PEACE AND RECONCILIATION: A PANACEA TO GUKURAHUNDI!!

The recent confession by Speaker of Parliament, Jacob Mudenda that he witnessed the torture and gruesome murder of more than 20 000 people in Matabeleland and parts of Midlands during the dark years of Gukurahundi in the early 1980s by soldiers from the 5 Brigade, but was powerless to stop it makes a sad but regrettable reading

Why Mudenda has chosen to speak after 27 years of silence is not known but what remains salient is the fact that there is no retreat from the ubiquitous challenge posed by the continued lack of political will on the need to create peace and dialogue on Gukurahundi.

Mudenda made these sensational claims during a three-day men’s fellowship conference organised by the Brethren –In-Christ church in Lobengula under the theme, “Peace and Justice” where he was guest speaker. He said though he witnessed it, he was too powerless to stop it.It boggles one’s mind why given the assumption that he has power today, why hasn’t he sought to seek redress on the matter.

President Mugabe soon after independence enunciated a policy of National Reconciliation in his famous speech where he said, “surely this is now the time to beat our swords into ploughshares so we can attend to the problems of developing our economy and our society. I urge you whether you are black or white, to join me in a new pledge to forget our grim past, forgive others and forget, join hands in a new amity, and together as Zimbabweans, trample upon racialism, tribalism and regionalism, and work hard to reconstruct and rehabilitate our society as we invigorate our economic machinery”.

Since then there is virtually no debate on this issue which remains sensitive till now. Every attempt to bring up this issue has been treated with cruel hostility and clampdown. Thousands of people who disappeared during Gukurahundi remain unaccounted for.

The Unity Accord of 1987 finally put to an end to this massacre but it didn’t address the process of healing and Reconciliation that the President had identified as a remedy to aggression. One hurdle that makes healing and reconciliation a herculean task is the fact that how does reconciliation where those who burnt other people’s houses, raped women and killed many don’t show remorse? For example it’s a public secret that Perence Shiri the current Air force chief was the commander of the 5th Brigade that carried out Gukurahundi in Matebeland and yet he has never been tried before any court but rather was actually rewarded with a top post.

The findings of the two probe committees established by Mugabe that is the Chihambakwe and Dumbutshena commissions were never made public and it remains unclear the recommendations they made. For a long time the ZANU PF government has successfully avoided direct discourse on the Gukurahundi atrocities but when you have a political figure like Mudenda confessing to the nation the barbaric ordeal of how innocent women, men and children were brutally killed by the 5th brigade it shows beyond doubt that Zimbabwe is nation that is in dire need of healing, reconciliation and peace.

The Parliamentary and Presidential elections in 2008 present yet another scenario that makes healing and reconciliation and national healing evitable. Violence, torture, murder, arbitrary detentions, disappearances, maiming of opposition supporters prompted Morgan Tsvangirai to withdraw from the election race. His supporters had limbs cut off and today these scars they still carry them while the perpetrators walk free. When the Government of National Unity was formed, the government responded by establishing the Organ on National Healing, Reconciliation and Integration (ONHRI).

The purpose and aim of the ONHRI was to establish a mechanism for national healing, cohesion and unity and laying the foundation for a society characterised by mutual respect, tolerance and development. The ONHRI was composed of members from political parties involved in skirmishes who themselves were not clean in terms of their utterances. One questions the wisdom of entrusting the process of national healing and reconciliation to partisan individuals. Of course this proved a futile exercise and the organ didn’t deliver its mandate till its mandate expired.

The truth is that the past should be revisited and confronted. Atrocities of the past have to be acknowledged and in some cases apologies made or even reparations where necessary since there is no healing without justice. Victims and perpetrators of conflict and violence have to be at the centre of reconciliation and healing activities. Reconciliation is an absolute necessity today. It is a guarantee that violence that happened in the past will never occur again. Victims of Gukurahundi aswell as the election periods especially the 2008 elections have not told their stories. They remain in the abyss of pain and neglect. The truth remains hidden or is being told from the perspective of those in power. The truth they tell is one-sided and therefore wounds remain open.

Mudenda is now speaker of Parliament and in his capacity as Speaker of Parliament; these are some of the debates that he should initiate by any means possible. He should now use that office to make past wrongs, right. Instead of giving a lame excuse to the few men at the fellowship that the government is sorry, he should initiate the healing process. The new constitution that is in place provides for the establishment of the National Peace and Reconciliation Commission(NPRC) which is not yet functional till now, albeit the herculean task that lies ahead. Whether it will deliver or not, remains a mystery. Only time will tell.

The writer, Rawlings Magede, is a rural political enthusiast who writes from Zimbabwe.rawedge699@gmail.com

ZANU PF: WHERE CORRUPTION EQUALS TO PROMOTION

The new political dimensions that we witnessed in the past weeks have been full of drama full swing. On the political front, cabinet ministers chose to abandon their duties to follow the first lady “meet the people” rallies where some ZANU PF cronies, drunk with partisan idiocy, paralysed with hero worship sought to revamp their waning uncertain political careers in the face of smearing retribution by the first lady on those she alleged were causing factionalism that were threatening the continued grip on power by her husband.

In all this hocus pocus, the public media notably; The Herald and ZBC led a full coverage of these rallies. I felt sorry for those paying licences to the “state” broadcaster who were “tortured” everyday by these rallies. Of course the state media must be commended for an “excellent” but lamentable propensity to make people of shallow intellect famous because of their proximity to the corridors of power. The functions of the whole government grounded to a halt as responsible authorities who were supposed to be running ministries were busy making slogans meant to gain Machiavellian mileage at their expense of government business. This is the orbit around which the country has been oscillating in the past weeks.
During one of these rallies the First Lady “Amai” Mugabe with an avenging sword single handedly chose to make shocking revelations in Mashonaland Central Province that there was “someone” not only trying to topple her husband but also engaged in a vast extortion enterprises.
Said Grace: “… that same person who goes around demanding 10 per cent shareholding in companies. If you go to any company now, the name of that person is mentioned.

“You lead factions, you extort companies and you are involved in illicit diamond deals, so you cannot say you are not corrupt. “These accusations many believe were targeted to vice president Joyce Mujuru. The gist of the matter is not so much who it was meant for, but how and why that person was still in government. Why that person has been given free course to do such unfair practices remains a scandal that will live to be told another day.

Despite the call by individuals, civic society and other pressure groups to call for an audit into how our diamonds from Chiadzwa were being appropriated, the ZANU PF government continued to nicodemously unaccounted for the vast revenue from diamonds. When the diamonds were discovered the government demagogically said that the proceeds from the diamonds were going to revamp our comatose economy but far from that, this individual whom Grace Mugabe meant was/is busy involved in illicit diamond dealings enriching her at the expense of the whole nation. Many people from Chiadzwa who were displaced when diamonds were discovered had to eke out an existence when promises made to them were never actualised.

This confession by Grace brings many things to mind.ZANU PF is a conference of lily livered opportunists united by money and greed, for you to remain on top you have to remain loyal to the vision of plunder of Zimbabwe’s natural resources and self-centeredness. Deviating from this set way, will result in expulsion. The economic haemorrhage and meltdown we have witnessed have not only been caused by sanctions as they say. This looting and plunder of resources and grabbing of other peoples businesses, has led to the collapse of our economy. The reality within ZANU PF at the moment is sickening; no drive to revive the ailing economy, no backbone to deal with corruption but just an expired swan song on sanctions.
Why President Mugabe doesn’t act on his cronies to stamp out corruption and greedy, remains a secret best known to him. His talk on sovereignty has proved a fiction used to limit humanitarian assistance to those who have been left on the peripheries of lack and poverty. He has used it so much to legitimise his power and coerce the weak into believing his fake gospel on the need to be sovereign as a nation.

How can we talk of sovereignty when one person and his accomplices extort minerals meant to benefit the country? Why does he continue to allow these corrupt individuals serve in his government? Has that proverbial statement that says birds of the same feathers flock together found its root within ZANU PF?Has ZANU PF factional fighting reduced him from being a national leader to something like a village head presiding over mundane unproductive cases? Time will not tell because he has failed to reign on those fingered in corrupt activities.
Rawlings Magede is rural political enthusiast who writes from Nkayi, Matebeleland North Province.rawedge699@gmail.com

STOP THE ROT MINISTER CHOMBO!

The song Mubikira by Leonard Zhakata best describes the plight or predicament that most hardworking home seekers find themselves in.In the song Zhakata laments the selective application of the law in a country ravaged by injustice and suppression. He describes those who oppress and wield political power as insincere to the attainment of justice and equality. “For how long shall people keep quiet? When the elephants fight, it is the grasses that suffer, “he sings.

In the year 2013 I penned a story that was informed by the investigations I had done in the city of Gweru involving one Smelly Dube who owns a real estate company called River valley Properties, who donated a house valued at US$ 50,000 to President Mugabe. The reason, as she puts it, was to honour and appreciate the president for the land reform programme and empowerment. The company also gave more than 1000 high and medium density stands to civil servants and offered to provide building materials on a monthly basis payment. Of course in the story I clearly said that the pledge by Ms Dube was celebrated in the public media of course to sell white lies to the citizens that she was advancing the causes of the general man while she infact was undermining them. And yes of course, Minister of Local Government Chombo was the guest at the handing ceremony.
In the article I gave several examples of people who were using treacherous political means to fleece innocent home seekers of their hard earned cash like musician-cum businessman Energy Mutodi etc. These people have been dragged before the courts time and again but our courts seem magnanimous to criminals. In the case of Rivervalley properties there have been several developments that I thought I should share a year after I penned that article.

From my investigations and findings it appears deliberate on the part of Smelly Dube who because of the current demolitions taking place in places such as Chitungwiza and Epworth, is trying by all means to fortify her “business empire” that is being funded by the dollars of innocent home seekers. Many desperate home seekers had to eke out an existence for the past years for them to achieve every man’s dream of owning property.

Some top politicians and top civil service commission officers, provincial heads of uniformed and general civil servants and a few in lower ranks in Gweru were given free stands. The majority of these have high salaries in the civil service with the capacity to pay for the stands. This was done to give a misleading impression that River valley properties is a philanthropic indigenous company there to assist the homeless in line with government policies, yet the truth is that this was a way of bribing the top officials to make them cast a blind eye to the rampant looting and robbery and corruption which is currently full swing.

The majority and paying civil servants were offered stands at a cost of $15 per square meter making a 1000sqm stand cost $15000 for servicing only. The servicing does not include sewerage. Paying at a rate of $100 (a 1/4 of the majority of civil servants' salaries) per month a beneficiary with that size of a stand will have to pay for the incomplete servicing for 12.5 years. Those who got bigger stands will have to pay for as long as 20yrs.

Desperate home seeking civil servants under River valley properties made an extravagant whim completing misleading agreement forms by the involvement of a River valley properties office operating in the public works offices headed by a “partly” River valley properties and “partly” government employee known as the projects manager Ms Matilda Manhambo.Why she is doubling as an employee of River valley or government employee, no one knows.

Phase 1 of a similar scheme which was done by Public works working with beneficiaries was completed in less than 10yrs and the servicing of stands even as big as 1800sqm cost less than $5000.This therefore shows that Rivervalley made its name by pretending to have given some civil servants, politicians and close associates free stands yet they made paying beneficiaries pay for all stands and also made sure the company would get a profit.The agreements of sales were so craftily designed and no one can withdraw from the scheme without substantially losing and refunds are not prompt.

Smelly Dube is building a mansion in the Kopje area while there is no significant servicing of the stands. The company also donates a lot of money in cash or kind to ZANU PF political events to maintain its “patriotic image" at the expense of beneficiaries. What still boggles is why all this rot has continued to go on unresolved while Minister Chombo continues to cast a blind eye. Minister Chombo has been a minister for a long time and over the years he appears to have an ear for sycophants and swindlers, those who run dubious and bogus land schemes or cooperatives have continued to take refuge under his fortress.

Property rights are enshrined in the new constitution and the Minister doesn’t appear moved. Even during the on-going demolitions that have taken place, he hasn't even bothered to do a land audit of how those home seekers got the land. What I know for a fact is that these home seekers just didn't start building houses from t nowhere but they got land from these people who are affiliated to the Minister. What is the Ministers mandate when he has failed monumentally to defend the rights of citizens? Now if the constitution guarantees property rights, who is Smelly Dube or Minister Chombo to bar citizens from exercising their constitutional rights?


Rawlings Magede is a rural political enthusiast who writes from Matebeland North Province. Email rawedge699@gmail.com