An air of normality has settled over Zimbabwe. But is it more political theatre than good faith?
One day in late December last year, Violet Gonda stepped off an airliner into the humid heat of a Zimbabwean summer. It was the first time Ms Gonda, one of Zimbabwe’s most prominent broadcasters, had set foot in her home country since she was exiled by Robert Mugabe nearly 20 years before – and she was not at all sure she would not be arrested.
“But the immigration official knew exactly who I was. He just said, ‘Welcome back, Ms Gonda.’ He wanted me not to do any journalism. When I objected, he wrote a note and told me to take it to the Media Commission for accreditation.”
It was a slightly disorienting first encounter with what Emmerson Mnangagwa, the incumbent president, has called his “new dispensation” – a break with Mugabeera violence and repression to build a new Zimbabwe of pluralism, free speech, and genuine democracy.
Since then, she has been pondering the question every Zimbabwean has asked since Mr Mugabe’s reign was ended by a military coup in November: has Zimbabwe really changed? If so, how much? And will it last?
Public demand for meaningful change has been clear ever since thousands took to the streets of Harare to party when news broke of Mr Mugabe’s arrest by the military on November 14, and both the main presidential candidates in tomorrow’s historic presidential election are vying for the mantle of reformer.
Mr Mnangagwa, the 75-year-old who served Mr Mugabe loyally for decades, says only he has the credibility, experience and influence with the army and the deep state to deliver that change.
“We have opened the country to the world,” Mr Mnangagwa declared at his final election rally at Harare’s national stadium yesterday
Nelson Chamisa, the 40-year-old lawyer and lay preacher leading the MDC Alliance, takes a different view. Mr Mnangagwa, he says, is knee-deep in the blood of thousands murdered by Mugabe’s regime over the past four decades; he is as culpable as anyone for two decades of economic mismanagement that has brought ght the country to the brink of collapse, and represents a moribund gerontocracy that still ll stakes its legitimacy on a liberation war that ended 40 years ago.
“Nothing has changed,” Mr Chamisa told The Sunday Telegraph during a break in campaigning this week.
“He is telling a very nice and very tall story to the international nal community. And unfortunately some in the international community are buying it.” On Harare’s Freedom Square yesterday, Mr Chamisa promised tens of thousands of his supporters a convincing victory, saying: “We are the government in two days.” “Your time is up,” he declared, addressing Mr Mnangagwa. “If we miss our opportunity on Monday we are doomed for life.”
Some 1,600 MDC activists have been murdered over the past 20 years, he said. No one has ever been prosecu prosecuted for those crimes.
But nowhere are the memories more b bitter, and the test of the “new dispen dispensation” more crucial, than in the western w province of Matabeleland. Mata
Between Be 10,000 and 20,000 people peo were killed between 1983 and 1988 when Robert Mugabe unleashed un a North Korean trained death dea squad, Fifth Brigade, on the political pol stronghold of the rival ZAPU ZA party. Responsibility for the “Gukuharundi” massacres goes well beyond Mr Mugabe. Mr Mnangagwa Mnan was Mugabe’s intelligence chief at the time. Perence Shiry, who commanded Fifth Brigade, is currently the agriculture minister.
“It was the longest period of mass atrocity on the greatest scale that Zimbabwe has had, including the liberation war,” said Shari Eppel, a forensic anthropologist from the region who is leading a new effort to uncover the graves of the victims. “It happened under Zanu PF. There are questions to answer.”
Mr Mnangagwa has ruled out apologising “as an individual.” But in January he set up a national peace and reconciliation committee, modelled on the post-apartheid commission in South Africa, to launch an inquiry.
“On economics, sure, maybe he will change something. But I am very sceptical about human rights,” said Lovejoy Ncube, who as a 22-year-old was tortured in a concentration camp during the Gukurahundi.
Nonetheless something has changed in Zimbabwe – and it is not just the vanishing of the police roadblocks that routinely used to shake down motorists for bribes. An unfamiliar air of normality has settled over the country, and people are talking to one another without wondering whether Mugabe’s Central Intelligence Organisation is listening in.
Mr Chamisa has been able to campaign openly and ferociously, and has for the first time penetrated rural areas once closed to the opposition – drawing immense crowds in the process. Ms Gonda has been able to host debates between rival candidates, international media have been granted access and there has been very little violence or voter-intimidation.
“These elections are very different,” laughed Paul Themba Nyathi, a former MDC activist who was once jailed by Mugabe. “They are boring. That’s a very unusual experience.”
But 38 years of dictatorship do not vanish overnight. And the electoral playing field is anything but level. One TV station, four public radio stations and a further four private stations are owned or controlled by Zanu PFaligned media houses. The Herald, the state-owned newspaper, has regularly misquoted Mr Chamisa, accusing him of promoting violence and of being in an electoral pact with Grace Mugabe, the widely hated former first lady.
Diplomats and senior Zanu PF figures have confirmed to The Sunday Telegraph that the international community has presented Mr Mnangagwa with a stark choice.
If he delivers tangible political change (the first test being a free and fair – or at least credible – election tomorrow), Zimbabwe has effectively been promised a return to the Commonwealth and relief from US sanctions that currently block desperately needed IMF loans.
However, Michelle Gavin and Todd Moss, of the US council on foreign relations, said after a recent visit that they found Mr Mnangagwa “a great pretender”.
“Unfortunately, we came away convinced that what we witnessed was more political theatre than good faith and that the United States should be deeply wary,” they said in a statement.
‘If we miss our opportunity on Monday we are doomed for life’