March 9-10 presidential election went down in history as a watershed election in two ways. First, Zimbabweans, in 22 years of independence, have never gone out to vote like they did in the recent presidential election. They braved the steamy and rainy weather to cast their votes in order to change the political leadership.
Second, Zimbabweans are no longer afraid to voice their opinions, despite the repressive measures government uses to silence them or whip them into submission. White farmers, independent election monitors and election observers have lost their homes at the cruel hands of ZANU PF's youth militia after the presidential election. Zimbabweans are determined to narrate their ordeals to the international community about a government that wants to cling to power at all cost.
The recent presidential election has reshaped the political landscape of Zimbabwe, but Zimbabweans remain defiant to repressive laws Robert Mugabe churns out to strengthen his vitiated political power base. Mugabe depends on state machinery to survive politically.
Just after the historic poll, the ruling party militias have been beating up MDC supporters for having voted for Morgan Tsvangirai. The MDC supporters are abducted to militia camps where they are subjected to various forms of torture both physically and emotionally. Women, married and single, have been gang-raped by the youth militias.
Members of the Zimrights Association in Zimbabwe have documented evidence of the various retributive activities carried out by ZANU PF to weed out dissenting voices against Mugabe's government. What surprises most people is that when reports are made to the police, the police develop cold feet in prosecuting the culprits. They either ignore the reports or arrest the violence victims. This has given "birth" to another level of criminality in Zimbabwe, where the young militias are left to their own devices wreaking havoc in a country already torn in civil strife.
About 1,250 people have fled their homes to hide from reprisals of ZANU PF militias. The human rights records reveal that 12 people have been killed in the retributions, including a white farmer who was gunned down recently in cold blood, in an attempt to escape the armed militia who had besieged his farm.
With acute, drought-induced food shortages being experienced in Zimbabwe and government-sponsored violence that disrupted farming two years ago, Zimbabweans have to produce ZANU PF cards to get corn from the Grain Marketing Board. Mugabe is politicizing every facet of Zimbabwean life.
Taking another twist in retributive exercises, Mugabe has ordered opposition supporters near the Mozambican border to pay money as compensation for having voted for the opposition.
Some $250 million Zimbabwean dollars' worth of property has been destroyed in the Marondera area, about 120 kilometers southeast of Harare, the Zimbabwean capital. Mugabe has ushered in a new culture of barbarism and vandalism in Zimbabwe in order to retain political power. With violence taking place in the remote parts of the country, it has been very difficult for aid agencies to deliver survival basics.
Zimbabweans are now living under a schizophrenic political system that does not deliver what it promises. Having stolen the election from Tsvangirai, Mugabe has continued to hand the MDC party and Zimbabweans a series of setbacks.
It is incongruous for a self-declared winner to be beating people after his much-desired victory was secured. The events unfolding in Zimbabwe after the election give little comfort to many people. Many thought Mugabe's victory would be an incentive to return the country to the rule of law, but instead he has resorted to violence to punish dissenting voices.
Write to Weston at wmudambanuki@bsu.edu
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