We will not be cowed!
On Tuesday, the Zanu PF cabal that has shackled almost all government institutions shocked everyone when it re-detained 18 MDC and civic activists in what must rank as the most calculated and determined assault on the Global Political Agreement signed by the three major political parties on September 15, 2008.
We in the MDC are aware of a well-knit minute group that comprises known senior civil servants aligned to Zanu PF, senior police, military and Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) agents fighting very hard to scuttle the new political deal in Zimbabwe.
Their gripe is understandable.They are beneficiaries of an entrenched system of patronage and corruption. They have benefited from the quasi-fiscal activities of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and the new political order threatens the comfort zone of this privileged minority.
The new dispensation came as a shock to them and every day, every night, they continue to plot against the successful implementation of the Global Political Agreement.
They continue to fight Morgan Tsvangirai and his team of determined ministers struggling to undo decades of patronage, corruption and laziness. The residual element recently exposed itself in The Herald when it brazenly fought, through proxy news articles, a Cabinet Retreat meant to inculcate a business culture of Key Performance Indicators for every ministry. This is a strange culture for the Stone Age politicians and Zanu PF-aligned senior civil servants who have survived over the years, not on performance, but on patronage and unmitigated bootlicking.
This is the same cabal that is running a parallel operation that continues to subvert agreed positions. It is the same cabal that authored and executed the violence ahead of the June 27 sham. It has tentacles that spread from the Office of the President and Cabinet, the Attorney-General’s Office, the police, the army, the Central Intelligence Organisation, the RBZ and the Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity.
It will fight tooth and nail against the success of the inclusive government because any success will naturally be credited to the MDC. It will block any successful resolution of the outstanding issues. It will continue to dent any prospects of economic recovery by engaging in farm invasions, illegal detentions and re-detentions to dim any prospects of donors putting money into this battered economy.
With the wings of Zanu PF’s Father Christmas, Gideon Gono, seriously clipped, their warped logic says Tendai Biti must equally fail in his bid to entrench a transparent system that will bring all the funds through Treasury. So the residual element will continue to engage in extra-legal activities to scuttle the work of the inclusive government and hope for a Zanu PF comeback in another dispensation, hopefully bringing back the “good” years of foreign currency salaries for top army brass, free tractors and State-sponsored terror. The good news is that Zanu PF is on a stretcher and we shall definitely wheel them out at the next election!
We in the MDC will not be cowed by the latest antics to frustrate us. The fact that Zanu PF back-tracked on the detentions after barely 24 hours means these re-detentions were political in the first place and had nothing to do with the law. It is hoped by this inner circle that re-detentions and intensification of violence will make the MDC make serious concessions, like dropping demands for the resolution of outstanding issues and the prospects of a blanket amnesty on perpetrators of violence and human rights abuses. The major drivers of the June 27 violence are naturally running scared.
It is these flagrant violations of the GPA such as the re-arrests and re-detentions of MDC and civic activists that will make national healing and reconciliation an onerous task.
For some of us, there is no doubt that Zimbabwe is in an irreversible transition. Just like a barking dog will not stop an express train, so too will this unpopular and secretive cabal dismally fail to stop the change agenda. After all, we are a party of excellence and together with the people; we will continue to march bravely towards a new Zimbabwe and a new beginning.
These illegal acts bring to the fore the debate on transitional justice. The fleeting images of dead children, dead men and women and barefoot MDC activists running into the hills in the name of keeping Robert Mugabe in office in the run-up to June 27, 2008, and now these re-detentions, must inform the debate on whether there has been any paradigm shift on the part of Zanu PF since September 15, 2008. It brings into question whether we, the victims of violence, should simply forgive and forget for the sake of national healing and reconciliation.
Justice is part of the healing process. Justice has to take its course so that those who were raped, maimed, tortured and illegally detained can begin to heal their conscience.
We in the MDC who have borne the brunt of torture and violence know that if anything, reconciliation and national healing are going to be an onerous task in Zimbabwe. Will we — the victims of madness, unmitigated violence, torture and illegal detentions — ever be able to forgive and forget? Can we — the perpetual victims of a thugocracy that is desperate for survival — just pretend that nothing happened?
Sometimes you need to have experienced these things personally for you to make an honest judgement on whether we can really forgive and forget as a nation and as a party.
Sometimes a brutalised people should be allowed to be subjective and say their conscience can only be cleansed if justice takes place.
We are dealing with residual elements in Zanu PF and in the securocracy who never learnt any lesson from Gukurahundi, from Operation Murambatsvina and Operation Mavhotera Papi. They are a people for whom only transitional justice will deliver the fundamental lesson that violence and extra-legal activities do not pay.
For some of us, the struggle against a system represented by the service chiefs and the cabal that is working every day to throw spanners into this inclusive government will be perpetual. The struggle against torture and heinous crimes against humanity must not be lost in the understandable excitement about the inclusive government.
The fundamental lesson of the past three months is that Zanu PF and the MDC remain miles apart despite being part of the same inclusive government. They remain exclusive players in an inclusive game. President Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai belong to two different ideological and political homes.
The struggle against oppression and repression has created our permanent home in the trenches. Yes, the trenches are our home from where we will continue to fight for democracy, freedom, transparency and accountability. We, the victims of unbridled violence and the devious machinations of the Zanu PF conspirators, will definitely not be able to simply forgive and forget.
A Truth and Justice Commission is the only tribute we can pay to Tonderai Ndira, to Better Chokururama, to Thabita Marume, to Learnmore Jongwe, to Gandhi Mudzingwa, to Jestina Mukoko, to Concilia Chinanzvavana, to two-year old “bandit” Nigel Mutemagau and to the thousands who were maimed and murdered during Gukurahundi and the violence that has become the hallmark of our electoral politics since June 2000.
The ground rules must be set before we go for another election in the next 18 months.
Only then can the souls of the thousands of victims of political violence rest in eternal peace.
Luke Tamborinyoka, is the Director of Information and Publicity in the Movement for Democratic Change led by Morgan Tsvangirai. He can be contacted at mhoful@yahoo.co.uk
Posted by Luke Tamborinyoka
on May 10, 2009. Filed under Opinion.
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