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Will normality return to Zimbabwe?
Terence Ranger
July 07, 2008

http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/News/news0707200815.htm

The state-controlled press in Zimbabwe is hailing the June 27 election "result" with jubilant relief. Now normal revolutionary service can be resumed. In March, it says, the Zimbabwean people forgot themselves, laid aside their revolutionary commitment, voted a majority of opposition MDC candidates into the Assembly, and gave the MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai considerably more votes in the presidential election than Robert Mugabe. The "revolution" was saved by one technicality - the requirement for a run-off if no one candidate for the presidency got more than 50 per cent of the votes cast. During the weeks before the run-off, the state press severely warned the people to take advantage of their "second chance." The voter-s cross, they warned, could not be allowed to overrule the gun - "We may have to shoot the ballot box." President Mugabe himself threatened to return to the bush to lead a war if he were to lose the re-run. And so now, after quite a lot of guns and other weapons have been used to kill and wound and cow the electorate, the ballot box has behaved itself, even miraculously allowing the vote to be counted in two days rather than the three-week delay of the June election. Mugabe is back, sworn in, and defying grim-faced the disapproval of the Botswana government at the AU meeting.

But can normal service be resumed? It is hard to comprehend how abnormal the situation in Zimbabwe has been between the March and June elections. Zimbabwe has had no parliament although all the MPs have been elected. The new parliamentarians have not met to elect a Speaker. Several MDC MPs have been arrested on charges ranging from child abduction to organising violence; many others are in hiding. There have been no functioning city councils or mayors even though a full slate of councillors was elected in March. The elected councillors in Harare met on private premises and chose themselves a mayor, but the only - and terrible - result of that was that his wife was abducted and brutally killed. Not surprisingly, no mayors have been elected elsewhere. Zimbabwe-s cities have been "in commission." Zimbabwe has hardly had a functioning civil society. Its human rights bodies have been raided and all non-governmental organisations have been prevented from operating in rural areas. Journalists have been beaten, arrested and killed. Churches have been under pressure, as Mugabe has declared his desire to see every church answerable only to Zimbabwean leaders and committed to the Zimbabwean revolution.

The single thread of legal authority has been the presidency, even though since March everyone knew that Mugabe had won only a minority of votes for the office. Between March and June people hauled before the courts for insulting the president could reasonably argue that they did not know who the president was and even some magistrates tended to take the same line. Despite this, the doubtful and fragile presidency was invoked more than ever before; more people were arrested for insulting it; it became treasonable to assert that Tsvangirai won more than 50 per cent of the March vote. All This, together with the obscenity of violence that has shocked even South African generals, has made Zimbabwe-s neighbours uneasy to an unprecedented extent. Can Zimbabwe-s relations with Botswana, which has called for its suspension from SADC, or with Zambia - or with Kenya - be normalised? Gradually, no doubt, normal institutions will re-emerge. Parliament will be summoned and if enough MDC MPs are still in detention or hiding, then Zanu PF may achieve a majority and elect a Speaker. The Senate, equally balanced between the parties after the March vote, will become dominated by Zanu PF once the newly legitimated president has exercised his right to nominate extra members. He may even be able to nominate men defeated in the elections who have been acting as ministers ever since. There will be a cabinet. The military and police joint command which has openly dominated in the inter-regnum will be able to move into the background. City councils will meet. Now that votes are no longer at stake, NGOs may be allowed to resume food aid in rural areas. Pressure on the churches may be relaxed. Zimbabwe will begin to look like a functioning polity again. Some of Zimbabwe-s neighbours will no doubt come to an uneasy co-existence with it.

But there are several reasons why even such provisional normality will be hard to achieve or to maintain. One is that it is supposed to be a revolutionary normality. Mugabe has said he will remain as President until every scrap of land in Zimbabwe is owned by Zimbabweans, and a fourth chimurenga - to take over control of business and industry - is in the wings. Violence, which is revolutionary normality, will increase. And that is the second reason. Violent revenge against those who supported the MDC has been enormously costly in lives and it has continued right through Mugabe-s inauguration as President. Mugabe-s spokesman may charge that Kenya-s Prime Minister Raila Odinga-s hands are stained with African blood, but this is at best mere name-calling tit for tat. Zanu PF is often called by its adherents, and by Mugabe, a party of blood. It becomes ever more so and in Zimbabwe the violated dead will have their revenge. However hard they try, Zimbabwe-s neighbours will find it impossible to recognise the façade of institutions in Zimbabwe as a legitimate state. There is nothing to be gained by calling for a government of national unity in Zimbabwe when Mugabe makes it clear that it can only come into existence on his terms. The Zimbabwean crisis, which Mbeki has denied exists, will resume and become in itself the only form of normality.

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