Harare, Zimbabwe — Fiona Nyaungwa (24) still recalls marching towards the State House in Harare on the 18th of November in 2017 to put pressure on the then Zimbabwean ruler, the late Robert Mugabe to resign.
Nyaungwa, then a student at the University of Zimbabwe was supposed to attend lessons but she could not miss the historic event impelled by the military.
“My neighbor convinced me to witness this historical event of our time in the hope that we were being liberated from bondage,” she said.
But she is quick to confess her fear of Zimbabwe’s dreaded military.
“I was afraid the military was going to open fire on innocent civilians,” she told Ubuntu Times.
In the city center, she joined millions of Zimbabweans around the country who were calling for the resignation of Robert Mugabe — the man who had ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist since its independence from Britain in 1980.
Four days before, Nyaungwa had seen armored vehicles taking strategic positions in the city center from Inkomo Barracks about 35 kilometers northwest of Harare.
She did not know what was happening until the morning of the 15th of November 2017. ZTV, the country’s only State television broadcasting station and radio stations had been taken over by the military under the cover of the darkness.
While the drama unfolded, they had placed Mugabe under house arrest and Major General Sibusiso Moyo calmed the nation: “We wish to assure the nation that (President Mugabe) and his family are safe and sound and their security is guaranteed,” he said.
“We are only targeting criminals around him who are committing crimes that are causing social and economic suffering in the country in order to bring them to justice.”
Mugabe together with his wife Grace and a faction of Zanu-PF G40 members including outspoken former Minister of Higher Education Jonathan Moyo, Patrick Zhuwao – Mugabe’s nephew and Saviour Kasukuwere were immediately labeled criminals – accused of corruption in Zimbabwe. Their persecution started.
The coup led to the ousting of Mugabe and paved the way for the ascendency to power of axed Vice President Emmerson Mnangangwa – the man who for many years was Mugabe’s confidante.
Young people like Nyaungwa saw Mnangagwa as a savior who would build a new nation where democracy, rule of law, and respect of human rights thrived. He carried Zimbabwe’s hopes of burying years of living under fear, years of political turmoil, and rebirth of a nation that was once praised for its economic boom. They welcomed the ouster of Mugabe.
“Mugabe’s regime was oppressive. There was no freedom of speech and expression. I needed change. My hopes were to see a democratic Zimbabwe. Under Mugabe there was nepotism and corruption,” Nyaungwa said.
Three years after the military-assisted takeover and a disputed election in 2018 Zimbabweans’ hopes have faded away as it becomes apparent to many that the coup was just a change of power and not a rotten system.
After outlawing the use of multi-currency in mid-2019 and introducing its local currency the Zimbabwean dollar, the latter has been losing value against major currencies.
As of November this year, Zimbabwe’s inflation rate was nearly 385 percent, according to Steve Hanke, an economist at Johns Hopkins University.
The country faces a myriad of problems.
There is a shortage of medicine in public hospitals which has left the majority of Zimbabwe’s population struggling to access health care.
The Mnangagwa-led administration, after dumping its “Open for Business” Public Relations stunt, has adopted the removal of sanctions mantra as the solution to Zimbabwe’s economic crisis.
The government thrives on propaganda and blame-shifting. The Mnangagwa regime has even dedicated the 25th of October annually as a day to campaign against sanctions.
The United States and its allies imposed “targeted” sanctions on Harare in 2002 following a chaotic Land Reform Programme that saw blacks taking back their land from about 4500 white farmers during the Mugabe era.
But, Washington through its embassy in Harare has insisted that Mnangagwa should reform and respect human rights.
Admire Mare, a senior lecturer at Namibia University of Science and Technology said Zimbabwe’s economic malaise is a combination of both external and internal sanctions.
“Internal sanctions are rooted in deep-seated corruption, bad governance, unending electioneering, winner takes it all politics and polarization,” he told Ubuntu Times.
He said the current situation highlights that the regime has learnt nothing and forgotten nothing about the modus operandi of “Mugabeism”.
“The intensity of rule by law and abuse of the criminal justice system is unprecedented. It casts doubt on the sincerity of the regime to reform the political and electoral system,” Mare said.
The government has been using force on citizens since 2018 thereby closing the democratic space.
In August 2018 the military shot dead six civilians in the streets of Harare who were demonstrating against the electoral body which was delaying to announce the country’s first elections after Mugabe.
In January 2019, the military was deployed to quell demonstrators, who were protesting nationwide against Mnangagwa’s decision to hike fuel prices by 150 percent, resulting in the death of 17 people and leaving hundreds injured.
This year, the government using its security forces committed gross human rights under the guise of enforcing measures imposed in March to slow the spread of the global pandemic, Coronavirus.
From March to September 2020 there were over 1,200 human rights violations cases ranging from unlawful arrests, assaults, threats and intimidations, harassment of citizens and journalists, and extrajudicial killings across the country, according to the Zimbabwe Human Rights Association, a human rights advocacy movement.
Dr. Wellington Gadzikwa, a journalism lecturer and academic at a local university, said the presence of the military in civilian issues which are normally handled by the police has increased and reports of the members of the army violating human rights have increased more than during the Mugabe era.
“I think most people expected Mnangagwa to be radically different from Mugabe but the frustration with lack of change has led many to perceive that the new leader is worse off than the former,” he said.
Freedom of expression is being suppressed by the current regime with independent journalists being arrested for exposing corruption.
Njabulo Ncube, the Zimbabwe National Editors Forum coordinator told Ubuntu Times that media reforms have been a fraud in the country.
“While (Mnangagwa regime) purports to be rolling out media reforms, it is sneaking in draconian laws that criminalizes the journalism profession,” he said.
“Mugabe was subtle in stifling media freedoms but Mnangagwa is brazen.”
Nyaungwa is regretting joining the march that forced Mugabe to resign in March 2017.
“The march brought corruption and the suppression of the freedom of expression,” she said.