After reading Caesar Zvayi's account of his dramatic expulsion from Botswana in the Herald, I felt compelled to comment on some of the issues he raised either in his defence or in plain self-justification.
The Herald's former political editor was unceremoniously kicked out of Botswana more than a fortnight ago after his name was included in the EU sanctions list.
In his account, Mr. Zvayi wrote that twelve hours from the time he had made farewell to his chauffeur, his world had turned up-side down. I quote, ' staring at the dark green walls of a stinking prison cell at Tshesebe Police Station, just 50km shy of Plumtree Border Post, awaiting deportation from Botswana to Zimbabwe'.
I feel I should remind Mr. Zvayi that police cells are known to stink the world over; worse in Zimbabwe.
I spent two nights in the police cell in Tshesebe way back in 1977. Luckily for me I was neither a deportee to the then Rhodesia, nor a suspect in any criminal case; I was on my way to join the liberation struggle. The police cells (not prison cells) were used as temporary accommodation whilst transport to Francistown was being arranged. My personal ordeal with police cells did not end there.
In 1984 I was detained in the Plumtree police cells for a night during operation, 'Mhanyai Mhanyai'. Mhanyai, a Shona term for run, was what the soldiers from the Presidential Guard used to bark during cordon searches of Plumtree town, which was under a brutal curfew. Although I worked for the then PTC, I was still suspected of being a dissident or dissident sympathiser. Members of the Zimbabwe Intelligent Corps (ZIC) and Central Intelligent Organisation (CIO) would call the detainees one at a time for torturous interrogation. The cries of those who were being brutalised by Mugabe's thugs in the CIO torture chambers occasionally ring in my head.
Mr. Zvayi's naively wrote about their belts and shoes being removed before they were let into the police holding cells, as if in Zimbabwe people got into police cells in their expensive footwear and belts. He should ask Tendai Biti, Phillip Chiyangwa or Chris Kurineri for an account of the state and treatment in police cells. Mr. Zvayi is urged to wake up to the truth: police cells in Zimbabwe stink and police cells everywhere are not hotel rooms. Detainees have to sadly spend worrisome nights on cold floors. It was indeed ominous to have a representative from the new aristocrats created by Mugabe experiencing the horrors of inhumanity.
The golden rule on police cells is: once a person is taken to the cells, their dignity goes a few notches to the drain! Refusing to enter the cells can indeed result in severe pummeling. For any first hand reference, Mr. Zvayi is free to ask Commissioner Chihuri on how those who resist police instructions are treated in his own dear Zimbabwe.
Mr. Zvayi wrote that his crime stemmed from his inclusion on the EU sanctions list, and rightly so. He however disputes the legality of president Lt-Gen Seretse Khama Ian Khama acting on EU sanctions, even though Botswana is in Southern Africa.
I would remind Mr. Zvayi that Botswana, a sovereign state in Africa, knows which side of its bread is buttered. Botswana has a choice of friends from a small list and the EU is one of their friends, whilst Zimbabwe could just be a neighbour they cannot get rid off and an erstwhile friend. Perhaps for Botswana there was no need to re-invent the wheel when the EU had already perfected it!
I am sure Mr. Zvayi realises that Zimbabwe, a Southern African state, finds solace from its association with China. Zimbabwe is free to implement helpful directives from China on the basis of economic and historic ties. A country should not have its capacity to take decisions tied by their geographic position. If, say, Russia had a sound rationale to have Mr. Tsvangirai on its sanctions list, I am sure Mr. Zvayi and all the hoodlums in ZANU-PF would not only religiously pontificate on that, but would actually have the poor guy deported to some gulag in Siberia.
Mr. Zvayi traces the roots of his problems to the time he was offered a lectureship post by the University of Botswana in the Media Studies Department in March. He blames some MDC functionaries and activists for writing, I quote, 'a flurry of letters and e-mails to the university expressing outrage at my appointment accusing me of trampling on the rights of Zimbabweans by writing in support of the Government'. He prides himself for not making any apologies for being Zimbabwean and backing the Government's pan-Africanist values and empowerment policies. It is not surprising as history shows that evil men like Goebbels (cue: Jonathan Moyo) died still justifying their evil acts and utterances even though evidence was heavily stacked against them.
In his unhidden anger and frustration towards the decision by the House of Chiefs of which Ian Khama is a member, Mr. Zvayi decided to ridicule Botswana's history by implying that Botswana took the cowardly path by choosing to become a British Protectorate. I am sure Botswana, a vast land with a very small population, chose what was best for them then, otherwise they would have been pulverised by the Boers. The choice of protectorate was one of the few honestly brokered deals that did not have economic exploitation as the motive; Botswana had nothing until they discovered cooper and diamonds well after their independence. Perhaps; Mr. Zvayi, there is honour in remaining neutral like Switzerland during the Second World War, than being pulverized in misdirected valour like Georgia provoking the Russians.
Mr. Zvayi blames the Botswana press for writing defamatory pieces about him without his input. Coming from a journalism background, Mr. Zvayi should know the difference between front page news and ordinary opinion. Opinion is what the newspapers gave and opinions do not necessarily require the subject to be contacted. In opinions the subject can be turned inside out without him/her providing defence. I am sure Mr. Zvayi did not contact all the people he demonised in his stint with the Herald.
I am very sorry to learn that Mr. Zvayi had retreated to a false comfort zone when the noises to have him deported had died down. He got the surprise of his wicked life when he was taken to the Immigration Department on Friday, 8th August, 2008 by an Immigration official and three security agents. Lucky for him, it was not a troop of SSG soldiers who came for him, or else he would have known what it is to be pushed about.
Mr. Zvayi seems to have settled well in Botswana as he found it hard to believe that he would be deported to nowhere else but his lovely Zimbabwe as one of the citizens who had been empowered by the government of Mugabe. I ask myself why he had need to leave Zimbabwe in the first place when he had been empowered by the system!
Mr. Zvayi is one man who has had fortune knock at his door several times over. He writes that when the immigration team came, he asked for their IDs and had the opportunity to call the embassy to get him a lawyer. It is heart-rending to learn that the Zimbabwe High Commission does provide such services; albeit to the ZANU-PF elite. For the rest of the Zimbabwean economic refugees who go to Botswana illegally and are caught, the embassy provides nothing; not even lip-service.
Mr. Zvayi even had the chance to phone the embassy to give them the vehicle registration number, colour and make as a precaution; lest they were not state agents. I say bravo to the system in Botswana; the CIO in Zimbabwe would not allow you all these privileges. The CIO/Immigration deportations are a mess; the victims get blindfolded and gagged.
Furthermore, embassy staff came to help him pack his belonging; what more could the man want? He was being attended to by ZANU-PF representatives in Botswana and he was being deported to his lovely country which he had no justification to leave in the first place.
Mr. Zvayi decries the reasons for his deportation as, I quote again, 'I stood accused of supporting a Government of my country and writing ill of the opposition that is preferred by Botswana; a country that purports to be a democracy'.
Point of correction: Mr. Zvayi was deported because of his inclusion in the EU sanctions list to which he personally acknowledged in his piece. Botswana is home to many ZANU-PF supporters; some of them larger fish than him (Mr. Zvayi).
Those of us who do not admire Mugabe and ZANU-PF feel exalted by the actions of Botswana. The onus to squeeze out those who oil up Mugabe's vile dictatorship is upon Zimbabwe's neighbours.
* Masola wa Dabudabu is a Zimbabwean commentator who is based in the UK
Hopewell Masola
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