Contribution to New Zimbabwe Constitution - Demilitarization

I want to make the bold proposal that Zimbabwe completely demilitarizes and redeploys or reassigns all armed forces personnel in productive public service jobs. My reasons are as follows.

Firstly, we can do without the armies as we are surrounded by friendly countries and there is no discernible military threat against Zimbabwe. In any case, if we demilitarize, like Costa Rica which dissolved its military in 1949 we will be under the protection of the UN and any country which will dare attack us will face the full might of the UN armed forces.

But more importantly, Africa’s disproportionately high military spending has been more crippling on African economies than all its other problems, ‘brain drain’ included. The costs of maintaining armed forces runs into billions of dollars and in the case of Zimbabwe we have since independence coughed out US$6 billion on military spending which would have offset the national debt which currently stands at just over US$4 billion and still left us with a cash surplus. That money can be put to good use in Education, Health, Social Services and many rural development projects.

Thirdly, the dependence on the military for political power in Africa has worked against the establishment of genuine democracy and responsible governance on the continent. When the military becomes the anchor for political power in stead of the people (ordinary citizens) democracy goes out of the window and citizens live in fear of the military instead of feeling protected by it.

In addition, the need by the head of state and his ruling clique to secure the support and loyalty of the army to themselves opens the door to cronyism and patronage which both have serious ethnic and sometimes regional ramifications in the whole architecture of political power. This stifles political freedom and undermines social and economic progress.

We can learn from northern countries where real democracy took shape at the same time that armed forces withdrew from active involvement in the political process and allowed citizens the freedom to do politics in a free, fair and civic environment.

And for Zimbabwe which has seen brutality committed against innocent citizens by both proxy forces and commissioned armed forces the option of demilitarization offers enormous social and economic benefits as the major role of our armed forces has become support of political leaders rather than defence of the people. Our politicians no longer care what the people think because their power base is now the military, not the electorate and that means the death of freedom and democracy.

Until our political system is freed from military interference political freedom and social and ethnic cohesion cannot be achieved in the country and there can never be a feeling of security for the ordinary citizen who has to live in mistrust and fear of his or her neighbour. We can never achieve democracy when citizens cast their vote surrounded by armed loyalists of the party in government whether that party is Zanu-PF or the MDC.

The above arguments make a compelling case for our country to seriously consider demilitarising. Our people will benefit hugely from reassigning all resources currently being committed to the military to give our hugely deprived people better social services, more schools, more clinics, better roads and more rural development - because more guns and bullets only mean more division, more trouble, more death and more suffering for them. This is not just about cutting budget deficits but about using the money we are already spending more effectively.

For example, it is a sobering thought that the price paid for just a single modern fighter jet which in most African countries is very unlikely to ever be deployed in any war action is enough to fund the following projects: (a) build and fully equip 1,000 schools for 800,000 children, or (b) buy 4,000 fully operational ambulances; or (c) train 2,700 fully qualified medical doctors.

But having said that, it is acknowledged that talking about doing away with the military can be risky business, especially as the military and other vested interests (both domestic and foreign) will want to resist due to the lucrative arms purchase deals which make this institution a vital gravy train for those at the top.

Outside the above factors, a major concern at the domestic level is the potential loss of jobs and means of livelihood for military personnel. Fortunately that problem does not have to arise. Demilitarization as proposed here is not about demobilising and releasing onto the streets the many thousands of soldiers who make up our armed forces. The objective is not to save money per se by demobilizing military personnel, but to redeploy both the human and financial resources that are being consumed by militarism to areas of development that will make a positive impact on the welfare and lives of Zimbabwean people.

There is an awful lot to be done in many other areas of our social economy and so all the human resources in the military can in a phased reassignment (without being laid off) simply be retrained in new skills and then reassigned to new areas such as education (teaching), police, health (for personnel in the medical corps), national parks and wildlife protection wardens and security patrol), the prison service, municipal security, fire services, marine services, civil defence and special disaster relief services, serious crimes units (including anti-terrorism), veterinary services and others.

Some soldiers can also join private sector organizations as well as state owned enterprises in the energy, transport and agricultural sectors as permanent employees. Those placed in permanent jobs in the private sector can be completely discharged from the civil service and have their pensions placed in a special fund pending maturity. Another potential benefit of demilitarization would be that existing military barracks and institutions can gradually be turned over to other uses such as police posts, vocational training colleges, civil defence posts, prisons and so on.

Accordingly, I would strongly recommend this proposal to be included in the Draft Constitution for approval or rejection by our people.

Chuck Daru, U.K