Too Small to Share, too Big to Waste

By Rejoice Ngwenya

I am no historian, but of necessity generally overwhelmed by a near crippling sense of libertarian euphoria. In which case am well too aware that even the usually error-prone United Nations is correct in that a nation worth its salt has a unflinching right to self-determination [International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights].

And therefore I get irritable when fellow – for lack of better terms – ‘nationalist thinkers’ accuse me – or better – insinuate that I do not understand or appreciate the virtues and the vices of Ndebele self-determination.

Just like you, I know why the Aborigines, Scottish, the Catalans, the Basque Spaniards, Palestinians, the Bavarians, Canadian Quebecois, Jews, Shiites, Sunnis, Kashmirs, Dinkas, baSarwas and even Ndebeles of Zimbabwe –must exercise their right to self determination.

Like Van Vuuren and Kriek put it, when “the idea of self-determination is replaced by the idea of solidarity which implies a universal reconciliation of freedom and identity”, I get a good night’s sleep.

The world, by virtue of technology, is getting smaller. Rather than argonise over extrication, I would better invest my energy on comparative advantage. Unfortunately for us Africans, while the colonialists were busy partitioning our continent, they trampled our freedom and identity.

Yet the lingering question is: do we invest money in agitating for the ‘Old Order’ or we get the best out of the ‘New Order’? More significant – at least to an unschooled mind like me – is the blind assumption that geographical extrication necessarily amplifies the virtues of a people’s identity.

In this order of things, the synonymous nature of ‘separation’, ‘sovereignty’ and ‘self-determination’ are swallowed in a sandstorm of nationalist arrogance. This – as in the Middle East, Asia, Europe and of late, northern Africa – breeds conflict.

My point is that we Ndebeles of Zimbabwe – like the Scottish, Bavarians, and Catalans etc – have a right to ‘exploit’ our peculiarity by way of self-realisation. But my argument is premised largely on that in the 21st Century and beyond – social, ethnic and for that matter; economic and religious norms are not the only legitimate basis for exercising one’s uniqueness.

If it is true that to merely argue that I am a Catholic, a Protestant, a Moslem, a Hindu or a Jew – so I deserve my ‘own’ country is retrogressive fundamentalism, I am convinced that being ‘Afrikaner’, ‘Ngwato’, ‘Ndebele’ is not per se, a sound basis for extrication.

However, one can conversely argue that if I am discriminated upon on the basis of being Catholic, a Protestant, a Moslem, a Hindu or a Jew, Afrikaner’, Ngwato, Ndebele – I have a legitimate right to self-determination. The challenge I therefore face as a liberal is how to weigh the credibility of ‘nationalist’ against ‘ethnic’ motives in the pursuit of sovereignty.

Moreover, when this quest for self-determination assumes military dimensions, it sidelines those of us who believe that human development has gone way past gunpowder diplomacy. In rejecting the sectionalist, Broderbund-type Ndebele ‘nationalism’ I am not in any way justifying pre and post colonial genocidal abuse of the Ndebeles by the Robert Mugabe-led ZANU-PF government.

In fact, the marginalisation of Matabeleland, its economic and political subjugation is the very reason for demanding self-determination.

But if this ‘metaphysical justification’ is fuelled by ethnic tribalism and cowboy militancy, it falls outside the boundary of my libertarian consciousness. It is this paradox of what Van Vuuren and Kriek refer to as the ‘chosen people’ myth that sucks in militant bozos and ethnic zealots into the otherwise justifiable cause of self-determination.

My conviction is that we Ndebeles have invested our lives in all parts of Zimbabwe as much as everyone else. I do value individual freedom, but whether or not I can assert this constitutional right outside the framework of devolutionary diversity, or for that matter, only in the comfort of Balkanisation – is a legitimate argument for another day.

We Ndebeles are marginalised not because of being Ndebele but that ZANU-PF has no DNA of constitutional democracy. It has been chocked by the faeces of majoritarian politics.

In this case, ethnic discrimination has become a legitimate basis for self-determination, yet since Zimbabwe has an integrated economy, I still believe individuals must benefit from collective exploitation of natural endowments. As in USA, the issue of ‘multiple ethnic identities’ renders human development based on geographical extrication a dysfunctional philosophy.

Like Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo deserved to rule Zimbabwe in its entirety, so do not try and give me some piece of small cake when there is one too big to waste.

Karl Deutsch writes: Systems of government that are respectful of the individual, protective of minorities, and permissive of new discoveries and individuals’ changing their minds about them, will be a necessity for the future growth of mankind.