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Mists of Tribalism cloud split in Zimbabwe's MDC
Duminsani Muleya, Business Day (SA)
November 09, 2005

http://allafrica.com/stories/200511090256.html

THE power struggle in Zimbabwe's main opposition Movement for Democratic (MDC) has widened in the past week after mediation efforts failed to narrow the rift in the party.

While a healthy debate is going on about the MDC's policies and leadership qualities, there is also an unwholesome ethnic discourse. Simplistic in character and content, it assumes that the MDC infighting is tribal because party leader Morgan Tsvangirai leads a Shona-dominated faction, whereas secretary-general Welshman Ncube heads a largely Ndebele camp.

The Shona-speaking people are Zimbabwe's majority tribe, while the Ndebele-speakers, who are an ethnic Nguni group of Zulu descent, are the minority.

The ethnic interpretation of the MDC internal strife is that it is a tribal conflict simply because of the different composition of the two factions. This is the trouble with Zimbabwe. Primitive ethnic dichotomies, largely hawked by self-centred politicians and their hirelings, are made to pass for critical analysis.

The cancer of opportunistic ethnic politics is not confined to the MDC, but permeates the entire body politic. The ruling Zanu (PF) is a cauldron of tribal politics. Almost everything in the party is seen through an ethnic lens, to the extent that you hear some people say so-and-so may be a good leader but he comes from the "wrong region".

The twin evils of tribalism and regionalism are Zanu (PF)'s stock-in-trade. Even the pecking order of the party reflects it.

The MDC has also pandered to the narrow issue of tribal balancing in its hierarchy. There are three Shonas and three Ndebeles in the pecking order. While at face value it appears to be a fair representation of competing tribal interests, the problem is it legitimises an ethnic social structure which poses fundamental dangers to the broad political order.

Ethnic political developments and debates have not suddenly emerged in Zimbabwe. They have been there for a long time.

The political dimensions of ethnicity and language raise complex questions.

During Zimbabwe's liberation struggle, nationalists often fought among themselves and sometimes killed each other in pursuit of tribal agendas.

After independence in 1980 the trend continued, and worsened, leading to the massacre of 20000 Ndebeles by President Robert Mugabe's regime over a purported dissident threat in the Matabeleland region. Mugabe has called the atrocities an "act of madness".

The growth of self-interested politics based on narrow concerns, rooted in the exploitation of divisions of class, gender, region, religion, ethnicity, morality and ideology, and a give-no-quarter and take-no-prisoners activism, can be very damaging to the fabric of a nation.

Ethnocentricism and the institutionalisation of tribalism breed corruption and incompetence, which often lead to national failure.

In all tribal societies an "us- versus-them" mentality destroys national cohesion. It can easily escalate into rhetorical excesses and physical violence.

Africa and other parts of the world have been convulsed by ethnic wars, partly fuelled by tribal politics. In most African countries -- including Zimbabwe -- people are defined as citizens largely on paper, but their primary designation is as members of an ethnic group.

But ethnic and racial particularism demands that one treats other human beings as though they were not only radically different from oneself, but also morally deficient.

It is time for Zimbabwe, and any other civilised country for that matter, to rise above ethnic and race politics.

*Muleya is Business Day's Harare correspondent and Zimbabwe Independent news editor.

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