Diaspora community losing identity

Diaspora community losing identityBy Lloyd MsipaThursday 20 December 2007

THE EU-Africa summit in Lisbon, Portugal has come and gone and it seems that the agenda set to discuss international trade, the impact of migration from third world countries and human rights, was largely sidelined and the highlight of the meeting became the presence of President Robert Mugabe and the conspicuous absence of Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Apart from the charade created by all this activity the issue that I found rather strange was that as Zimbabweans we have indeed or are in the process of shedding our identities in exchange for foreign ones. The irony is that the foreigners we emulate will do everything in their power to deport us from their countries while making sympathetic noises and acting as though ignoring Mugabe will restore order to Zimbabwe. Our actions and the way we behave are a far cry from those of the nationalists that brought independence to Zimbabwe. There are brothers and sisters among us who are behaving as if they will never set foot in Zimbabwe again. We have become agents of doom in as far as our country is concerned. It is one thing to campaign for a certain political dispensation and another to burn the entire house down. In fact, our actions have given foreign nationals the license to say whatever they want about our country. An example of this was Archbishop John Sentamu’s theatrics on BBC television. I was taken aback by the Archbishop of York’s behavior when he cut his collar in protest to what he called “the theft of the identities of Zimbabweans by the Zimbabwean president” amongst other allegations. Coming from a Ugandan who has given up his Ugandan citizenship for British citizenship I found this quite ironic. The Archbishop does not have the locus standi to make such remarks on behalf of Zimbabweans.

It is one thing to encourage Zimbabweans to take the path to self-determination and another to do it on their behalf.The problem we have regarding Zimbabwe is that, as a people in the Diaspora, we seem to have mortgaged the solutions to our problems to foreign nationals. We are prepared to listen to everybody else except ourselves. In fact I would go as far as to say that we have given some kind of de facto permission to foreign nationals to throw potshots at Zimbabwe without us considering their impact. At the rate we are going we stand to lose our identities faster than we think, with no hope of salvaging them in the end. What strikes me as even more ironic is the fact that it is the white farmers who despite being at the epicenter of the land revolution have largely refused to leave Zimbabwe. They insist on being recognized as Zimbabweans. They still believe the situation can be resolved for the betterment of all Zimbabweans. President Robert Mugabe is only one man and a mortal, at that, who will step down sooner or later. However the legacy that he has created will remain forever whether we like it or not. It is a legacy that is now part of our history. A history that tells us that whenever a revolution takes place it is bound to upset the status quo and Zimbabwe has not been an exception.

What is important now is for Zimbabwe to arouse its sons and daughters to take up the responsibility of reconstructing the country. We are the sons and daughters of Zimbabwe and the task of reconstruction of our country must start with us, not with foreigners. What we say about our country and our leaders in front of other nationals significantly damages our international standing such that as a people we have largely become unwelcome whether we are visitors or refugees wherever we travel abroad. I was re-watching the video of an interview with the late vice president Joshua Nkomo when he was in temporary exile in the UK and I was amazed at his refusal to paint events in Zimbabwe with a black brush and his insistence that he was only taking a break, but would be returning home to Zimbabwe shortly. I was amazed at how he put the country’s interests before his own and his refusal to become embittered. By contrast, we have given permission to foreign nationals to attack us and steal our identities over time.

In the United Kingdom we have our Zimbabwean brothers and sisters masquerading as South African nationals or Malawians. The truth is that we have thrown away our Zimbabwean identity. The fact that the summit in Lisbon failed to conjure up or renew previous agreements between Africa and Europe is ample evidence that Africa has come very far as a continent from a mere supplier of primary products or raw materials to the west and now has a desire to export to Europe finished secondary products. That is Africa today. It seems to me as Zimbabweans in the Diaspora we need do to realize this and think of how we can take our own place in that new situation.The fact that Africa has come out in support of Zimbabwe in these trying times should say something to us Africans living in western countries. Is it possible that we have lived for far too long away from home to a point that we have lost our sense of being Zimbabweans? Maybe it’s time for us to reconsider whether the so-called target sanctions are benefiting ordinary Zimbabweans in the country or whether there is need for new thinking on the issue. I think Zimbabweans in the Diaspora could play a pivotal role in this. From a different perspective, it is my belief that the United Kingdom, without going into detail is also equally to blame for the challenges Zimbabwe faces today. We need to acknowledge that the Zimbabwe/Britain stand off will not be resolved without Mugabe and the British sitting down to thrash out their differences.

The land legacy will remain with us long after Mugabe has gone. That legacy is ours and how we manage it will fundamentally affect what becomes of us as a nation in a post Mugabe era. My worry is that Zimbabweans in the Diaspora maybe in danger of working against the grain. We seem to be caught up in the politics of doom. As I said before, it is one thing to campaign for a particular political dispensation and another to burn the house down.(Lloyd Msipa is a lawyer resident in the United Kingdom. He can be contacted at lmsipalaw@googlemail.com)