Elections, Land and the Politics of Opposition in Matabeleland

Abstract

In the run up to the elections of June 2000, President Robert Mugabe promised to deliver land to the people; he sought to rede?ne the rural areas as the moral heart of the nation, and used veterans from the liberation war to spear‐head occupations of largely white‐owned commercial farmland. ZANU‐PF's electoral campaign succeeded in large swathes of the countryside, but it was notably unsuccessful in Matabeleland. In rural (as well as urban) Matabeleland, ZANU‐PF experienced a massive, and largely unanticipated, electoral defeat. Here we explore the reasons behind rural Matabeleland's electoral results. Our discussion focuses on three districts of Matabeleland North (Nkayi, Lupane and Hwange), where we investigate the dynamics of particular land occupations, both major parties' electoral campaigns and local re?ections on the electoral outcome and the ongoing politics of land.We stress the importance of the legacies of ZAPU's nationalism, of post Independence state violence, of perceived economic neglect and the particular agrarian dynamics of this region.