By Sizalobuhle Khumalo
Former Liberation Movements in Southern Africa should formulate policies that enhance regional cooperation and integration in the wake of renewed efforts by western sponsored reactionary forces seeking to destabilise the region.
This was said by the ZANU PF Secretary for Administration, Dr Obert Mpofu in his opening remarks to the 10th meeting of the Secretaries General of the Former Liberation Movements of Southern Africa which is underway in Victoria Falls.
Dr Mpofu’s calls also come at a time when the region has witnessed ugly scenes of Afrophobia in South Africa.
“This movement of Former Liberation Movements is the only one that can influence regional policies. Policies that educate our people about where we are coming from and where we are going as Africans,” Dr Mpofu said.
“As FLM we are facing an emergence of reactionary forces that want to divide us as a people. That want us as Africans to look at each other as foreigners when we are one people.
“It is incumbent upon this movement to educate our young people and our nations about our hard fought liberation struggle and our attainment of independence,” Dr Mpofu said.
Dr Mpofu also said the venue of the 10th meeting also evoked emotional memories of colonialism.
Dr Mpofu who was born and bred in the community surrounding the resort town poked fun at how the Falls were said to have been discovered by David Livingstone.
“This great part of Zimbabwe, Victoria Falls, a name coined by famous British explorer, David Livingstone evokes the emotions of a difficult and protracted liberation epoch.
“Victoria Falls is said to have been discovered by David Livingstone. Did he also discover our ancestors,” quipped Dr Mpofu.
Recollecting the liberation struggle, Dr Mpofu said, Victoria Falls was “the entry and exit point for ZANLA and ZIPRA cadres who were streaming from Zimbabwe into Zambia and Botswana.
“It is also in this same area, in the middle of the animal jungle, in Hwange, where the world renowned game park is domiciled, with the Big Five in abundance where a special battle which saw the colonial forces being defeated is found.
“In that battle, our ally sister liberation movement, the African National Congress participated with distinction. Our battle hardened forces pounded the viciously armed Rhodesian forces backed by their apartheid kith and kin to submission. It awakened the racist settler of the new reality of a people’s war which she was bound to dismally lose.”
Dr Mpofu said after attainment of independence, now the thrust of FLM was the economic empowerment of its citizens.
“We managed to bring political independence to our respective nations; the next journey is that of economically empowering our people. The vigour which brought this cherished freedom is the same which we should apply in the economic battle,” Dr Mpofu said.
The conference is being run under the theme ‘Uniting Against Neo Colonialism through Total Economic Cooperation, Development and Independence.’
For the first time the meeting is being attended by Botswana’s BDP and Zambia’s Patriotic Front as the region strengthens its show of solidarity.
