When I read on Friday 25th January about the political shenanigans between the former, Ndebele ZAPU members of Mugabe's political elite and his Shona ZANU (PF)adherents my heart sank. As if poor, broken Zimbabwe was not in enough trouble already, this apparent reappearance of old, so-called `tribal' animosities is the pits.
My information is that the Ndebeles, from whichever quarter are fed-up with the way they have been treated by the overlord Robert Mugabe, especially as they were virtually force-fed the 1987 Unity Accord (another `so-called' it seems) which old Joshua Nkomo had to swallow in order to save his people in Matabeleland from what looked like an attempt by Mugabe's lot at genocide in - the national army's 5th Brigade assault, called `Gukurahundi'. An uneasy peace has lasted ten years and Nkomo is long gone. But his right-hand man Joseph Msika lives on, placated, bribed, if you like, by high office as one of Zimbabwe's two vice-Presidents. Until recently he has been remarkably loyal to his present boss.
We had almost forgotten about Dumiso Dabengwa, the former Zipra commander, jailed by Mugabe after independence (was it perhaps to prevent him from leading a revolt against the Shona who had grabbed most of the spoils of the liberation war?). Anyway, he was released after nearly five years; he succeeded as a business magnate (ironic in view of his former incarnation as a Soviet trained guerrilla known as rhe Black Russian) and then was coaxed into Mugabe's cabinet. (Readers are asked to forgive me for so boringly and repetitively invoking the name of Mugabe because it is really rather pointless avoiding the fact that it is from him that all else flows in today's policy making in the country). Back to Dabengwa: by 1997, as Minister of Home Affairs, he functioned as the man responsible for the police until he lost his Matabeleland seat in parliament to a member of the opposition MDC party. He was pretty quiet until his recent move to openly challenge Mugabe at a recent ZANU (PF) party politburo meeting. Angered by Mugabe's cavalier treatment of his vice-president when RGM showed huge favour to Jabulani Sibanda, the disreputable, dismissed `war vet' leader in Matabeleland and sycophant-in-chief to Mugabe, Dabengwa has resurfaced. Seconded by Msika and supported by party chairman John Nkomo and others they look set to fracture the delicate peace between the Matabeleland and Midlands region and old enemies in Mashonaland. I heard Fergal Keane on the BBC today saying that the mayhem in Kenya was not a manifestation of tribalism: he claimed that it is poverty which causes people in different regions within African states to attack each other - or something like that. I cannot agree that tribalism is a fiction, or a convenient and simplistic, white man's way to explain the black-on-black bloodletting that goes on in so many parts of Africa. In Zimbabwe's case the differences between the people of Matabeleland and those of Mashonaland go very deep and well beyond the era of white settlement. Mugabe, in his arrogance is tempting fate, forgetting that the Unity Accord, however fragile, has kept internal `tribal' peace as a vital part of his country's sovereignty. Pleasing Jabulani, rather than Joseph and Dumisa et all may eventually prove to be yet another nail in his coffin.
Copyright © 2004 Diana Mitchell
Copyright © 2004 Diana Mitchell
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