Kubatana.net ~ an online community of Zimbabwean activists

Activism as a way of life

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Wednesday, October 23rd, 2013 by Lenard Kamwendo

Some people become activists through passion while some find themselves on the streets because they are just tired of getting screwed by the system. When Martin Luther King took to the streets he wanted to share his dream of a society where race was not an issue. The general socio-economic and political conditions we now live in demand action and solutions to our day to day needs. Every time we turn on news channels its about protests and uprisings as more and more people continue to demand solutions to contemporary problems affecting them.

South Africa was recently dubbed “the protest capital of the world” as the streets have become permanent homes for activists. Living in a world faced with a lot of injustice and inequality mainly driven by greed, profiteering and ignorance, calls for a collective effort from everybody. Activism is about affecting social change and championing a cause whether big or small. Small things like a change of mindset won’t even require government or big donor funding for a start and that’s the reason why we often read about the great works by Wangari Mathaai of Kenya who managed to share knowledge on environment conservation with rural communities. A young girl from Pakistan almost lost her life because she wanted other young girls in her country to have access to education. Even the young school children of South Africa became active in 1979 demanding better education. Artists as role models for the young generation have also become heavily involved in activism especially towards raising awareness on behavior change targeting drug abuse and safe sex.

Activism comes with its own challenges with many activists the world over being persecuted for championing people’s rights. Zimbabwe is one such country where activists and social movement groups have been labeled enemies of the state. A crack down on dissenting voices has resulted in many people shying away from being active in the community on issues that affect them due to fear.

One of Zimbabwe’s aspiring activists Wadzanai Motsi was awarded the prestigious Thomas J. Watson Fellowship and she conducted research on youth’s contributions to activism. At a Food for Thought session hosted by US Embassy Public Affairs section, Wadzanai and Ruvheneko Parirenyatwa shared their experiences on various forms of activism and the different ways each person can contribute to make the society we live in a better place.

Social / protest movements

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Wednesday, October 23rd, 2013 by Bev Clark

Sociologist/movement theorist, Zeynep Tufekci, suggests we stop looking so much at outputs of social media fueled protests and start looking instead at their role in capacity building. More on Ethan Zuckerman’s blog

Zimbabwe government and its money sucking

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Wednesday, October 23rd, 2013 by Fungayi Mukosera

There’s a level of totalitarianism that pinches my nerves that is clearly visible in Zimbabwe. The people are always stuffed under the heavy hand of the despot either in the guise of ‘home grown solutions’ or ‘catching up with international standards’. Whenever the government wants to suck money out of us they do it to catch up with international trends.

Good examples are the introduction of toll gates, increasing toll fees, debates about urban tolls, spot fines, increasing import taxes and levies, new police and ministers’ vehicles, etc. International standards are unceremoniously dumped whenever issues of accountability and good governance are brought up and replaced by ‘home grown remedies’, which in most cases have only looked well crafted on paper but void in implementation.

They work these things like magicians in our eyes; most of the time we fail to connect the two dots in the line in the use of the terms from the start of the con plan to steal money from us to the point where we want the result and details of expenditure. A good but sad example is the toll fees which were forcibly introduced on our roads to catch up with regional and international trends and without fail, every motorist is paying but the amount of potholes on our highways by far do not reflect the tremendous amounts of money that is being collected in toll fees everyday.

Interestingly the government is still working ‘flat out’ to craft ‘home grown solutions’ that will insure that the system is water tight and any corruption be brought to book. Others who have tried to question the accountability of the government and police over toll fees and spot fines have been labeled western puppets whose agenda is to serve their western masters and to push for a regime change in our country. Anyone who asks questions about the diamond revenues (including the former Finance Minister, Biti), Zupco unfair operations, civil service inflated wage bills and unfair distributions of farming, energy, water and security resources etc, has been placed in this neocolonialists puppet bracket.

Fire in the sky

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Monday, October 21st, 2013 by Bev Reeler

October 20th 2013

Today Harare is covered in a choking pall of black toxic smoke
a thick fog seeping through every nook and cranny
the dry heat and hot winds of the last weeks has turned the city dump into a burning inferno

The scanty resources and inadequate management of our city ‘fathers’
unable to halt the fire and it’s the searing fumes

Today we sit sweltering inside (an unheard-of event on a Sunday)
watching thick smoke -  through closed windows (also an unheard-of event)
settling in waves across the vlei – the neighbouring almost invisible
and we are over 7 km from the fire as the bird flies

Today we breathe our own burning waste
the inevitable consequence of the consumerism we comfortably choose
to ignore – once we have placed it in bins and had it taken away

October 21st 2013

the fire still rages this morning
some respite earlier when the wind changed,
but it is back …
burning, choking, eye watering toxic fumes

our little bit of self-made poisonous addition to the fires in New South Wales

Victories & Violations – The Struggle for Minority Rights in Africa

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Thursday, October 10th, 2013 by Bev Clark

Launch of Openphoto 2013 Competition with US$5,000 First Prize … Victories & Violations – The Struggle for Minority Rights in Africa
Deadline: 30 November 2013

After the success of the inaugural competition in 2012, the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) is pleased to announce the launch of OPENPhoto 2013 on the theme of Minority Rights in Africa – with the winners being selected by a jury comprised of some of Africa’s and the world’s top documentary photographers, and with a top prize of US$5,000.

Aiming to encourage analytical and critical thinking about society in Africa and support the development of photojournalism across the continent, OPENPhoto 2013 is looking for strong, interpretive documentary work on the theme of Victories and Violations: The Struggle for Minority Rights in Africa.

“Across the continent, many people remain marginalised and socially excluded because they are minorities. People are discriminated against because they are disabled or homosexual or indigenous or sex workers. Or because they are women living with HIV. Or men from a small ethnic group. Or children from a non-state religion. Or families fleeing persecution in another country,” said Richard Lee, OSISA’s Communications Manager. “OPENPhoto 2013 is looking to reward photo essays that depict the reality of life for these marginalised minorities – the good and the bad, their struggles and their successes.”

The competition is open to any photographer based in Africa – professional or amateur. And the prizes are definitely worth winning:

First Prize – US$5,000 plus a commissioned assignment with OSISA in 2014
Second Prize – US$2,000; and
Third Prize – US$1,000

OPENPhoto 2013 will be judged by a prestigious jury of award-winning African and international photographers. Convened by the Pulitzer Prize-winning South African photographer, Greg Marinovich, the jury includes João Silva, Munem Wasif, Patrick Baz, Robin Comley, Yunghi Kim, Enrico Dagnino, Andrew Lichtenstein, David Dare Parker and Janine Haidar.

The competition deadline is November 30th with the winners being announced on December 16th.

For more information and to apply: www.open-photo.org

Public Event: Discovering the activist in you

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Monday, October 7th, 2013 by Amanda Atwood

“Discovering the activist in you” presentation by Wadzanai Motsi

When: Tuesday October 22, 3 pm
Where: US Embassy Public Affairs Section, 7th Floor, Gold Bridge, Eastgate, Harare

Wadzanai Motsi, a graduate of Grinnell College, was awarded the prestigious Watson Fellowship for one year of independent study and travel abroad.  As part of her Fellowship, Ms. Motsi traveled to Egypt, Tunisia, Ghana, Cambodia and the Czech Republic to study youth activism.

Free to all interested members of the public.