By Takura Zhangazha*
This is a slightly complicated article. So it is easier to
get some of my own definitions out of the way for your ease of understanding. I
have also put some sub-titles for your ease of reading.
* “Liberation Capital”- refers to the Private Capital acquired
after the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP) of 2000 and ongoing Urban, agricultural,
mining, tourism and general resettlement land) as controlled by the ruling Zanu
Pf Party
* “Succession Battles”
- refers to the ruling party’s political contestations on who can/should/will
succeed current president Mnangagwa
* “Land Baron”- refers to those that benefitted from the
economic ambiguity of the FTLRP cited above, including those that acquiesced to
it
Ever since the ouster of one of Zimbabwe’s luminary
liberation struggle leaders Robert Mugabe from executive presidential political
power in 2017, there have been many evident conversations around who, again
within the same party, should succeed his successor.
The current president Emerson Mnangagwa was post 2017 seen as the most able to bridge a gap between former liberation struggle fighters and nationalists as determined by the historicity of the liberation struggle against colonialism.
He was deemed not only the
most senior after previous nationalists but also one of the few who could command
a healthier respect from a military that was composed of former guerrilla
fighters who had ascended to positions of army colonels, lieutenants and
commanders. These would be the likes of current vice presidents Chiwenga and
Mohadi and others who are currently serving at the highest level in the security
services of Zimbabwe.
The unwritten rule during Mugabe’s tenure was that there was
an eventual succession plan after what was anticipated to be his voluntary and
in part benevolent departure from power.
This was as explained by war veteran cdes such as Wilfred Mhanda (cde Dzino)
and cde Freedom Nyamubaya who outlined the anticipated hierarchy of succession in the then liberation
struggle but which also never became a reality.
In their outline, they had been advised, even after national independence, that those that were the original surviving nationalists such as Mugabe, Nkomo, Nyagumbo and other who were at the forefront of negotiating the Lancaster House agreement were to be supported as the ones to take the country forward immediately after independence. They would eventually give way to those that were the guerilla commanders who were more radical such as Commander Tongogara, Lookout Masuku and other members of the then separate high commands of either ZANLA or ZIPRA to be at the apex of political executive authority in the country. These were considered half nationalist-half military.
And this unwritten succession plan would go on sequentially to those who were full guerillas such as Chiwenga and others that I cannot mention but who claim they bore the brunt of the war at the various fronts.
Then it would follow that those in the then training camps, through to those that
were war collaborators and be completed by those that were part of post independence
youth brigades.
Before we as Zimbabweans could easily say we are done with
our liberation struggle history and its organic kneading of our politics.
Mugabe’s Mis-anticipated Long Duree Rule and the Rise of
Morgan Tsvangirai (MDC)
This was obviously disrupted not only by Mugabe’s long duree
holding on of power and delaying of succession but also the emergence of a labour
backed opposition movement in the formation of the Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) at the height of not only a national but global economic crisis
between 1997 and 2000 caused by neoliberal economics (World Bank/IMF) and what
we now refer to as climate change.
This was as serious a challenge to Zanu Pf’s hegemony as ever
since 1980 and that of ZAPU as led by Joshua Nkomo.
The FTLRP of 2000
What happened thereafter politically is common knowledge
around the role that war veterans of our liberation struggle with the support
of a united Zanu Pf decided to do with the programme that we all now refer to historically
as the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP)- and with thanks to Professor
Sam Moyo for helping coin this term.
The multiple elections that occurred after the 2000 constitutional
referendum (2002, 2005, 2008, 2013, 2018 and 2023) were indicative of a shift in our national consciousness. It was clear to many urban based Zimbabweans
that politically Zanu Pf was no longer invincible. More so by the time we had the SADC mediated inclusive
government of 2009-2013.
The FTLRP as Part of the National Political Economy
But by then the FTLRP had become embedded in our national
political economy. White farmers had been
quite literally in radical nationalist fashion been kicked off the land they
either inherited, had purchased for many years by the ruling party. And even within the ambit of the inclusive government
were never going to recover that land with any sense of immediacy.
This led to the creation on either side of the political
divide of what we now refer to as ‘land barons’ (LBs)
Now these LBs did not just look at land in an historical
sense of restitution. They looked at land as primarily private capital. Be it urban land, agricultural land and also
mining land. And they knew that when
Mugabe at his many rallies announced the FTLRP as irreversible, all they had to
do was play the game right in relation to newer statutory laws, including black
indigenization policies about their claim to ‘revolutionary ownership’ of the ‘new
land’.
This also included opposition political party funders, functionaries/leaders
and members particularly in the urban areas who had the protection of various ministers
of local government so long they towed the political-economic line.
A New Nationalist State- Embedded Capitalism
This national political economy has birthed what we can now
refer to as a new nationalist elitist state-embedded capitalism (NNSEC). One in which the state as the harbinger of
the FTLRP can easily get into various forms of private capital to control the
national political economy. Be it in mining, urban land development, agriculture,
rural development (privatization) and religious allocations of fixed capital for
political survival of the ruling party.
This includes the financialisation of state capital, primarily
land, for climate carbon financiers and claims to be part of a global neo-liberal
(pro-private capital) village.
So Where Do Current Zanu Pf Succession Battles Fit into All of This?
It would appear that the ideological economic framework for the country has been pre-set by Zanu Pf after the 2017 ouster of Mugabe. The removal of indigenization laws and the oxymoronic nationalization and privatization of land as capital is no longer in dispute. The question that emerges is one of who controls the levers of political power and economic largesse stemming therefrom. Even in trickle down format. Or downstream industries.
Either by courting the West or the East and
ensuring a new elite economic class for control beyond loss of power. Both via direct political control and
secondly via controlling the narrative on what can popularly be deemed nationally benevolent national progress.
As has been publicly reported by credible mainstream media,
all is not well in the Zanu PF presidential camp. Be it rumour or reality, we do know based on
what happened in 2017 that there is no smoke without fire in Zanu Pf about
issues of who is ultimately in control.
At least until their next congress in 2027.
But as ordinary Zimbabweans we are allowed to comment on
what we see, hear or even perceive.
Conclusion
And in this, we are seeing a battle for what I have defined
above as battles for what can be considered a uniquely Zimbabwean ‘liberation capital’ after the Fast Track Land Reform Programme
(FTLRP) being key in Zanu Pf’s succession battles as they play out on their and
opposition social media platforms. And in their physical realities (rallies,
conferences, and pending Congresses).
It creates new nodes of competitive individual and almost
cartel/mafia like wealth that we are now suffering for. And where sometimes we are purchasable for it
(tisataure mazita). Across economic,
political, social and religious sectors. But more significantly among more individualistic
and materially oriented younger Zimbabweans who could not care less about the ideological
nuances of the First or Second Chimurenga.
And where we lose them, the values and the younger generations simultaneously we may never recover.
*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity
