Zimbabwe

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Republic of Zimbabwe
Flag of Zimbabwe Coat of Arms of Zimbabwe
MottoUnity, Freedom, Work
Anthem: Simudzai Mureza Wedu weZimbabwe (Shona) or Kalibusiswe Ilizwe leZimbabwe (Ndebele) ("Blessed be the land of Zimbabwe")
Location of Zimbabwe
Capital
(and largest city)
Harare
17°50′S 31°03′E
Official languages English
Government Parliamentary Democracy
Independence
 -  Rhodesia November 11, 1965 
 -  Zimbabwe April 18, 1980 
Area
 -  Total 390,757 km² (60th)
150,871 sq mi 
 -  Water (%) 1
Population
 -  July 2005 estimate 13,010,000* (68th)
GDP (PPP) 2005 estimate
 -  Total $30.581 billion (94th)
 -  Per capita $2,607 (129th)
Currency Dollar (ZWD)
Time zone CAT (UTC+2)
 -  Summer (DST) not observed (UTC+2)
Internet TLD .zw
Calling code +263
* Note: estimates for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS.

Zimbabwe , officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in the southern part of Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers. The name Zimbabwe derives from "dzimba dzemabwe" meaning "houses of stone" in the Shona language.[1] Its use as the country's name is a tribute to Great Zimbabwe, site of the capital of the Munhumutapa Empire.

History

The precolonial era

Part of Great Zimbabwe

Iron Age Bantu-speaking peoples began migrating into the area about two thousand years ago, including the ancestors of the Shona, who account for roughly four-fifths of the country's population today. Ruins at Great Zimbabwe, a Shona-speaking state, attest the existence of a medieval Bantu civilization in the region. Linked to the establishment of trade ties with Muslim merchants on the Indian Ocean coast around the early tenth century C.E., Great Zimbabwe began to develop in the eleventh century. The state traded gold, ivory, and copper for cloth and glass. It ceased being the leading Shona state in the mid-fifteenth century.

In 1837 the Shona were conquered by the Ndebele,who had migrated north in response to the Zulu mfecane. Later in the nineteenth century British and Boer traders, missionaries, and hunters began encroaching on the area.

Colonialization

In 1888 British imperialist Cecil Rhodes extracted mining rights from King Lobengula of the Ndebele. In 1889 Rhodes obtained a charter for the British South Africa Company, which conquered the Ndebele and their territory (named "Rhodesia" in 1895 after Cecil Rhodes) and promoted the colonization of the region and its land, labor, and precious metal and mineral resources. This was the beginning of forced removal of Africans from land considered to be reserved for whites. The black majority were forced to move to poor lands for farming. Both the Ndebele and the Shona staged unsuccessful revolts against white colonialist encroachment on their native lands in 1896-1897.

In 1911 the territory was divided into Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) and Southern Rhodesia, the latter becoming a self-governing British colony in 1922. In 1953 the two parts of Rhodesia were reunited in the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, and after its dissolution in 1963 the whites demanded independence from Southern Rhodesia (Rhodesia from 1964).

Civil war

As African-majority governments were assuming control in neighboring Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, the white-minority government, led by Ian Smith, declared unilateral independence on November 11, 1965. The United Kingdom (UK) called the declaration an act of rebellion but did not reestablish control by force. When negotiations in 1966 and 1968 proved fruitless, the UK requested UN economic sanctions against Rhodesia. The white-minority regime declared itself a republic in 1970, but it was not recognized by the UK or any other state.

As guerrilla activities fighting minority rule intensified, the Smith regime opened negotiations with the leaders of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), led by Joshua Nkomo, and the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), led by Robert Mugabe. With his regime near the brink of collapse, Smith in 1978 signed a desperate accord with three black leaders, headed by Bishop Abel Muzorewa, who offered safeguards for whites.

Muzorewa had the support of Smith, the United States, and the white-minority regime in South Africa but lacked credibility among significant sectors of the African population. His government soon faltered, and in 1979 the UK asked all parties to come to London in an attempt to negotiate a settlement of the civil war. Smith's political party took part in the ensuing elections but lost badly to the Patriotic Front (ZANU and ZAPU) party.

Independence

Following the conference, held in London (1979-1980), Britain's Lord Soames was appointed governor to oversee the disarming of revolutionary guerrillas, the holding of elections, and the granting of independence to an uneasy coalition government led by Joshua Nkomo. In the free elections of 1980, Mugabe and ZANU won a landslide victory, and Mugabe has won every election since then.

A second civil war erupted in 1982, between the military wing of ZAPU and the newly elected government. To suppress supporters of the former, the government systematically killed between 20,000 and 30,000 Ndebele people between 1982 and 1987 (according to Amnesty International estimates, though the actual number of people murdered by Mugabe and his government will probably never be reliably established). A peace accord negotiated in 1987 resulted in ZAPU's merger into the ZANU-PF.

Despite majority rule, whites made up less than 1 percent of the population but held 70 percent of the country's commercially viable arable land. Land redistribution emerged as the vital issue beginning in 1999. Mugabe's land reform involved the (often violent) seizure of land from white property owners and its redistribution to blacks. The compulsory land redistribution program in 2000 led to a sharp decline in agricultural exports, traditionally one of the country's leading export-producing sectors. As a result, Zimbabwe experienced a severe hard currency shortage, which led to hyperinflation and chronic shortages in imported fuel and consumer goods.

Following elections in 2005, the government initiated a crackdown on illegal markets and homes that had emerged in towns and cities. This action has been widely condemned by opposition and international figures, who charge that it has left a large number of the urban poor homeless. The government described the operation as an attempt to provide decent housing.

Zimbabwe's current economic and food crisis, described by some observers as the country's worst humanitarian crisis since independence, has been attributed, in varying degrees, to a drought affecting the entire region, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the government's price controls and land reforms.[2].

Politics

Zimbabwe is a republic with an executive president and a bicameral Parliament. Under constitutional changes in 2005, an upper chamber, the Senate, was reinstated. The House of Assembly is the lower chamber of Parliament.

The major opposition party at the moment is the Movement for Democratic Change, or MDC, led by Morgan Tsvangirai. In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the African Union and SADC countries reported no major irregularities, but opposition figures claimed vote rigging. [3]

The presidential election scheduled for 2008 was postponed to 2010, allowing Mugabe to stay in power two more years. But some analysts have suggested he is preparing to share power as a step toward eventual retirement.[4]

Administrative divisions

Administrative divisions of Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe is divided into eight provinces and two cities with provincial status. The provinces are subdivided into 59 districts and 1,200 municipalities.

Education

Zimbabwe had a literacy rate of 95.2 percent in 2000, the highest in Africa. Zimbabweans generally value and pursue academic achievement. For males, the country's adult literacy rate (the percentage of persons aged 15 and over who can read and write) is 97 percent. Recent international student counts from Africa show that Zimbabwe has the third largest student population in the United States, behind Ghana and Nigeria. Zimbabwe, with its highly educated professionals, has provided a number of professional services to its neighbors.

Geography

File:Zimbabwe sat.png
Satellite image of Zimbabwe, generated from raster graphics data supplied by The Map Library
Bridal Veil Falls, Eastern Highlands

Zimbabwe is a landlocked country, surrounded by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the west, Zambia to the northwest, and Mozambique to the east and northeast. The northwestern border is defined by the Zambezi River. Victoria Falls is a popular tourist destination on the Zambezi. To the south, Zimbabwe is separated from South Africa by the Limpopo River. Zimbabwe also shares a narrow border with Namibia to the west via a narrow land corridor.

Economy

The government of Zimbabwe faces a wide variety of difficult economic problems after having abandoned earlier efforts in developing a market-oriented economy. Current problems include a shortage of foreign exchange, soaring inflation, and supply shortages. Economic sanctions from the United Kingdom, European Union, and United States have contributed to a shortage of foreign currency. Its 1998–2002 involvement in the war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) drained hundreds of millions of dollars from the economy, though Zimbabwe is given credit for helping stabilize the DRC.

According to official figures, inflation rose from an annual rate of 32 percent in 1998 to a high of approximately 1100 percent in August 2006, a state of hyperinflation.

Demographics

According to the World Health Organization, the life expectancy for men is 37 years and for women is 34 years, the lowest in the world in 2006.

Zimbabwe has a very high HIV infection rate. In 2001, it was measured at its highest level ever of 33.7 percent for people aged 15 to 49. Subsequent government figures show an apparent decrease, down to about 18 percent. Critics questioned the veracity of the reduction but figures reported by UNAID, BBC, the UN, and Cambridge University have confirmed the reduction in HIV/AIDS to 20.1 percent for people aged 15 to 49.[5]

Zimbabwe in 2006 launched the world's first official HIV/AIDS Toolkit, which forms the basis for a global AIDS prevention, treatment, and support plan. The country was chosen to test it because of its excellence in initiating different strategies for home-based care. Zimbabwe continues to show innovative methods of reducing the incidence of HIV/AIDS. [6]


Ethnic groups (2005 Est.):

(The black ethnic groups total 98 percent of the population.)
  • Shona 80-84 percent. The ruling party is linked to the Shona ethnic majority, as are the opposition parties.
  • Ndebele 8-10 percent. Up to 1 million Ndebele may have left the country, mainly for South Africa. The Ndebele are descended from Zulu migrations in the nineteenth century and the other tribes with which they mixed. Support for the opposition is particularly strong among the Ndebele. In the early years after independence Mugabe ordered a massacre of all Ndebele-speaking people. The genocide resulted in the death of over 100,000 Ndebele people. The unrest of the Ndebele people is ongoing in Zimbabwe.
  • Bantus of other ethnicity 8-10 percent.
  • White Zimbabweans Currently less than 1 percent. These are mostly of British origin, but some are of Afrikaaner, Portuguese, or Dutch origin. The white population dropped from a peak of 275,000 in 1970 to possibly 120,000 in 1999, and was estimated at little more than 60,000 in 2006. Recently emigration has been slowing due to a ceasing of land seizures. Much emigration has been to the UK, South Africa, Zambia, and Australia.
  • Mixed Race 0.5 percent.
  • Asian ethnic groups (mostly Indian and Chinese) 0.5 percent.

Culture

Traditional arts in Zimbabwe include pottery, basketry, textiles, jewelry, and carving, including incised-wood and raffia masks. Among the distinctive qualities are symmetrically patterned woven baskets and stools carved out of a single piece of wood. Shona sculpture in essence has been a fusion of African folklore with European influences. A recurring theme in Zimbabwean art is the metamorphosis of man into beast. Zimbabwe sculptors have exhibited their art at major galleries in Europe. Zimbabwe stone sculptors have sold their work for as much as $500,000. Their work has become recognized recently in the United States.

Religion

There are various forms of spiritual practice in Zimbabwe. Forty to fifty percent of Zimbabweans attend Christian churches. However, as in most former European colonies, Christianity is often mixed with enduring traditional beliefs. The Mwari is the most practiced non-Christian religion, which involves ancestor worship and spiritual intercession; the Mbira Dza Vadzimu, which means "Voice of the Ancestors", an instrument related to many lamellaphones ubiquitous throughout Africa, is central to many ceremonial proceedings. Mwari is believed by many Zimbabweans to be an unknown supreme being that communicates with humans through cave-dwelling oracles known as the Voice of Mwari. The remaining 1 percent of the population is Muslim.

Zimbabwe, like most African countries, has experienced a Christian revival and sends its citizens to minister in the United States and Europe.

Language

English is the official language, though only 2 percent consider it their native language, mainly the white and Coloured (mixed race) minorities. The rest of the population speak Bantu languages like Shona (76 percent) and Ndebele (18 percent). Shona has a rich oral tradition, which was incorporated into the first Shona novel, Feso, by Solomon Mutswairo, published in 1957. English is spoken primarily in the cities, but less so in rural areas. The end of colonial rule has led to more emphasis on Bantu languages. Today radio and TV use them extensively. However, most Zimbabweans do speak English.

References
ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle, Into Africa: A Journey through the Ancient Empires, Key Porter Books, Toronto, Canada, 1997. ISBN 1550138847

  • U.S. State Department, background Notes [1]

Notes

  1. http://www.history.und.ac.za/ebe1mhm/zimbabwe.htm Zimbabwe at History Department of UKZN] www.history.und.ac.za (accessed April 3, 2006)
  2. "Crisis profile: Zimbabwe's humanitarian situation"(July 26. 2005) Reuters Foundation AlertNet
  3. Robert Mugabe is poised to rig a general election once again (March 23, 2005) www.economist.com (accessed April 3, 2006)
  4. Mugabe plan called strategy for 'dignified exit' Reuters (published in The Washington Times, January 18, 2007
  5. "Zimbabwe HIV infection rate drops location = Harare", BBC News, 2005-10-10. Retrieved 2006-12-28.
  6. Mu Xuequan. "Zimbabwe launches world's first AIDS training package", Xinhua, 2006-10-03. Retrieved 2006-10-03.


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