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Interview: Misihairabwi, Matshe, Williams and Holland
THIS is the final part of an SW Radio interview for the Hot Seat programme featuring former NCA chairperson Thoko Matshe, WOZA coordinator Jenni Williams and MDC officials Priscilla Misihairabwi, MP and Sekai Holland
Broadcast on 12 September 2006
Violet: Welcome to the final segment of the teleconference discussion with Sekai Holland from the Tsvangirai MDC; Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga from the Mutambara MDC; WOZA coordinator Jenni Williams and women activist Thoko Matshe.
Last week we ended the discussion on the issue of whether the feminists/intellectual agenda is relevant to the daily existence of people in Zimbabwe at present. Jenni Williams said the suffering is so great that Zimbabweans, mostly women, aren’t really interested in great intellectual discourse and they don’t really want to know what a feminist is. She said they just want to demand a socially just Zimbabwe.
I then asked Thoko Matshe to comment
Thoko Matshe: I do agree with that statement that says unless and until some intellectuals and feminists come and rub shoulders with people. I am a feminist and I rub shoulders with people on the ground all the time and I struggle all the time. Brian Raftopoulos is an intellectual, and he has worked tirelessly up to a point that he has had to leave the country and choose to live elsewhere because for him to continue to struggle and do certain things with his family, it’s not happening. So, it’s not about what the different naming because as people in this society we are different people doing different things. And also, for me, I don’t want to be defined by the outside and what they think the reality in Zimbabwe should be, because, people tell you ‘they did this in Congo, they did this there’.
The Zimbabwean situation has got certain things that are peculiar to this country as much as there are things that are common for other struggles. The re-defining of mass action, we might have to tell people what, in our context, is what we mean by mass action, kind of thing. And, I do agree when people are saying that people are doing things in their various ways and it’s not everybody who will be visible, that does not mean that they are not doing things, and, it’s different things that have got to be done at different times, OK? Some of us were there on the 1st April 2000; that demonstration, the last demonstration that we did in this country with a certain level of organisation and doing, when we had those people coming with pangas at us. And, that has informed also what then people are saying about mass action, about resistance, because our resistance and our courage has got to be strategic to the enemy that is coming.
Violet: So Thoko, is unity an absolute pre-condition for mass action or civil disobedience?
Thoko: Unity with a commonality. I don’t believe in unity where people talk about unity in words and, as Sekai said, there are initiatives and there are co-ordinations that are starting that are building up and I’m sure those coming together are on certain principles and values and shared strategies, OK. That is what will work. The unity cannot be in a vacuum. There should be certain shared values, shared visions, shared focus that will push. And, I do agree, the opposition forces in their broad spectrum and those that are within the struggle to push for change, they are a big number and chunk to have unity of purpose.
Violet: Mai Holland?
Sekai: I think we need to understand that as well, and I have to keep going back to the great debate. In Zimbabwe, who is an intellectual, what is an intellectual is very greatly misunderstood. Intellectuals reflect what’s going on in their society and intellectuals who are really intellectuals do reflect this reality in its diversity and depth and it is from that event which takes place with people whose practice produces that intellectual focus. Where the unity in that produces political, social unity, which then produces the answers that we need to get our economic theme right.
I’m just saying that I’m sorry to hear that Brian Raftopoulos has had to leave Zimbabwe, but as he leaves there are others who are coming up in Zimbabwe to carry the theme forward. Zimbabwe is a very rich country with every sector of what is going elsewhere in the world with a very sophisticated public. We are going through a historical period where we are organising ourselves to get things right, and, I think that I appreciate this programme today because foundations are being set up for people to really start debating together, and, it’s through that debate that ideas that are out there get drawn in for people to see the actions they are doing in a more focused way which takes us forward.
Violet: Ok and I want to go back to Priscilla. Are you there Priscilla? I always have to check on you because of your phone.
Priscilla: I am here.
Violet: Ok, sorry to go back to this issue because I just need some clarification and it’s important what Amai Holland has said that it’s good to have this kind of debate so people can work on finding ways of resolving this crisis. But do you agree that there needs to be a united force and that force is no longer there in Zimbabwe right now? You know people are looking for role models but all groups are split, in their homes, in the newsrooms, in the communities, in the opposition, in civic society. Is there a uniting force that can say let’s do this right now?
Priscilla: Well certainly, and perhaps some of us do not want to harp on negativity. You know the split within the MDC, one cannot underplay it, one cannot underplay that it has had an impact in terms of the things that the progressive forces would be doing or should be doing or what was expected of them. But, I think what is important is that we should get to a stage where people understand that it’s not just about people being under the same roof, it’s about strategy and it’s about admitting and saying at this particular point in time we may want to do that strategy or that strategy.
You do not necessarily; all of you have to be called Karamba or Thokozani: you can be called in your different names; I can be Priscilla, I can be Thoko, I can be Sekai, but still work around a united process and a united front. We saw it happening in South Africa when they had the UDF, all these different institutions did not necessarily need to be in one particular place. The ANC did something else, PAC did something else, the other groups were doing other things, the Churches were involved, the Desmond Tutus were doing different things but they had a kind of consensus and agreement and I think it is important to acknowledge that particular discussion and debate is indeed taking place and that there is an agreement that we need to have an organised strategy, an agreed strategy, but still remain in our spaces doing the kind of things that we are supposed to do.
So even unity needs to be understood; it’s not unity about people being under the same roof – it’s unity around principles, around values, around strategies. So, that we are not just being united for the sake of being united; we are united for purpose, for values, for a particular vision. We want to see a different kind of Zimbabwe and I think that is what we are working towards and I think that is what is actually going on. Like I said, agreed, we have gone through a crisis, where some of the differences that have taken place in the progressive movement have had an impact in terms of the energy and images that we should apply.
Violet: And Thoko, you know, some say there is a need for a new coalition or a new broad alliance. What kind of a new coalition do you think needs to emerge right now in Zimbabwe?
Thoko: I think if I were to buy in that I would say that coalition should take the different struggling points and focuses into that coalition. I would say it would be the opposition political parties, it will be the different movements; the women’s movement, the constitutional movement – which will be the NCA, it will be the legal guys and things like that. So, if I were to summarise it I would say it would be civil society as defined without the political parties in it, and the Churches, sorry, the Churches is a big chunk.
Violet: Did you say without the political parties in it?
Thoko: I mean if I were to say civil society because sometimes people define civil society and say political parties are not in civil society, and then I would say civil society in its entirety including Churches and the opposition political parties. That’s the coalition that involves everyone who is struggling.
Violet: Do you agree Amai Holland?
Sekai: Well, I wanted to respond to Priscilla and now Thoko is raising that point. I really find the word ‘split’ in our media language very worrisome. In a family, in a political party when certain people in a group say now ‘we want to go and do something else’, I think people should really learn that democracy is about accepting diversity, about accepting difference, about people really growing up to set themselves in new ways and new growths reflecting the same desire for positive change for society. So, the thing which has happened in MDC, myself, personally, is something that has happened in the male domain, in patriarchy, because I still don’t know what is the wider division occurring, and, I see it as very healthy because people have gone their separate ways and people are moving in their separate ways with their programmes and there is nobody who is worrying about ‘why did so-and-so go there’; except the men. So for me the word ‘split’ I find very, very worrisome because growth taking place is positive growth in the quest for democracy in Zimbabwe.
The second point I wanted to make is this; that the unity that comes cannot be discussed on this programme or among leaders, it’s something that really in Zimbabwe comes from people going through processes of consultation, consensus, consensus-building, and I think that process has been taking place now in the past six years when people finally responded to the crisis by agreeing that they need to come together.
So I think it’s a nation wide thing that will happen and it is happening, and I think we need to really appreciate the importance of us talking together and seeing where we are doing our things and allowing each other the space to do those things, so that, in front, up there in time, we are going to come together with one concrete thing. Zimbabweans have every element of what we need to build something much better than what we went to fight for in the war. Much, much better than anything happening elsewhere in Africa. This is not a theory, this is something that Zimbabweans have done which they are capable of doing, which I believe, in our different places and situations, we are working towards.
Priscilla: I need to respond to what Amai Holland has just said. I think it’s important to acknowledge the fact that there has been a split in the MDC, there has been a division on issues of principles and of values and the more we can accept that fact, the better we can move forward. I think it is unfortunate to say that division is within the male domain…
Sekai: For me it is!
Priscilla: We may have political differences that are largely patriarchal but it’s actually about principles and about values, and some of us still believe we are women, unless something has changed along the way. I think there are a majority of women both, in the grassroots, both in the leadership where that split has taken place. I don’t think the debate should be about who is wrong who is right –I think we may have another debate about that but it’s important to acknowledge the fact that there has been a split in the MDC and that that split has had an impact in terms of the democratic movement in this country, it is important, that split actually happened.
Sekai: Well, I want to differ with that, very much!
Jenni Williams: But you see, for me, the issue here is there is too much pre-occupation with power and positions, and too little time taken to speak to people and their problems and motivate them to demand a better Zimbabwe. And, therein lies the problem. If we look at the last second or two minutes of this discussion here, it’s about the split in the MDC when it actually should be about people and mobilising them to take their power.
Sekai:
People are still mobilising and they are not talking about the split,
they never did, it’s in the media.
Someone laughs
Violet: But isn’t this what Priscilla is actually saying that it is important to talk about the split because it did actually happen.
Sekai: But we need a different programme for that, the programme today was about mass action and women. We can have another programme on the split.
Violet: Yes I think it’s very important
Thoko: can I just say something…?
Violet: Before you do Thoko, I think it’s very important that we actually have another programme to talk about this split. I can see that we will not move on until and unless we have dealt with this problem, so hopefully…
Jenni: Please excuse me from that programme because I think I am not interested in factions. I’m interested in people and their problems and mobilising them for a new Zimbabwe and somewhere along the way we’ll find how to make that political change a reality.
Priscilla: I think everybody is interested in the problems of the country…
Thoko? I think that when the MDC was formed in 1999 it changed with other things that were happening there. It changed drastically the politics of this country, and it gave courage to people who for twenty, was it twenty, or twenty-five years had been suffering silently. When the split happened it affected the energies of the opposition forces in this country, and that split did not just happen within the opposition political party. It has caused all sorts of splintering within civil society.
Priscilla (in the background): Oh yes!
Thoko: And that’s why in everything that we are doing we have what Sekai says - we are moving towards coordinating. So I am hoping that in that moving towards doing things together and unity, we have re-covered, we have picked up ourselves, we have picked up the energies that are there. The split in a way - politics is politics and people differ - is healthy, we don’t want a one party state…
Sekai (in the background): Thank you! Thank you.
Thoko: And why we are struggling is that we don’t want a one party state…
Sekai: Exactly!
Thoko: … and what I would say personally to my friends in the different factions is let’s get on with it. OK…
Sekai: We are getting on with it…
Thoko: We organise, mobilise…
Sekai (in the background): We are mobilising we are moving and I don’t think it’s a problem…
Thoko: …we co-ordinate until we see Morgan and Mutambara holding hands saying we have got a unity of purpose. Let’s then work towards that and have it as a lived reality, OK?
Sekai (in the background): I am saying I am moving, we are moving…
Thoko: There are things that caused that split, maybe they are for another programme, it had an impact but lets MOVE ON.
Priscilla (in the background): Precisely and we acknowledge what has happened.
Violet: OK. Thank you very much ladies.
All: Ok, thank you Violet, bye
Violet: There remains much to talk about, but unfortunately we have to bring this particular discussion to an end. Perhaps the biggest question for the future is; can the different parties come together and find a common cause for change?
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feedback can be emailed to: violet@swradioafrica.com
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