Chenjerai Hove
6 January 2002
opinion
As I look at the laws which my country is creating, I cannot avoid thinking of the law and order minister of Rhodesian times. He was Lurdner-Burke, and his vision for the country was that all thinking blacks should be in prison.
To imagine that a 'free' African government can introduce a law which makes criticism of the head of state illegal, is out of this world, not to mention imposing a huge penalty on those criticising the police for not doing their work properly.
The bizzare part of the law is the penalty for throwing a stone at a government building. It means that if there is a snake between myself and a government building, I should not throw a stone at the serpent even if it has bitten my child or my wife.
Then the president has introduced this sick national service programme in a bid to continue to create a bigger, more personal party militia-the terror begins.
Even the former enemies of the people are at the forefront of the regime of terror.
The president and his officials talk of a free and fair election, but at the same time, they talk of war. How can we have a free and fair election when the opposition parties are not allowed to go anywhere near the rural areas?
For myself, and all thinking Zimbabweans, this is the road to full dictatorship, that is, if we do not already have it in place.
The militia situation means the creation of warlords. Soon, each district will be controlled by the leader of a segment of the militia. Already, Murehwa, Mutoko, Mashonaland Central, Gokwe, Zaka, and more, are in the hands of militias.
These are personal party militias which the ruining party will find it difficult to control if it wins the election. Like in Afghanstan, each warlord will control his own area and impose his own taxes and laws. He will not be easily disarmed by anyone, including those who initially appointed him.
Warlordism is a tool for dictators all over the world. South America was full of them, but despite the coming of democracy, it is still difficult to dismantle the militias.
In a situation where militias kill and kidnap whomever they want, you have a true dictatorship. The country is divided into fiefdoms in which each warlord demands whatever he wants from his subjects and can even rape the women in front of their husbands, torture his critics, and order the disappearance of anyone who thinks.
It reminds one of the death caravan of Mr Pinochet. As a full time dictator, Pinochet had no other answer to criticism except to shout: "Go and kill them, and don't explain to me how." With that sort of thinking, many patriots were killed and thrown into the middle of the sea from helicopters.
A dictator is a ruler who wishes to treat everyone as if he were the all-knowing headmaster. No questions, no opinions.
I remember one South American dictator who put in place a law making it a crime for a journalist to quote a person who was not an expert on the subject. This meant that after a car accident, you could not write an article in which you quoted an eyewitness.
Another dictator in eastern Europe made a law which required that all owners of type-writers had to have the machines licenced.
The drafters of the new laws of Zimbabwe must have travelled to Banda's Malawi several times to make notes, but what they do not realise is that dictatorship and one-party rule are now old-fashioned.
And I hear that the bulk of the soldiers in the DRC are being recalled for the elections, as if the elections had a military operation.
The question the ruling party has to ask itself is: What have the people of Zimbabwe done to deserve all this brutality? Democracy means the right to choose, it also means free access to those choices and alternatives.
After the current political massacre, I can assure you it will take decades to rebuild the souls of the people as well as reconstruct the homes, buildings and roads which are being destroyed now. The most difficult will be the reconstruction of the wasted souls of the youngsters being trained to become murderers and heartless abusers of human life and dignity.
Chenjerai Hove is a renowned Zimbabwean writer.
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