Of Shona and British Colonialism

Of Shona Colonialism, British Colonialism and the Need to Defeat Both

The 20th century history of Africa is a history characterized by massive European Colonialism. Europe, then made up of the world's leading powers, sat at the Berlin Conference and there started what we now know as the Scramble for Africa. European powers would fall over each other carving out colonies for themselves in Africa as if the continent was some vast people-less and resource-full wilderness. One of those European powers was Britain, which would carve out for itself much of Southern Africa (if not most of Africa), with one Cecil John Rhodes as its frontman.

Of all the lands that Britain annexed, the piece of real estate between the Limpopo and the Zambezi now called Zimbabwe, seemed the most priced. In it, people of British stock would go on to appropriate to themselves vast swathes of land and disposes the locals, pushing them to arid regions. This would be cast in laws like the Land Apportionment Act and others. The most fertile lands went to man of British stock, who would go on to become filthy rich out of stolen property.

In addition to the land, the British went on to create vast mines and industries built on the cheap labor provided by locals who had been dispossessed of their ancestral land. White only communities, neighborhoods, schools, hospitals, jobs, and even toilets would be created. Racial discrimination became the order of the day. The white man's language, English, became the official language. All business opportunities and jobs of note were reserved for the whites. White controlled media became the only source of news. The white man's culture was propagated as 'THE' culture, in fact as God's very own culture. All that belonged to the black man was evil and to be shunned (and replaced by that which belonged to the white man). The black man who wanted to advance in life essentially had to look like the white man.

Fast-forward to the 21st Century

After almost 100 years of colonial rule and after a bloody war, the black man got his (now hollow) independence in the land now called Zimbabwe. But that independence was to be short-lived. A new breed of black colonialists was born, this time fronted by one Robert Mugabe. Within two years of what was supposed to be independence, Robert Mugabe and his fellow goblins (Tuhwane neTjiKalanga, in my culture that's the most evil thing imaginable) would launch the Gukurahundi Genocide on an innocent people in the region erroneously called "Matebeleland" and the Midlands (land that had been Bukalanga for nearly 2000 years). I have previously estimated that 100,000 people may have been killed in that genocide (I arrived at this figure by estimating that with a rate of kill of 20,000 a year - Gukurahundi had killed 20,000 by 1983 - up to 100,000 may have been killed by 1987). Enormous fear was instilled in our people, innocent women and children raped, bayoneted and brutally murdered, men thrown alive into open mines, homes and whole villages burned down, many a child left orphaned, etc. In fact, the new black colonialists murdered in 5 years more people than the white colonialists ever murdered in about 20 years! How evil, how satanic, how hellish, how Tuhwane-ish!

As if that was not enough, the black colonialists are going on with their hell-engineered plan known as the 1979 Zanu Grand Plan. The plan envisions Zimbabwe as a Shona country. It sees everyone else who is not Shona, especially Zezuru, as a foreign intruding settler. The plan states that all jobs must be set aside for the Shona. All parastatal heads and government departments must be Shona. All banking licenses must be given to the Shona. All educational opportunities must go to the Shona. The people of 'Matebeleland' - Bakalanga, BaNambya, BaSotho, Vhavenda - must be denied education, their languages and cultures must be suppressed, and they must be denied job opportunities. At the apex of the plan is that land must be seized from Bakalanga, BaNambya, BaSotho and Vhavenda (who have been in continuous occupation of the land for nearly 2000 years) and be allocated to the supposedly indigenous Shona (who only arrived in the land now called Zimbabwe 300 years ago and never at any point in history settled in the land erroneously called Matebeleland).

This, fellow Bakalanga, BaNambya, BaSotho, Vhavenda, is the plan being pursued by the goblins (zwituhwane) in the Harare corridors of power. They are the new black colonialists. They practice in Bukalanga/Matebeleland exactly that which the white colonialists practiced. They practice tribal discrimination exactly as the whites practiced racial discrimination. They deny our people job and economic opportunities just as the whites did. They steal our land - the land in which lie the bones of our Fathers - and appropriate it to themselves and their fellow Shonas exactly as the whites stole our land and appropriated it to their kith and kin. They deny us development, looting our resources to develop their own regions. For 34 solid years, they suppressed our languages, and used the so-called Zimbabwe broadcasting corporation to foist their not-so-excellent language down our throats. Such is the treatment that we are receiving from the black Shona colonialists my fellow people.

(And let me make it clear - Shonas, you stand accused of collective guilt. Your silence in the face of evil and benefit from it makes you culpable. Just as the ordinary white person could have said they don't support colonialism and white racial discrimination, yet silently benefited from it, they couldn't escape guilt and culpability. The perpetrator of evil and the silent beneficiary stand guilty together! And make no mistake, majority in number is no guarantee for security!)

All Forms of Colonialism Must be Fought and Defeated

When the heat of British colonialism and white repression became unbearable, the African had to act. First he sought to negotiate his way to freedom, but as that bore no tangible result, his only option was to take up arms. Indeed, as Wole Soyinka has said, the color of the leg wearing the boot of oppression doesn't matter, oppression is oppression and it must be fought, and sometimes by ALL lawful means.

People of Bukalanga, I ask you: till when? Till when will we be denied development? Till when will we be denied jobs in the Land of our Fathers? Till when will we be denied educational opportunities in colleges and nursing schools right in our communities? Till when will Shona people come and invade farms in our regions - farms in which lie the bones of our Fathers which were originally stolen by the white colonialists - and we do nothing about it? Till when will the Shona language be foisted down our throats via the Zanu Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) and the Shona Civil (or evil) Servants? Till when will borders in our regions be staffed with Shonas when ours are jobless and we do nothing about? Till when will our infant children in primary schools be taught by Shona teachers who do not speak nor understand our languages? Till when will all government departments in our areas be led by Shonas who have no interest in the development of our areas? Till when will the Civil Service Commission and other departments be staffed by Shonas who deny our people jobs and hire fellow Shonas and we keep quiet? What's their interest in our regions in the first place except being spies and fronts of the Gukurahundist colonial system planted to ensure no development takes place in our areas and jobs go to fellow Shonas?

Till when will we live in fear? Till when will we be cowed by the accusation that we are tribalists when we complain about issues affecting us? Till when will we see jobs in Victoria Falls going to foreign Shonas at the expense of the local BaNambya and BaTonga? Till when will we allow foreign Shonas to take up all jobs at the Beitbridge and Plumtree border posts at the expense of the local and indigenous Bakalanga and Vhavenda? Till when will we be terrorized by corrupt Shona-speaking (occupational force) police officers and we keep quiet? Will we continue to do nothing, or will we take action to free ourselves, govern ourselves and determine our own destiny?

Now is the Time to Act!

Fellow Bakalanga, BaNambya, BaSotho and Vhavenda, now is the time to act. As the HIV/AIDS advert goes, it begins with you. The Civil Rights Movement in the US caught fire when a woman name Rosa Parks refused to give up a bus seat to a white person. The anti-apartheid movement gained momentum when the black South African refused to carry passes around and to be choked with the Afrikaans language. I ask you, what will you do? Keep quiet and live like a slave, or speak up and obtain your freedom? I am not calling on us to take up arms of war (although experience elsewhere shows us that's inevitable for an oppressed people), I am asking you to take action. Refuse to speak the Shona language in your own area. Refuse to be bossed around. Communities, mobilise against Shona teachers teaching infant children in our schools. Communities, mobilize and demand our ancestral land back (a Shona settler is no different from a white settler, they are both settlers and thieves!) Let us educate ourselves more where opportunity arises. Pay no bribe to no corrupt Shona police officer or civil servant. Demand your rights. Stand up and fight for yourself.

Let us vote as a block for our own and for our interests. Let us not be afraid to mobilize and build our own regional party, that's the only way to make sure devolution (or better still federalism, if not total independence) works for us. Trust no Shona politician, trust your own. Yes, I mean it, it doesn't matter which party they belong to, Shona politicans generally subscribe to the Grand Plan and support Shona colonialism nomatter how much they pretend to care about victims of the Gukurahundi Genocide. They remain Gukurahundists!

Now is the time to act! Now is not the time to whimper like kittens whilst doing nothing. The time has come. The old goblin is nearing its end. The colonialists are getting divided. As we look to the next election, let us remember to stand together, fight together, soldier together, trust only our own, and vote for our own. Ngatisitihhile kummele setjinudzana tjisinamayi!

The battle lines are drawn and open. Let us take it as a badge of honor to be called tribalists. In fact, if you're not a tribalist your allegiance to Bukalanga/Matebeleland is questionable. We have been abused, oppressed, repressed and suppressed for too long to keep asslicking our enemies. Now is the time to act.

Yes, they will call it hatred, but we know who the real haters are - them Shona colonialists. They will call us discriminatory, but we know who has discriminated against us for the last 34 years. They will call us all sorts of things, but all that matters for nothing. What matters is our freedom, self-government and self-determination. They will even call us instigators of violence, but we know they to be the violent Gukurahundists who are oppressing us and murdered up to a 100,000 of our people and drove millions more into exile. They will call us divisive, but we know how they have already divided the country by their colonialist Gukurahundist policies and actions.

Now is the time to act without fear or favor. In the words of JFK, let us let them know that whether they wish us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty. Let us let them know that we do not shrink from the responsibility of defending freedom from its hour of maximum danger, we welcome it. Freedom has never been given on a silver platter, it has to be fought for, it has to be taken.

The Shona (inasmuch as there are lovely and reasonable Shonas out there), is generally a Gukurahundist, especially the political Shona. If they cared about us, they would have spoken out against their fellow Gukurahundists' deeds, but alas, they only remember us and our sufferings only in election years. Now is the time to put our interests first and make it clear to the political Shona, we will not accept your Gukurahundist ways. And for that we will not apologize! Now is not the time for niceties over sweet nothings. Now is the time to defend freedom, democracy, peace, progress and development, and that means defeating all forms of colonialism, black or white, British or Shona. Indeed, now is the time to say, in their own language, Bukalanga/Matebeleland shall never be a colony again. And the invitation must be sent to the progressive and reasonable Shona to say the same, otherwise we hold you culpable and equally guilty. And remember, your supposed majority is no guarantee for perpetual rule, safety and security. TjiKalanga tjoti dzake dzili njizi dzabe wwobana. Dzingabe njizi nasi koga dzowobe wwobana limwe hhuba lisikule.