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National healing: Truth recovery, justice and the reconciliation process
Part 2 Download
this document Background When Zimbabwe's three main political parties, namely the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC led by Professor Arthur Mutambara and the Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU PF) led by Mr Robert Mugabe, agreed to form an inclusive government on the 15th of September 2008. It was the first time in the history of Zimbabwe that political leaders had agreed to work together in government without necessarily having to merge their parties. This was a good sign of the toning down of the animosity and ill- will that had existed amongst them and their supporters for close to a decade. The Global Political Agreement (GPA) gave birth to an Inclusive Government whose mandate, among other pertinent responsibilities, was that of restoring Zimbabwe i.e. economically, socially, politically and in all other aspects that will allow for the revival of the integrity, prosperity and harmony among the people of Zimbabwe. In fulfilment of the Inclusive Government's mandate to facilitate national healing (Article VII, part (c), GPA), an organ responsible for national healing was then formed. The parties to the GPA and in the Inclusive Government were represented by one member each; namely Sekai Holland of the MDC led by Mr Tsvangirai, Gibson Sibanda of the MDC led by Professor Arthur Mutamabara, and John Landa Nkomo of ZANU-PF. On the 24th of July 2009, the inclusive government launched a national healing and reconciliation programme in which the country was to observe three days of peace and tranquillity from the 24th to the 26th of July, in recognition of what President Robert Mugabe called "our new found peace". What remains questionable is the method used, the environment and timing of the process. It is with this background that the NYDT through the Bulawayo Youth Council (BYC) decided to organise a series of policy dialogue meetings aimed at finding out from young people what kind of a process would be ideal for them to heal truly and completely. The topic National Healing or Political Gimmick: Will the Current Process Achieve True Peace? was widely discussed through intimate focus group meetings at ward level and at public policy dialogue meetings at constituency level. The topic was taken to three constituencies in Bulawayo namely Emakhandeni, Nkulumane and Bulawayo Central. A rural outreach meeting was also organised which saw the NYDT conduct a meeting in Lupane, the capital of Matabeleland North Province. The NYDT enlisted the services of two resource persons to facilitate the discussions during the meetings and these were; Dumisani Nkomo the Chief Executive Officer for Habakkuk Trust and Nhlanhla Mpofu a civic society activist who also travelled with the NYDT team to Lupane. The meetings drew an average of eighty participants each at public policy dialogue meetings and 30 participants at focus group meetings. While gender representation was somewhat disappointing due to the lesser number of female participants, their contributions to the lively discussions more than made up for this limitation. The following is a compilation of young people's views and recommendations (communiqué/position) on the national healing process in Zimbabwe. Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.
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