The Sunday News
Opinion Micheal Mhlanga
Democracy is a contested and a perplexing notion yet it is a daily manual for political systems since time immemorial. The contribution of nationalist icons to modern Africa suggests that democracy is not just about the art of managing political systems and challenging their pitfalls. Rather, democracy is a way of life and this is my point of departure. If democracy is indeed a way of life, we must appreciate that different societies have different traditions and cultures that shape their ways of life. Out of necessity therefore, Africa’s history, culture and beliefs should shape its way of life. It is in this milieu that Zimbabwe must negotiate and appreciate a form of democracy that most suits its context. Zimbabwe is not compulsory mandated to meet standards of Western liberal democracy because of its own history and epistemic logic. Instead we should invest time modelling democracy in a fashion that builds on our realities in a manner that largely proclaims the very essence of being Zimbabwean.
Making democracy work requires informed and active citizens who understand how to voice their interests, act collectively and hold public officials accountable. Citizens must understand the basis of citizenship, politics and government, and they need knowledge to make good policy choices and understand the proper use of authority. Voters also need the desire to exercise their rights and the political space to do so without unreasonable resistance or harassment of authorities or others who assume a neutral position. However, this is more theoretical than it is practical in a context, where opposition political proponents have a self-arrogated benchmark of perceiving themselves as the ultimate definition of democracy in Zimbabwe.
An utterance of “peaceful protests” is not enough to guarantee the safety of other citizens who do not want to participate in such political mantras. I am left with no choice but to continue penning about politics even if there are other pressing national issues. In Zimbabwe everyone has become a politician, whether by circumstance, accident, inheritance or hunger, we all are now politicians. I do not need a degree in political science to identify one; in any case most of our politicians have not studied POLAD.
Perhaps let me share my conversation with Sabelo Gatsheni-Ndlovu (2009) (a prolific Zimbabwean academic from Gwanda). From the interaction we had, he mentioned that there are three recent developments in Zimbabwe and South Africa which evoke the need to rethink African nationalism and the current stage of the African national project. African nationalism bore post-independence governance and politics, including opposition parties. Gatsheni said the first was the promulgation and unrolling of the Third Chimurenga in Zimbabwe from 1997 onwards together with its agenda of reclaiming land from the white commercial farmers (settlers/aliens) giving it back to the “Black Zimbabweans” — natives (a Black Zimbabwean includes those in opposition too) as part of the fulfilment of the objectives of the liberation struggle. The second was the launch of the Native Club in South Africa in 2006 as the “third pillar” of the democratic transformation agenda with a specific focus on issues of national identity, knowledge production, revival of African cultures and critique of neo-liberal ideology.
The third was the explosion of xenophobia in South Africa at the beginning of 2008 that left more than 60 people dead and many others homeless — where he refers to his comrade Mbembe 2008’s writings. These developments compel one to rethink the direction of the national project in post-colonial Africa and the changing deployments and articulations of nationalism not only as a state ideology but also as a popular imaginary open to manipulation by both the elites and the poor in times of crisis. This discussion explored the dynamic of how post-colonial state entitlement by any black African (Zimbabwean) has created a self-suited democracy definition, particularly the bigotry displayed by opposition politicians and their supporters.
Hypocrites and bigots
As I am writing I am following some WhatsApp group chats where emergent opinion leaders are labelling people who don’t think like them “sell outs”. I am reminded of Joseph Chakawa’s (Midlands State University’s History lecturer) theme of liberation struggle ‘sell outs’. He talks about how residents who had personal vendettas would label each other sell outs causing gory troubles and internment of innocent civilians. Some even died because they were successful, success was allied with being a sell out. The most mirthful thing with this throbbing period is how hard drudgery and devotion resulted in your death or incarceration. Anyway that is not what I want to talk about. Back to the new “sell out”. It has come to light that anyone who does not think like opposition is Zanu-PF and is paid for thinking in that particular fashion.
Humanity has jettisoned any possibility of independent thinking and decided to Zanunise such thinking. I am dazed by opposition thought aptitudes that pronounce tolerance of thought miscellany, impartial appreciation and autonomy of expression. Academic credibility is almost totally artisanal in Zimbabwe since opposition apologists now possess the barometer of academicism. For one to be called accredited an academic, they have to inscribe anti-establishment material lest they be called Zanu-PF stooges or bootlickers. This is exactly what artisanal thinking is. When you begin to denounce thoughts based on party lines or thinking differently from you, you are worse than the one you are alleging to be intolerant. This was the case of Sam Moyo an outstanding agrarian scholar whose academic excellence was ludicrously attached to Zanu-PF by contemporary scholars because he saw prosperity in the Agro economy and policies of the government. It has become unthought-of of to share the same thoughts with Zanu-PF.
Disturbingly, it is the same people who deny that they are being paid or their political gods are being paid by western countries to stage regime change in Zimbabwe. I swear you would be smothered if you tell them that Evan Mawarire is being paid, but they have the nerve to claim that anyone who shares the same thoughts with Zanu-PF, however independently, is being paid by the party or is a bootlicker. Reverse logic must tell you this: if you denounce that one can think independently you are also classifying yourself under the same banner of being a dependant thinker. If you conclude that a thinker is being paid to think in a particular way, then you are also being paid to think in a particular way. Does that mean for us to have a thought we should be paid? Political opinion does not need a financial incentive, this is what is killing the society, when we think that way we cripple the very essence of thinking, ideas are free and can be shared freely. Society should embrace the independent thinker and stop attaching every thought to being partisan. This is how it reversely implicates you: I am a thinker — I am paid to think that way — therefore I do not have a mind of my own. You are a thinker — for you to think that way you are paid — therefore you do not have a mind of your own. Whenever you think of calling someone a bootlicker because they do not think like you; remember that you are a bootlicker too because you think like your political gods.
Few young scholars are brave enough to display their thoughts against opposition politics for fear of being labelled bootlickers or Zanu apologists. I implore you today, speak out do not think legitimacy of thought lies in opposition thought wobbles, they do not own ideas, infact they operate on borrowed mindsets #borrowedmindsetsmustfall. Tedious Ncube (Political Science 2nd year student) has been a beacon of displaying his independent thoughts in a formidable manner that I find him being a rare breed of emerging “thinking” youths in Zimbabwe’s political practitioners. He says in Zimbabwe, opposition has monopolised democracy to itself because they seem not to agree with democratic principles when they are at the advantage of the ruling party.
His extensive thought is that in the protest culture, there has been a lot of hypocrisy and use of citizens for political gain by many political actors which encompasses de-identification of those who do not support social movements, anyone who thinks like Zanu-PF is a Zanu card holding member, exorcism of nationalist ideas in young people (as if it’s a demon to be nationalistic) and illegitimacy of any thought whether academic or not if it’s not anti-establishment. It is not too late to introspect and revisit our opinions on how we appropriate tolerance as a nation and to be ideological hypocrites, we now sound like there is something wrong with being Zanu and everything is absolutely awesome with being opposition. Perhaps there is need to account for Tsvangirai’s 16 years as the only president not voted by MDC supporters through constitutional means within his party, hence the multiple factional divides in MDC to this date. If that is democracy according to opposition then call me whatever you want.
Micheal Mhlanga is a research and strategic communication specialist and is currently serving Leaders for Africa Network (LAN) as the Programmes and Public Liaison Officer. He also administrates multiple youth public dialogue forums in Zimbabwe including the annual Reading Pan Africanism Symposium (REPS) and Back to Pan Africanism Conference. Feedback can be sent to [email protected]
