History and People

Great Zimbabwe

The earliest known history of Zimbabwe is indicated by the Great Zimbabwe ruins near Masvingo, from which the country took its name, meaning 'house of stone'. Built between the 9th and the 13th centuries, Great Zimbabwe was the centre of a huge empire based on trade and commerce with Africa's east coast.

The site on which Great Zimbabwe stood was inhabited by Khoisan and later by Bantu-speaking migrant farmers around 500. The fortress began to be built around 1000 AD by the ancestors of today's Shona people.

Ruin

The arrival of the Portuguese on the African east coast in the 16th century heralded great destruction for Africa, including the imminent collapse of the Great Zimbabwe civilisation. When trade with the coast declined, so did the city's main reason for existence. Several tribes of the Shona people, whose ancestors had built Great Zimbabwe, now consolidated to form the Rozwi Empire.

The Rozwi empire covered more than half of present-day Zimbabwe, forcing the Portuguese off the plateau and ensuring peace and prosperity for almost two centuries. It finally came to an end following upheavals in South Africa's Transvaal and Natal regions - the mfecane (scattering) caused by Zulu chief Shaka's aggressive militarism. Zimbabwe came under control of Ndebele chief Lobengula in 1834.

Colonisation

Lobengula soon found himself having to deal with the British, who colonised Zimbabwe from the 1890s onwards. Led by Cecil John Rhodes (after whom the country was named Rhodesia), the British South Africa Company came from South Africa to mine Zimbabwe's gold, and reached an agreement with Lobengula to trade guns and ammunition for mining rights in the area.

Britain named Rhodesia a British sphere of influence. Although the Ndebele allied with the Shona to wage guerrilla war against the colonists, they were eventually defeated and Lobengula died as his people fled northwards.

Conflict

It was increasingly apparent to the remaining Shona and Ndebele that the British government was uninterested in their problems, and they began the first Chimurenga (fight for liberation). This met with limited success - after about a year the leaders were arrested and hanged, and resistance came to an abrupt halt.

A near-apartheid state evolved over the next sixty years, with whites granted rights and land that blacks were not. Inter-racial conflict developed and worsened.

Two black political parties had formed by the late 1950s - the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) - but they were banned almost as soon as they arose, and their leaders were imprisoned.

Independence

Ian Smith replaced Winston Field as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe in 1964, and immediately began to push for independence. Britain issued a list of conditions to which Smith knew Zimbabwean whites would not agree. He issued a unilateral declaration of independence in 1965.

Britain responded with economic sanctions, but this was ignored by most other nations and the Rhodesian economy actually improved. However, conditions for Africans did not improve, and ZANU/ZAPU guerrilla warfare caused white farmers to start abandoning their farms. This was the second Chimurenga.

Negotiations

Smith soon realised that the political situation was untenable, and entered into negotiations with the African leaders. These were protracted due to deep disagreements, and as long as they continued, so did white emigration.

Finally, in 1976, Smith agreed to a compromise that would allow majority rule in two years' time, with 75 parliamentary seats reserved for blacks and 25 for whites. In the following elections (in which all citizens older than 18 could vote) the majority of the 75 black seats were won by Bishop Muzorewa's UANC Party.

Black rule

Muzorewa had support from Smith and apartheid South Africa, but he lacked credibility among most Africans. Disorder bordering on civil war continued in the country, and in 1980 another election was held after the disarming of communist guerrillas. The election was won in a landslide by Robert Mugabe's ZANU party.

ZAPU cabinet member Nkomo was fired from the cabinet after a weapons cache was discovered on his properties and those of his lieutentants. This caused massive fighting between ZANU and ZAPU. Mugabe sent the Fifth Brigade to quell the ZAPU rebellion. Many atrocities were committed against the Ndebele during this campaign.

Finally Mugabe and Nkomo held talks to stop the violence and reunify the Patriotic Front. The perpetrators of atrocities on both sides were offered amnesty, and ZANU-PF was formed in 1987.

Land reform

Although majority rule had been implemented, 70% of commercially arable Zimbabwean land was owned by a white 1% of the population. Only a tiny proportion of these had been reallocated to blacks despite the millions of pounds given to Zimbabwe by Britain to this end. Those that were redistributed ended up in the hands of high-ranking political and military people.

The government began forcing white farmers off their land in 1999. The sudden drop in supply caused a drastic increase in food prices, and Zimbabwe's heavily agriculture-dependent economy began to collapse. Starvation became widespread. Despite the redistribution of white-owned land to blacks, most Zimbabweans are worse off now than they were before the redistribution.

Devolution

Zimbabwe was suspended from the UN Human Rights Council following the forced land redistribution program and widespread allegations of election tampering in 2002, which included allegations of voter intimidation and violence against supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), led by Morgan Tsvangirai.

In 2005, Mugabe's government instituted Operation Murambatsvina ('drive out the trash') in an effort ostensibly to eliminate illegal markets and houses. This left about 700,000 people homeless, and was widely condemned by opposition and foreign parties.

Ongoing opposition

The MDC is currently split into two factions. One faction continues to contest elections, while the other boycotts the elections saying that participation is tantamount to endorsing Mugabe's doubtful claim that they are free and fair.

The latter faction is led by Tsvangirai and is by far the more popular of the two. However, few people hold out much hope for improvement in Zimbabwe's political situation in the near future.

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