Paidamoyo Muzulu
THE BRITISH are renowned for their fondness for leaders, especially those who led them through difficult times like World War II and the Cold War. Most notable are Army Commander Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. They have become personality cults.

Churchill nicknamed the British Bulldog after defending London against an air invasion from Nazi Germany. A time when most Londoners had to know the sound of the alarm and immediately enter the bunkers until the siren sounded.

He became the face and the symbol of the resistance to the German occupation. Many Britons felt that he saved them from Nazi occupation. Churchill became a war hero and was even honored in colonial territories of the time, such as Zimbabwe, where a public school is named after him in Harare.

Thatcher made history on two fronts. She became the first woman from Western Europe to become prime minister, head of government. She was first elected in the 1979 election and won two consecutive general elections for the Conservatives.

She came to power at the height of the Cold War, a clash of political ideologies – capitalism and socialism. The world had been split in two economically and militarily – East and West.

Thatcher carried out the most brutal economic reforms in modern history by privatizing most public companies. It has become the face of neoliberalism.

The direct influence of the state on the economy has been reduced. Transport, electricity, telecommunications, mines, industries and even water have been privatized.

She survived protests against her policies but she resisted, hence her nickname – Iron Lady.

Zimbabwe has its own version of personality cults. There is the late liberation war hero Josiah Magama Tongogara, the late former President Robert Gabriel Mugabe and his successor Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa.

Tongogara died on the eve of Zimbabwe’s independence and many in military circles believe he was the man who could have curbed Mugabe’s excesses. Some even say he is the leader Zimbabwe never had, a man of action.

Mugabe, meanwhile, became the first democratically elected leader and his government got to work. He increased access to education, health care and even stipulated a minimum wage for the working class.

He also empowered many people in urban areas through the home ownership program and land reform program in his later years.

His weakness was being surrounded by weak personalities, thieves, and men and women who saw ministerial jobs as a ticket to personal enrichment. It has not acted decisively against corruption in government and the public sector in general.

Mnangagwa strives to build his cult. He is announced by his full title – Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defense Force during state radio news bulletins. Every minister cannot speak about ministerial policies without invoking the name of Mnangagwa and in Zanu PF he is the alpha and the omega.

This week he sacked Zanu PF ICT director Munyaradzi Katsande and suspended party administration director Dickson Dzora for their involvement in the recent violent and rigged internal provincial elections.

In the reports that announced the news, it was Mnangagwa who made the decisions and not any of the recognized party structures.

It seems that someone close to Mnangagwa whispered to him what Professor Yuvral Harari wrote in Homo sapiens a brief history of mankind. Harari writes that humans are bound by myths and the ability to have languages.

One of the myths that binds societies together is religion.

Mnangagwa quickly latched onto the mythical spiritual figure of Mbuya Nehanda for Zanu PF.

He commissioned and launched the statue which now straddles the corner of Samora Machel and Julius Nyerere Way.

In the same tone of taking ownership for Zanu PF, Mnangagwa was heard in videos that went viral on social media saying that Zanu PF was everything – it’s the police, the army, the government, the judiciary and anything you can think of. He adds that one would wither like a fallen leaf if they left Zanu PF.

The above is a classic example of the fusion of party, government and state. To Zanu PF, these three are one and the same and they strive to convince everyone equally. It was a deliberate lie to make the party the central pillar of people’s lives and harvest electoral votes for fear of transgressing the party during the elections.

As the 2023 general election approaches, it is the duty of the opposition to create a Zanu PF counter-hegemony. I don’t know if the counter-hegemony is there right now and if it is, if it’s being properly communicated. Zanu PF and Mnangagwa cannot be allowed to appropriate national symbols for their political gain.

Zanu PF has since independence emphasized what academic Blessing Miles Tendi calls “patriotic history”. There have been a lot of things that have been whitewashed as much as some things have been deliberately taken out of the history books.

Very few young Zimbabweans know characters like Herbert Chitepo, Ndabaningi Sithole, Lookout Masuku, Jason Ziyaphapha Moyo, Dumiso Dabengwa and Edgar Tekere. Once crossed with certain rulers, they gradually faded from historical accounts.

Holes should be punched in his heroic mythos about the Crocodile Gang, ownership of Mugabe projects he merely completed, and bookish economic growth and mega-deals. If left uncritically, these myths will soon become facts and Mnangagwa will benefit.

There is an apt quote from essayist and novelist Chinua Achebe who says, “Until lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.

Temporal counter-narratives are produced, but this is no small feat.