Some youngsters in Mbare regularly cross into South Africa and back again. They have no passports or travelling documents of any sort.
How do they do it? I ask them. They just grin. They indicate with a gesture that they wriggle their way through, under barbed wires, over fences. But this is no joke.
“Five of the women were raped and two babies were literally taken off their mothers’ backs and thrown into the river” by border bandits (from a report quoted in a recent pastoral letter Zimbabweans in the Diaspora, Catholic Bishops of Zimbabwe).
I was three years old when our family escaped from advancing armies in the east of Germany at the end of World War Two and spent a month on the road, travelling in a horse-drawn wagon in ice and snow.
I was seven when we moved on again, this time crossing illegally the German-German border between East and West, what was to become the “Iron Curtain”, under the very noses of armed border guards. We were not caught or shot at and we made it to a big city in the West where eventually we found a new home though feeling complete strangers.
We were only “internal refugees”, we did not have to cross continents or oceans. But the very different dialect I spoke was enough to cut me off from my new classmates who found it very funny and laughed a lot about my unusual accent.
So refugees of any sort, whether political or economic, have my sympathy. Many could not care less about them. “Good riddance,” party politicians think and deride migrants as disloyal and unpatriotic, though the money they send back is welcome to prop up an economy still seriously sick and dysfunctional.
“While not wishing to abandon their beloved country, these migrants felt abandoned by it” (Diaspora, ZCBC).“But they are citizens of this country. They belong here. They have a right to live in the country of their birth.
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They contribute to the life of the nation and its development; they should not be deprived of their vote. They have not given up their citizenship. Their voices should not be suppressed, their votes should be counted. “They are not a stateless people. They belong to the State of Zimbabwe. They are our concern. We embrace them as one of us,” the bishops say.
How come our leaders show so little concern about this tremendous loss? “The greatest asset of any country is its own people.” They are more precious than all the diamonds of Chiadzwa and of greater value than all the rich resources the country is blessed with. “Those in the Diaspora are Godly human beings, made in His image and likeness.”
Our new Constitution must reflect this fundamental truth that people are the prime asset of our country and must be respected as such, never to be sacrificed for economic gain or “sold out” for political supremacy.
Citizenship must be clearly defined, and must never become a football in the political game, depriving marginal groups, deemed “politically unreliable”, of home, security and livelihood.
People must never become playthings in a mere game. Why do so many people of this continent have to flee across the seas to find a living on foreign shores?
Why do so many sons and daughters of Africa perish crossing the Mediterranean on fragile craft? Some of us remember the “boat people” of Vietnam, victims of the conflict between East and West fought out on the soil of their home country. Why have Africans become today’s “boat people”, crossing the Sahara while fleeing the economic desert of their countries of origin?
Why are there hundreds of thousand, even millions, of internal refugees in the Congo and the Great Lakes region, in Mali and West Africa?
Exporting labour from Africa to the Americas was called “slave trade”. What do we call the present export of our workforce to the rest of the world?
These are the fundamental questions the leaders of the continent should ask, rather than merely wrangle over power and personal privileges. Creating work places for the young is one of the great challenges facing Africa, so as to stop the great exodus of our children.
Using the tremendous natural resources of Africa (precious metals, oil, gas, diamonds, platinum etc) for the common good, for the benefit of all its people, is the other great challenge to our leaders: at present these treasures are a curse because they fuel wars which drive people from their homes, but they could be a blessing and provide the starting capital for African industry, creating work places for Africa’s children and stopping the drain of labour from the continent.
I remember a young journalist friend of mine phoning me on the eve of his departure: “I will be back when things are better.” He did not mean to leave the country of his birth for good. But as a media worker sworn to freedom of information and expression, he saw no chance for himself in Zimbabwe at the time.
I was tempted to ask him: “Who is going to make it better if you leave?” I think he tried, but got so discouraged he left. I very much hope he will come back once he has enjoyed a more open society elsewhere (and also seen its drawbacks and darker sides).
Freedom-loving people have breathing difficulties in this country. Their love of liberty is being choked out of them.
The prevailing atmosphere of fear, caused by ever-present intimidation and threatening behaviour by politicised State agents and party thugs, is depressing them. They do not want to be forever on the run.
They are tired of the “ongoing culture of intimidation and abuse of human rights. Genuine engagement in a process of national healing and reconciliation must become real rather than notional.
Without this engagement the festering sore will remain and Zimbabweans will continues to leave their country in significant numbers”, the bishops warn.
We need a new “liberation” and must not be afraid of the“struggle”. Then we can bring our brothers and sisters home.
