BEFORE THEY CHOSE!

BEFORE THEY CHOOSE!

All in the name of their choices,
Their homes are burnt down
Their ribs are broken and
Their buttocks are buttered
Young boys are dressed in mass boots
and camouflage garments before
They are taught to run, sing, destroy and sloganeer aimlessly
It happens before they choose!

Their brains are thrown into washing machines
where they are spun thoroughly before they are pegged to dry
on blood stained washing lines
Under a watchful eye of recommended supporters
Its their time to choose!!!

They carry their guided choices to the ballot and their fears,
detect and predict victory for men with big bows and piercers
When choices cease to be what they ought to be!!!

Decades of prolonged droughts of democracy have taught them,
to choose with their mouths shut, eyes closed and dreams shuttered
they know not the freedom to choose!!!

to them choosing is an odd ideal
a catapult erected against them
predetermined outcomes of their choices
have trained them to careless about their choices!!!

Let anyone who wants to lead do so,
ours is to be led come what may
The blind , the idiots, the devils and saints,
have pulled our chains of servitude
We know not the meaning of fresh air
our atmosphere reeks with poison gas, tear gas,
acidic policies, draconian laws and unfulfilled promises
All this happens before they choose!!!

(By Sheunesu Reginald Mpofu,

Human Rights Defender, Policy Analyst, Researcher and Advocate for Political and Social Justice

Mobile# +263 (0) 772 346 004 or +263 (0) 713 272 161
Email: sheunesu.mpofu@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/sheuregie

CONSTITUTION MAKING AND ELECTIONS

The Constitution Making Process and Elections

“If nothing else is left, one must scream. Silence is the real crime against humanity.” Naddezhda Mandelstam

I have been reluctant to be part of the discourse about the constitution making process which has provided more heat than light. What COPAC has gathered so far is information from an elite driven discourse that left the people by the way-side. It would therefore be difficult for anyone to convince me that in Zimbabwe people can drive any national process or that they have any burning desire to do so. What I can safely say is that the constitution making process in Zimbabwe has been elite led, elite managed or elite manipulated. This is a reality and a tragedy of elitism. I had the privilege of observing the COPAC led outreach meetings and noted with grave displeasure that the process was reduced to a contest between political parties – an arena for bitter struggles because parties viewed it as a process of crafting new rules of the political game, rules which would prescribe who has the power. With the new meta-rules that are likely to govern the new political order and ideally leveling the political field the process became an arena of partisan struggle for supremacy.

The three protagonists in the inclusive government have been declaring their readiness for the elections. One would shudder to imagine why? Why would ZANU PF want an election when it enjoys the lowest popular support in its post independence history, unless the party has suicidal tendencies? And why would MDC (T) desire early elections when the psychological impact of the June 2008 elections violence is still logged in the voters’ souls? It needs more than three years for the fear factor to start dissipating and for the voter to make an effective and meaningful choice. And why would MDC (M) want an election when it is comprehensively in disarray, unless it is also predisposed to committing suicide? And why would the current crop of members of parliament want to end their tenure unless they also need to be exorcised of their suicidal inclination. In fact early elections are no one’s best option. It is of paramount importance to note that there is no inherent virtue in early election before the country has done its homework it terms of crafting a new constitution, allow time for the new constitution to take root, clean the voters rolls that is allegedly inflated with phantom voters and develop the infrastructure for a contest that produces valid and undisputable elections. In short Zimbabwe is not ready for an election.

THE UNITED STATES OF AFRICA - IS IT VIABLE?

THE UNITED STATES OF AFRICA.... IS IT VIABLE?

The United States of Africa remains a continuous premise, a grand reverie esteemed from earliest days of Pan-Africanism. The rhyme entitled ‘Hail United States of Africa’ by Marcus Garvey in 1924 instigated ideas which latter on profoundly predisposed the outset of Pan- African Movement. Later, Kwame Nkrumah the then President of Ghana and Haile Sellassie took the initiative further to form the Organization of African Unity the precursor of the African Union. The Libyan leader Muamar al-Gaddafi made an ardent plea for the immediate establishment of the United States of Africa at regional Summits in June 2007, Guinea and February 2009 in Addis- Ababa, Ethiopia. A number of African Leaders gave a blank cheque to al-Gaddafi’s proposal believing it could end the blight of conflicts in Africa.  One queries if the continent has the aptitude and single exceptionality to implement a centralized government.

In my scrutiny it is not possible to come up with a union government. The issue of culture and communication can be a serious impediment to the formation of the union government. Africa houses Islamic states, there Christian nations and some who believe African Traditional Religion. Amalgamating people with diverse cultural and religious beliefs will be a solemn risk to the solidity of the United States of Africa. In such coregent conditions, I wonder whether it is really viable to forge any form of unity apart from conjectural African solidarity that has typified the activities of the African Union.

There are some countries which are tyrannical in nature and some are military regimes while others are hatchling democracies which would not want to be associated with totalitarianism and authoritarianism. Some countries in Africa have never experienced any form of democracy since the demise of colonial rule and these would prefer to continue with their undemocratic, militaristic and atavistic regimes. Such countries if incorporated in the unity arrangement they would certainly destabilize its value. In any case, who would want to bond with people who have no esteem for human rights and sanctity for human life? In Africa, respecting the sanctity for human life is a aphorism that has since been thrown into the dustbins of stupor.

I will use my beloved country Zimbabwe as an example. The southern African country almost brought down to its lowest ebb by a dilemma of economic comatose as a result of corruption and prowling by the ZANU PF led government. The country’s attempt to recover from the crisis is being halted by the big brother attitude of Robert Mugabe in the Unity Government. If such characters are included in the unity government it would not endure. With the waves of unity governments sweeping across Africa as a result of autocrats who refuse to relinquish power after losing an election. Ii all started with Kenya, then Zimbabwe, Madagascar and very soon Ivory Coast will join the list. Kenya set a bad precedent and this drivel has to stop! With such brand of leaders in Africa, proposing for a union government is a wild goose chase. It is an intricate task to merge the liberal democracy in South Africa with the autocracy in Guinea. It might be difficult to fuse relatively stable countries like Botswana and Namibia with the bedlam in Somalia, Uganda and Sudan. It would be complex for the Union Government to wholly blow the level of civil wars; the situation might merely be transferred to the United States of Africa, such that instead of talking about the civil war in Somalia we will talk about civil war in the eastern part of the United States of Africa. It would be intricate for the ordinary Ndebele people in Zimbabwe who stomach the brunt of the Gukurahundi genocide to be calmed by the new geographical spot.

The African Union and the highly fancied United Nations have botched to resolve conflicts in Africa. The founding fathers of the African Union keen to shield their newly found powers and privileges laded the continent with problems that will always militate against the Union Government. The organization’s reluctance to interfere in the internal affairs of the member states is at the root of much of the civil rivalry in Africa. The political and social instability in the horn of Africa provide the starkest example of how this ‘self serving’ clause in the African Union’s founding charter has been a curse to the continent. Somalia has provided scientist with the perfect data to theorize about a ‘modern government-less state’.

While conflicts are tearing the continent apart, yours truly is aggrieved by the fact that the African union wrings its hands in impotence and at times sublets liability to the United Nations. In fact the African Union behaves like a sweet mama pacifying its aberrant and delinquent children. The African Union has sat in the terraces while African leaders have made politics a lifetime profession. It is sat to note that the African Union do not sympathize with besieged, browbeaten and oppressed general populace of Africa but instead support dictators. The winds of unity governments which are sweeping across Africa for instance in Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Madagascar and soon it will be Ivory Coast is a sad episode for Africa. A fellow comrade in the struggle for democracy in Zimbabwe, Farai Nhende, has this to say about the Global Political Agreement in Zimbabwe, ““The GPA epitomizes a classic case of democracy being taken to the negotiation table. This pact is the very antithesis of everything that democracy represents and how easily the will of the people can be sacrificed in the name of political expediency”. The aim of the Unity governments is to make everyone a winner instead of having winner and losers. This is not consistent with the unity proposal. The African union should be disturbed by about millions of people who have been forced into a glide life as refugees and internally displaced people, dispossessed of their means of living, human self-respect and hope. Before we start talking about the United States Africa, there is a need to see an African Union that issue ultimatums, barn arms supplies and stamp its clout in the continent.

The wide spread corruption in Africa is a cause for concern. For example in Zimbabwe corruption mostly involves people in positions of public trust such as the police, government officials and high ranking politicians. The elite seek to gain and keep economic fortification at the expense of the general populace. The culture of non-accountability that parades sectors of the economies of most African states will always militate against any form of Unity. Robert I Rothberg, President of the World Peace Forum posits that, “… during the past three decades roughly ninety percent of the Sub-Saharan African leaders have behaved despotically, governed poorly, eliminated their people’s civic and human rights, initially and exacerbated existing civil conflicts, decelerated per-capita economic growth and proved corrupt…” it is therefore crocked thinking to argue that a United States of Africa can emerge when African leaders still have such demonic depiction.

Taking regional assimilation towards continental government as projected by Gaddafi would lead to a scantily negotiated marriage of convenience which would put the union government in a serious risk in the long term. Amalgamation developed economies such as those of Botswana and South Africa with some of the least developed countries in the world. Would Botswana, Namibia and South Africa feel that they have to soldier the financial burden of uniting just as West German did when it united with East German? It would be difficult to come up with a political system of such a government. The high-status post of the President of the United States of Africa will create solemn troubles for the Union Government. Would Robert Mugabe for example acquiesce to say Jacob Zuma and become a measly governor of a province? If we can have disputed presidential election in Nigeria, Kenya, Zimbabwe and Ivory Coast how then would we accept results of a continental wide presidential ballot? For Africa to come up with the Union government, it must endow with leadership in search for answers to its tribulations. African leaders should comprehend that leadership is about serving to secure and uphold people’s welfare, their collective ethos and protect facets of their socio-cultural norms. It is imperative to underline that, Leaders in the mould of Sir Seretse Khama. René, Ramgoolam, and Nelson Mandela understood their rationale and devoted their vigor to achieve their cause. Africa’s disfigured examples miss the point.

Parting shot: if the United States of Africa is to be attained, the idea has to be shared by all stake holders; these comprise the governments, the private sector (s), the civil society, academia, among others. one the same note African leaders should desist from viewing leadership as a money spinning business venture – a rare opportunity to further one’s nest and bequeath material security to one’s offspring. This is gibberish comrades and will not take Africa anywhere! 

(BY SHEUNESU MPOFU, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR -  PROGRESSIVE YOUTH ALLIANCE ZIMBABWE)

DEMYSTIFYING THE PARTITION OF AFRICA

DEMYSTIFYING THE PARTITION OF AFRICA

OVERVIEW

There is no even slightly discernable accord among historians and scholars relating to the basic nature as a historical process and the driving forces of the Partition of Africa. All agree that the partition was an extra ordinary flow of European Imperialism. The ability to account for the partition of Africa has been declared an acid test of theories of imperialism and contradictory arguments have been put forward with great intensity. Was it a ‘big bang’, something that European powers undertook abruptly by a premeditated decision, as the familiar illustration of the Map of Africa being drawn in a symposium at Berlin would suggest? or was it somewhat a much more unintentional and slapdash stuff, in which half unenthusiastic powers hauled themselves from one tragedy situation to another, as more recent imperial historiography uphold? Underlying such significant issues is the essential notional and practical question about the scope to and the mode in which the intentions and basis of historical proponents can be taking as comprising the basis of this historical process.

Much might be known about the events of the colonization of Africa but when it comes to the motive behind it, there is no consent of opinion among scholars and historians. Some scholars are of the view that it was driven by pride and prestige. One should take cognizance of the fact that, Germany and Italy, unified, did not have colonial chattels. They then briskly struggled for places in the colonial sun commensurate with their eminence in the community. France envisaged in imperial dominions, recompense for defeat in 1870 and the loss of Alsace and Lorraine. France wanted to demonstrate to the world that she was still a first class nation by acquiring colonies in Africa. One might also argue that the partition was a result of the decoy of markets. Overseas holdings had the latent to furnish raw suits, otherwise unavailable in Europe to feed the Whiteman and his machines. It is equally importance to note that the premeditated reasons and liberalism were other driving forces behind the colonization of Africa. For some the colonization as a result of spontaneous actions dictated by the emergencies in Europe. It is therefore the saddle of this article to explore the several causes that accounts for f this fundamental phase of African history.

The subjugators were primarily driven by anecdotes of Africa’s colossal wealth, bona fide or imaginary, to invade and loot the abundant resources. It is suffice to say that the economic factor was the main drive of the colonization of Africa. I will substantiate my view with that of Uzoigwe (1978: 21) who avow that, the economic motives have always loomed large in the process of empire building. It is of supreme importance to note that, to dismiss economic motivations as an unimportant factor in the colonization of Africa is as subtle as to argue that these motivations alone were the only justifications for the colonization. 

New markets were the invariable of Europe’s captains of industry and merchant princes and it was well that to them that the ears of governments willingly inclined. The imperialists viewed the colonization as a prudent territorial expansion for the creation of new markets. It is important to accentuate that, Britain passed through the Long Depression of 1873 – 96 which led to a growing poise of trade deficit, with attenuation and escalating protectionist markets. The melancholy was blamed for the hostile tariffs. This therefore meant that to avoid the recurrence of such a depression, Britain had to consider Africa. Africa offered an open market that would garner British trade surplus. The Britons therefore thought that acquisition of markets would therefore nullify the adverse effects of hostile tariffs by creating an open door to world trade in particular thus helping them to nurse the dilemma of economic meltdown. Equally important was the impact of the surfacing of America as a large scale world exporter which caused an alarm in the British exports, and this beyond every rational qualm gave rise to the outcry for new markets. Britain like other European countries had long since begun to run an adverse balance of trade which was increasingly offset by the income from overseas investments. Surplus capital was often more profitable invested overseas, particularly in Africa, where cheap labour, limited competition, and copious raw materials made a great premium possible. 

The colonization of Africa also came as a result of the economic state of Europe. Germany united under Prussian rule as a result of the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71 was seeking new outlets for her energies and new markets for her growing industries. The demand for raw materials unavailable in Europe especially copper, rubber, palm oil, cocoa, diamonds, tea and tin which European consumers had grown habituated to and upon which the European industries had grown utterly dependent on for their economies to remain intact forced the countries to consider Africa for a smooth supply of the much needed resources. Powerful industrial and financial capitalists soon ran out of lucrative areas of investment in their own countries and therefore persuaded their governments to focus their attention on Africa where they could find high profits from their investments, new markets for their products and a safe source of raw materials. That economic motives played a crucial role in the colonization of Africa cannot be denied but a jam-packed understanding of the causes of the colonization requires one to explore other motives as well. 

The other theory which has to be considered is the geo-political or strategic theory. Strategic and political considerations seem to have been of principal importance in bringing the colonization of Africa. Some areas were strategically important for maintaining trade routes to Asia or refueling stations for a worldwide navy. The need to shield the sea route to India and the Far East propelled countries such as Britain to pursue colonies. Britain hoping to link Cairo in the North with Cape Town in the South wanted north-south dominion; therefore, all the territory between the two points gained strategic value. Mauritius was taken from the French because she had the best harbor in the south Indian Ocean. Ceylon was also taken from the Dutch because it controlled those straits to China. This was also a result of the desire for stopover ports in eastern and southern coasts of Africa en-route to Asia and the Indian Empire of Britain. The completion of the Suez Canal made Egypt an area of vital interest because it set astride the shortest route to India. It is important to highlight that; Britain might have had significant strategic reasons for protecting the Suez and cape rotes to India but France and other nations were not pushed by these motives. 

It is also important to underscore that, Pride and Prestige also features in the list of the causes of the colonization of Africa. To report back home and throughout Europe that one nation has acquired thousands of square miles of territory and millions of captive population enhanced the prestige of that nation throughout the world. To a victor in the imperial game meant great national pride. Germany for example began to consider having colonies in Africa despite Bismarck’s lack of enthusiasm for the idea because there was a shift of command in the governing elite. Bismarck, the then Chancellor of Germany had no interest in overseas colonies and once compared them to ‘fire furs worn by impoverished Polish nobles who had no shirts underneath.’ His concern laid in the exposed position of Germany and on one occasion, he said, “My map of Africa lies in Europe…” such statements lost their worth and meaning as the Germany governing elite began to view the world as a finite, one which only the strong would predominate. They were not content with allowing other European countries to expend diplomatic energy on African initiatives. Germany’s pride and prestige were at stake; hence one can safely say that, her participation in the colonization of Africa was as a result of the inevitable struggle for world supremacy. Britain, France, Italy and Germany among other powers wanted to be regarded as forces to reckon in world politics. 

Some historians have pointed to liberalism as a cause of the colonization of Africa. they say the liberal tradition of Europe emphasized on ‘self improvement’ and the ‘perfectibility of man’ the belief combined with Charles Darwin’s ‘new science’ and warping of the statement, ‘survival of the fittest’ by social Darwinism encouraged the view that, Europe was going down into the ‘Dark Continent’ to raise up and civilize the people. To the Europeans nothing seemed paternalistic or racist; they associated the partition, scramble and colonization of Africa with the liberal view of the perfectibility of man. Eurocentric scholars, among them, Hamerow (1969) argue that the Africans were inherently inferior and needed the assistance and protection of the stronger. However this nurture- nature debate shows an inquisitive blend of the wealth seeking and prestige conscious impulses of the imperialists. The exploits of imperialism created tales of wartime glory that fostered exploitation. This therefore laid at bay the liberalism theory as an invalid explanation of the colonization of Africa. Such chauvinistic ideas are attempts by Eurocentric scholars to cover up the impiety of the partition, scramble for and colonization of Africa.

One can safely conclude that, the partition of Africa was an interaction between structural conditions and personal intentions. These created a snare of essential and ample causes acting on one another. The process was conditioned by structural changes unfolding in European economy and politics. It could have hardly happened without the expansionary economic weight and the amplified political rivalry created by the breakthrough of industrial ventures. 

(By Sheunesu Reginald Mpofu

Executive Director, Progressive Youth Alliance)