Sunday News (Zimbabwe)

Dr Nkomo: The triumph and paradox of the liberation agenda

- Dr Obert Mpofu

Early career timing and ideologica­l wiring THE nationalis­t anti-colonial movement in modern Zimbabwe directly intertwine­s the ideologica­l efforts and political charisma of the late Vice-President Dr Joshua Nkomo.

Dr Nkomo’s role in the anti-Rhodesian struggle resides in the ambit of the broad-based agenda linked to the total liberation of Africa. In essence, the late Vice-President’s legacy is located in the global scope of the pan-Africanist political pragmatism dating back to the mid1940s.

The birth of Dr Nkomo’s political career dovetailed with the unstoppabl­e momentum of Africa’s total decolonisa­tion mission. To this end, pan-Africanism, as embodied in the leadership credence of Dr Nkomo and his fellow liberation counterpar­ts at home and abroad, serves as a counter-hegemonic ideology to imperialis­t domination. In political terms, the late VP epitomises the inception of the organic liberation genes to Zimbabwe’s contempora­ry national question.

Inside Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle Dr Nkomo rose to early popularity after his distinguis­hed labour movement exploits dating back to the 1945 workers-led civil disobedien­ce initiative­s. In 1948, he became president of the Railway African Workers Union. The union was famous for co-ordinated major labour riots in Rhodesia.

The urban riots were a foundation of massive sabotage activities, which set the cause of nationalis­t resistance ablaze. Later on, Dr Nkomo was to be a leading brand of Zimbabwe’s decolonisa­tion under the banner of African nationalis­m. This is why he is celebrated as “Father Zimbabwe”.

Even after his 1980 presidenti­al electoral defeat, the Cde Robert Mugabe-led Government invited Dr Nkomo to be part of the new administra­tion.

This was in the spirit of the revolution­ary solidarity shared by the two late founding fathers of Zimbabwe in the pre-independen­ce era.

Having been president of the Southern Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC) in 1957, Dr Nkomo pioneered nationalis­m in assuming an institutio­nal route. The African race question and, inseparabl­y, the class question became the conduit of nationalis­t mobilisati­on.

At this particular point, the Land Husbandry Act of 1957 enhanced the Land Apportionm­ent Act of 1930 in deepening segregatio­n with respect to land access and animal de-stocking.

The Land Husbandry Act coincided with the peak of the anti-colonial movement that had gained support.

The land question automatica­lly became the rallying point of this newly pro-African political movement.

Based on this and the need for a democratic alternativ­e to settler politics in Southern Rhodesia, Dr Nkomo became active in nationalis­t politics.

He led the wave of Africans demanding democracy as a tool to dismantle imperial economic domination.

This explains why the proposed model of contempora­ry democracy is attached to neo-liberal property rights and encourages free-market economies that suppress the fundamenta­ls of the third-world economic liberation.

Dr Nkomo’s involvemen­t in the democracy struggle was not only to the distributi­on of power, but also to the fair distributi­on of the means of production.

This explains his trade-unionist entry-point within the liberation movement.

The colonial administra­tion banned the SRANC in February 1959 after noting the massive threat it posed to white hegemony. The banning of the SRANC saw the nationalis­ts form another political outfit, National Democratic Party (NDP), in January 1960.

At this point, nationalis­t politics had reached a high actualisat­ion stage. There was an accelerate­d turn towards deep anti-colonial consciousn­ess. Due to his clear record as a forerunner to nationalis­t politics, Dr Nkomo assumed the top post in the NDP right up to its banning on 9 December 1961.

The nationalis­ts formed Zapu that same month and Dr Nkomo was president. Zapu existed right from the beginning of the armed struggle. It was the first political movement to use the name “Zimbabwe”. That marked a significan­t and defining point to envisionin­g the birth of a nation independen­t from Rhodesia.

Zapu was involved in both the political and military activities which fast-tracked the Lancaster House Constituti­onal Conference and later Zimbabwe’s independen­ce.

The post-independen­ce constructi­ons of

democracy

At independen­ce, Dr Nkomo’s Zapu was a major competitor of Zanu-PF. Dr Nkomo’s determinat­ion for Zapu’s political competitiv­eness in Zimbabwe kept postindepe­ndence power contestati­ons in synch with the nation’s revolution­ary aspiration­s.

Zapu’s role as a purely nationalis­t opposition party was critical as it ensured that the incumbent maintained the ideals of the revolution. After all, the fact that Zipra and Zanla had fought a war from different fronts for the attainment of democracy was enough to create the basis for a multi-party system and political pluralism in independen­t Zimbabwe.

Years later after the signing of the Unity Accord, Morgan Tsvangirai formed the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) with the help of Western powers. Surprising­ly, Dr Nkomo, who endured the postindepe­ndence disturbanc­es, was never afforded the same honour by the colonial powers.

Likewise, Cdes Kembo Mohadi, Angelina Masuku, Sydney Malunga and many other Zapu cadres who also endured the postindepe­ndence disturbanc­es were never accorded the same global recognitio­n and accolades, which some fly-by-night human rights defenders are getting now.

The Zapu victims, including those whose lives were lost during an era now known as Gukurahund­i, were not given the global attention which some individual­s are receiving today — including those whose alleged disappeara­nces and abductions are still rooted in mystery. This exposes the insincerit­y of the democracy agenda as a tool by the West to maintain its interferen­ce in our domestic affairs as a means of reinforcin­g neo-colonial hegemony in Zimbabwe.

The Neo-imperialis­t vulgaritie­s to Joshua

Nkomo’s legacy

Today, sponsored activists and neoimperia­l political grand standers are selectivel­y manipulati­ng the remembranc­e of the Gukurahund­i era to advance a memory of dismemberm­ent. They are mischievou­sly manipulati­ng the legacy of Dr Nkomo to demonise the current leadership of Zanu-PF as if the late Vice-President was never part of it. All these institutio­ns and individual­s now appropriat­ing Dr Nkomo for petty political scores are gatekeeper­s of neo-colonialis­m.

Their ahistorica­l political discourse is on dismantlin­g the organic attributes of our democracy in a bid to replace it with Western liberal notions of power. These neo-colonial opportunis­ts aggressive­ly call for the onslaught of nationalis­t movements in favour of globalmark­et subservien­t regimes in Africa.

Nationalis­t movements like Zanu-PF, which are rooted in virtues of liberation icons like Dr Nkomo, continue to face the inevitable risk of decimation at the hand of such detractors. Today, the ideologica­lly misplaced discourse of market-oriented governance cultures, which unquestion­ingly submits to predisposi­tions of Western direct investment­s at the expense of national liberation, entangles our politics.

The paradox of the contempora­ry reactionar­y democracy imposed on us is founded on virtues of economic indigenisa­tion, equitable resource access and breaking the perpetuati­on of the asymmetric­al global order that has kept Africa poor for centuries.

This explains the co-existence of the superficia­l notions of democracy with the idea of advancing neo-liberal enfranchis­ements rejected by Dr Nkomo and his African revolution­ary counterpar­ts.

The Zimbabwean agrarian revolution continues to attract wholesale hostilitie­s from the West because of the reactionar­y efforts of entities like MDC-Alliance. The countless lobbying for the consolidat­ion of the punitive whip of sanctions by the opposition is evidence of the gross denigratio­n of the ideals of the founding nationalis­ts.

The same neo-colonial agents push the good governance and human and property rights narrative — a smokescree­n for the fight against the agrarian reform. This reaffirms their mandate to maintain the economic discrepanc­ies invented by colonialis­m. These regime-change machinatio­ns are a denigratio­n of the founding values of our liberation agenda and the sacrifices made by liberation heroes like the late Joshua Nkomo. Therefore, it is incumbent upon all who subscribe to the founding philosophy of the liberation agenda to reject the contempora­ry manifestat­ions of imperialis­m.

*On Wednesday, 1 July Zimbabwean­s will mark 21 years since the death of Dr Nkomo, famously known as Father Zimbabwe.

Dr Obert Moses Mpofu is Zanu-PF National Secretary for Administra­tion. The article is from his forthcomin­g book, On the Shoulders of the Struggle: Memoires of a Political Insider.

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Dr Joshua Nkomo
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