Henning Melber
2 October 2008
opinion
When liberation movements take power, their governments are often marked by military mindsets, categorising people as winners and losers and operating along the lines of command and obedience. Such trends are evident in southern Africa. Democratic discourse in search of the common good would look quite different.
A knee-jerk reaction of 'Tiers-Mondisme' is to show solidarity with the struggle for freedom among the 'wretched of the earth'. Sometimes, struggles are glorified, as was the case back in the 1960s. Frantz Fanon's book 'Les damnés de la terre' (the wretched of the earth) was paradigmatic. His manifesto became a call to battle for the Algerian resistance movement against France, the colonial power.
Jean-Paul Sartre wrote the introduction. He was quite selective in his argumentation, tending in some spots to glorify violence as an act of emancipation. Indeed, he seemed to see violence as a purifying force that would turn the colonised into full citizens. Fanon himself however spoke out against excessive post-colonial authoritarianism. In penetrating analyses and withering criticism, he described what he had seen, mainly in West Africa, up to his death in 1961.
Fanon critisised the authoritarian attitudes of the African elite, which usurped young states in the course of decolonisation, and their abuses of power when securing privileges for themselves and turning entire states into instruments of control. His early warnings went largely unheeded, however. Not until the 1990s, when the shortcomings of revolutionary movements could no longer be ignored, did Fanon's analyses come back into the foreground.
VICTORY IN PEOPLE'S STRUGGLE?
When liberation movements in the so-called third world took up arms, they enjoyed support from the socialist countries as well as solidarity movements in the West. Organisations such as the PAIGC, MPLA, and FRELIMO challenged Portugal's colonial power. Their resilience in Guinea Bissau and Cape Verde, Angola, and Mozambique even had repercussions in the Lisbon metropole. They triggered the Carnation Revolution, bringing an end to Portuguese colonialism in Africa in the mid-1970s.
In Rhodesia - today's Zimbabwe - the ZANU and ZAPU liberation movements fought the white minority regime under Ian Smith, which had declared unilateral Independence (UDI) from the British Empire. Colonial rule came to an end in 1980 when the Lancaster House Agreement was signed and ZANU subsequently won the elections.
In Namibia, the United Nations negotiated a transition period for independence, which was ultimately implemented in 1989-90. South Africa had occupied the country in violation of international law. SWAPO fought against this illegal occupation for a quarter of a century.
Four years later, the Namibian model of controlled change helped South Africans hold their first free elections, which were won by the ANC. The former liberation movement thus assumed political responsibility, and it did so in a legitimate fashion.
One must bear in mind that armed resistance was part of the solution both in South Africa and Namibia. It led to negotiations for transitional arrangements towards majority rule. The compromises required from all sides contributed to the transitional periods working out. At the same time, a decidedly patriotic form of writing history turned the independence struggle soon thereafter into a myth.
ZIMBABWEAN TRAUMA
It bears repetition that the unscrupulously violent character of Zimbabwe's ZANU regime already revealed itself in the early to mid-1980s, when a special unit killed an estimated 20,000 people, mainly in Matabeleland, where the opposition ZAPU had most of its supporters.
The soldiers of the fifth brigade trained by North Korea, took no prisoners. They killed, tortured, raped and humiliated anyone who seemed suspicious (and it was enough to be Ndebele); men, women, and even children. The only organisation to protest was the local catholic church, which raised its voice to protect the victims. The rest of the world, including those who had originally shown solidarity, had little to say; after all, it simply couldn't be true.
The violence did not stop until ZAPU agreed to sign a pact with the ruling party. ZANU basically took them over. None of this hurt the Mugabe government's bilateral and multilateral standing. To the contrary: up to the late 1990s, Zimbabwe was considered a success story, an example of successful transition. Indeed, in 1994 Queen Elizabeth II personally bestowed knighthood upon President Mugabe, who had assumed comprehensive executive powers in the meantime. Not until June of this year was his knighthood revoked.
WOUNDS OLD AND NEW
When a new opposition party, the MDC, took to the political stage in Zimbabwe and turned out to be a serious competitor at the end of the 1990s, the 'Chimurenga' (struggle) became a permanent institution. Violence became the customary response to political protest. As political power shifted away from Mugabe after he lost a referendum in 2000, his regime became only more violent.
In 2005, Mugabe and his people launched Operation 'Murambatsvina' (Drive Out Trash) in raids on pockets of opposition in Harare and other major towns: more than 2 million people are estimated to have lost their already meagre livelihoods in the process. There is no need to delve into the recent escalation of violence, since the election troubles were reported in detail worldwide.
An estimated third of Zimbabwe's people has fled the country for political and economic reasons; from exile, they try to support family members who have stayed home. All of this is sad proof that life under a liberation movement is not automatically better than it was under colonialism. The human-rights violations of SWAPO have also been downplayed. In the 1980s, the organisation imprisoned thousands of its own members in dungeons in southern Angola, accusing them of spying on behalf of South Africa. These people lost their liberty in spite of never having been proven guilty; indeed, they were not even brought to trial. Many of them did not survive the torture. Those released are scorned even today.
It could have been different in South Africa. The ANC government's Truth and Reconciliation Commission talked about human rights violations committed by its own members. But the final report containing these findings was never published in its original form. So far, ANC omissions have not been discussed openly.
VICTIMS BECOME PERPETRATORS
There is nothing new about military movements that are supposedly justified in ethical and moral terms quickly losing their legitimacy. Since the French Revolution, liberators have often turned into oppressors, victims into perpetrators. It is not unusual for a new regime to quickly resemble an old one. That has happened time and again around the world.
The Indian psychologist and sociologist Ashis Nandy, one of the founders of critical post-colonial studies, has dealt with this issue in depth. The Intimate Enemy, his book of 1983, discusses how liberators tend to reproduce the past rather than offering genuine alternatives. In this light, the "anti-imperialist" Robert Mugabe turns out to be merely the final executor of the policies of the racist colonists Cecil Rhodes and Ian Smith. Armed combat merely created new repressive institutions of the state for the dominant group within anti-colonial resistance. Former PLO activist Yezid Sayigh argued 1997 in Armed Struggle and the Search for State that this was also happening in the Palestinian liberation movement.
Such power structures often revolve around individual commanders who act to the benefit of their crony supporters. Resistance movements normally adopt rough survival strategies and techniques while fighting an oppressive regime. That culture, unfortunately, takes root and is permanently nurtured. In sum, it becomes questionable whether there is a true difference between the political systems they manage to throw out and what they establish in their place.
In May 1990 Albie Sachs had already spoken of this trend in respect to South Africa. In a lecture at the University of the Western Cape, this South African lawyer, who was crippled by a parcel bomb in Mozambique during his 24-year exile, expressed his doubts about ANC activists being ready for freedom. He worried about the habits they had cultivated. As Sachs put it, the culture and discipline of resistance may have served a survival strategy in the underground, but these skills were certainly not those of free citizens.
Maybe this is why Nelson Mandela became a global icon in his lifetime; the many years he spent in prison kept him away from the daily intrigues and power plays prevalent in an organised liberation movement. Mandela preserved a spirit of human compassion and tolerance that a life of struggle and exile might not have afforded him.
This may sound cynical but might be close to reality. Jacob Zuma, a product of the struggle, cultivates a 'Zulu warrior culture'. He emerged as a populist alternative to the more intellectual, somewhat aloof Thabo Mbeki, and will probably soon be South Africa's next president. Zuma has an international reputation for various allegations of corruption, charges of sexual abuse and martial rhetoric (his favourite song is 'Bring me my machine gun').
Disappointed by the limits of the liberation they have experienced, many people are looking for substitute saviours. Fortunately, the number of those for whom fundamental values of democracy, liberty and human rights matter more than submissive loyalty to an organisation is growing.
Raymond Suttner is an example. He used to operate underground in South Africa as a member of the ANC, and spent years in solitary confinement as a political prisoner. As a member of parliament and later as ambassador, he represented the ANC government before returning to the academic world from which he originated. In November 2005, he pointed out that ANC ideology and rhetoric do not distinguish between the liberation movement and the people. He thus argues that the liberation movement is a prototype of a state within the state, one that sees itself as the only legitimate source of power.
'END OF HISTORY'
As we now know, post-colonial life looks a lot like the colonial era did in respect to day-to-day life, the reason being that socialisation factors and attitudes from armed struggle have largely shaped the new political leaders' understanding of politics, and their idea of how to wield power.
In governmental office, liberation movements tend to mark an 'end of history'. Any political alternative that does not emerge from within them will not be acceptable. This attitude explains the strong sense of camaraderie between the Mugabe regime and the governments of Angola, Mozambique, Namibia and South Africa over many years. Typcially, any political alternative cropping up in these countries as a result of disillusionment with post-colonial life will be discredited as part of an imperialist conspiracy designed to sabotage national independence.
These governments never seem to even consider the possibility that their own shortcomings may be the reason why opposition forces are becoming stronger. Instead, they only think along the militaristic dichotomy of friend/foe, leaving no legitimate alternative to their own hegemony.
At the same time, the sad truth is that the opposition forces that do stand up against such governments tend to only add to the problem, rather than to provide a solution. All too often, they only want to share the spoils of the state apparatus and its bureaucracy among their cronies once they are strong enough to constitute a true power option. Again, the relevant categories of thought are only winners and losers.
Democracy however is about something completely different: compromise, and even the search for consensus, in pursuit of the public good. To achieve that, one does not need military mindsets, but rather a broad political debate.
* Henning Melber is Executive Director of the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation in Uppsala, Sweden. This text was published first in Development and Cooperation, October 2008.
* Please send comments to editor@pambazuka.org or comment online at http://www.pambazuka.org/
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COMMENT 1
Where the Africans Stand to be blamed for the Destruction of Africa
NOT TO SPARE THE AFRICANS WHO THINK ONLY OF DESTROYING THE continent of africa
One thing that can turn the stomach of even the most seasoned Warrior ” African Freedom Fighter “, involved in the work of ending oppression and awakening human dignity in oneself and ones comrades, is the incredible shamelessness of those who profit and thrive off the suffering of their own people and this is what is happening in Africa today .
The mind boggles at the blatant callousness of individuals " THE BLACK AFRICANS " who really and truly do not care about the pain and the suffering of their tricknology causes.
Not even a “I didn’t know” or the usual denial of hard facts. No, the shameless ones are so versed in their insanity of Greed ; they have no need to protect their psyche through such defence mechanisms. Instead they tend to be totally clear and aware of what they are doing.
Take a look at the much talked about African Elites the so called admired Leaders of today’s Indepenedent African Countries .
What have they truly done, for Africa, and African people ? Have they done anything, in aiding Africa to realise wholesome, balanced societies and communities ? Have they guided Africa in the constant rebirth of Africa's roots and culture ? Have they partaken in the process of finding out what the Africans can learn from other cultures and what Africa should avoid like the plague that is hitting Africa ?
The obvious ( though not quite correct ) answer is : They have done nothing. The truth is though, they have done far more than enough in misguiding, decieving and misleading the people of Africa . If it only they had done nothing, the situation wouldn’t be as tragic as it is. No, they have not merely idly stood by.
They have gone beyond the level of the useful fool, who due his / her misconditioning, ignorance and good old fashioned pigheadedness can be used to destroy his / her society and implant the values, norms and governance of the imperialist .
They are now willing fools . In effect, they collaborate with open eyes with the destroyers of humanity for the sole purpose of getting a slice of the cake for themselves, and their little circle of friends and family, or those who share the same social status as themselves.
Truly , a fitting title would be accomplices to the crimes of genocide, enslavement, terror and the rape of the collective mind of an entire people. There is no excuse only arrogant greed, lack of remorse, lack of compassion and shamelessness .
Just see for yourselves of Africa :
Who goes to Paris, London, Washington, etc and signs away the land underneath the feet of their own people?
Who agrees that their people should work for nothing under inhuman conditions for multinational companies in the name of foreign investment?
Who agrees to ethnically clear an area of unwanted tribes, so the global economy, or rather the global monstrosity can gain access to the resources that lie in Ancestral Lands of Africa?
Who swears by , obeys and enforces ridiculous Colonial laws that still are in place in many so-called independent African countries, as Administrative law?
Who continues to pay off loans which are nothing more than economic entrapment designed to keep Africans locked in the ideology and practice of poverty?
Who continues to obey the thinking, that Africa must grow and export agricultural produce for Western markets instead of cultivating food to feed THEMSELVES ?
None other than the African Elite. ( SO CALLED ELITE ) And why? So they and their little clique can get rich and fat without doing an honest days work. So their children can go to fine European schools and speak French and English with the proper accent. Not giving a damn about the blood split to ensure their material living standard and status as elites.
Take Azania (South Africa). As the Racist regime came to the end of its overt power, - now it just rules covertly -what happened ? Was their justice, was their liberty, was their redress, was their a redistribution of Land? Far from it, there was - to be blunt - A BIG FAT LIE !!!!!!!!!! that comes out of the African Elites mouth
More than 70% of the Land, which the Racist government had seized through the 1913 land act, has remained in the hands of the white farmers. . The agents of Apartheid, the butchers who had tortured and killed with impunity for years were allowed to do a confessional song and dance and let off scot-free. In the name of reconciliation and Christian charity.
It is simple in mind; whatever academic title or social rank the Africans hide behind, the majority of African Elites are nothing more than an imperialist fifth column within African societies. Until Africa gets rid of the mentality that infects these twisted minds of these Elites , until it is forever barred from all affairs that touch on all African collective wellbeing all talk of change , remains just that so " Africa Moribund " in the hands of these African Elites .
N.B
Whilst Lado is fighting over this issue , the same African Elites are busy in their conspiracy working hard as enemies or joining hands wih Lado's enemies to destroy Lado in Africa . . . .
COMMENT 2
IF ONLY THE AFRICANS KNEW WHEREBY THEY HAVE BEEN TRICKED AND WHEREBY THEY GO WRONG !!
Notables points :
3rd August 1875 ------- Can be remembered as the beginning date , as the European States divided the African Continent amongst them , ( the Paris Resolution ) and once again on - 26 February 1885 ----- (The Berlin Treaty) where they took African Freedom and Liberty and imposed their Religion and their Values on the African Peoples .
1945 - The Pan Africanism Association was formed . With the death of the King Atabua ( of the till now Occupied Kingdom State of Lado in Africa by " BRITAIN AND BELGIUM " ) was actually the end of Pan Africanism with its founded Head Quarters at Arua - Aru in the Independent Kingdom State of Lado as Lado was / is Rightly situated in the Heart of Africa .
Where Africa was Tricked and wrongly guided in the prepared for , a received independence s Issues !
After the Assassination of the Chairman of PanAfricanism ( King Anacleto Atabua ) on 14th April 1948 by the British , because he asked USSR to raise the question of Lado at the UN in 1947, and the British found that was not the right thing to do. and inorder to cover up this most important History part of Africa , the Wester World Europeans decided to draw the African Minds to establish a new system of a giving Independence to the African People by encouraging the Secretary of the assassinated King Atabua " Francis Kwame Nkuruma " to take over to work on this issue of Indepedences but without Sovereignty issue at hand to the African people . Francis Kwame Nkuruma betrayed the African People over the Question of Sovereignty This is the biggest mistake he ever made .
1958 ---------- The Western - European Agreement with Nkuruma led to the initiatives of the formation of Organisation of African Unit in the African Independence Conference held in Accra in 1958 giving in the end the rise to : In 1961, the OAU Charter was drawn without formulating the Rights of Sovereignty issue of the Independent African Nations . This was and is the Political Suicide for the African Nations which still today are properties of the Western - European Controlled Nations and whereby we are witnessing now ---
" is that the African People are ridding themselves of the Ruling Elite, who have Betrayed their People, and who have only been kept in Power with the massive Support of the Old Colonial Powers, mainly Britain, France and Belgium, who have and are still now contributing heavily with Military Expertise and Weaponry. And not least to the pockets and Foreign Bank Accounts of their African Leaders " . The Africa Leaders since from Independence are still under the control of these Colonial powers till today with exception of " Lado Occupied " still struggling for Freedom since from 1947 when Lado refused and refuses still to sign for a given Independence witout her Territorial and the Peoples Sovereignty ( see the the story of Chroonological Political History of Lado in Africa : .
African Institute for equal rights on the global market+.+
The adverse impact of one important element that the author has missed to analyse in his overall structured approach is that of "get rich quick by any means" that characterised people in the one-party structures that most liberation movements engineered following the assumption of power.
Long years of deprivation of goodies while pursuing the liberation struggle gave way suddenly to the greed to making quick bucks at all costs by most of the cadres who integrated the government and parastal institions.
The victims in the civil society had hardly any recourse to denounce such acts or raise awareness around. Rampant corruption therefore spread like wildfire, which soon brought to a halt the socio-economic take off.
People started to feel the pinch, but they hardly had any opportunity to mount any significant social movement in favour of transparency and accountability. This was further compounded by the fact that the government was by far the largest employer in these countries, except South Africa. Most people in jobs and with good intent preferred to sacrifice the larger interest of the community, keep their mouth shut in order to be able to feed the family. The tentacles of the government reached every nook and corner of the economy and anybody fired for political reasons could hardly find other jobs in the country. Zimbabwe is a perfect example!
Whereas in countries with a diverse economy and a relatively well developed private sector dissidents could find alternative jobs and therefore could sustain their political activism, in the former countries under one-party regimes it was suicidal to raise any voice against corrupt practices.
Political power is concentrated in the one-party regime. The opposition is not allowed any space to breathe, hence the precarious conditions under which the opposition members have to operate.
The contention of the author that people in the opposition parties were also keen to join the loot once in power goes a long way to sustain my argument that an oversized civil service and a weak private sector has been at the root of several evil practices. One had to be in the structure or be able to establish privileged links with people in the structure to be able to make "quick bucks".
A pyramid of privileges grew up superimposed on a pyramid of party cadres. The higher the cadre, the higher the privileges. The higher the cadre, the nearer they were to the top leadership. They did everything to make the king (dictator) believe that he was the best dressed although he was naked! The dicatators themselves living a material life of abundance in pursuit of carnal pleasures hardly had time to listen to the cries of their citizens.
Today a growing number of people, especially youngsters, want transparency and accountability. That is what Mugabe is facing now. Everybody is so corrupt around him that they are more concerned about how to perpetuate the system in order to continue protecting themselves from popular calls to make them account for the failures.
Zimbabwe enters into very unsettling times ahead. Will there be a violent street initiative to bolt away the lunatic Mugabe? Will there be a more reasoned approach for gradual change?
Mbeki has left an incomplete work. Mugabe is vile, overwhelmed by greed (both power and wealth), indifferent to the sufferings of millions of his citizens, ready to even sink the boat that is already wrecked.
The end of Mugabe (and with him the end of the liberation era) is pitiful. A hero who has turned into a murderer and an illegitimate president??
How would Zimbabwe's liberation heroes turn in their graves with restlessness that such a devil is still causing untold sufferings to the people they had so valiantly liberated in order for them to taste freedom, dignity and the fruits of development?
SHAME to whom? Even little kids in Zimbabwe know the answer.