Dumiso Dabengwa condemns Unity Accord
The 'Black Russian' Dumiso Dabengwa /////// The late Joshua Nkomo
FORMER PF-ZAPU intelligence supremo, Dumiso Dabengwa has for the first time come out of his shell to condemn the 1987 Unity Accord signed between the ruling Zanu-PF and opposition PF-Zapu in 1987, saying he was reluctant to be part of it.
Speaking in Bulawayo recently, Dabengwa, once described by a Kenyan newspaper as the most trained soldier in southern Africa, said the agreement should be revisited – reducing it to a non-starter. His comments could be regarded by his old foe, President Mugabe as precarious in view of the prevailing political situation. Mr Mugabe has never forgiven or trusted Dabengwa, instead, Mugabe trusted the late Joshua Nkomo whom he manipulated a lot more.
Dabengwa, popularly known as the black Russian because of his KGB training in Moscow spent years in Robert Mugabe’s prisons despite being acquitted by the Supreme Court after being accused of attempting to remove Mugabe through an alleged military safari.
The usually secretive former Zipra intelligence chief, who hardly talks about the past said there were a lot of grey areas that President Mugabe’s regime had failed to address following the death of the former PF-Zapu leader, the late Vice President Joshua Nkomo.
Dabengwa who was arrested and imprisoned by Mugabe’s government alongside with ZIPRA commander Lockout Masuku soon after independence on allegations of plotting to overthrow the government warned that the Unity Accord would remain irrelevant to the people of Matabeleland if the government failed to address some grey areas. He said the accord was now being exploited for political expediency by the Mugabe’s regime.
“Some of us were very reluctant to sign the unity agreement with ZANU then,” said Dabengwa.
“We were convinced that there was no serious commitment to the unity cause on the part of our comrades on the other side, which was ZANU.
“There were a number of pointers that made us reluctant to sign the agreement, but were convinced by our leader (Joshua Nkomo) that signing would bring about good things to us as well as to the people whom we were fighting on behalf of.”
He said pressure was brought to bear on the PF-Zapu leaders to negotiate peace as their fellow Ndebele people were being butchered by the Fife Brigade which was deployed by then Prime Minister Robert Mugabe to quash dissident activities in Matabeleland.
“One of the main reasons why we had to enter into unity was that we sought an end to the suffering and killing of the people of Matabeleland by Fife Brigade. It was like a forced agreement because some of the leaders in ZAPU had been thrown in jail and the only way their freedom was to be sought was through their agreement to sign the unity accord.
“To a larger extent, unity was achieved in an unbalanced and forced manner, given that the government had failed to crush the dissident activities that were spreading all over the Matabeleland region.”
Dabengwa said empirical historical evidence had shown that the unity sought by the liberation forces, namely, the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) and the Zimbabwe National Liberation Army (ZANLA) would cause serious problems if politicians were to be involved in the signing of the unity pact.
He said that several attempts to include the politicians from both ZANU and ZAPU back in the 1960s and the 1970s had hit a brick-wall, as the politicians were reluctant to enter into unity, given the mutual lack of trust on the part of the politicians.
Dabengwa said even if they were party to the agreement that was eventually signed, there were still areas that the PF-Zapu leaders were not happy about. He said one of the contentious issues was the names that were to be retained by both parties after the signing of the unity accord. For instance, Zanu-PF was to retain its name Zanu-PF while ZAPU was to be rechristened PF only, describing this arrangement as a senseless arrangement that smacked of belittlement.
“The cockerel (which appears) on the Zanu-PF logo at the party’s headquarters, Jongwe House in Harare, was to be struck from the logo,” said Dabengwa.
He said there had been agreement that the Great Zimbabwe Ruins would be incorporated in the Zanu-PF logo instead.
“That is still to be done until today,” Dabengwa said. “Even the appointment of cabinet ministers is still an issue up to this day. We had hoped there would be balance in the appointments but we have realized that most of the young men from the ZAPU side are appointed only as deputies, which raises the question whether they are incapable of performing the same duties performed by their ministerial colleagues from Zanu-PF.
“We need to revisit this unity accord and put right those disparities that have been pointed out by the people because this is a people’s party.”
Dabengwa criticised Mugabe’s attempt to portray the recent rise of war veteran leader, Jabulani Sibanda, albeit through the back door, as a process of the unity accord signed in 1987.
He said that he viewed the plot as “child’s play aimed at hoodwinking lame political analysts into believing that there is still the element of unity within Zanu-PF.
“The recent efforts by some elements to bring back Jabulani Sibanda into the picture are nothing but efforts to try and paint a picture to the lame that there is still unity within Zanu-PF. These are not really serious efforts because some of us do not recognize Jabulani. We know him as a young man whom we recruited for training in Angola.
“Unfortunately, his training was not completed because they had to be evacuated back home for safety reasons. He was not properly trained nor did he have any bullet fired at him during the liberation war,” an irate Dabengwa said.
Many people of Matabeleland have appealed to Dabengwa whom they trust much to spearhead efforts of a breakaway state on the grounds of Matabeleland massacres and lack of development in the region. Dabengwa remains the most credible leader in Matabeleland largely because of his refusal in the early 1980s to acknowledge Mugabe as his president.
There are numerous calls from Matabeleland for Dabengwa to assemble a group of trustworthy politicians from the region and lobby the UN security council to endorse Matabeleland autonomy as a means of developing the region.
Additional reporting by the Zimbabwe Times