World Habitat Day
The Olympics this year opened to a salubrious and illustrious Beijing on the 8th of August. No one would have guessed that under all that glitz China had earlier cordoned off all slum areas and dwellings of the poor by erecting great colorful walls to hide the eyesores. Undesirables in the form of migrant workers were given forced leave and Beijing’s Olympic chief ordered a “social cleansing” operation to clear the city of beggars, hawkers and prostitutes before the arrival of Olympic tourists. If this was the best way of dealing with the ‘undesirables’ for China, then it is no wonder that President Hu is one of Mugabe’s best friends. They have a lot in common.
This time four years ago in 2005, over 700 thousand people lost what they called home to bulldozers under Mugabe’s directive to ‘drive out filth’ and pull down all illegal structures. Among them were mostly women and children who had to bear the brunt of the cold at the onset of winter. Four years later, despite the government’s cursory attempt to provide new accommodation for them, a majority still do not have a decent roof over their heads in comparison to what they had before the government waged a war on them. The concept behind Murambatsvina was to stop disorderly urbanization in the form of shacks and other structures that were being constructed illegally all over the country. Madam Tibaijuka’s controversial report revealed that most of the unsightly ‘shacks’ were actually brick and cement extensions that were quite neat and actually habitable. If deemed illegal they should have just attracted some sort of fine rather than being pulled them down rendering poor citizens homeless.
The late Hon Chen Chimutengwende, then Minister of State and Interactive Affairs in the Office of the President and Cabinet said in an August 2005 press statement: “Indeed some people were pained by Operation Murambatsvina. It must also be noted that change and development is usually a painful process. But happily for them, Murambatsvina is turning to be a blessing in disguise. It is linked to Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle which will provide houses, vendor marts and factory shells.”
Indeed some funny little houses were built in segregated areas around Hatcliff and towards the airport in Harare, as well as Killarney and Cowdray Park in Bulawayo. It is no secret that these small houses are not enough to cater for all the victims of the ‘tsunami’ of 2005. Needless to say, there haven’t been any new vendor marts constructed, and the streets of Harare are littered with hawkers peddling their wares across the ankles of pedestrians on the pavements. The truth is they are an even worse off now compared to when they used to operate from places like the charge office and other centralized venues.
Early this year, following the March harmonized election, militias terrorized citizens especially in the rural areas in order to cow them into voting for Zanu PF in the run-off. Homes of perceived and genuine ‘opposition’ supporters were razed as a form of punishment for ‘voting wrongly’ in the previous election. Most of the victims were forcibly displaced or killed.
The theme of World Habitat Day this year is Harmonious Cities. The theme seeks to remind people that a world that urbanizes cannot claim to be harmonious while others remain impoverished and marginalized. In Zimbabwe this day will be commemorated while we remember the plight of internally displaced people who lost their homes in the wakes of both Murambatsvina and the post election violence after the March and June elections this year.
Is there any hope of living in a harmonized city when one’s house risks being torched for one’s divergent political inclination or for simply not fitting into the image that government seeks?
One of the many challenges for the interim government to address is an audit of the allocation of land as well as the compensation for those affected by Murambatsvina and post 2008 election violence. They must also ensure efficient water reticulation in the face of the cholera outbreak as well as improved general local service delivery before we can begin to talk of harmonized cities in Zimbabwe.