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Independence without peace, security
Webster M Zambara
April 16, 2006

http://www.thestandard.co.zw/viewinfo.cfm?linkid=21&id=567&siteid=1

NEVER have we celebrated Independence Day with so much stress since 1980. Everything that can go wrong seems to have gone wrong now.

We have the highest inflation rate in the world, at 913.6%. On second position is Iraq whose rate of inflation is 40%.

Teachers now earn one salary a term, spread over three months. Yes, because if the poverty datum line is $35m and a teacher’s salary is $12m then that’s it!

Bread and beverages have gone up, again. Medical fees have shot through the roof. Our health institutions are empty, and three thousand people die every week. While this list is endless, the question that arises is, are we secure and at peace?

These issues punctuated the year-long celebrations of our Silver Jubilee, and as we approach Independence Day, issues of peace and security will be at the centre of our leaders’ adumbrations.

We have learnt to think of security mainly in terms of our ability to use or threaten force to hold our enemies at bay. This we have a distinction, no doubt.

However, much as national security is very relevant to the extent that maintaining the integrity of the state is an effective way of maintaining the security of the people who live within its jurisdiction, it seems a little odd that we spend so much time talking about protecting the nation, and so little time talking about whether the policies we follow in pursuit of that objective actually increase the security of the individuals who live within it.

It should be noted that there has been a paradigm shift in terms of how security is defined since the inception of state security advocated in the 17th century. Simply said, it has been broadened, and as a people we should move with the changing times. Attention has shifted from security of the state to security of the people — human security.

In its definition of human security, the United Nations Commission on Human Security (1993) underscores the need to protect the vital core of all human lives in ways that enhance human freedoms and human fulfilment.

Human security means protecting fundamental freedoms — freedoms that are the essence of life. It means protecting people from critical (severe) and pervasive (widespread) threats and situations. It means using processes that build on people’s strengths and aspirations. It means creating political, social, environmental, economic, military and cultural systems that together give people the building blocks for survival, livelihood and dignity.

As UN Secretary General Koffi Annan pointed out during his recent trip to Africa, human security joins the main agenda items of peace, security and development.

Annan postulated that much as human security is comprehensive in the sense that it integrates the above items, in its broadest sense it embraces far more than the absence of violent conflict.

It encompasses human rights, good governance, access to education and health care, and ensures that each individual has opportunities and choices to fulfil his or her own potential. Every step in this direction is also a step towards reducing poverty, achieving economic growth and preventing violent conflict.

Human security thus brodens the focus from the security of boarders to the lives of people and communities inside and across those borders. The idea is for people to be secure, not just for territories within boarders.

The UNDP (1993) identifies seven aspects, that is, economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community and political security as vital aspects of a secure populace.

Human security implies the ability to carry on a normal flow of life activities without constant stress or worry. A person, who is continually struggling to meet basic material needs, living in a precarious balance between income and outflow, can scarcely be said to be secure.

Similarly, a person who must constantly weigh every opinion he/she expresses against the possibility of punishment for having spoken out is also not secure. Thus, societies organised in ways that perpetuate poverty and inhibit free expression cannot be considered conducive to personal security.

They are not at peace. In sum then, human security requires at least a decent material standard of living, along with reasonable assurance that it will continue (or improve). It means being protected against arbitrary imprisonment or punishment for the exercise of basic human rights in ways that do not injure others or prevent them from exercising these same rights.

And, of course, human security most certainly includes protection against illness, injury and death, especially from "unnatural" causes such as criminal activity, repression or attack by foreigners. This is what results in peace.

Only if a nation successfully provides security to the individuals who live within its borders is there meaningful linkage between human and national security.

Only then is the protection of the artificial entity we call "the nation" a legitimate and viable means of protecting the real people who give it life.

A nation that protects its people against subjugation, illness, injury and death arising from attacks by hostile forces, but fails to prevent them against preventable disease and malnourishment or exposes them to imminent danger of being arbitrarily arrested, assaulted or murdered while doing about their day-to-day lives is certainly not keeping them secure.

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