THE issue of the interference of the security sector into politics which is not only symbolized by unprofessional political utterances and declarations by heads of security sectors of the country but also by the physical intervention of regular and non-regular forces including green bombers and war veterans in various acts of violation of human rights, has ignited animated debates on security sector reform in Zimbabwe.
Now that the employment contracts of some of key members of security sector including that of the police commissioner are up for renewal, the debate on security sector reform has intensified but in a wrong direction. The reduction of the debate on security sector reform to issues of retiring some individuals and/or not renewing their contracts is wrong-headed and misses the bigger problem.
Of course, among heads of various security organs of the state of Zimbabwe, there are individual variations in terms of levels of enthusiasms for interference in the political direction of the country and culpability in human rights violations. But the elephant in the house is not particular individuals manning the security sector. It is actually to do with the cultures and traditions inculcated into postcolonial armies, police forces and other security officers including the central intelligence organisation and prison officers.
The key question which needs to be answered not only with regard to Zimbabwe’s security sector but for the whole of postcolonial Africa is what are the roots of predatory security sectors? Are they traceable to pre-colonial warrior traditions? Are they rooted in colonial traditions of conquest and pacifications? Do they emerge from nationalist struggles for liberation? Are they a postcolonial invention?
Having studied African history, I can say with certainty that pre-colonial societies were characterised by cordial civil-military relations. The military emerged directly from civil society to carryout national military duties only to return to civil society after accomplishment of military assignments. There are no recorded cases of pre-colonial militaries engaging in terrorizing society on behalf of a particular king or chief. Secret service existed to predict external threats not to keep society in perpetual fear of being spied on by other members of the same society.
Dark glasses were not yet invented. Barracks which kept soldiers away from society and became nurseries of military cultures separate from those of mainstream society were rare. Even King Shaka of the Zulus who is said to have quartered young men in barracks of set age groups (amabutho), this was just a temporary set-up meant to create a particular camaraderie and national identity among youths drawn from various social backgrounds.
Amabutho remained an important cog of society playing a fundamental role in reproducing national identity and cooperative work spirit on behalf of the nation. Amabutho were never nurtured into a special human species in possession of instruments of coercion ready to discipline the society from which they came from. This way, the pitfalls of militarism and adventurism were avoided by our pre-colonial progenitors.
But when it comes to colonial period the story of security services becomes different. Colonial militaries did not emerge from African societies. They were a collection of rag-tag white people desperate for militarism and adventurism as well as primitive accumulation of wealth. The earliest layer of colonial militaries consisted of a coterie of poor white men who were promised land, mines and other material benefits if they violently conquered African societies.
The case in point is that of the Pioneer Column that was put together by the imperialist Cecil John Rhodes and the British South Africa Company (BSACo) to colonise the lands lying between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers in the 1890s. There was no pretence that colonial security sectors were impositions on society. The relationship between the colonial security sector and African societies was that of domination, repression and violence. Colonial security sector was a guardian of white society and oppressor of black society.
The black society was a perpetual ‘other’ that needed to be put under perpetual surveillance. Constant threats of violence were issued to keep black society under a cloud of terror and fear. Colonial security sector was predatory on black society. Under colonialism it became an offence for African people to seek to support a black leader of their choice. The notion of black leadership was itself criminalized. Any black person who aspired to lead black people was deemed a trouble-maker and his/her rightful place was either prison or detention or restriction camp.
The mind boggling question is how far has our postcolonial military sector imbibed this distasteful relationship with the black people? The liberation struggle was predicated on creation of a people’s state and a people’s security sector. The officers manning the postcolonial security sector were expected to emerge directly from the African society to service the interest of the African people. This became the ideal and not the reality.
The young men and women, who scarified their lives to liberate the country from colonial rule, were organised into forces with people-oriented nomenclature for example Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA), Zimbabwe National Liberation Army (ZANLA) and Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA). From a close look at these names one can easily detect an emphasis on the connections between the armies and the people.
But during the course of the liberation struggle itself incidents of coercion and violence began to spoil the ideal. Of course, exigencies of fighting guerrilla warfare dictated some of the actions which tended to spoil civil-military relations. For example, the reality of existence of sell-outs made it difficult for liberation armies to just maintain cordial relations with members of society that endangered their lives and mission.
But revolutionaries like Amilcar Cabral who led the PAIGC until his assassination by Portuguese imperialists, already detected the pitfalls of militarism and adventurism cascading from the realities of fighting liberation wars. He consistently highlighted the primacy of the political over the military, emphasizing that the political organization led the struggle in the military, civilian, political, administrative and technical spheres. He defined the fighters as armed activists (people in arms) who were not a special species in the struggle. But despite these attempts to subordinate armed activists to civilian-political leadership and civil activists the glamour of the gun always spoiled the civil-military relations.
The history of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle is littered with dualities and clashes between old-guard civilian nationalist leadership and young cadres who had undergone military training and had field experience in the theatres of war. Throughout the liberation struggles the tensions between civilian leadership and armed militants continued and spilled over to the postcolonial period.
In a country like Zimbabwe whose army is still headed at the top levels by former liberation fighters, this duality has continued with deep and serious consequences particularly for those civilian leaders considered to be without war credentials. It’s a pity that liberation credentials have been elevated to a qualification for leadership. This thinking has fed into dangerous conceptions of political power as a straight-jacket fitting only those considered to have war credentials even in clear instances that majorities of such people have degenerated into looters and a selfish cabal that is undermining national interests.
An opportunity was lost in 1980 to build a truly people’s army out of ex-freedom fighters who had already lived among the people for years. What became known as professionalisation of the Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) that was outsourced to the British officers contributed to the missing of an opportunity.
The strong links that both ZIPRA and ZANLA had created and cultivated with the rural society even made those who planned to abuse armed young men to solve political competition for power between PF Zapu and Zanu PF to prefer to create a typical postcolonial military outfit known as the Fifth Brigade (Gukurahundi), specially trained by the notorious North Korean military officers in martial and other arts of dealing violently with citizens on behalf of a particular political party. Indeed an opportunity was missed and the nation is today paying dearly for this.
What was expected to be a people’s army was systematically turned into a predatory and partisan force by selfish political elites who wanted to be the alpha and omega leadership of the country. Ironically, that same leadership is now hostage to the monster they created. Hard thinking is needed by the collectivity of the Zimbabwean leadership across political party lines to re-imagine and rethink the type of security sector that the nation needs.
No Zimbabwean wants to live in perpetual hostage and fear of the security sector. A security sector is indispensable for any country, but what type of security sector has the post-colony created is the main challenge? A security sector modeled on colonial lines will always be predatory and hard to subordinate to the civilian governments. What is needed is to rethink the values, cultures and traditions inculcated on our security sector as we try to liberate ourselves from the monsters we deliberately created over the years.
Professor Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni teaches in the Department of Development Studies at the University of South Africa (UNISA)