A Dying Progressive Global North, War and Consciousness.

By Takura Zhangazha*

In conversation with a comrade (yes I generally have many of those), we discussed what in our African context constitutes a ‘World War’.  We didn’t have an evident answer except to borrow from history . 

We knew about the First World War at the turn of the 20^th century which led to among many others, the Russian revolution in 1917.  We also knew it led to the rise of the nefarious Hitler and his Nazi republic that killed not only many but established a regrettably enduring culture of racism and assumptions of exceptionalism of colleagues in the global north.

We also learnt via Eurocentric history text books of the Second World War and its full import on how eventually the Union of Soviet of Socialist Republics (USSR) as led by Stalin, with the eventual assistance of the British, the Americans and in part the French defeated Hitler in 1945 Berlin.

We however did not know enough of the fact that in both world wars, Africans had been key in winning the wars on behalf of what we now know as the global west/north.  Our forefathers from all corners of the African continent and former African colonies had fought on behalf of colonial empires against two German regimes that intended to dominate the global political economy.  With the one under Hitler intending to be globally and a racist hegemony. 

As is now historically given, wars and battles were fought.  As Africans we won some in for example Ethiopia.  We lost many lives (African and African American) in the European hinterland where we are now no longer wanted.  Even though we have many recruits in their armies by both descent and now contemporary voluntary recruitment. 

We learnt the hard way in the second world war that, as an historical fact that, we are as human as ‘white people’ and also that ‘they also die in war’.  That is, if they get shot, they die too.

From thence we also learnt to launch our own liberation struggles as learnt from the USSR and the emergent philosophy of the Chinese and its metaphoric/ideological Maoist linking of the people as “fish to water”.    

Eventually we won our liberation struggles for African independence barring the Saharawi Republic by 1994, a case which remains outstanding with the African Union (AU). 

And in our naïve assumptions we thought the age of global war, cold or otherwise was over.  We thought we had become equal nations before the global United Nations (UN) except for the fact of the UN Security Council veto of the five member states of the same.  A matter that remains outstanding today.

As African, people,  states and governments, never mind our democratic credentials as measured within the context of  international allegiances based on the then global Cold War, we  punched above our global weight and formed not only the Organization of African Unity (OAU) but also further expanded it into regional anti-colonial organizations such as the Southern African Development Community (SADC) which thankfully we still have in the contemporary. 

But there is one thing that as Africans we have generally agreed on.  Given this historical background and across many of our regions, we know that we have experienced war.  We have experienced it in an immediate pre-colonial context (where we have some victories), a colonial context in which we lost some major wars such as the First Chimurenga in Zimbabwe and subsequently won the Second one in the late 1970s (even if the white settler regime negotiated and refused to accept complete defeat, we still won that war.)

The key point however of this blog is that we know war.  We have experienced it and we have said to ourselves, as Africans, that never again should we allow it to visit not only our shores but also our interiors. 

The only problem is that we are not the ones with a proclivity to war.  Given what is going on in Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Libya and  what failed but might be revived in Afghanistan or what might happen in Iran, we know who the real war mongers are.  Globally. 

It is the governments’ of the global north (North America, Western European and now Eastern European).  Be they conservative or liberal.

One may ask what is the basis for proclivity to war by people in power in the global north and east.  The easy answer is always access to strategic resources such as oil, gold and of late lithium. 

The aforementioned point is generally accepted across ideological divides.  Including progressive ones in the global south or the global north.

What remains a bit more perplexing is that ‘progressiveness’ in the global north is no longer a flag post as to what can happen in the global south.

Progressive leftists and liberals are losing ground in the global north.  They are becoming fewer and far between for reasons that they are probably best able to explain themselves.  With the cold reality that they are unable to win national or even local government elections as an example to comrades in the global south,

I wanted to write this short blog almost as an indictment of the progressive global north comrades.  But that would be unfair. 

I am of the firm view that whether we are in the global north or global south, progressive ideological thinking is dying.  Electorally but more sadly, organically.  But I remain optimistic.

Indeed I will argue with many colleagues in European and North American capitals about why they voted for Trump, Steimer or a conservative government that hates immigrants of colour in particular .  They generally tend to say ‘we tried’.  The only catch is that we are also trying over here.  Perhaps in less free circumstances.  But we are trying.

*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity (takura-zhangazha.blogspot.com)

 

 

Understanding Wicknell and His Money as Ambiguous Influence in Zimbabwe

By Takura Zhangazha*

Controversial Zimbabwean businessman Wicknell Chivayo has been quite literally dishing out both luxury and basic utility cars to celebrities and individuals at an alarming rate.  Both unilaterally or upon social media requests/ pleas from long known celebrities.   

He has also been helping, at least according to his social media accounts and some media reports, well known national figures in their times of medical, accommodation or welfare needs. 

This is a very interesting political and social development in our country.  Both by way of its meaning and also how it is popularly perceived by many urban and rural Zimbabweans.  Some of whom have actually joined social media to make their claims to whatever fortune they think he has in order to help with both deep or abstract social problems them may be facing. 

I will not mention names (tisataure mazita) but indeed a good number of local celebrities in the sporting, music and film entertainment circles have been recipients of his astounding 'generosity'. 

Officially I know of one legendary one who has stubbornly refused at least two offers while asking questions as to where the money is coming from.  

An issue that for now, is probably falling on the deaf ears of our now very national and populist ‘mbinga syndrome’.  

Almost as though we are all hymning in the back of our minds that again popular song from Marshall Munhumumwe and the Four Brothers, “Ane Mari Ndiye Mukuru’ (literal translation- he who has the money is the eldest). 

For those that are in mainstream media, civil society, opposition politics and social media influencers against corruption or shady relationships between the state and individuals, this should have been  relatively easy anti-corruption activity material.

Except that it has not been off the mark as anticipated. Neither will it be in the short term. 

When you have popular both historically and in the present sports, culture and journalistic celebrities gratefully receiving gifts in cash or ‘car’ kind from Chivayo, there is limited ground to gain counter narrative popular traction against it.  Mainly because it is a difficult task to challenge our new found Zimbabwean ‘Mbinga Syndrome’.

As argued above, a greater majority of Zimbabweans are not really seeking an understanding of the importance of societal equitability in the country as an ideal.  Let alone understand the massive national socio-economic inequalities that we are faced with in the contemporary and the foreseeable future.

We generally tend to have a perception that whoever has made their money, however they have made it, let them use it how they wish. Except where it relates to political partisanship and factions. 

Moreso if they are going to be somehow philanthropic by starting for example a football club that wins promotion to the national Premier league, or construct multiple boreholes or in the much more publicized Chivayo cases, help artists, musicians and others in their vehicular or other needs. While supporting one faction of either Zanu Pf or the CCC and whatever remains of it.  Things that the Mbingas themselves do not hide either side of the political divide. 

In our own non-partisan political instance we do not ask about the source of these individual’s incomes as much as we would even want to.  Either for fear of being excluded or for fear of being sued and in the last instance for a final lack of actual evidence of wealth related to corruption after acquittals of these individuals at the highest Zimbabwean court levels. And as usual criminal defamation charges that still subtly hang over us today.  

But our desire to receive gifts and generosity for one real or perceived problem is not limited to our celebrities only.  And besides given our dire economic circumstances, particularly for young and gendered Zimbabweans, there is no time to ask a religious pastor throwing around United States dollars in a street in Chitungwiza or Kwekwe where he got the money from.  

The pertinent and quite violent issue is to grab as much as you can while it is being thrown out of a moving vehicle while shouting ‘Mbinga Mbinga!’

So what we have now obtaining is a very complicated culture around wealth, access to it, and celebrity induced misunderstanding of how to get rich quick that can be recognized in one social media message by a ‘Mbinga’ to your favourite musician, footballer or any other person who either has national gravitas. Or has serious personal problems that social media users ask for help for.

Our political and economic realities however indicate that this is highly unsustainable.  It is an almost a live for the moment sort of situation.  Yes you can get a vehicle from the “Mbinga’.  Questions arise as to you did you even want it?  Or if you are allowed to sell it?  Or even get support to maintain it?

And before comrades accuse me of jealousy, vehicles are essentially just that. Especially if they are donations.  As are mansions that even if you build them, if you cannot maintain them, they became derelict former castles.

What I have however come to realize with most of us as Zimbabweans is that we tend to live in the moment.  Or in the materially immediate.  At highly individualized levels in which the only common thread is again our newfound high levels of individualism. 

And its easy for those that are linked to state resources, especially after the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP) such as urban land barons, miners, "tenderpreneurs"and farmers can create competitive wealth in order to become the new ‘untouchables’.  As long as they have proximity to contemporary state power. 

So popularly, in both a political and economic sense, barring a major political change in Zimbabwe, the likes of Wicknell Chivayo will be revered as enablers of some sort of individual material progress for celebrities and other national figures.

But if you ask me whether we should fear them for their money?  My answer is an easy no.  We should fear them for their values and their cross generational individualistic impact.  As we are witnessing it in the ghettos and the peri-urban rural areas for now. And we should find ways and means to counter this even if at the moment it seems bleak. 

What I also do know is that in the culture and sports industry, if the state was more organic, our legends would not be as materially vulnerable as they are today.

*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity (takura-zhangazha.blogspot.com) takurazhangazha.com

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Mothers as Flawed Revolutionaries

 

By Takura Zhangazha*

Mothers are correctly sacrosanct in Zimbabwean culture.  More-so given the  popular adage ‘kusina Mai hakuendwe, kune rima’ (where there is no mother, you do not go there, there is darkness) is deeply ingrained in most of our national consciousness. Especially as popularized by Simon Chimbetu  and the Orchestra Dendera Kings in the famous hit single “Kusina Mai”.      

Hence we revere motherhood.  No matter its circumstances.  Be it single, married, step or widowed motherhood. 

And whether you are female or male, you tend to hold your mother in absolute awe.  Both by way of your own personal history but also your present circumstances and your future (marriage, illness, wealth and even notions of the afterlife)

But there is a key consideration that we sometimes overlook.  This is the fact that mothers are at the heart of our national consciousness in Zimbabwe.

Be it in the past, the present and the future. 

If its in relation to the past we need not look beyond the first and second Chimurenga’s for an understanding of what ‘mothers of the revolution’ meant politically and socially.  With even the emblematic Nehanda Nyakasikana proving to be a major motivation for a subsequent struggle against the colonial Rhodesian state.  It was not just her femininity but also the assumed role of being a motherly spirit medium that embedded her to our national political consciousness. 

And this stemmed largely from a point where culturally we all know that the last stop for protection for a child is the mother.  And the first step of learning to walk, sleep or go to the toilet is in normal societal circumstances, the mother of the child. 

This applies to both the past and the present.  And will most likely apply to a nearer Zimbabwean future. 

In the present however, the meaning of motherhood has been shifting significantly.  Its no longer as cultural as it was in the past.  Its increasingly about both domestic work and also formal work where roles of motherhood and making money continually clash in our capitalist society. And where gender related vulnerabilities exploit motherhood to an extent that leads many to a path of assumptions that materialism is the only thing that makes the world go round.  Despite religious affiliations and loyalties.

This has been both empowering and disempowering.  The cultural norms that are traditional and the expected roles of mothers still obtain. Ones in which giving birth,  care, love, affection and being the last bastion of material and emotional refuge of children remain valued and important both to men and women in our society.  But mothers are also working women and therefore they have newer demands to who they are and what they are expected to deliver.

In other words they definitively have a double work load.  The traditional function of motherhood and the material importance of the same in modern times.  They are no longer expected to wait for their men/husbands to bring the money but also to earn it. 

This however comes with a consciousness dilemma.  Motherhood, from a distant analysis perspective is increasingly bout the fact of the material and the children.  It is less about what we are culturally attuned to about either agricultural activities and waiting for the father to send anticipated income. 

At the same time it is increasingly clear that these new nodes and regrettably religiously motivated understandings of what it means to be a mother are now more complex due to economic constraints.

This however does not change the indelible fact of our mothers as revolutionaries.  AS argued above they have taught us out most basic consciousness.  And will continue to do so.  They are both the harbingers of our everyday culture and also the ones that instill seeds of societal ambition in us. 

The key questions that emerge are however their ideological outlook of Zimbabwean society.  Or in some cases their lack of it. 

In most cases this is largely a materialist mimicry of mothers in the global north.  Without much argumentation.  Whether we look at it religiously or in the material sense. 

I know that this viewpoint may ruffle a few feathers but it is important to point out that our initial consciousness comes from our mothers.  Who we quite literally worship but in some cases forget that they are also human beings like the rest of us.

So we need to continually respect our mothers.  They are revolutionary because of what they made a majority of us becomes.  They also have their flaws as highlighted above but as Nkrumah once wrote, “Educate a Woman, You liberate a Nation”.   And this is for the future.   

*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity (takurazhangazha.com  takura-zhangazhaa.blogspot.com)