06.09.2006
The tipping point
Under the leadership of John Rees and Alex Callinicos, the International Socialist Tendency has swung violently to the right over the last year or two. That has directly affected the left in Zimbabwe. Here is a country ruled by gangsters, paralysed by successive opposition failures and undergoing a horrendous and seemingly never ending socioeconomic collapse. Despairing at the possibilityof organising a working class-led revolution against the Zanu-PFregime, some are now crudely mimicking the rainbow politics of Respect. Personifying this shift is Briggs Bomba (picture). A year ago he proudly billed himself as the international coordinator of the International Socialist Organisation (the IST's Zimbabwean affiliate). Now he modestly describes himself as "a social justice activist" and calls for what amounts to a popular front
The cruel impact of the country's crisis on the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans can no longer be fully described through terms such as 'rate of inflation', 'percentage unemployment', 'GDP' and so forth. Today one has to talk in terms of the complete dehumanisation and social breakdown that is ripping the nation apart: the breakdown of families, increasing levels of domestic violence, the crime that is getting out of hand and premature deaths and sickness related to the hopeless situation of abject poverty that the majority has been condemned to.
The crisis is now eating away at the very social fabric that defined us as a people. Families can no longer come together even in times of mourning because travelling costs have become prohibitive. So everyone has been condemned to their own lonely space. In the ghettoes, young people whose dreams have been mercilessly shattered are now forced to become beasts preying on each other. Those who would have been engineers and responsible community members are now thugs and prostitutes on the streets gambling with death. So desperate is the situation that thousands of mostly young people are braving the crocodile-infested Limpopo river for perceived greener pastures which mostly turn out to be a dehumanising nightmare.
On the other hand the Mugabe regime is in a state of thoughtless denial, refusing to wake up to the unsustainability of the status quo and childishly hoping that this crisis can be contained through repression. To show how completely removed from reality the regime has become, last week the government splashed hundreds of millions of US dollars on fighter planes and luxury vehicles. This at a time when people are desperate with no medicine in hospitals, food shortages, perennial fuel crisis and company closures due to forex [foreign exchange] shortages. No wonder that some rightly ask if this is a curse worse than Malawi under Banda: rule by an irrational dictator, who lacks even the decency to die on time.
The main question today is how to unlock the current political stalemate and create a tipping point in favour of the masses. It is in this regard that the recent initiatives through the Christian Alliance to unite Zimbabwe's progressive forces in the democratisation and socio-economic transformation struggle must be welcomed as a long overdue move. One cannot over-emphasise the need to regroup progressive forces to a common platform if the democratisation struggle is to move forward.
The Christian Alliance initiative, which resonates with calls that have been coming from a number of quarters, is probably the most important opportunity yet for a united democratic front and all efforts must be made to critically support it. Critical support at this stage is indispensable when one considers the fact that we have had a plethora of 'broad alliance' initiatives that were mostly stillborn.
It should be unnecessary to ask whether a united front is desirable. The undeniable fact in any sincere analysis of the current status of the broad opposition in Zimbabwe today is that no opposition group has the capacity on its own to create a tipping point. A fact needs to be acknowledged that the Movement for Democratic Change is no longer the lion that roared in 1999, when the people broadly endorsed the MDC with the mandate to lead the process of democratisation and socioeconomic crisis. At that point the MDC became the common platform through which everyone in the democratisation struggle ultimately channelled their energies. Unions used the MDC Chinja maitiro slogan at labour forums, and in the student movement back then it became a war cry at our rallies. People used their phones and their time to spread the word about MDC activities and mobilise support, and a lot of groups were even selling cards recruiting people. This built a whirlpool of resistance that handed Mugabe a defeat in the referendum and almost won the 2000 parliamentary elections.
Today's reality represents a completely different scenario. Especially after the 2002 presidential elections there has been a steady withdrawal of movements, organisations and individuals to their own sectoral platforms. The split in the MDC was probably the lowest point along this withdrawal path as the 'spaghetti mix' of 1999 came face to face with contradictions in its ingredients. It is therefore clear that a united front that regroups all progressive forces is critically important in moving forward the democratisation process. A united front built in good faith by all stakeholders has the potential to create a tipping point and unleash another massive wave of resistance that can take down Mugabe through the ballot, the bible, or toyi-toying on the streets. Whichever way.
The biggest crisis of broad alliance politics in Zimbabwe is that most of the times it is not even top to bottom, but just top-level. The grassroots is always left out and the broad alliance ends up being reduced to a meeting of the top leadership of a few organisations. Such a broad alliance obviously is extremely handicapped as a vehicle to advance the transformation agenda. To build a massive wave of resistance you need a mass alliance and therefore the question of mass grassroots engagement is of vital importance. A constant question that must be asked is, where are the people?
So a deliberate process of going back to the masses and consulting on the stalemate itself and the process of moving forward is crucial. A new united front mandate and commitment must be sought from the people through a thorough process of national consultation, which at the same time works to effectively remobilise people. This consultation must be at the scale of the 'Vote no' campaign involving community-based processes and engaging all stakeholders. Such a consultation is different from rallies. In fact it cannot be done at rallies, because you want people to speak, take responsibility and own the process. So this has to be small community and shop-floor-based meetings. Rallies can only be the culmination.
Building a united front now must not be confused with uniting the split factions of the MDC. The only viable united front is one that creates enough space for all progressive forces to make a contribution. And, yes, including those that are in or were in Zanu-PF. This must include all progressive faith-based organisations and the progressive churches, labour, community-based organisations, women's movements and organisations like Women of Zimbabwe Arise, youth organisations, HIV/AIDS groups, residents, cross-border traders, artists, students, social forum constituencies, civic groups, opposition political parties and unaffiliated individuals.
A strong commitment from the leadership in all these sectors to forge an alliance and mobilise their constituencies as part of a united front programme can create the tipping point and tilt the game in favour of the democratic forces. Obviously such a united front can only work on the basis of democratic principles and this is why some have been playing with phrases like United Democratic Front. The progressive church in particular can play a key role in facilitating this regroupment.
Beyond the commitment to forge a united front, the next important thing is the ideological orientation such a formation assumes. Whilst acknowledging the fact that broad-alliance politics by definition ultimately implies compromising on each one's maximum programme to achieve a common denominator, to mobilise the wider masses progressive forces need to reclaim the radical democratic agenda that informed the massive struggles we waged in the 90s, culminating in the formation of the MDC. Whilst terms like 'governance' and 'constitution' are legitimate, the ordinary man and woman on the street interprets the crisis more in terms of its socioeconomic havoc. Thus we must articulate our agenda in terms of questions of hunger, poverty, wages, availability of antiretrovirals, affordable sanitary pads, student grants, water and electricity cut-offs, collapse of municipal services, harassment of cross-border traders and vendors, food shortages, transport costs, price increases, access to land and so on.
This is the language that will resonate with people's day-to-day lives and, together with civil liberties, must form the basis of a People's Charter. But such an agenda for socio-economic transformation cannot be stated in the abstract. The world over, we now know how economic structural adjustment programmes (Esaps) and neoliberalism condemn the vast majority of the people to suffer in conditions of desperate poverty. Thus progressive forces need to make a commitment to an anti-Esap agenda if we are serious in wanting to resolve poverty. This fundamentally means that we must advocate, from this very moment, a people-centred economy.
Lastly there is the question of tactics and strategy. Sometimes you get the sense that people are now begging for talks with Mugabe. Whilst we must welcome anything positive that can come out of talks, we need to know that Mugabe never surrenders anything on a silver platter and has no ears for words like 'please'. So, in order to create a tipping point, there is no option other than rebuilding united, mass resistance, starting with small confidence-rebuilding measures.