Opinion / Columnist
What does Mnangagwa call a 'brutal colonial regime' when the ZANU-PF government is even more brutal?
11 hrs ago | Views
It's often easy for the pot to accuse the kettle of being black.
I am always left bewildered whenever I hear President Emmerson Mnangagwa express outrage at what he calls ‘the brutal colonial regime,' as if brutality is something he truly finds abhorrent.
To directly receive articles from Tendai Ruben Mbofana, please join his WhatsApp Channel on: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaqprWCIyPtRnKpkHe08
He utters those words with such conviction and fury, as though brutality is something he detests with every fibre of his being.
Each time, I find myself pausing and asking: So, this man actually knows what brutality is - and that it is reprehensible?
If so, then why does his own government embody and perpetuate the very same brutality he so vehemently condemns?
One would be forgiven for believing that Mnangagwa, through his frequent rebuke of colonial repression, understands that brutality against citizens is morally indefensible.
Yet, since independence, Zimbabweans have endured cycles of state-sponsored atrocities, violent repression, arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, and economic decay - patterns that have persisted across successive leaders, who claim to have liberated the nation.
The post-independence government, under ZANU-PF, has been responsible for some of the most horrifying atrocities against the people it supposedly freed from colonial rule.
We do not even need to look too far into history.
The Gukurahundi massacres of the early 1980s remain one of the darkest chapters in Zimbabwe's post-independence era.
More than 20,000 civilians - mostly from the Ndebele ethnic group - were brutally murdered in Matabeleland and the Midlands provinces under the guise of eliminating dissidents.
It was an ethnic cleansing operation that bore the full endorsement of the government, and tragically, Emmerson Mnangagwa was not a passive bystander during that time.
Fast-forward to the 2000s, and we see a continuation of this violent trajectory.
Hundreds of opposition supporters were killed for merely daring to vote against the ruling party.
The 2008 presidential elections saw a wave of politically motivated killings, torture, and displacement of citizens after then-President Robert Mugabe lost the first round of elections to opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
State brutality in Zimbabwe has not only involved killings but also enforced disappearances.
A chilling example is Itai Dzamara, a journalist and activist who was abducted in broad daylight in 2015 while peacefully calling for Mugabe's resignation and has never been seen since.
Dzamara is not alone - others like human rights defender Paul Chizuze and MDC election agent Patrick Nabanyama have also vanished without a trace, revealing a pattern of the state erasing dissenters from history.
That same ruthless machinery remained intact and active even after Mnangagwa took over in November 2017.
In fact, brutality has not only continued under Mnangagwa's administration - it has become more systematic and entrenched.
Barely nine months into his presidency, Zimbabweans watched in horror as soldiers gunned down unarmed civilians protesting alleged election fraud on 1 August 2018.
Six people were shot dead in cold blood on the streets of Harare.
Shockingly, the killings were carried out in broad daylight, in full view of local and international observers, journalists, and the cameras of the world.
The message was clear: Mnangagwa's "new dispensation" would be no different - perhaps even worse - than Mugabe's reign.
Only five months later, in January 2019, security forces again unleashed a brutal crackdown on citizens who took to the streets to protest a dramatic fuel price hike.
At least 17 people were reportedly killed, with many others injured, arrested, and allegedly raped by security forces.
These were ordinary Zimbabweans, expressing their frustration over the unbearable cost of living.
Yet the response from the state was one of indiscriminate violence - disproportionate, cruel, and chilling.
The brutalisation of Zimbabweans has also taken more insidious forms.
Journalists, activists, and opposition leaders continue to be criminalised and targeted for persecution.
The case of Job Sikhala stands out as a glaring example of judicial repression.
Surely, why did he spend 595 days behind bars for crimes the state clearly knew he never committed - especially when his subsequent convictions and sentences were overturned by a higher court on appeal - yet he was repeatedly denied his constitutional right to bail and left to languish in pre-conviction detention?
In fact, one of the charges on which Sikhala was convicted no longer existed in the country's statute books.
He had been charged under Section 31 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, which dealt with publishing or communicating falsehoods prejudicial to the State - a provision that had been declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court in the 2014 case of Chimakure and Others v Attorney General.
Jacob Ngarivhume, another opposition figure, was sentenced to two years in prison for allegedly inciting public violence - charges that were later dismissed on appeal due to lack of prima facie evidence.
By the time of his release, he had already spent over eight months in jail.
Journalist Blessed Mhlanga was arrested earlier this year simply for interviewing Blessed Geza, a war veteran and former ZANU-PF Central Committee member who publicly called for President Mnangagwa's resignation.
Despite simply doing his job, Mhlanga was held in remand prison for 73 days and repeatedly denied bail.
Even satire is no longer safe in Zimbabwe.
Faith Zaba, editor of The Zimbabwe Independent, was recently arrested over a satirical article ridiculing President Mnangagwa that appeared in her newspaper.
The fact that a government would arrest a journalist for publishing satire speaks volumes about how far we have descended into autocracy.
This is not democracy.
It is state-sponsored fear and control.
But the brutality of Mnangagwa's regime is not confined to political violence alone.
It is evident in the everyday suffering of millions of Zimbabweans whose basic rights are trampled underfoot by the government's neglect and corruption.
Is it not brutality when thousands of Zimbabweans die due to the absence of cancer treatment machines, when women lose their lives giving birth in unsanitary hospitals, and when many more perish in facilities lacking even the most basic medical supplies?
In 2023 alone, more than 26% of children under the age of five in Zimbabwe suffered from stunting - a clear sign of chronic malnutrition.
This is not due to natural disasters or war.
It is the direct consequence of policy failure, mismanagement, and looting.
Zimbabwe is not a poor country by any means.
We are home to Africa's largest lithium reserves, the second-largest platinum deposits globally, vast diamond fields, and significant gold resources.
And yet, over 80% of our population lives in poverty - struggling each day to afford basic necessities such as food, shelter, healthcare, and education.
Why?
Because our national wealth is siphoned off through corrupt procurement deals, smuggling, illicit financial flows, and cronyism - enriching a small clique connected to power - while the majority of citizens are left to starve, suffer, and struggle for survival.
Transparency International gave Zimbabwe a dismal score of 21 out of 100 in its 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index - the worst in southern Africa.
This isn't just about stolen money.
It is about the destroyed lives that result from this grand theft.
It is about schools without books, hospitals without drugs, and homes without food.
That is also brutality.
It may not always be televised or bloody, but it is just as deadly.
So, when Mnangagwa stands before the nation and the world, condemning the "brutal colonial regime" of Ian Smith, I find myself asking - does he not see the irony?
Does he not realise that his own regime has subjected Zimbabweans to even greater suffering, even more sustained repression, than what many experienced under colonial rule?
That some might even say the average Zimbabwean today is poorer, less free, and more traumatised than they were four decades ago?
To denounce the brutality of colonialism while presiding over a regime that jails journalists, kills protestors, and plunges millions to poverty - is not only hypocritical, but deeply insulting to the intelligence and dignity of the Zimbabwean people.
Brutality does not become less brutal simply because it wears a black face or dons a national flag.
If Mnangagwa truly believes that brutality is wrong, he must look into the mirror and ask himself whether his government is any different from the one he so often condemns.
For millions of Zimbabweans, the answer is tragically clear.
© Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to WhatsApp or Call: +263715667700 | +263782283975, or email: mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com, or visit website: https://mbofanatendairuben.news.blog/
I am always left bewildered whenever I hear President Emmerson Mnangagwa express outrage at what he calls ‘the brutal colonial regime,' as if brutality is something he truly finds abhorrent.
To directly receive articles from Tendai Ruben Mbofana, please join his WhatsApp Channel on: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaqprWCIyPtRnKpkHe08
He utters those words with such conviction and fury, as though brutality is something he detests with every fibre of his being.
Each time, I find myself pausing and asking: So, this man actually knows what brutality is - and that it is reprehensible?
If so, then why does his own government embody and perpetuate the very same brutality he so vehemently condemns?
One would be forgiven for believing that Mnangagwa, through his frequent rebuke of colonial repression, understands that brutality against citizens is morally indefensible.
Yet, since independence, Zimbabweans have endured cycles of state-sponsored atrocities, violent repression, arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, and economic decay - patterns that have persisted across successive leaders, who claim to have liberated the nation.
The post-independence government, under ZANU-PF, has been responsible for some of the most horrifying atrocities against the people it supposedly freed from colonial rule.
We do not even need to look too far into history.
The Gukurahundi massacres of the early 1980s remain one of the darkest chapters in Zimbabwe's post-independence era.
More than 20,000 civilians - mostly from the Ndebele ethnic group - were brutally murdered in Matabeleland and the Midlands provinces under the guise of eliminating dissidents.
It was an ethnic cleansing operation that bore the full endorsement of the government, and tragically, Emmerson Mnangagwa was not a passive bystander during that time.
Fast-forward to the 2000s, and we see a continuation of this violent trajectory.
Hundreds of opposition supporters were killed for merely daring to vote against the ruling party.
The 2008 presidential elections saw a wave of politically motivated killings, torture, and displacement of citizens after then-President Robert Mugabe lost the first round of elections to opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
State brutality in Zimbabwe has not only involved killings but also enforced disappearances.
A chilling example is Itai Dzamara, a journalist and activist who was abducted in broad daylight in 2015 while peacefully calling for Mugabe's resignation and has never been seen since.
Dzamara is not alone - others like human rights defender Paul Chizuze and MDC election agent Patrick Nabanyama have also vanished without a trace, revealing a pattern of the state erasing dissenters from history.
That same ruthless machinery remained intact and active even after Mnangagwa took over in November 2017.
In fact, brutality has not only continued under Mnangagwa's administration - it has become more systematic and entrenched.
Barely nine months into his presidency, Zimbabweans watched in horror as soldiers gunned down unarmed civilians protesting alleged election fraud on 1 August 2018.
Six people were shot dead in cold blood on the streets of Harare.
Shockingly, the killings were carried out in broad daylight, in full view of local and international observers, journalists, and the cameras of the world.
The message was clear: Mnangagwa's "new dispensation" would be no different - perhaps even worse - than Mugabe's reign.
Only five months later, in January 2019, security forces again unleashed a brutal crackdown on citizens who took to the streets to protest a dramatic fuel price hike.
At least 17 people were reportedly killed, with many others injured, arrested, and allegedly raped by security forces.
These were ordinary Zimbabweans, expressing their frustration over the unbearable cost of living.
Yet the response from the state was one of indiscriminate violence - disproportionate, cruel, and chilling.
The brutalisation of Zimbabweans has also taken more insidious forms.
Journalists, activists, and opposition leaders continue to be criminalised and targeted for persecution.
The case of Job Sikhala stands out as a glaring example of judicial repression.
Surely, why did he spend 595 days behind bars for crimes the state clearly knew he never committed - especially when his subsequent convictions and sentences were overturned by a higher court on appeal - yet he was repeatedly denied his constitutional right to bail and left to languish in pre-conviction detention?
In fact, one of the charges on which Sikhala was convicted no longer existed in the country's statute books.
He had been charged under Section 31 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, which dealt with publishing or communicating falsehoods prejudicial to the State - a provision that had been declared unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court in the 2014 case of Chimakure and Others v Attorney General.
Jacob Ngarivhume, another opposition figure, was sentenced to two years in prison for allegedly inciting public violence - charges that were later dismissed on appeal due to lack of prima facie evidence.
By the time of his release, he had already spent over eight months in jail.
Journalist Blessed Mhlanga was arrested earlier this year simply for interviewing Blessed Geza, a war veteran and former ZANU-PF Central Committee member who publicly called for President Mnangagwa's resignation.
Despite simply doing his job, Mhlanga was held in remand prison for 73 days and repeatedly denied bail.
Even satire is no longer safe in Zimbabwe.
Faith Zaba, editor of The Zimbabwe Independent, was recently arrested over a satirical article ridiculing President Mnangagwa that appeared in her newspaper.
The fact that a government would arrest a journalist for publishing satire speaks volumes about how far we have descended into autocracy.
This is not democracy.
It is state-sponsored fear and control.
But the brutality of Mnangagwa's regime is not confined to political violence alone.
It is evident in the everyday suffering of millions of Zimbabweans whose basic rights are trampled underfoot by the government's neglect and corruption.
Is it not brutality when thousands of Zimbabweans die due to the absence of cancer treatment machines, when women lose their lives giving birth in unsanitary hospitals, and when many more perish in facilities lacking even the most basic medical supplies?
In 2023 alone, more than 26% of children under the age of five in Zimbabwe suffered from stunting - a clear sign of chronic malnutrition.
This is not due to natural disasters or war.
It is the direct consequence of policy failure, mismanagement, and looting.
Zimbabwe is not a poor country by any means.
We are home to Africa's largest lithium reserves, the second-largest platinum deposits globally, vast diamond fields, and significant gold resources.
And yet, over 80% of our population lives in poverty - struggling each day to afford basic necessities such as food, shelter, healthcare, and education.
Why?
Because our national wealth is siphoned off through corrupt procurement deals, smuggling, illicit financial flows, and cronyism - enriching a small clique connected to power - while the majority of citizens are left to starve, suffer, and struggle for survival.
Transparency International gave Zimbabwe a dismal score of 21 out of 100 in its 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index - the worst in southern Africa.
This isn't just about stolen money.
It is about the destroyed lives that result from this grand theft.
It is about schools without books, hospitals without drugs, and homes without food.
That is also brutality.
It may not always be televised or bloody, but it is just as deadly.
So, when Mnangagwa stands before the nation and the world, condemning the "brutal colonial regime" of Ian Smith, I find myself asking - does he not see the irony?
Does he not realise that his own regime has subjected Zimbabweans to even greater suffering, even more sustained repression, than what many experienced under colonial rule?
That some might even say the average Zimbabwean today is poorer, less free, and more traumatised than they were four decades ago?
To denounce the brutality of colonialism while presiding over a regime that jails journalists, kills protestors, and plunges millions to poverty - is not only hypocritical, but deeply insulting to the intelligence and dignity of the Zimbabwean people.
Brutality does not become less brutal simply because it wears a black face or dons a national flag.
If Mnangagwa truly believes that brutality is wrong, he must look into the mirror and ask himself whether his government is any different from the one he so often condemns.
For millions of Zimbabweans, the answer is tragically clear.
© Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to WhatsApp or Call: +263715667700 | +263782283975, or email: mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com, or visit website: https://mbofanatendairuben.news.blog/
Source - Tendai Ruben Mbofana
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