Sunday 31 May 2015

Borders are not for Africans

Imagine a young Venda man living a hundred kilometres downstream of Beitbridge town. They spy a beautiful girl they fancy on the other side of the Limpopo river. Does anyone in their right mind seriously think the young man will travel a hundred kilometres to Beitbridge border post to have a passport stamped so that he can go and propose to a girl who lives a few kilometres across the river?

And if officials happen to meet the young man, how do they know on which side of the river he belongs. They speak exactly the same Venda on both sides of the river.

Colonial borders are artificial and arbitrary lines drawn right down the middle of existing communities in ALL cases.

Therefore for anyone to demand that a border must not be porous is daydreaming of the highest order. It is also a sign that the person has not travel and has no clue how borders function.

At the border border between Zambia and Tanzania it is difficult to tell which street or footpath is in Nakonde the Zambian town, and which one is in Tunduma the Tanzanian town. You can be living in Nakonde and go fetch water in Tunduma and vice versa.

In Dedza the border between Malawi and Mozambique is a nondescript building surrounded by open plains. People and livestock wonder across the plains freely. In Ntcheu district of Malawi the main road from Blantyre to Lilongwe is said to straddle the border for several kilometres. People from Mozambique use clinics and schools in Malawi and vice versa.

Where my wife comes from in Honde Valley the local chief used to rule cases from both sides of the border. People's movement was only curtailed when the border was mined during Zimbabwe's liberation war. All along the Zambezi river the Tonga people fish using canoes and build their homes on either side of the river as they choose. No person in their right mind can try and allocate a Tonga person to Zambia or Zimbabwe.

At Kasumbalesa the border post between Zambia and the DRC is a collection of nondescript buildings surrounded by thick bush. If you take a footbath a few hundred metres long you won't know on which side of the border you will be.

The bottom line is border controls have never really worked as a way of controlling immigration. It is unlikely they will work. If people have a motive, they will find a way across. Palestinians dig tunnels across the border despite it being patrolled by two of the Middle East's biggest armies, one of them inhumanly ruthless.

No country in the world has ever successfully sealed its borders against human movement. There is a much better chance of finding ice-cream in hell, than that of South Africa being the first to succeed. Not with borders drawn right down the middle of Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga, Venda, Tswana and Nama peoples. These peoples are quite capable of choosing which set of documents they want and when.

No one should make noises about 'the border tribes' allowing in foreigners. Over seventy percent of the people I met in Johannesburg who introduced themselves as Zulus, latter explained that they are actually Swazis. That is how I came to know that there are people called Jo'burg Zulus. These are people who speak one of the Nguni dialects and pass themselves off as Zulus because the Euro-Africans from whom they would be looking for work express preference for Zulus but have no clue about the different Nguni dialects.

The problem for South Africa is not the mere presence of foreigners. The major problem is South Africans are often out-competed by foreigners in nearly all spheres of endeavour. This goes against their notion that they are 'better' than other Africans.

That is why most of the xenophobic sentiments are targeted at people who are running small businesses or holding onto jobs more successfully than locals.

Monday 18 May 2015

President Mugabe's Comments and the Kalanga People: Unraveling the Truth

In my primary school days I went to school with a Tsveropile Tlou. One of my father's tenants was a Mr Mbedzi. At that time I had no clue there was a tribe called Venda and I thought they were just Shonas who grew up in Matabeleland.

Zimbabwe's history books, which were written from the point of view of European settlers, do not mention anyone other than the Shona and the Ndebele. Like nearly all of Zimbabwe's school children I first learnt about other tribes from anecdotal social discussions.

If the adults around you happen to discuss social traits you might pick up a thing or two about the existence of other tribes. However what you pick-up might not be accurate of even true because it may be heavily tainted by the speaker's biases.

The first tribe I learnt about were the Tonga because my father was always talking about how powerful Tonga muti from Binga was. Later when I was hanging around the workshop of a relative and talk centred around sexual activity, I picked up that Shangani women had beads that could drive a man crazy and they also pulled certain anatomical parts to make them longer.

That should not be the way we let our children learn about Zimbabwe's ethnic mix. Right now my first child is in high school, I do not know if she is even aware that Zimbabwe has other people apart from the Shona, Ndebele and Europeans.

President's Mugabe's comments are unfortunate but, ironically, it may mark the first time the Kalanga people were mentioned in international news services. Even though, most western media services like BBC and CNN did not report the story. It would have been difficult for them to explain to their audience who this Kalanga tribe were. They were suddenly being mentioned in a country that has always been reported as having Shona and Ndebele tribes only.

President Mugabe's comments are unfortunate on more than one front. The second being that it also shows that he takes the colonial version of history as gospel truth.

For the record there is no tribe called Shona. No group of people ever called themselves Shona people prior to colonialism.

The bulk of the people called Shona today were called maKaranga. The reason for that is that they practiced the chiKaranga religion. If you call yourself Shona and dispute what I am saying, tell me at every funeral you have attended from Mutoko to Zaka-Jerera, when they announce rituals do they not say 'Tava kuita chiKaranga'?

The Tswana call our culture iKalanga, not iShona. The Venda call all Shona people maKaranga. That is who we are.

What about the Kalanga people. Who are they? They are maKaranga with heavy Ndebele influence. That influence happened simply because colonial governments forced anyone from the Matabeleland provinces, and parts of Midlands, to learn Ndebele at school irrespective of what language they spoke at home.

The Herald recently had an article explaining how the name Lomagundi came about from Nemakonde. European settlers first mispronounced place or people's names, then they Nguninised the names. Thus Mutare became Umtali, Panyaronga became Penhalonga, Uhera became Buhera and the Karanga within Matabeleland became the Kalanga while the rest were simply called Shona.

The name Karanga was popularised again after independence. However that was accompanied by the misconception that it applied only to people from parts of Masvingo province. Those people are mostly vaDuma and the dialect they speak is Hwesa. The name Karanga should actually be used in relation to all dialects now collectively called Shona.

Shona is a subset of chiKaranga not the other way round. ChiKaranga includes Kalanga, Nambya and iKalanga spoken in parts of Botswana.

Therefore truly, truly peaking, President Mugabe himself is a Kalanga.

Friday 15 May 2015

Zimbabwe Politicians and Intellectuals Have To Work Together

Leaders everywhere rely on think tanks to formulate policy. The unfortunate circumstances that gave birth to Zimbabwe led to a political establishment full of raw ex-guerillas many without high school education.

As a result the intelligentsia in Zimbabwe mostly chose to stand aloof and hold the political establishment in disdainful regard. Where they got involved or decided to pass comment it was mostly in the form of condescending critique and very often virulent negative criticism, not constructive engagement.

Many intellectuals, among them Jonathan Moyo, Kempton Makamure, Welshman Ncube, John Makumbe, Heneri Dzinotyiwei to mention a few made careers out of attacking the political establishment. They did not seek to offer advice.

On the other hand those in the political establishment felt they had made too big sacrifices for the country to be treated like mops by the intelligentsia. To put it in words claimed to have been spoken by Comrade Chinotimba, they had died for the country. The result was a huge gulf of mistrust between those holding the steering wheel and the intellectual engines. The engine was always angrily revving but the clutch was broken and steering wheel was locked in one position.

For years the think-tank gap was filled in by donors and NGOs. It was these groups who floated and financed development programmes. They gave the political establishment of raw combatants advice and direction and in the early years the arrangement was quite successful. Names like DANIDA, Christian Care, CIDA, DFID became household names in Zimbabwe. These organisations filled in the gap of think tanks, coming up with development projects.

Most, if not all, of these NGOs were from Western countries. When the political establishment fell out with Western politicians they were inevitably pressured, by their politicians back home, not to work with the Zimbabwe government.

The Zimbabwe government panicked. They stumbled from one panic stricken measure to another without any clear and coherent plan. Price controls were at first favoured. When these didn't work direct restrictions in the movement and trade of commodities were rushed in. When cash ran out it was simply printed. When this resulted in massive devaluation foreign currency was simply commandeered from private entities.

In the process massive damage to the country's financial, commercial and economic systems was wreaked. Local savings were obliterated by the massive devaluation caused by the printing of cash. Entities who owned foreign currency resorted to keeping it outside Zimbabwe, out of the clutches of a clearly mismanaging government.

The result was an economy in free fall. The Zimbabwe government blamed the West, but in doing so they did not understand where the real problem was. They focused on sanctions which were mostly targeted at individuals. However in my view, the real damage to Zimbabwe came from the withdrawal of 'think-tank' support which Zimbabwean politicians had grown to take for granted.

Zimbabweans politicians were unable to manage the resources which they had. In my view, those resources were more than sufficient to keep Zimbabwe afloat. Piqued by the withdrawal of Western support, the government came up with a Look East policy.

What that amounted to was simply directing nearly all of the Zimbabwe government's buying power towards China, at the expense of local industry. No meaningful 'think-tank' support has been forthcoming from the east. The Chinese have never been associated with development projects the same way Western agencies were. In fact in the minds of ordinary people, they are associated with reckless exploitation of resources, and harsh employment practices.

The bottom line is for Zimbabwe to develop, local intellectuals and politicians will have to respect each other and share ideas. Politicians will have to take the input of intellectuals seriously, even if it is in the form of criticism. Intellectuals will have to learn that persistent attack merely generates resistance with little chance of achieving the desired outcome.

Wednesday 13 May 2015

Zanu-PF on the decline, failing Zimbabwe

I know Zanu-PF leaders are not going to like this but they have got to be told the truth. They are failures and their greatest failure has been the failure to support local industry and the local job market which depends on that industry.

It is a matter of record that senior political leaders of all persuasions, and rich business people, are commercially disloyal to Zimbabwe. They consider it a sign of status to buy things outside Zimbabwe. They have their holidays outside Zimbabwe. They go and splash money all over the world except inside Zimbabwe.

They even consider status symbol to send their children to obscure backstreet universities, as long as they are outside Zimbabwe's borders. Yet much of SADC runs on professional services provided by top quality Zimbabwean trained professionals.

They associate Zimbabwe with backwardness and whenever they want to do something they perceive as sophisticated they rush out of the country to spend money. In the process they impoverish the country by taking money out of the country unnecessarily.

Not only do they take money out of the country, but they are also the biggest culprits in stripping Zimbabwe of revenue. Of all these farms, mines and businesses run and owned by ministers and the politically connected, how many are paying their taxes correctly? I would love to know.

They seem to be completely ignoring the free advice that I gave them in an open letter to cabinet and MPs. If they listened to just half that advice, Zimbabwe's economy would be much better than it is.

One of the major points of advice in an open letter to President Mugabe was that he should not include people trying to get rich as quickly as they can in his cabinet. Again that seems to have been ignored.

I also complained of mafia like tendency in government. Some in government are using the provision of services as an excuse to extort money from the public. That money is then skimmed out of public coffers by officials who award themselves unbelievable salaries and perks at the expense of service provision. Just look at the salarygate scandal to see what I mean.

There is only one way Zanu-PF can turn around its fast sinking record. Corruption and patronage must go. Corruption and patronage are placing a massive stress upon Zimbabwe's budget. The reason why Zimbabwe has run out of money is that over the years too much money has been wasted in giving people posts and perks, when they have no real functional role in the running of the country. On top of that, those people engage in corrupt activities, siphoning more money from state coffers.

I did a quick research on the size of Zimbabwe's executive relative to its budget, and compared it to some of the world's leading countries. My conclusion was that there is very little chance that Zimbabwe's economy can recover while current spending patterns continue.

I also made it clear that in Zimbabwe right now there is a huge and growing divide between the haves and the have nots. The haves are lavishing off public money which is supposed to provide services for the have nots. They are not engaged in any meaningful productive activities which would increase the national wealth pool.

I have never ever tired of stressing the Zimbabwe needs a small lean government not the current patronage bloated behemoth.

The irresponsible use of resources was highlighted by the then minister of finance, Tendai Biti. Despite that, he continued to preside over this irresponsible state of affairs. Even after the tenure of the massive government of national unity, resources continue to be wasted. Especially by never ending travels.

I have lamented that unless the mentality of political entitlement changes, even a constitution written by Mwari Baba, Sekuru Chaminuka, Jehovah, Jesus Christ, Allah, Prophet Muhammad, Buddha, the Brahman, Jah, and all the good supernaturals you can think of, will not make a difference.

I have not concealed my opinion is that one of Zimbabwe's biggest problems is dishonest leaders who manipulated and are manipulating the country's laws to rob people of their possessions. The raft of lawsuits against the RBZ's practice of just taking foreign currency and replacing it with worthless local currency bears me out on this.

I have also not hidden my strongly held belief that some of our worst economic woes have been caused by plain incompetence and ignorance. Particularly the incompetence of a man who failed to run the country's financial systems so dismally that he resorted to selling scorthcarts, ploughs, plough-chains, majoki and tractors just to try and prove that he was good at something.

He was not good at that too. Right now the government is grappling with the problem that he just took tractors and materials from suppliers without paying for them running up a massive debt.

The quality of Zanu-PF's leadership has been declining. From the days of freedom stalwarts like Josiah Tongogara, Hebert Chitepo, Edgar Tekere and others, the party finds itself sliding into the hands of people like Grace Mugabe. Apart from a foul mouth and a chance landing in the right bedroom, such people have no other credentials.

The only one left of the old crop of leaders is Robert Mugabe himself. It is difficult to predict how the party will fare once he too, inevitably departs. Personally I don't think the party will do well once Mugabe's generation is out if the picture.

With the sinking in the quality of Zanu-PF's leadership, so are the hopes of many Zimbabweans.