Zimbabwe's unofficial state of survival

Zimbabwe's tragedy has always been written in paradox. A country that once stood as the jewel of southern Africa - with a robust economy, strong institutions and enviable social services - was slowly and deliberately dismantled by political mismanagement, corruption and authoritarian hubris. By the late 1990s, the collapse was unmistakable. Industries shut their doors, agriculture imploded, hyperinflation devoured savings and repression silenced dissent or pushed it into exile.

What followed appeared, at the time, to be a national haemorrhage: the flight of millions of Zimbabweans into the diaspora. This mass departure was framed by the ruling elite as betrayal, as abandonment, as proof that those who left had turned their backs on the homeland. History, however, has delivered a far more inconvenient verdict. The very exodus that symbolised Zimbabwe's collapse has become its salvation.

From Johannesburg to London, Sydney to Toronto, New York to cities across Africa and Europe, Zimbabweans did not abandon their country. They sustained it. What began as survival migration has evolved into something far more profound: a parallel system of governance. The diaspora, once dismissed as economic refugees, now functions as Zimbabwe's shadow State - a government without offices, ministries or motorcades, yet one that funds education, healthcare, housing and the daily survival of millions.

This is not charity. It is governance by necessity. It is the quiet but relentless assertion of relevance by a constituency that has earned its place in Zimbabwe's political, social and economic architecture. While the official State rewards sycophants, entertainers and agents of distraction with cash handouts and luxury vehicles in a country where over 80% of citizens are unemployed, the diaspora pays school fees, settles hospital bills and keeps households afloat. The contrast is obscene. The irony is undeniable.

Those who sustain Zimbabwe are denied recognition. Those who presided over its collapse are celebrated.

Zimbabwe today exists under two governments. One is the official State: bloated with patronage, indulgence and spectacle. The other is the shadow State of the diaspora, whose authority is not decreed but earned, not announced but lived. From the early 2000s, when remittances trickled in as desperate lifelines, to 2025, when they surged to an estimated US$2,4 billion, the diaspora has become the nation's most reliable institution.

Diaspora communities have built schools where classrooms were abandoned, funded clinics where hospitals ran out of medicine, replaced obsolete dialysis and cancer machines, and invested in housing where government policy left citizens homeless. They have created an informal but highly effective social welfare system, sustaining millions and proving that exile did not sever their bond with Zimbabwe - it deepened it.

This is the rise of Zimbabwe's shadow State: a government without ministries, parastatals or propaganda machines, yet one that governs through necessity, sustains through sacrifice and commands legitimacy through results.

It is important to remember why Zimbabweans left. The mass exodus after 2000 was not wanderlust or a romantic search for foreign dreams. It was forced migration - a desperate flight from a State that made survival impossible. Land seizures and political violence destroyed agriculture, the backbone of the economy, overnight. Hyperinflation, peaking at a grotesque 79 billion percent in 2008, obliterated wages, savings and pensions. Factories closed. Unemployment became a national condition. Health and education systems collapsed, forcing doctors, teachers and engineers to choose between dignity abroad and destitution at home. Political repression completed the push, driving activists, journalists and ordinary citizens into exile.

This was not an accident of history. It was the cumulative outcome of decades of mismanagement, corruption and the mutation of a liberation movement into a patronage machine. Zimbabweans did not abandon their country; the country abandoned them. And in leaving, they created the very diaspora that now keeps Zimbabwe alive.

The truth Zimbabwe's leaders refuse to admit is that the nation survived not because of the State alone, but because of its exiles. Economically, remittances have eclipsed almost every other source of foreign currency, propping up a fragile economy that would otherwise collapse under the weight of corruption and policy failure. The diaspora has invested in housing, small businesses and infrastructure, imported new technologies and business models, and acted as Zimbabwe's bridge to global markets.

Intellectually, the diaspora has become the country's reservoir of skills. Doctors, engineers, IT specialists and academics now train local professionals, collaborate remotely and inject global best practices into healthcare, education and innovation. Socially and culturally, they fund rural projects, preserve national identity abroad and expose younger generations to democratic values and global standards of justice.

In short, the diaspora has become Zimbabwe's saviour - the invisible scaffolding holding up a collapsing edifice.

Yet, despite this monumental contribution, the diaspora is treated with contempt. Zimbabweans abroad are denied the right to vote. They face punitive fees at ports of entry. They are branded outsiders even as they function as the nation's most reliable insiders. This is not mere hypocrisy; it is betrayal. It is the grotesque inversion of justice where those who feed the nation are denied a voice, while those who loot it are rewarded.

The time for denial is over. Zimbabwe can no longer afford to treat its diaspora as a peripheral community when it has become the nation's shadow State. Their remittances, investments, skills and networks have earned them not token recognition but institutional power.

This means guaranteeing diaspora voting rights and genuinely upholding dual citizenship. It means creating formal diaspora representation in policymaking, offering diaspora bonds and secure remittance channels, and facilitating return and digital collaboration programmes. It means operationalising the National Diaspora Policy with timelines and accountability, rather than leaving it as a decorative document.

Across Africa, the lesson is clear. Nigeria, Ghana, Somalia and Egypt have recognised that their diasporas are not burdens but assets, central to national survival and growth. Zimbabwe stubbornly refuses to learn this lesson.

The diaspora has already saved Zimbabwe once. It is already governing, already sustaining, already rebuilding from afar. The question is whether Zimbabwe's leaders will continue to indulge in spectacle and sycophancy, or whether they will finally acknowledge the shadow State that has kept the nation alive.

The choice is stark: embrace the diaspora as the engine of renewal, or condemn Zimbabwe to perpetual collapse.