‘Eat Quickly, We May Get Arrested’ Remembering ZCTU’s Lovemore Matombo.

By Takura Zhangazha*

Cde Lovemore Matombo, the former president of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) quietly passed on this week.  An organic intellectual and left leaning trade unionist for many years, he had an unassuming aura about his person that never betrayed the immense role he had played in keeping trade unionism afloat after the formation of the then worker’s party Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). 

And also as a successor ZCTU president to the inimitable and regrettably also late, Gibson Sibanda.  Together with then secretary general, Wellington Chibebe, Matombo, ensured that the ZCTU would have a smooth leadership transition after the resignation of its then charismatic secretary general, again also late,  Morgan Tsvangirai. 

Matombo was to ably steer the ZCTU through the difficult years of being accused of being an affiliate of the opposition MDC, the hyperinflation years of 2008-2010, the informalisation of the economy and the general crackdown on human rights by the Mugabe government. This also included phases in which he, together with his colleagues in the trade union movement would be arrested and tortured for irgansiing either national stay-aways’ or demonstrations against either unfair labour practices, the high cost of living or the dire state of human rights in the country.   

Matombo also sought to maintain the ZCTU’s critical historical role in challenging the hegemony of the ruling Zanu Pf party.  I specifically mention ‘hegemony’ because ideologically Matombo was as clea as daylight on his social democratic credentials.  He did not challenge Zanu PF merely because it was in power and ruling badly.  He challenged Zanu Pf primarily on the basis of how he directly disagreed with it’s ideological outlook.  One which was largely a radical neoliberal nationalism that relied more on the past than it sought solutions for the future.

In conversation with him he would also aver that in part the opposition MDC, as initially formed by the congress of trade unions, was also beginning to lose its ideological social democratic radar to neoliberalism.  In mentioning this he would however point out the difficulties he was facing in the labour movement trying to navigate various blind loyalties to either political parties or embassies by some of his colleagues and affiliate unions. And how in part he could not however risk any further division of the union in the difficult operating environment that was already increasingly hostile to unionism. 

A unique characteristic that Matombo demonstrated was his evident willingness to interact with civil society.  The ZCTU was still by far the largest organization outside of the state and churches, but he never had a high browed approach to meet with CSOs’.  I always fondly remember his hearty welcomes at the annual May Day/Workers Day rallies.  

He also never hesitated to participate in broader multi-stakeholder engagements such as that which would bring about the Zimbabwe People’s Charter.  Or to directly engage with the National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) and challenge the Zanu-PF- MDC constitutional reform process of 2010-2013 on the basis of democratic principle.   

The latter was also to make him lose some allies in civil society, affiliate unions and the international community.  But he stuck to his principles.  I do not recall him expressing regret on the decisions he made about his ideological persuasions or strategic considerations on either constitutionalism or the national political economy. 

This was demonstrable via one particular example concerning the Zimbabwe National Students Union (ZINASU).  Matombo was a keen supporter of student and youth activism.  He however had a keen intent that it not be directly similar to the way it was done in Zanu Pf, that is be based on materialism and raw populism.  At a time when the MDC-T was fighting for control of ZINASU, Matombo chose to support an organic student leadership that was not influenced ether by populism, donors or mercenary politicians.  Together with the NCA, the ZCTU supported a progressive ZINASU and refused to succumb to undue pressure on the matter.   

On matters beyond unionism Matombo would always demonstrate organic and progressive knowledge. And always in its left leaning assessment of global events and how a better world is possible. 

And he also had an amazing sense of caustic humour.  At one time we had travelled to Chinhoyi for a Zinasu national congress in 2010 as solidarity delegates.  We were slightly late but had not had breakfast and so we headed to the dining hall.  Once there I noticed how quickly he was handling his breakfast.  He noticed my startled expression and looked up at me and said, “Cde Zhangazha, eat quickly.  We might get arrested. And we don’t want that on empty stomachs!”

Or the way he would specially mention the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) for its propaganda against the ZCTU by mockingly referring to it as ‘Zete Biii Ciii!’

Cde Matombo is a man that will be sorely missed by Zimbabwe’s left and its progressive civil society.  Even more significantly his brand of labour unionism that can only be admired and urgently learnt from. 

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

Zim's 2nd Constitutional Amendment: An Exercise in Symbolism and Power.

By Takura Zhangazha*

The Constitution of Zimbabwe is due to be amended this year.  The changes to be made according to the gazette constitutional amendment bill No 2 of 2019 include repealing clauses that allow for presidential running mates, the extension for two more parliaments of the women’s quota system and the new addition of ten parliamentary seats for the youth quota.  The latter point also interestingly being done with names of candidates that are interchanged by way of gender.  

Other proposed constitutional amendments include the extension of the tenure of office of judges who have reached retirement age and the constitutional establishment of the office of a public protector and deputy. Further proposed constitutional amendments relate to provincial and metropolitan councils wherein members of the same are to be elected by proportional representation.  Also add to these the proposed changes the greater role the president would be expected to play with respect to the disciplinary procedures of the office of the prosecutor general.

These proposed constitutional amendments are a handful.  And somewhat varied in their import.  Arguments put out by either civil society organisations or opposition parties relate to at least three issues.  The first being that the amendments are too soon after the constitution was passed and therefore fly against the spirit and letter of democratic constitutionalism.  A point that is relatively moot if anything else. 

The second being that the proposed amendments give the president considerably more power via changing the running mate clause and allow him/her to appoint deputies as well as with the greater role the president plays in the dismissal or retention of the prosecutor general or the appointment of judges.  A fair point in so far as it relates to the dynamics that were present during the COPAC led constitutional reform exercise.  As determined by the larger than life political figure that was Robert Mugabe.

Thirdly, the argument is why change a constitution that has not even been fully aligned with the existent subservient laws?  For them the issue to is first fulfill the alignment requirements before seeking to change it.  The only problem with this is that Mnangagwa’s government has no legal obligation to do that. It can always argue that it is all ‘work in progress’.

The ruling Zanu Pf party has also given some reasons why it wants to change the constitution.  On the issue of presidential running mates it has argued that it does not require two centers of power.  On devolution it is arguing that it is fulfilling its electoral campaign promises.  Same with the extension of the women’s quota and the introduction of the youth quota in Parliament.

Beyond these arguments against  or for amending the constitution as proposed by Constitutional Amendment Bill No 2 of 2019, there are some stark political realities that may be lost in translation.  The first and what should be the most obvious one is that the government wants to change the constitution because it can.  The ruling Zanu Pf party has a two thirds majority in both houses of Parliament (Section 328 (5) and can therefore constitutionally do so.  Except for Chapter 4 (Bill of Rights) and Chapter 16 (Agricultural Land) where it will require a constitutional referendum.  So on the face of it, it is within Zanu Pf’s legal right to do so. Unless someone takes them to the Constitutional court on some technicality or the other.

The next hidden element to these proposed amendments is a desultory political public.  Amending the constitution is not high on the Zimbabwean public’s priority or concern list.  Instead it’s the  political economy (with an emphasis on economy and economic survival) that is top of the list.  This does not mean there will be no entertainment of the subject in general or in its parliamentary specificity and televised antics when it is read for the first and second times.  

The general lack of populism around the matter indicates a continued public ignorance of the provisions of the constitution but more significantly a continued lack of desire at public ownership of the same.  In other words, the constitution of Zimbabwe is not an organic but entirely functional one. Especially for the political elite that wrote it and got their supporters to vote for it. 

A final hidden element to the constitutional amendments as proposed is the fact of their symbolism in the exercise of political power.  First of all the recognizable source of the changes is the ruling party which in doing so is asserting not only its authority for public recognition but also for its own party structures.  That is giving meaning via this sort of action to its own exercise of power.  In the second instance is the benevolent attitude toward women and the youth via extending, for the former, the quota system and for the latter, introducing it.  Add to this, the new Chinese facilitated massive new Parliament building made in the image of Great Zimbabwe and you have a sum total of the exercise of power and symbolism.  Even if the majority of us don’t see it.

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

. 

Anticipating Zimbabwe’s 2020: Four Reasonable Considerations.

By Takura Zhangazha*

Happy new year, 2020 Comrades. Hope everything that you have individually or collectively planned works out as approximately close to what you intend in the next 12 months. This blog, being my first of the year will be comparatively shorter than most that I put up.   

Because I am not a prophet, neither do I harbor ambitions to be one (unless I get really broke and use my limited intellect to cram the Bible and have a go at the few dollars of the most gullible and vulnerable in our society), this write up is about what to reasonably expect in Zimbabwe’s political economy in 2020.  Note that I used the turn of phrase ‘reasonably’.  Not ‘emotionally’ nor ‘religiously’. 

And because we are generally supposed to plan ahead, we must do so in realistic context.  So here are 4 things you/we must anticipate to occur in Zimbabwe’s year 2020. 

Firstly, on the political front, the ruling Zanu Pf party will try to fully undertake policies that point to ‘performance legitimacy’.  This being to appear to be a government and party that listens to the most vulnerable in our society while at the same time having a holistic neo-liberal/free market economic framework.  It will also up the ante with its devolution drive not necessarily for democratic purposes but in order to shift political centers of activity from Harare and Bulawayo.   

Mnangagwa’s team however will be beholden to the international community and will be hoping to have the newly elected British Prime Minster Boris Johnson on their side in their re-engagement foreign policy strategy.  Domestically there will be limited political reforms, some of which are already in motion such as amendments to the constitution (running mates, devolution and extension of gender quotas among others). Issues such as political dialogue will remain largely domesticated with Mnangagwa being fully in charge of the process. All based largely on the political fact that he has an unassailable two thirds majority in Parliament. 

The largest official opposition, MDC Alliance, will remain actively popular in urban areas while at the same time struggling to gain new ground in the rural.  The latter area being not only unfairly closed out to them but also from them not having a sustained rural mobilization strategy.  The same party may also face challenges in countering the ‘performance legitimacy’ strategy of Zanu Pf in the local governments it controls.  Not only for lack of knowledge but also for lack of resources that will largely come from central government.  

Like Zanu Pf, the MDC Alliance will seek to court the eye of the international community.  With the difference being an intention to still call out the question of legitimacy while Zanu will focus on courting global capital, be it from the West or the East.

There will be no new major political parties that will be formed beyond the largest official two. Despite the Zanu Pf faction’s Generation 40’s  (G40) intentions.  But like in Uganda, there will be new celebrity politicians drawn from the entertainment industry who will make political ripples and eventually be co-opted into the major formations. 

 Secondly, with regard to the national economy, the most significant issue is that we have a drought on our hands.  And that will affect everything else mainly because agriculture remains the backbone of the economy, particularly peasant agriculture.  So the state will be forced to be benevolent.  It will have to subsidize those things that tis neo-liberal approach would not countenance.  This would be for services such as drought relief, rural health services and public transport.  In this Mnangagwa will have no choice if he wants to retain a modicum of popularity, despite what his finance guru Mthuli Ncube says/wants.  Foreign direct investment will largely remain bilateral i.e. Chinese support for infrastructure, Russian investment in mining or United Arab Emirates support in pharmaceuticals.  

Private global capital will remain hesitant despite changes to the indigenisation laws. The local currency will still be rammed down the throats of reluctant Zimbabweans with the United States Dollar still being the arbiter of value (Chicken Inn anyone?)  We will however remain a consumerist society focusing largely on individualist desires as opposed to collective well being.  Hence Private Public Partnerships (PPPs) will appear to initially work out, but eventually break down due to high costs of public services and also our running out of money. 

Thirdly on the human rights and social welfare front, central government will continue being benevolent in observing the rule of law, respecting human rights and ensuring overall good governance.  This as was the case in 2019 only because of fear of the gaze of the western international community (which probably won’t relent on the matter.) Bu the opposition will still put the state to the test, not always on what would be clear issues but also to gain the attention of the international gaze, by way of the media. 

Socially, urban poverty will increase based on a increasing rural-urban migration and the continuing expansion of urban settlements.  Rural poverty will be exacerbated by the evident drought and also again, an ageing population that is losing its young ones to the cities and the Diaspora. 

The influence of religion will remain exceedingly high, but not perhaps for as political reasons as in 2019.  Churches as major owners of fixed capital will seek to maximize the electoral vulnerabilities of political leaders for institutional and in some cases individual gain. 

Fourthly and finally, the role of social media in the national consciousness will be enhanced.  Even if there are electricity shortages and in the worst case, government internet shut downs.  It is a role that will however remain ephemeral, based on events as they occur.  Such as if the president makes a bad joke or a celebrity leaks some untoward video of themselves.  But all the same the mobile telephone and its connectivity to social media (not necessarily the internet) is now the new medium of consciousness.  It may not be the immediate motivator of direct political action but it will definitely define the meaning of the same.  It will most certainly modify our political, economic and social behavior especially in urban areas.

Once again here’s to an organic 2020 and thinking beyond. For posterity.

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

Uchena Report on Land: Losing State Capital for Political Expediency, Hedonism

By Takura Zhangazha*

The Commission of Inquiry into the Matter of the Sale of State Land in and Around Urban Areas Since 2005 headed by Justice Uchena recently submitted its full report and recommendations to President Mnangagwa. What was made publicly available was the executive summary of the report. 

In it, there were astounding but very expected findings. Some of them that were/are also being brazenly lived out.  They include the unlawful change of land use of agricultural farms adjacent to major cities, the lack of infrastructure for subsequent physical settlements on the same land, the prejudicing of the state of at least US$ 3 billion or the lack of interactive regulatory responsibility by at least two ministries and local government authorities.  Just to mention a few. 

The executive summary is scant on names of actual perpetrators but hints at land barons, housing cooperatives and political party operatives. 

What is most clear however is that fifteen years after the fast track land reform programme (FTLRP) began (in 2000) it has dramatically changed in its preferred import.  Whereas initially intended as a massive nationalization or re-possession of agricultural land for, again agricultural livelihood use by a black majority, it has morphed into a largely urban focused land (capital) utilisation reform exercise.  Across cities, peri-urban areas and even what has always been designated as growth points. 

It is reflective of not only of the urban aspirations of a lot of Zimbabweans. That is to want land for urban use. But also and tragically so, haphazard profiteering from the FTLRP by those that have been in charge of the country and local government since the latter's inception. 

The forgoing point is perhaps the most significant.  The Uchena commission report boldly states that the state was directly prejudiced of at least "USD 2 977 072 819 [two billion nine hundred and seventy seven million eight hundred and 19 thousand united states dollars]"  as it relates to 'intrinsic value.' 

This is no small change but may still not be reflective of the actual amountlost to the state.  

The key issue is that state capital was directly turned, without full legal and financial accountability, either in terms of following legal procedures or paying relevant taxes, into private capital. 

The FTLRP, it would appear, moved from being ‘revolutionary’ as regularly pronounced by proponents of a ‘third Chimurenga’.  Instead it became a smash and grab political feast on state capital.  As led by not only land barons, the politically powerful and housing cooperatives.  All within the other context of the fact that this originally state owned capital is still disputed in relation to ownership and control by the former white commercial farmers and global capital. 

So it’s a catch 22 situation.  The Uchena Commission exposes what is a Zimbabwean version of ‘enclosure’ of what the 3^rd Chimurenga had nationalized. To its re-privatisation for adjacent to urban areas rural agricultural land for direct individual private profit. 

This then leads us to the reality that by the time Uchena submits his report to the presidency, there are thousands of families that are now living and eking out some sort of livelihoods on the same land.  The heads of these families through various agents and means settled there because they were legally able to.  Or in the most political of the cases, they found opportunity to do so.  And as alluded to earlier, this is a direct result of aspirations to the urban or being irban by Zimbabweans.

The FTLRP may have been an enabler of a resurgence of a massive rural-urban migration based not only of the fact that the rural political economy had been immediately negatively affected.  But also the fact that opportunities to live closer and permanently to the ‘bright lights’ were availed by political parties, land barons and housing cooperatives.  Even those in the Diaspora took advantage for the same and have even acquired housing 'cooperatives' from as far away as Canada even though the likelihood of their permanent return for the same is next to none. 

Uchena however makes recommendations that ask central government to regularize existent residential use of acquired land, pursue criminal and civil charges against land barons, housing cooperatives and political actors who did not regularize their acquired land or duped desperate home seekers.  Uchena also recommends greater efficiency between relevant ministries and the expansion of water facilities in all urban areas as well as a cessation on new residential stand allocation across the country.

While it remains the prerogative of central government to decide what to do with these recommendations, we can only say that we know it has been complicit in creating the problems outlined as having occurred since 2015.  We also know that the Uchena reports points to the political expediency of the FTLRP.  Political actors created new urban spaces to gain electoral leverage and in tandem distribute patronage that also directly economically profiteered from.  Like having your cake and eating it too. 

What is however also subtly hinted at in the Uchena report is the inevitability of urbanization.  All via a vehicle they refer to as a proposed special purpose vehicle to be run by the Office of the President and Cabinet. 

The major risk of this is to fall into a narrative of the inevitability of urbanization in Zimbabwe or Africa.  My considered personal view is that we need to resist this false narrative.  The urban may have bright lights but it may not be as humanely progressive as is touted.  We may need to look at how we can improve the rural, to try and modernize it and make it more self-sufficient beyond subsistence agriculture.

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

No Longer in Envy of the Global North

By Takura Zhangazha*

Growing up, we were always taught to admire the global north.  In fact to aspire to it.  There was even a comedy on Zimbabwean television that we loved to watch.  Its’s theme song had lyrics that said something like ‘I wanna be an American’.  In school European history was always made to be slightly more exciting. I am pretty sure a lot of us in Zimbabwe, if we studied history in high school know of the Sarajevo incident that precipitated the First World War.  We were never taught that Africans also fought in the war but we knew the name Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria.  

Add to this, the expansion of satellite television and African American rap music or rhythm and blues, we would be all set for desiring the global north as the definitive version of life’s success.  Never mind the fact for example that Tupac Shakur was railing against the establishment in his own country of birth. 

By the time we got to university our aspiration was (probably still is) to know the most profound thinkers of the European enlightenment era (John Locke, anyone?)  or the latest developments around Einstein’s theory of relativity. 

Coming full circle to adulthood or assumptions of self-sufficiency, we would still be green with envy about the lives of those that live in New York, London, Paris or Edinburgh. We even aspired to eat fish and chips as a signal of personal arrival at success.  And also why inevitably your Chicken Inn easily persuaded us to ‘luv dat chicken’. 

But the issue that most concerns me is how we fell in love with the politics of the global north.  I, to my great regret, once had a Time Magazine cover of Tony Blair stuck up on my wall at university.  Right there alongside bigger posters of Nelson Mandela and Steve Biko.  

Our naïve assumption was that politics would always be better in the global north.  In fact we considered it more progressive and envied it.  We would think the world of Bill Clinton, Jacques Chirac and the partisan purveyors of the political brands such as CNN, Time magazine and the like. 

Even when the invasion of Iraq occurred few of us thought to call it out for what it was, a war fought under false pretense with devastating consequences.  I remember a friend who watched the invasion of Baghdad with the equivalent glee of seeing a Rambo movie.  Always expecting the victory of the west over the east. 

By the time we get Obama as the likeable image of politics in the global north, we were in over our heads.  We had already formed opposition political parties made in the image of the politics of the global north, all with the intention of anticipating ‘acceptability’ and ‘recognition’. Not that we were without cause, but it was always easier to have it affirmed by those that we envied. 

Correctly we had also accepted the universality of human rights and the freedom of movement of all human peoples. 

A lot of things have happened since then.  The liberalism of the global north began to wane.  Particularly after the global financial crisis of 2008 (incidentally in Zimbabwe we still don’t think that directly affected our economy.) The emergence of nationalism's and to the east of state capitalism, left us increasingly high and dry where it came to our initial assumptions of global solidarity or even belonging.  The people of the global north demonstrated our worst fears by electing leaders that lean to the right and reflect a newly strident (and possibly racist) nationalism.  

With the election of Trump and more recently Boris Johnson in the UK, we now know that contrary to our feel good assumptions, the majority of people in those countries and probably in the majority of European states, still want to remain exceptional.  They still want to be different from our preferred assumptions of ‘equality’.  And these are not the people that we were all along seeing on CNN or the BBC.  These are the very real people of the global north.  They evidently do not like immigrants, they also do not like being similar to everyone else.  And this is a hard truth to swallow for us in the global south who had been taught to hold those societies in awe. 

We had all along preferred the elitist version of societies in the global north, where it would have been unfathomable for a man who referred to Muslim women as ‘letter boxes’ to become a prime minister.  In this, we were wrong but have not been wronged.  We have just misjudged those societies and misunderstood what is meant by a global universality of human values.  There is them and then there is the rest of us. 

I will end with an anecdote.  I have a Zimbabwean friend based in the Diaspora.  The UK to be exact.  I asked him to vote Labour in that country’s recent election.  He was startled.  He retorted that he would not vote for a party whose leader looked like a homeless person.  He works in the social services field.  He however wanted acceptance as being truly British.  And argued as such.

Its almost like how most of us would argue in favour free market economics in the Zimbabwean context. It is not that they would truly believe in such a neoliberal approach.  

They want to be recognized for sharing that opinion with the wealthy persons of the global north.  No more no less. We need to value ourselves better and to stop looking for the approving gaze of those in the global north. 

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

Being Educated but Unconscious to a Fault in Zimbabwe.

By Takura Zhangazha*

My father probably hoped I would be a mathematical genius like him. My mother might have hoped the same but with an anticipation that I would encounter a religious calling to become a Catholic priest. Regrettably I did not meet either of my parents’ expectations. I never became a mathematical genius nor a Catholic priest.  But I did know at some point that in everything I was to eventually become, formal education was given as key.  As taught not only by my parents but also by the Zimbabwean government. 

And education also had a success hierarchy.  The most educated among us would eventually become medical doctors, engineers, lawyers (thanks to Herbert Chitepo) or priests.  The least educated would become bus drivers, security guards or God forbid what we derisively refer to as ‘garden boys’.  

And Robert Mugabe insisted on this hierarchy for a while. He also set up various state universities that demystified the acquisition of degrees and made it almost normal to have one.   

Until at some point the most educated became restive.  Those that were educated to blue collar levels decided that his stay in power was too iniquitous to their own aspirations and formed trade unions that challenged the very same hierarchy. 

In challenging it however the aspirations were the same.  That their children would via further education escape their own blue collar or peasant lives to being the nouveau rich in the leafier suburbs of Harare. 

And this is very ironic.  In being educated and struggling to get our children similarly or better educated we aspire for the same things, same lifestyles that those who would historically deny us already have. 

This is the bane of what I have previously referred to as the ESAP (Economic Structural Adjustment Program) generation of the 1990s.  We were taught that success, which was defined as driving a car, owning a television and living in affluent parts of capital cities comes through success in formal education.  Only for that education to be made redundant with economic liberalization where jobs became not only based on your actual education but also your willingness to take risks and forgo a diligent studious past. 

But we insist in believing that the type of education your child receives will make them cross the Rubicon  of success.  Or will ensure that they remain north of Samora Machel Avenue.  The truth of the matter is that we are leading our children down a false garden path.  If like me, you were privileged enough to go to a school like St Ignatious College, Chishawasha, there is no logical reason why you would not want your offspring, to go to the same.  Regrettably a lot of us who went to the same school believe that it would be beneath their aspirations for their children to go to the same schools they went to. 

Education then shifts from being a route to success to being an emblem of lifestyle success.  Almost as though we are watching how others perceive of our own personal success.  Never mind the children. 

But I must get back to my main point in this blog. 

As Zimbabweans we assume we are bright sparks because of our education system and our own personal education.  The truth of the matter is that while we may be formally smart we are organically dull. Our formal education regrettably does not always see the future.  It is too selfish, too self centered and too focused on immediate recognition.

This is what would explain our inability to think, even as educated as we would be told we are, collectively. Tell me, what intelligent, educated people even consider privatizing as natural a right as water?  Our mothers would have to defrock themselves in Bikita if that were to ever happen.  But it is being planned and for execution by the most educated of us.  PhD’s and all. 

The key issue is that we are at fault for assuming flaunting education certificates as the sine qua non of individual success. 

We have forgotten that you should never become educated in order to be a copycat.  Or to mimic others.  We should be educated to produce new knowledge.  Always.  Especially in our African contexts where the Global North thinks we are exceedingly dull. Or that we are not organic about our won knowledge production.  

If you were to walk in Harare and ask young comrades the exact role of Mbuya Nehanda in our African liberation struggles you are least likely to find any affirmation of her role.  Even as you read this blog, if you are Zimbabwean, you will probably google her name. 

We cannot assume that the more educated we are, the more organically conscious we are.  I know comrades who have gone to Bible school and become pastors but still exhibit a naivety that cannot be considered progressive.  Or comrades who think being called a comrade is Russian and therefore anti-American.  Educated as they are.  Yet we know, historically, we would never have triumphed in the liberation struggle without calling referring to each other as comrade. Or friend.

You see comrades, we are not as educated as we think. In Africa.  We suffer. We continue. But we know how to talk and act back.

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

Video Assisted Politics Vs Video Assisted Consciousness.

 By Takura Zhangazha*

In discussing the state of affairs of the English Premier league, a colleague joked about how its current log leaders, Liverpool FC, appear to be a little bit too lucky with the Video Assistant Referee (VAR).  He went on to joke that Liverpool FC should be spelt as Li(VAR)pool in reference to the additional match official who cross checks incidents during games.  I laughed my lungs out. And because he is a Manchester United supporter, I reminded him of the game in which VAR worked in  favour of his team.  Against mine.  All he could say and sheepishly so, was that it was a different game altogether! And of course we burst out laughing at each other and our biases. 

Later on, I reflected a little bit on the changing manner in which we now have to anticipate the entertainment of watching the globally famous EPL via the medium of television or a mobile phone or tablet. 

And how the very act of pausing real time, in a football match.  All in order to subjectively attempt to verify what occurred or didn’t with the intention of coming to a version of the truth that will remain unpalatable to one of the two parties involved.  Who, where it concerns football at least, will have to accept the eventual decision because those are the rules. 

While in our everyday African lives we do not have immediate video assistant referees to pause our daily political activities and check via camera recording whether we really did or not do something, we may be living as though our lives VARs exist.  Not only to judge but to decide the next course of action we must take. 

In this, we must also ask key questions of how we might perceive of ourselves as part of the equivalent of video reviewed or motivated lives.  Or alternatively, what we consider critical to make this even possible.

In my view, we probably look at our lives as potentially video assistant refereed by default.  And in the particular area of our political perceptions.  Via the medium of the mobile phone as it is linked to internet connectivity and the social media platforms that come with the same.  

In most cases, like two football teams, we have opposite end political preferences and we like to slug it out on social media on behalf of those that we support.  And we also like our biases better if they are ‘video verified’ or simply put accompanied by some form of audio-visual footage. Again to confirm to our biases in similar fashion to me as a Liverpool FC supporter and my friend the Manchester United supporter. 

This is now most evident during election campaign periods.  Not just in Africa but probably in the United Kingdom where they will have a general election this December.  Contemporary elections are increasingly influenced by access to online audio visual content of political parties and their candidates.  Particularly in urban areas.  This development has in part changed the organic meaning of politics as is already well analyzed through recent studies on how the big tech companies are increasingly working to not only help parties win elections but even beyond that, the ominous modification of our human behavior to suit their super profit motivated intentions.  

In this, our video assisted politics becomes a channel that confirms what we prefer to see/hear.  Just as I would in my sporting bias, keep my fingers crossed actual football VAR favours Liverpool FC.  All the time.  Not that I will  not accept a negative or objective determination by VAR on occasion.  It would be that in a majority of the cases I will not do so because of assumptions of loyalty and hypocritically decry the change in the meaning of football.  Or in the case of politics, resort to assumptions of party or celebrity loyalty via a stubborn refusal to accept an objective truth.

The other option, though it’s much harder, is to look at our newly mediated realities via videos that confirm or challenge our stubborn biases through a different lens. One that would look a the medium itself and how to utilize it to make oneself more conscious of the issue it raises.  Its not as easy as crosschecking/googling the FIFA rules on ‘ball to hand’ versus ‘hand to ball’.  

Instead it would be to seek more to understand the equivalent of how FIFA actually functions and why for example wherever the World Cup is held, FIFA takes the greatest control of products and services affiliated to it in the host country.  That is then utilizing the medium or the VAR toward a new critical consciousness. Or a video assisted consciousness. 

In the political realm this would entail a critical consciousness to the next  ‘political video’ you see. Even if it harmless news, the veracity of what is being shown should be understood from at least three angles. The ideological import of it, its impact on the national economic livelihood and what it portends for the future.  It may not be as immediate or as entertaining as a controversial moment in a football match. But I am certain it will help.

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