Most often he is depicted as having two faces, facing opposite directions; one head looks back at the last year while the other looks forward to the new, simultaneously into the future and the past…
“He was frequently used to symbolise change and transitions such as the progression of past to future, of one condition to another, of one vision to another, the growing up of young people, and of one universe to another. He was also known as the figure representing time because he could see into the past with one face and into the future with the other.
Hence, Janus was worshipped at the beginnings of the harvest and planting times, as well as marriages, deaths and other beginnings. He was representative of the middle ground between barbarity and civilization, rural country and urban cities, and youth and adulthood.” — Wikipedia.
So, right now as we celebrate New Year’s Day we are seated in the middle ground between barbarity and civilisation. Does that sound too severe an assessment of ourselves and our country?
Were there any acts of barbarity in the year just gone by?
Many acts of cruelty emerged mainly during the constitution-making outreach programme. In an otherwise peaceful year during which the nation was recovering from the excesses of 2008, political violence resurfaced as the Constitution Select Committee sought to collect people views on the new constitution. According to the political roadmap that should lead to free and fair elections, the country was supposed to come up with a people-driven constitution. That meant people’s views had to be gathered nationwide in an atmosphere in which they were able to express themselves freely.
This did not happen. Some sections of the political leadership saw the constitution-making process as a life and death issue. They saw certain views as dangerous and went out of their way to suppress them. Through the use of violence people were intimidated into silence while a few parrots were coached and paraded at meetings as the true representatives of people’s views.
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On its own admission Zanu PF now boasts 80% of the views expressed during the outreach programme are its own views. But at what cost? How many people died and how many more were brutalised so that those views could prevail?
The country is now faced with another situation where its supreme law will not be people-driven; that means therefore that we are going to be saddled with another illegitimate document similar to the one we got at Lancaster House.
In the past two years the country has been ruled by a coalition government. Although it was far from being a perfect arrangement it went a long way into stabilising the country after years of political mayhem.
But during 2010 many barbaric things were done that sought to destroy the only arrangement that was practical at the time. Any act that threatened to break this arrangement was an act of extreme cruelty. This might sound like an extremist view, but when a person is wounded and the wound is beginning to heal any act that could revive the wound is an act of barbarity.During the year the nation was always on the edge as the principals in the inclusive government squabbled without end. Unilateral decisions were made and some parts to the agreement threatened to walk out.
The arbiter, Southern African Development Community (Sadc) was indecisive and clearly looked partial. Sadc came out as a toothless bulldog; a good example was when its important arm, the Sadc Tribunal, was rubbished by the Zanu PF side of the inclusive government. Sadc also often played truant when the MDC approached it with grievances.
The latest example was last month when two senior members of the Sadc Troika, Mozambique’s Amando Guebuza and Zambia’s Rupiah Banda, chose not to go to Botswana where MDC principals had sought a parley.
The public press, particularly broadcast, continued to carry hate speech. High-ranking members of Zanu PF continue to threaten that they would not cede power even in the face of defeat. Journalists in the private media were threatend and arrested. Our staffer Nqobani Ndlovu had to suffer nine days in a maximum security prison chained to hard-core felons.
Can we look into the future with hope? Hardly! The referendum that should bring the draft new constitution to the public is going to be nothing but a fuss. Zanu PF will use its old tactics to ensure that a “Yes” vote prevails; this will be for their very survival. Many groups will campaign for a “No” vote.
These will include most non-governmental organisations under the tutelage of the National Constitutional Assembly. These civic organisations will constitute “the opposition” and Zanu PF will descend upon them like a tonne of bricks.
The “Yes” vote is likely to win considering the tactics that will be used. Areas where opposition is likely to be will simply not be given the chance to express themselves.
More importantly, the ballots will be handled by the same partisan cadre that has always rigged our elections. So the result of the referendum is foregone.
As soon as the issue of the referendum is done away with, the real war will begin. Elections pencilled in for midyear will plunge the country once again into a warpath. The international community, as is their wont, will look on making lots of impotent noises.
One thing we can bet on is that Zanu PF does not give a hoot if the elections are internationally acceptedor not. It is telling, it is not, that Zanu PF is the only ruling party in the world that has stood by Ivory Coast’s Laurent Gbagbo who is refusing to transfer power when he clearly lost an election.
Efforts by the international community to pressure him into submission are proving fruitless. Zanu PF is watching intently the developments in the West African country.
So, this new year we fail again to move from barbarity to civilation!
