mis) managed.
We received some interesting response. A subscriber called Miles suggests that we need a complete overhaul of how we do things in Zimbabwe rather than adopting this piecemeal approach we have to fixing our broken country.
Check out some of the response we got . . .
Yes of course our first step should be getting our own house in order first, but that would require brave actions from a lot of Zimbabweans and I’m afraid the will amongst the masses just isn’t there. I worked in the 2002 elections as a security man for Harare Central Constituency. I had flown out from the UK and volunteered to do a job which no one else wanted.There were a lot more Zimbabweans who just put their heads under the covers and hoped the whole awful situation would just disappear, there are, percentage wise, very few people like Jenni Williams and members of WOZA who are prepared to demonstrate with a physical prescence, rather than the masses who just blog sites like the Zim Times and moan incessantly “why isn’t anyone doing anything”. Mugabe and his gang, which now should probably include many opposition members as well, should be overthrown by the people as soon as possible. Everyday we put off the inevitable showdown is a day which we give to the Chefs to hide their assets and benefit from Marange. Zimbabwe requires a new Leader; a man whose sole remit is to place the needs of the people before anything else. A person who will lead by example. The ZNA needs to be re-entitled the Zimbabwean Army of Reconstruction and all weapons to be replaced by tools to help rebuild the infrastructure. All members of the Youth League to attend re-integration classes and proper counselling before being allowed back into the community. All Foreign Bank Accounts of all citizens to be repatriated to Zimbabwe and a thorough audit of their origins to be determined. A Truth and Reparation Council to be established. Zimbabwe will never take a step forward until reparations are made to those who have suffered by the perpetrators of that suffering. It is shameful that people like the Mujuru family sell ten tons of Congolese gold whilst their bretheren starve. The times of Mammon must cease, Greed cannot continue and Violence cannot prevail. The time for a Massive General Strike must be now .The people must take to the streets and say “Enough and no further. Chinja Maitiro”. But are you brave enough Zimbabwe? Are you brave enough? Somehow I don’t think so and if that is the case you deserve all you get! – Miles
I found the HRW report incisive and your comment important in terms of grounding the discussion in our reality at home and in engaging the rest of the world. I think we should start moving beyond abusing our resources through such privatization of public funds as is shown in the diamonds case. This is a strategy that unaccountable regimes get donor funds and parade it as conditional and meager to address our challenges while robbing the family kitty behind barricaded walls. We need more information on other sectors so that we can strengthen domestic demand for change financed slowly, transparently and incrementally towards a democratically defined and shared future. – Kudzai
Do you think there are any diamonds left in Marange. I doubt very much. What about gold fields? Do we have any left? How about recovering money already looted by this mining? It does not cost anything only political will. Lets all work together to make this country better for future generations. Remember we (SIT UNDER A SHADE TODAY BECAUSE SOMEONE PLANTED A TREE MANY YEARS AGO) so lets stop the rot and all will be fine. All it needs is political will. – Wellington
Thursday, July 2nd 2009 at 11:42 am
I think we have a problem with people who all they see is a problem and fail to acknowledge change- no matter how small it is. Miles is being unfair- and he knows it. He is one of the few emerging ‘intellectuals’ to have made a name for himself from the crisis and actually he doesn’t have a credible solution- except demo- c’mon- after that then what. Zimbabwe is coming out of post-colonial relationship and sadly our own intellectuals do not acknowledge the nature of this relationship. All of a sudden diamonds from Marange should have solved all our problems- c’mon guys how much is made by Rio from Marowa and other fields, how much is made from the gold by the different international mining houses. Its only looting when it’s done by black elites. We need a proper class analysis of how elites (no matter how corporatised or informal) have ruined the economy- those in organised mining and agriculture included.
This sort of ahistorical analysis of the Zimbabwean question is not taking us anyway for we have made it to be a problem of politics and the politicians without an adequate analysis of the structure of the economy in terms of ownership and where the profits are kept. Young black intellectuals have become the biggest apologists for white capital- which wants to convince us at this late stage that it meant well- created jobs etc.
We really need to rethink the national project but I am afraid some of our Oxford trained ‘scholars’ do not have the necessary tools for such a project. Without an understanding of the real issues we risk being sucked into the labelling approach- (corrupt, dictator, etc) very common amongst Political Scientists of this age without giving us a proper methodology of moving ahead. So with all due respect to Bev and team at Kubatana lets rethink the Zimbabwe project beyond Mugabe- because one day he will be gone but we will still be caught in this rut because we lack ideas of moving ahead.
Manatsa