Nation Building in Zimbabwe and the Challenges of Ndebele Particularism

This article deploys a politico-sociological historical analysis in the interrogation of the origins, tenacity and resilience of Ndebele particularism across pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial epochs in Zimbabwe. While the issue of Ndebele particularism is currently overshadowed by the recent political and economic crisis that has seen Zimbabwe becoming a pariah state, it has continued to haunt both the project of nationalism that ended up unravelling along the fault-lines of Ndebele-Shona ethnicities and the post-colonial nation-building process that became marred by ethnic tensions and violence of the 1980s. In this article, Ndebele particularism is described at two main levels. Firstly, successive pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial historical processes contributed to the construction and consolidation of Ndebele particularism. Secondly, this particularism is a product of coalescence of grievance and resentment to Shona triumphalism. The politico-sociological historical analysis is intertwined with a social constructivist perspective of understanding complex politics of identities in general. The discussion is taken up to the current reverberation of Ndebele particularistic politics on the internet including the creation of a virtual community known as United Mthwakazi Republic (UMR) that symbolises the desire for a restored pre-colonial Ndebele nation in the mould of Swaziland and Lesotho. African Journal on Conflict Resolution Vol. 8 (3) 2008: pp. 27-5

Colonial Modernity and the African Worldview: Theorising and Historicising Religious Encounters in South-Western Zimbabwe

The Postcolonial and Post-structuralist conceptual and theoretical interventions in African studies in general and African history in particular enable historians to re-read colonial and cultural encounters with a view to liberate them from the inflexible ‘domination and resistance’ interpretation that was installed by nationalist historiography in the 1960s. This article deploys Postcolonial conceptual and theoretical tools to analyse the complex religious encounters that unfolded in the region that was occupied by the Ndebele nation that was built by King Mzilikazi Khumalo prior to the Anglo-Ndebele War of 1893-4 and the subsequent colonisation of the Ndebele-speaking people by the white settlers in 1895. The religious encounters are read as a terrain of meeting of two worldviews- one informed by Victorian capitalist and colonial hegemonic ethos and the other by African communal but equally hegemonic Nguni ideas of assimilation and incorporation. What ensued was uneasy religious dualities, conversations, contestations, blending, interpellation andtransformation of consciousness in which only direct colonial conquest resolved the encounter in favour of Christian missionaries. The Gramscianconcept of hegemony and Jean and John Comaroff’s concept of cultural and colonial encounters are used to assist in teasing out deeper meaning in the encounter between the Ndebele and the early Christian missionariesprior to inscription of settler colonialism in the area lying between the Limpopo and Zambezi Rivers.Keywords: Religion, worldview, Christianity, Matabeleland, African traditional religion, hegemony, colonial encounters, conversio

How did Europe Rule Africa? Dialectics of Colonialism and African Political Consciousness in the Matabeleland Region of Zimbabwe

The question of how Europe ruled Africa relates to the crucial issues of settlernative identity as constructions of colonialism as well as political consciousness formation and development among the colonized as well as the colonizers. Because colonialism operated ambiguously throughout its life to the extent of hiding its adverse contours of epistemological and mental invasion that have come to haunt during the post-colonial era, it deserve to be subjected to systematic theorization and historicization. This article deploys various conceptual tools culled from post-colonial theories to delve deeper into the dialectics and ontology of colonial governance in Zimbabwe and it simultaneously historicize the phenomenon of colonial governance on the basis of how white Rhodesians inscribed themselves in Matabeleland in the early twentieth century. It also systematically interrogates the development of Ndebele political consciousness under the alienating influences of settler colonialism up to the mid-twentieth century. The article contributes to the broader debates on colonial encounters and colonial governance that have left an indelible mark on ex-colonies across the world. Colonialism was not just a footnote in African history. It had long term pervasive impact of altering everyone and everything that it found in Africa.LWATI: A Journal of Contemporary Research Vol. 5 2008: pp. 85-10

Quarrying African indigenous political thought on governance: A case study of the Ndebele state in the 19th Century

African indigenous political thought on governance and human rights has remained victim to mythology, Western stereotyping, colonization as well as African romanticization. The net effect has been that African styles of governance have either been stigmatized and reduced to a long night of savagery and violence or celebrated as a golden age of freedom and equality. The reality lies somewhere between these two erroneous views. This article re-examines the debate on governance in Africa by means of a case study of the Ndebele state. Of special interest in this study is the kind of governance style that the Ndebele constructed, the values that underpinned it, how it was operated and articulated, as well as the general political ideology of the Ndebele in the 19th century

Nation-Building and the FIFA World Cup, South Africa 2010

There is endless debate about the legitimacy of major global sporting events, most notably the summer Olympic Games and the World Cup of men’s football. At a symbolic level, they are heralded as grand opportunities for sport to express the brotherhood and sisterhood of humanity. At a national level, they are regarded as a source of national pride in the face of world competition. At a commercial level, they are seen as a boost to economic development through infrastructural development and tourism. Conversely, these occasions are also and equally pilloried, for precisely the obverse of the positive claims made about them (Pellegrino et al., 2010; Carreño Lara, 2012; Ferreira & Boshoff, 2013)