Apropos Advocate Nelson Chamisa’s land remarks at CCC’s campaign-launch rally at Mkoba Stadium in Gweru. The issue is not about how it is being framed either by Advocate Chamisa’s detractors or by his supporters; rather the issue is about how Advocate Chamisa himself actually framed his remarks, and about not what he said but what he meant.
It is now common cause in the 2023 election campaign that Advocate Chamisa’s frames his public communication less to inform and more to confuse his perceived enemies within CCC and outside CCC, especially but not only in Zanu-PF.
There’s nothing important, not even one thing, of informational or factual or truthful value that Advocate Chamisa has said, which has come to pass or has happened as per his word. Advocate Chamisa has proudly called his message-framing, whose purpose is to confuse literally everyone rather than to inform anyone, ‘strategic ambiguity”.
Therefore, given Advocate Chamisa’s rally context, it’s important to apply his ‘strategic ambiguity’ template to understand the subtext of his Gweru rally text beyond its pretext, which is being used to cover up his real message whose meaning is a ruse.
Below is the text of what Advocate Chamisa actually said in Shona-English’, followed by its English translation:
CHAMISA TEXT IN SHONA-ENGLISH:
“Nyaya yeland is an important point. Wese akabviswa paland anofanira kudzorerwa. Todangira ipapo.”
CHAMISA TEXT IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION:
“The issue of land is very important. Everyone who was removed from the land must be returned. We should start there.”
The above text, which is also verbatim on the attached video clip below, is an example of Advocate Chamisa’s self-declared approach to public communication which he has labelled as, ‘strategic ambiguity’ through which he believes that he is able to say what he does not mean, and to mean what he does not say; and get away with it, thereby leave everyone confused and no one informed.
It is disingenuous and misleading to claim, as Advocate Chamisa’s supporters have done, that to understand the text in question, one must simply consider what Advocate Chamisa said before he made the text to have its proper context and meaning.
But, quite clearly, the text or statement in question stands alone and speaks for itself, such that it is self-explanatory and thus does not need antecedents or pretexts to be interpreted or understood.
As already intimated, Advocate Chamisa has himself made it clear that he communicates “to confuse” rather than to inform.
It would therefore be sheer folly to use his PRETEXT [the “make-believe” antecedents or what he said before the text in question] as the context or meaning of his text. What is relevant and necessary is the SUBTEXT [namely, the underlying message] of his text.
Frankly, the subtext of Advocate Chamisa’s text is as clear as it is duplicitously dangerous. Here goes his text, again:
1.
“Nyaya yeland is an important point. Wese akabviswa paland anofanira kudzorerwa. Todangira ipapo.”
2.
“The issue of land is very important. Everyone who was removed from the land must be returned. We should start there.”
It is to miss the subtext of Advocate Chamisa’s ‘strategic ambiguity’ by a mile to claim, as his supporters are doing, that the above text is with reference to particular land, at a particular place affecting particular people.
Hell no. Forget the pretext, the subtext is clearly about land [all land] acquired from white settler farmers and redistributed under the historic land reform programme.
CONCLUSION
Advocate Chamisa’s seems to like cheap politicking, especially at election time and more so at rallies, about protecting the land reform programme, protecting security forces and respecting the liberation struggle and its veterans. But none of these is for cheap, patronising or perfunctory politicking at rallies.
Regarding the historic land reform programme, which is the subject of this intervention, it is not for protection by Advocate Chamisa or by any politician or individual. The peasants, therefore, the people themselves will always guard jealously the historic land reform programme and will protect it.
There’s no need for any politician at rallies to chant perfunctory and patronising slogans about not reversing the land reform programme. No need for that, whatsoever.
The reason why there’s no need for cheap politics over the land reform programme is not only because the peasants in their evolution in history will always protect the land, which is now in their hands, in the main, but it is also because the historic land reform programme is protected by the Constitution of Zimbabwe.
In terms of section 328(6) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, like chapter 4 on the Bill of Rights, chapter 16 on the Land Reform Programme or Agricultural Land is entrenched and thus cannot be amended without a referendum.
Nationalists comrades did the job in 2012-2013 constitution-making process, by ensuring that the land reform programme is constitutionally protected. So the non-reversibility of the land reform programme is the constitutional position, not a rally position, and the constitutional position is more important than any cheap or patronising talk by politicians at rallies under the pretext of supporting the non-reversibility of the land reform programme, when the cheap talk is only meant to confuse and hoodwink voters, under a subtext that is in fact patently treacherous, and is opposed to the historic Third Chimurenga!
Source – Twitter
