Are the conditions that sparked the French Revolution emerging in Zimbabwe?

“Predatory politics generates mass grievance. Mass grievance generates mass anger. Mass anger generates mass mobilization. Always.” — Sipho Malunga

Zimbabwe appears to be approaching one of those moments in history where politics, economics, and psychology collide.

Across history, societies rarely collapse because people are poor. Poverty alone does not produce revolutions. Human beings can endure hardship for surprisingly long periods. What often becomes intolerable is something deeper: the widening gap between the lived reality of ordinary people and the insulated reality of those who govern them.

This is why historians continue to study the French Revolution of 1789. France did not erupt simply because bread became scarce. It erupted because an increasingly desperate population watched an elite class continue to live in extraordinary privilege while appearing emotionally detached from the suffering around them. History never repeats itself exactly. However, it often reproduces familiar patterns, and Zimbabwe today is exhibiting some of those patterns.

A growing perception exists that political power is increasingly concentrated around a small network of politically connected business figures, government officials, religious personalities, social media defenders, and beneficiaries of state patronage.

In popular political language, many Zimbabweans have come to refer to sections of this network as “Zvigananda,” a term popularized by Vice President Constantino Chiwenga.

Among the most visible public faces associated with this emerging elite culture are businessmen Kudakwashe Tagwirei, Wicknell Chivayo, Scott Sakupwanya, Presidential Investment Advisor Paul Tungwarara, various politically aligned religious figures, like Ubert Angel and a network of social media activists commonly referred to as “Varakashi.”

Whether one supports or opposes these individuals is not the central issue. The issue is symbolism.

The recent wedding associated with the Tagwirei family became a national talking point not because Zimbabweans oppose weddings, but because the event appeared to many citizens as a public display of extraordinary wealth in a country experiencing extraordinary hardship.

The images of luxury, exclusivity, and opulence circulated through social media feeds into homes where many citizens struggle with unemployment, inflation, collapsing public services, and declining economic opportunities.

Psychologically, this creates what social scientists call relative deprivation. People do not judge their wellbeing in isolation. They compare themselves to others.

The greater the visible gap between elite privilege and ordinary suffering, the greater the likelihood of resentment, grievance, and social instability.

This is precisely the dynamic that lawyer Sipho Malunga warned about when he observed: “The mistake predatory political elites make is to believe they can permanently contain or restrict political space and immobilize citizens’ resistance. Predatory politics generates mass grievance. Mass grievance generates mass anger. Mass anger generates mass mobilization. Always.”

History supports his observation.

The French aristocracy did not believe their world could collapse. The Russian aristocracy did not believe their world could collapse. The Shah of Iran did not believe his world could collapse.

Many ruling elites throughout history have mistaken temporary control for permanent legitimacy. They eventually discovered that citizens can absorb only so much humiliation before they begin to withdraw their psychological consent.

From a Mental Fitness perspective, the situation becomes even more interesting. The excessive accumulation and display of wealth often reveal something deeper than confidence as we have observed in our previous articles, it may reveal fear where human beings accumulate when they are afraid of losing.

They control when they are afraid of vulnerability. They surround themselves with loyalists when they are afraid of uncertainty. The tragedy of many post-colonial societies is that the same trauma created by colonial domination often survives independence and reappears in new forms.

This has been the heart of our mental fitness lens. Power becomes safety. Money becomes protection. Control becomes emotional regulation. The result is a political culture where wealth is not merely enjoyed, it is performed.

Cars become symbols. Weddings become political theatre. Public gifts become demonstrations of influence. Religious endorsement becomes moral cover. Social media defenders become psychological reinforcement for the system. The elite begin to inhabit a parallel reality, increasingly insulated from the emotional and economic experiences of ordinary citizens.

This is not merely a political problem. It is a psychological one.

History suggests that when enough citizens conclude that the system no longer exists for them, but only for a privileged few, the resulting grievance can become a force that neither money nor propaganda can easily contain.

South Africa offers a contemporary reminder of this reality. In recent months, public attention has focused on senior law-enforcement figures, investigations into organised criminal networks, and commissions probing allegations of corruption and state capture.

What struck many observers was not merely the allegations themselves, but the willingness of certain individuals within the system to speak publicly despite the obvious risks involved.

Figures such as Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi became symbols, for some South Africans, of institutional courage, the idea that an individual can refuse to be intimidated by powerful interests, wealth, influence, or political connections.

Equally significant was the public response. Large sections of society rallied behind calls for accountability, demonstrating that even where money, patronage, and influence appear deeply entrenched, public legitimacy still matters.

Wealth can purchase many things, but it cannot permanently purchase trust. Influence can shape narratives, but it cannot indefinitely silence grievance.

West Africa offers another reminder. In Guinea, decades of authoritarian rule under Lansana Conté left citizens exhausted by corruption, patronage, and elite accumulation.

When Captain Moussa Dadis Camara seized power in 2008, many hoped for change, only for the country to descend into further instability. Yet the deeper lesson from Guinea is that no ruling order, however entrenched, can permanently suppress a population’s desire for dignity, accountability, and participation.

The eventual rise of leaders such as Alpha Condé reflected the power of public pressure and democratic aspiration, even if later developments would reveal the complexity and fragility of political transitions. Guinea’s story reminds us that legitimacy ultimately matters more than force, money, or patronage.

Perhaps the most dramatic example came from Tunisia in 2010. The Tunisian Revolution, which became the spark for what the world later called the Arab Spring, began not with generals or politicians but with an ordinary street vendor, Mohamed Bouazizi. Humiliated repeatedly by local authorities, stripped of dignity and opportunity, Bouazizi’s desperate act of self-immolation ignited something that had been accumulating beneath the surface for years.

Within weeks, protests spread across the country. Within a month, President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who had ruled Tunisia for twenty-three years, fled the country. The lesson was profound. Political systems often appear stable right up until the moment they are not.

Beneath the surface, grievance accumulates quietly until a triggering event transforms private frustration into collective action. The Arab Spring demonstrated that fear can dominate a population for years, but once enough citizens stop being afraid simultaneously, history can move with astonishing speed.

The lesson is an old one. Powerful elites often assume that money is the ultimate source of security. History repeatedly shows otherwise. The true source of stability is legitimacy.

When citizens believe institutions serve the public good, societies endure. When citizens begin believing that institutions exist primarily to protect a connected few, a dangerous psychological shift occurs.

People stop identifying with the system and begin emotionally withdrawing from it.

That moment is often difficult to detect from within elite circles. Everything may appear normal. The parties continue. The motorcades continue. The speeches continue. The displays of wealth continue. Yet beneath the surface, grievance accumulates. And history teaches that accumulated grievance has a habit of eventually finding expression, often in ways that ruling elites neither anticipate nor control.

This is why the Zimbabwean moment is so significant. The question is no longer simply who has money, influence, or political power. The deeper question is whether those with power still understand the emotional reality of the people they govern. History suggests that when that connection is lost, money alone is rarely enough to save a system.

The question facing Zimbabwe today is therefore not whether history will repeat itself. The question is whether Zimbabwe’s political and economic elite have learned enough from history to avoid repeating its mistakes.

The Cargo Cult of the Zvigananda

Anthropologists coined the term “cargo cult” to describe communities that became fascinated by the wealth and goods brought by outsiders and attempted to reproduce the outward symbols of prosperity without understanding the underlying systems that produced it.

The term has limitations, but it offers a useful metaphor for understanding an emerging culture within sections of Zimbabwe’s elite. The defining feature of this culture is not wealth itself but the performance of wealth.

Cars, convoys, private jets, multi-million-dollar weddings, birthday celebrations, public gifting ceremonies, televised handouts, social media spectacles, the wealth is not merely possessed, it is displayed, repeatedly, publicly, relentlessly.

The display itself becomes part of the power. A person who quietly owns ten luxury cars does not create the same political effect as a person who publicly hands out ten luxury cars while cameras roll. The gift becomes theatre. The recipient becomes advertisement. The audience becomes psychologically conditioned. This is where figures such as Wicknell Chivayo become important symbols. The cars are never just cars. The houses are never just houses. The gifts are never just gifts. They communicate a message:

“Power resides here.”
“Resources reside here.”
“Loyalty is rewarded here.”

In the same way, the public generosity associated with figures such as Scott Sakupwanya and the extraordinary displays associated with the Tagwirei network operate as more than personal acts. They become political language. The language of patronage. The language of influence. The language of dependency.

Historically, patronage systems emerge where institutions weaken. When institutions work, citizens obtain opportunities through transparent systems. When institutions weaken, opportunities increasingly flow through personal relationships.

The benefactor replaces the institution. The gift replaces policy. The patron replaces the state. The danger is that citizens gradually begin looking upward toward powerful individuals rather than outward toward functioning institutions. The result is a culture of dependency.

From a Mental Fitness perspective, this represents a profound psychological shift. People begin confusing survival with citizenship. Instead of asking: “How do we build systems that work for everyone?” they begin asking: “Who can help me?” This is how oligarchic cultures reproduce themselves. Not merely through money. But through psychology.

The tragedy is that such systems often become increasingly detached from the daily experiences of ordinary citizens. The person struggling to buy bread. The nurse earning an inadequate salary. The graduate unable to find work. The family unable to access healthcare. The farmer struggling with production costs.

These realities become distant. And history teaches us that elite detachment is one of the most dangerous stages in the life cycle of any political order. The French aristocracy reached that stage. The Russian aristocracy reached that stage. Numerous post-colonial African elites have reached that stage. The warning signs are remarkably similar. Increasing disbelief that change can occur through ordinary democratic channels.

The question facing Zimbabwe is not whether wealth should exist, but the question is whether a political economy built around patronage, spectacle, and elite accumulation can remain stable indefinitely in a society experiencing widening economic hardship. History’s answer has rarely been encouraging.

Is This Where Zimbabwe Is Now?

History rarely announces itself, but it whispers, and leaves clues and also sends warnings. And then one day people wake up and realise that what seemed impossible has suddenly become inevitable. The French Revolution did not begin with crowds storming the Bastille on 14 July 1789.

By the time Parisians marched on the Bastille, the revolution had already happened psychologically. The people had stopped believing, stopped trusting, stopped hoping, stopped fearing the state. That is the point at which ruling elites become most vulnerable.

France in the late 1780s was a country trapped between two realities. On one side stood the monarchy, aristocracy, and privileged classes who continued to enjoy enormous wealth and privilege. On the other stood millions of ordinary French citizens struggling under rising food prices, unemployment, debt, taxation, and hopelessness. Bread prices had risen dramatically. Harvests had failed, and the state was effectively bankrupt. Yet Versailles remained a world of ceremonies, luxury, banquets, and elite insulation.

The problem was not merely poverty, but contrast, and the people could see. And once people begin to see clearly, history becomes dangerous. The atmosphere became electric. Pamphlets circulated. Rumours spread. Conversations shifted. Anger accumulated.

Every display of privilege became another insult. Every display of excess became another grievance. Every act of elite indifference became another spark. The political class mistook silence for acceptance. They believed they still controlled the nation. They believed the people remained afraid. They were wrong.

The storming of the Bastille became symbolic not because the prison held many prisoners. It held only seven. What mattered was what it represented: fear. And on that day, ordinary citizens demonstrated that they were no longer afraid. The Bastille fell. Then the old certainties began collapsing with astonishing speed.

Nobles fled. Officials resigned. The authority of the monarchy evaporated. What had seemed permanent suddenly looked fragile. The crowds grew bolder. The language became harsher. The demands became greater. Eventually the revolution consumed even those who had helped create it. King Louis XVI was executed. Queen Marie Antoinette was executed. Many aristocrats were executed. Even leading revolutionaries such as Georges Danton and Maximilien Robespierre would themselves later be swallowed by the forces they unleashed.

History’s lesson is not that revolutions are glorious. Often, they are tragic. The lesson is that ruling elites frequently fail to recognise the moment when public grievance transforms into public anger, and public anger transforms into public action.

Zimbabwe today is obviously not France of 1789. History never repeats itself in exactly the same way. But the emotional atmosphere feels familiar. Economic hardship, visible elite privilege, growing public frustration, increasing distrust., a widening gap between rulers and the ruled, a sense that ordinary democratic channels are becoming ineffective, a feeling that important decisions are being made by a small circle while the majority watch from the outside.

One hears whispers in commuter omnibuses, and one reads comments on social media, listens to conversations in homes, churches, beer halls, universities, and workplaces, The TENSION is there. The question is whether those in power can hear it.

Many Zimbabweans now look toward Vice President Constantino Chiwenga. Some see him as perhaps the last remaining internal obstacle to constitutional changes they fear will fundamentally alter the country’s future.

Others wonder whether he will ultimately accommodate the very forces he is expected to restrain. History offers no easy answers, and difficult questions for that matter, like, Will he be remembered as a man who spoke when it mattered? Or a man who remained silent when history demanded courage? Will he follow the path of accommodation? Or the path of resistance? Only time will answer.

But one thing is certain. The Zimbabwean moment is becoming increasingly serious. This is no longer merely a debate about personalities. It is a debate about the future architecture of the state itself.

The French Revolution teaches us that societies can tolerate suffering for surprisingly long periods. What they struggle to tolerate indefinitely is the feeling that those in power no longer care.

The danger for Zimbabwe is therefore not simply poverty, but the accumulation of grievance. And grievance, history teaches, has a way of eventually finding its voice.

Whether that voice emerges through reform, resistance, elections, institutions, or something far less predictable remains the unanswered question hanging over Zimbabwe today.

The COUNTRY STANDS AT A CROSSROADS.

And like France before 1789, many can sense that something is changing.

The only uncertainty is what comes next.

This article was co-authored by Bhekilizwe Bernard Ndlovu, a Mental Fitness scholar-practitioner, coach and social innovator focused on leadership, intergenerational trauma and nation-building across workplaces, schools and tertiary institutions in African and global contexts and Mqabuko Gabriel Ndlovu, a historian based in the United Kingdom.