Sapes Trust Online Policy Dialogue Series - What will it take to reach a Settlement in Zimbabwe?

The 31 July 2020 is significant, less for the purported failure of the envisaged demonstrations and more for the extent to which it exposed a securocrat/military state on its last leg; forced to rely on its conventional but unsustainable military / security ideology which dictates that only brute force and coercion can forever keep a restive and discontented population submissive; and with its head of state virtually nominal if not hostage to the military-security establishment that installed him in November 2017, bereft of any socio-political base or legitimacy, and therefore isolated and besieged.

31 July this year was also a poignant reminder of the role of the military-security complex in both the disputed election and the 1st August 2018 massacre of innocent citizens; a military-security complex so aggressively invasive on 31 July this year, as an estimated 100,000 military, police and security personnel were regimented in defiance of a population already intimidated and fearful, not to mention the burden of the vagaries of everyday life ; a collapsed economy and a nonexistent health delivery system.

Therefore, 31 July this year is but a red flag, warning that that the situation in Zimbabwe has reached a new and unsustainable level altogether: the abductions ,torture and assaults of citizens - before, during and after 31st July; the arrest and incarceration of people in crowded and unhygienic conditions that expose the prisoners and their captors alike to the danger of COVID and its spread; and while the regimentation and deployment of virtually the entire army and police to contain peaceful protests demonstrates the fear that the securocrat state has of its own citizens, and in recognition that there in no longer any political trust in the state and government , this also places the security forces themselves at extreme risk of both contracting and spreading COVID-19.

Above all, it is evident that the events around 31st July show that all manner of citizens - black and white male and female, urban and rural - no longer have any faith in this government. Likewise, 31st July this year has quite rightly led to an informational outcry, and reinforced all the views that Zimbabwe is a pariah state.

Accordingly, this Policy Dialogue - on "What will it take to reach a Settlement in Zimbabwe?" - is both timely and appropriate, a week after the events surrounding 31st July, and with the backdrop of the four previous sessions in a Series that is seeking to understand the crisis in Zimbabwe as the bases for its resolution.

We look forward to a discussion that seeks to interrogate and engage the factors - national, regional and international - that are attendant to the Zimbabwe situation and, in doing so, recommend the agenda for the weeks and months ahead, for the resolution of the political and economic crisis in Zimbabwe.

Panellists:
Todd Moss (USA)
Stephen Chan (UK)
Tendai Biti (Zimbabwe)

Discussants:
Muleya Mwananyanda (Zambia)
Tiseke Kasambala (Malawi)
Greg Mills(SA)
Patrick Smith (UK)


Convenor:
Ibbo Mandaza (SAPES Trust)

Moderator:
Violet Gonda (Journalist)