Mnangagwa and the military may mean more bad news for Zimbabwe

Reuters/Philimon Bulawayo

The military has taken control of the national broadcaster, troops are in the streets and the president is being held in a secure environment. All military leave is cancelled and a senior general has addressed the nation. Yet the Zimbabwean military continues with the pretence that this is not a coup d’etat.

The obvious response to this is: if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then the chances are it’s a duck. And the sole reason the Zimbabwean military is not acknowledging this as a coup d’etat is to avoid triggering the country’s automatic suspension from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Both bodies frown on coups.

A perfect storm formed ahead of these events and made military action predictable. The country had once again entered a steep economic decline (not that its “recovery” had been anything of note). A clear and reckless bid for power was being made by the so-called Generation 40 (G40) faction around Grace Mugabe in direct opposition to the Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, the standard bearer for the so-called Lacoste faction.

This culminated in Mnangagwa’s dismissal by President Mugabe: a clear indication that Grace Mugabe was now calling the shots. It also served as a follow up to the 2015 Grace-engineered dismissal of another Vice President and rival, Joice Mujuru.

The coup means that Mugabe’s long and disastrous presidency is finally over. The only questions that remain are the precise details and mechanics of the deal which secures his departure.

Why the coup

Mnangagwa is a long time Zanu-PF stalwart and is clearly closely integrated with the military high command and the intelligence services. Both institutions are concerned that the succession is being arranged for a faction led by people with no liberation credentials but who have been skilled in manipulating Mugabe himself and in making him do their bidding. The G40 now appear to have overreached, perhaps believing that their proximity to the “old man” made them invincible.

This coup’s explicit purpose is twofold. First, it’s trying to definitively kill off Grace Mugabe’s ambitions to become president and to set in place a ruling dynasty akin to the Kims in North Korea. Second, it’s a bid to clear Mnangagwa’s path to power, first in Zanu-PF and then within the state itself (over the last three decades these have been virtually one and the same thing).

What we do not yet know is what counter force, if any, the G40 can bring to bear against the military. The calculation of the military hierarchy appears to be that Grace and company are paper tigers who will have few cards to play against such force majeure and who lack the popular appeal to bring angry and disillusioned masses out onto the streets.

Could this be the end of President Robert Mugabe’s 37 year reign?
Reuters/Philimon Bulawayo

The coup has formally stripped away the façade that Zimbabwe is a constitutional state. This is clearly a militarised party-state where the military is a pivotal actor in the ruling party’s internal politics. It is not simply a neutral state agency subordinate to the civilian leadership. And the idea that this military intervention is an aberration – a departure from the constitutional norm – is misplaced.

Zimbabwe is a de facto military dictatorship. It serves as a guarantor of ZANU-PF rule rather than as a custodian of the constitution. It has helped Zanu-PF rig elections. And it was central to the state terror which was unleashed against the population to reverse Mugabe and Zanu-PF’s electoral defeat in 2008. The military has always been a key political actor. The only difference this time is that its intervention is designed to control events within Zanu-PF rather than to crush opposition to it.

But, a highly politicised military is a major impediment to the re-establishment of a democratic order in Zimbabwe. It has nothing to gain, politically or financially, from democratic rule given the lucrative networks of embezzlement and plunder it’s put in place over decades. Most recently it seized and siphoned off of the country’s diamond wealth for military officers and the party hierarchy.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and former Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Reuters/Philimon Bulawayo

This intervention is designed to secure the presidency for Mnangagwa. So it is hard to avert our eyes from the elephant –- or in this case the Crocodile –- in the room. Mnangagwa is the Mugabe henchman who helped enable the misrule and tyranny of the last 37 years. He was one of the principal architects of the Gukurahundi -– the genocidal attack on the Ndebele – in the early to mid-1980s which left at least 20 000 people dead.

He has also been instrumental in rigging elections and crushing all opposition to Zanu-PF rule, including the atrocities of 2008.

Expecting such a person to now make a deathbed conversion to the democracy, constitutional government and good governance he has spent an entire career liquidating is dangerous nonsense.

Dilemmas to come

Mnangagwa will soon have to confront a series of dilemmas. How can he put in place an administration which has the appearance of a national unity government, can secure international approval and the financial assistance required to help rebuild a shattered economy – but avoid ceding any meaningful power or control? Can this circle be squared?

The best hope for Zimbabweans is that the international community uses its leverage wisely and sets stringent conditions for such assistance: free elections closely monitored by an array of international organisations, the establishment of a new electoral commission, free access to the state media and the right of parties to campaign freely.

There should also be a role here for South Africa to restore its badly tarnished image as a champion of democracy in Africa. It has followed a malign path over the last two decades, facilitating Zanu-PF authoritarianism in the name of a threadbare and increasingly degenerate “liberation solidarity”.

Such a combination of pressures will severely restrict Mnangagwa’s room for manoeuvre. Anything short of that will deliver an outcome which is essentially Mugabeism without Mugabe.

James Hamill, Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, University of Leicester

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

A military coup is afoot in Zimbabwe. What's next for the embattled nation?

President Robert Mugabe and his wife Grace have become increasingly divisive figures in Zimbabwe.
Reuters/Philimon Bulawayo

Nobody is safe from the rages of Zimbabwe’s First Lady, “Dr. Amai” Grace Mugabe. There was the young South African model Grace lashed with extension cords. 93-year-old President Robert Mugabe’s longtime and usually trusted ally Emmerson Mnangagwa, was next in the firing line: he was sacked because his supporters allegedly booed her at a rally.

The consequences of her vengeance may have led to a coup headed by Zimbabwe’s army chief General Constantino Chiwenga, who is commonly perceived to be Mnangagwa’s protégé. But ex-freedom fighter Mnangagwa has his own presidential aspirations.

Mnangagwa has been exiled from the party in which he has served since he was a teenager. But he is not just skulking in the political wilderness. On arrival in South Africa he issued a statement calling those who wanted him out “minnows”. He promised to control his party “very soon” and urged his supporters to register to vote in the national elections next July.

As if to back Mnangagwa, on November 13 General Chiwenga announced that he and his officers could not allow the “counter-revolutionary infiltrators”, implied to be behind Grace Mugabe, to continue their purges.

Factions and purges

Chiwenga declared that the armed forces must ensure all party members attend the extraordinary Zanu-PF congress next month with “equal opportunity to exercise their democratic rights”. He flashed back through Zanu-PF’s history of factionalism, reminding his listeners that although the military “will not hesitate to step in” it has never “usurped power”. Chiwenga promised to defuse all the differences “amicably and in the ruling party’s closet”.

Although this airbrushed more than it revealed about the party’s rough patches when leadership vacuums appeared, the statement appeared more as a cautionary note than a clarion call to arms. It’s not often a coup is announced before it starts; but once in motion direction – and history – can change. Grace Mugabe may have unleashed a perfect storm and her own undoing.

Soldiers stand next to a tank on a road in Harare.
Reuters/Philimon Bulawayo

All the “shenanigans” that have inspired the generals to consider a coup have set the stage for an extraordinary Zanu-PF congress this December instead of in the expected 2019: that is, before rather than after the July 2018 national elections.

This suggests some people were in a hurry to settle the succession issues for the president, who is now showing every one of his 93 years. Maybe Robert Mugabe won’t rule until he is 100-years-old. If not, and members of his family or party wanted to keep their dynasties alive, they had to work quickly lest some similarly inclined contenders are in their way.

These contenders include Mnangagwa and a slew of his “Lacoste” faction consisting of war veterans and the odd financial liberal. The best-known of these is Patrick Chinamasa. This former finance minister tried to convince the world’s bankers he could pull Zimbabwe out of the fire. He was demoted to control cyberspace and then fired. Perhaps he may make a comeback in the wake of the semi-coup.

The pro-Grace faction includes the members of Generation 40, or “G-40”. Many are well over 40. But in Robert Mugabe’s shadow they appear young, as does the 52-year-old First Lady. Without a base in the liberation-war cohort, they resorted to working with the Mugabe couple: sometimes their ideology appears radical, espousing indigenous economics and more land to the tillers.

If the history of their best-known member – the current Minister of Higher Education Jonathan Moyo – is indicative, however, they are pragmatic; or less politely put, opportunist.

But with Grace Mugabe sans Robert, they would have to muster inordinate amounts of patience and manipulation to steer the sinking ship to the shores of stable statehood and incorporate yet younger generations who cut their political teeth as Robert Mugabe’s rule faltered.

Perfidious ‘saviours’

Yet the possible plan for the upcoming congress – to create a third vice-president – appears not to move far beyond the cold hands of the old. Phelekezela Mphoko would be pushed to third vice-president status. Grace would be the second vice-president.

The current defence minister, Sydney Sekeramayi would be first vice-president and so, next in line for the presidential palace. He is a quiet but no less tarnished member of the Zanu-PF old guard; especially when one remembers the massacre of thousands of Ndebele people during the Gukurahundi.

When performing the calculus necessary to rectify Zimbabwe’s graceless imbalances, remember that Mnangagwa was perhaps the key architect of the nearly genocidal Gukurahundi, now chronicled in archival detail in historian Stuart Doran’s Kingdom, Power, Glory: Mugabe, Zanu, and the Quest for Supremacy. Among the scores implicated therein are the British, condemned by Hazel Cameron, another meticulous archivist, as exercising “wilful blindness” during what Robert Mugabe has dismissed as a “moment of madness”.

Perhaps it’s no surprise, then, that many are suspicious of Mnangagwa’s relationship with the UK. Many suspect he has been swimming with perfidious Albion for a very, very long time.

Those waters, in the shadow of Mugabe’s heritage, will take a few more generations of hard political work to clear. It hardly seems propitious that a coup, and the same generation that has ruled since 1980, starts it off.

David B. Moore, Professor of Development Studies, University of Johannesburg

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

What the hijacking of South Africa's Treasury means for the economy

There are claims President Jacob Zuma may push through irresponsible proposals relating to higher education funding.
Reuters

South Africa has been rocked by news that President Jacob Zuma has bulldozed the country’s National Treasury to adopt a fee free higher education proposal without following standard process and scrutiny. This is reportedly what’s behind the resignation of the Treasury’s respected head of budgeting, Michael Sachs. The Conversation Africa’s Sibonelo Radebe asked Seán Muller to weigh up the implications.

How significant is the resignation?

Reports indicate that the resignation came as a result of interference in the budgeting process. There appears to have been an attempt to push through irresponsible proposals relating to higher education funding. From a technocratic perspective this is a serious a blow to the Treasury’s credibility.

What’s unfolding can be seen as a continuation of the “state capture” inspired attack on National Treasury that began in 2015 with the firing of the then finance minister Nhlanhla Nene. The attack was temporarily halted and Zuma had to reverse the appointment of trusted ally Des van Rooyen.

The president relented by bringing back trusted finance minister Pravin Gordhan. But then he fired Gordhan early this year and replaced him with another ally Malusi Gigaba. This was followed by the departure of the department’s director general Lungisa Fuzile.

The head of the budget office is arguably one of the most important positions within the Treasury. The incumbent, Sachs, played a pivotal role in protecting the country’s public finances while also increasing transparency and engagement with civil society.

He is the son of former constitutional court judge and anti-apartheid activist Albie Sachs, and a former member of the ANC’s Economic Transformation Committee. He had unparalleled insight into both the bureaucratic and political sides of the budget process. His resignation indicates the extent to which political dysfunction has compromised responsible management of public finances.

How does the proposal for increasing higher education funding compromise the budget process?

One of the major achievements of post-1994 governments was to embed a thorough, bureaucratic and political process of developing the annual national budget and the medium-term budget. Within this process, any major changes to budget priorities are signalled in the medium-term budget. They are then gradually integrated into successive national budgets.

Any intention to dramatically change the structure of the budget – for instance, by cutting social grants in order to pay university fees – should have been contained in the medium-term budget.

In the current case, the Heher Commission, under retired Judge Jonathan Heher was established to investigate higher education funding. It handed its report to the president on the 30th of August, before the presentation of the 2017 medium-term budget policy statement. Its findings should have been released earlier and any decision reflected in the medium-term budget. That would have provided a basis for Parliament to facilitate democratic oversight of the proposals and alerted citizens and stakeholders to government’s intention.

What’s more worrying are reports that the president has ignored the Heher Commision’s recommendations. Given the extensive consultation by this commission, it would arguably be irrational and irresponsible to ignore its findings and implement an ill-conceived, “populist” removal of university fees.

Regardless of the merits of such proposals, to try and ram them through in the period between the medium term budget, in October, and the national budget in February is reckless. It will undermine the credibility of South Africa’s public finance management and carries negative implications for investment, credit ratings and economic growth.

What is your view on the call for free university education?

We should start with the widely accepted principle that no student who is suitably qualified for university education should be prevented from pursuing it. Given this principle we then need to ask the following questions:

• How many students does the basic education system adequately prepare for higher education?
• How many of those need financial support and to what extent?
• What are the total cost implications of providing all such students with the necessary support, whether in grants or loans?
• Can the country afford to do this for all such students immediately?
• Even if we can afford it, is it the most equitable use of such funds?

I have argued previously that too many students are being admitted into the higher education system. Many are ill-prepared given the poor quality in the schooling system.

Evidence on the household incomes of students in higher education indicates that – relatively – they are much better off than the majority of South African youth. Youth outside the further education system get little, if any, direct support from government. And so a large increase in funding for university students is not the best way to assist poor youth.

What are the implications beyond education?

There are two major implications.

Firstly, it increases the chances of a downgrade of the country’s debt that’s held in local currency. Even before these recent events I argued this was almost inevitable. My view then was mainly informed by the revenue shortfalls indicated in the medium term budget, poor economic growth forecasts and the government abandoning its policy of fiscal consolidation (stabilising government debt).

The resignation of the head of the Treasury’s budget office makes the situation even more dire. The interference that induced it constitutes an unprecedented subversion of the country’s national budget process and National Treasury’s mandate to ensure stability and sustainability of public finances.

Secondly, the way in which the president intends to unilaterally ram through his favoured approach to higher education funding signals that a similar approach could be taken with a decision to pursue nuclear power. At the time of the medium-term budget, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba indicated that government cannot afford nuclear. But shortly afterwards the new minister of energy, David Mahlobo, and Zuma both suggested that they are preparing to push it through. If that happened, it would further compromise South Africa’s public finances and economic growth.

There was some hope that a victory in December for the anti-state capture grouping in the governing African National Congress’s elective conference might be able to stabilise governance and public finances. But it now appears that a great deal more damage could still be done by the president before then.

Seán Mfundza Muller, Senior Lecturer in Economics, University of Johannesburg

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Why South Africans should be worried by ANC talk of a 'colour revolution'

Ukrainians mark the first anniversary of the Orange Revolution in 2005.
REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

The term “colour revolution” has recently found its way into South Africa’s political vocabulary. The evocative phrase is increasingly cropping up in government and ruling party speeches.

African National Congress (ANC) Secrecy General Gwede Mantashe has, for instance, claimed that the party is under threat from a “colour revolution”. And in a recent speech David Mahlobo, former State Security Minister and now energy minister, argued that African countries are also under threat. He claimed that these “colour revolutions” were as a result of the

nefarious activities of rogue NGOs threatening national security.

It is easy to dismiss Mantashe’s and Mahlobo’s statements as the rantings of an increasingly paranoid ruling elite. But doing so would be a mistake. The “colour revolution” is a full blown intelligence doctrine - or a principle of intelligence policy - used by authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes to guide responses to protest movements. It is most closely associated with regimes in the former Soviet Union countries and the Balkans.

In South Africa, “colour revolution” talk is now being translated into deeds. In his recently released book, The President’s Keeper Jacques Pauw, the South African investigative journalist, claims that:

one of the ‘colour revolutions’ that the State Security Agency identified as promoting ‘regime change’ was the Fees Must Fall student protests’, and that these protests could lead to ‘an attempted coup d'état’.

Sources also told Pauw that the police recruited spies from within the movement to infiltrate student organisations.

The government’s appropriation of this doctrine strongly suggests that South Africa has been swapping notes with countries like Russia on how to contain popular dissent. And when legitimate organisations are treated as criminally suspect, democracy itself is threatened.

The Eurasian ‘colour contagion’

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 spelled the end of authoritarian communism. More than a decade later a diverse series of pro-democracy protests broke out across the region. The first was the Rose revolution in Georgia in 2003. This was followed by the Ukrainian Orange revolution in 2004 and then the Tulip revolution in Kyrgyzstan in 2005.

The name “colour revolution” came from the fact that they had all adopted particular colours, or flowers, to represent their struggles.

The protest movements mainly used non-violent strategies, focusing on regime change through democratic elections. Some were true mass protests, while others were middle-class led, with significant student and NGO involvement.

Regimes used the term “colour revolution” to explain the contagion of the protests, which they said had spread because Western countries have sponsored them to ensure pro-Western regime change.

Some movements did receive Western sponsorship, and were undoubtedly tools of Western foreign policy. But to cast all the protesters as agents of foreign imperialists was both historically incorrect and politically dangerous. Many were legitimate anti-government campaigns taken up by disaffected social groups.

While the initial wave of protests were largely successful in removing authoritarian regimes, later ones were less so. This was mainly because governments had learned from one another about how to contain the protests.

By the time the Arab Spring swept across the Middle East and North Africa from 2010 to 2012, governments had fine-tuned a range of strategies to contain popular protests, building on those developed to contain Eurasia’s “colour contagion”.

From violent to ideological state strategies

Shaken by the “colour contagion” and fearing further diffusion, Eurasian regimes such as those in Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, and Iran studied the protests and collaborated to develop strategies to contain them.

Repression was always an option, but it wasn’t the preferred strategy because it could be politically damaging and possibly escalate the protests.

As a result the focus was on ideological strategies to prevent and respond to protests.

Across the region, protests were delegitimised and marginalised by linking them to the West. Conspiracy theories about the protests being foreign led were circulated. They were characterised as threats to sovereignty, territorial integrity and stability.

Regimes with strong economies used financial resources to secure the loyalty of local elites and co-opt sections of the protest movement. For example in Russia, fearing the rise of a colour revolution in 2007/2008 the regime set up an alternative, youth mass movement, which engaged in large counter-protests.

In Tajikstan and Belarus, the regimes used their control over resources to ensure the loyalty of local elites. In Uzbhekisatan, the regime was able to co-opt sections of the protest movement.

A convenient doctrine

By using the “colour revolution” doctrine, the ANC and the country’s security apparatus can stretch the definition of what constitutes a national security threat. Local NGO’s and protest movements engaging in lawful advocacy can now be accused of engaging in subversion, and investigated on these grounds.

By invoking the doctrine, South Africa is in fact positioning itself as an authoritarian country, drawing lessons and emulating strategies from authoritarian countries like Russia. The doctrine provides the ruling ANC, and the state security forces, with the ideological tool to preempt and undermine any opposition to government policy. Growing opposition to a possible nuclear deal between South Africa and Russia is a case in point.

Jane Duncan, Professor in the Department of Journalism, Film and Television, University of Johannesburg

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

South Africa is still way behind the curve on transforming land ownership

Land ownership patterns in South Africa have not really changed since the advent of democracy.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings

Land is a highly charged and politicised issue all over the world. South Africa, with its history of extreme dispossession through colonialism and apartheid, is no exception.

The democratic government has tried to redistribute land to address this legacy of dispossession. But, according to government, only around 10% of commercial farmland has been redistributed or restored to black South Africans in the 23 years since formal apartheid ended. Many are angry at the failure of land reform and there are increasing calls for land to be returned to black South Africans.

But there is very little clarity as to who owns what land in the country. This is why a recent report released by Agri-SA, an organisation that represents the majority of South Africa’s white commercial farmers, has proved so controversial.

The report looks at the changing patterns of land ownership. The key question it purports to answer is the degree to which racially unequal patterns of land ownership have been altered through a combination of land reform and private land purchases by black South Africans.

Agri-SA argues that the initial government target of transferring 30% of agricultural land via land reform has almost been met. On the back of this it argues that the market is much more effective than the state as a vehicle for change.

But these claims are not borne out by Agri-SA’s own data. Even though the data in the report appears to have been rigorously collected and analysed, its interpretation by Agri-SA is flawed. We believe that many of the report’s core arguments are inaccurate and misleading.

It’s also clear that, contrary to the AgriSA report, we are nowhere near to hitting targets set by the government in 1994. Black South Africans remain in the minority among landowners.

Transformation simply has not happened.

A fallacious argument

The first major flaw in the report is that it adds two numbers together – the amount of land held by black people, and the amount of land held by the government. It does this for all land, but also for agricultural land, estimated at 93.5 million hectares, or 76% of the total of 122.5 million hectares. It argues that a total of around 25 million hectares – or 26.7% of South Africa’s agricultural land – is now owned by previously disadvantaged individuals and government.

If the rand value of the 25 million hectares is considered, it asserts that this amounts to 29.1% of the total. If the agricultural potential of this land is considered, then the share owned by black people and government is 46.5% of the total value of agricultural land.

Agri-SA’s argument, then, is that land reform targets are close to being met. This is fallacious because it doesn’t report on government and black ownership separately. And there’s no basis for arguing that government land is black-owned. State land is held on behalf of all citizens, including white farmers.

Secondly, rural land in the former Bantustan lands – those areas held in trust by government for black residents during apartheid – is still held in trust for communal area residents. Their occupation of around 13% of South Africa’s total land area is the result of centuries of dispossession. It cannot be counted, and has never been counted, as a contribution to achieving an initial land reform target of 30% of white commercial farmland.

On top of this, Agri-SA argues that only 2.2 million hectares of farmland has been purchased by government for transformation purposes, compared to 4.3 million hectares bought by black people on the open market. The latter conflates private purchase of land by black farmers with government payment for land which is then transferred to black people through land reform. These figures don’t stand up to scrutiny. In truth, we don’t know how much agricultural land has been privately purchased by black people, using their own funds or loans, since 1994.

The report’s data on transactions doesn’t lend support to the argument that the market is more effective that the state in changing the pattern of land ownership. According to AgriSA’s data, government and black South Africans together accounted for only 12.9% of the 69 million hectares purchased between 1994 and 2016. If anything, this data shows that market transactions by themselves cannot result in the kind of changes required by land reform – particularly if it is to target the poor, who cannot afford to buy land.

Overall, vast disparities in the distribution of land in relation to race and class mean that land reform still has a long way to go. The collection of proper data as a basis for monitoring, evaluation and planning is crucial, but is inadequate at present.

Data are lacking

Government data on land and agriculture is problematic. Statistics SA collects few reliable data on either large or small-scale agriculture, and none on land reform. Data on land reform released by the department of rural development and land reform are also thin, often inconsistent and hide as much as they reveal. For example, no figures on the average size of farms transferred or the cost per hectare have been released.

We now have contradictory reports on how much land has been transferred through land reform. The department says that land restitution has transferred 3.4 million hectares to claimants to date, and land redistribution has transferred 4.7 million hectares . That yields a total of 8.1 million hectares. But the Agri-SA report provides a total of only 6.5 million hectares of agricultural land acquired through both government and private acquisitions. Which is correct? We don’t know.

The absence of reliable data means that government policy on a key and highly politicised issue is being made without the benefit of rigorous evidence and informed debate on how to improve delivery. This leaves room for bodies like Agri-SA to inflame tensions with data and interpretations that misdirect society at large.

Ben Cousins, Professor, Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape and Ruth Hall, Professor, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape

This article was originally published on The Conversation.