CITE|The Matabeleland Collective (MC), a grouping of civil society organisations and clergy from the southern region, is reportedly on the verge of collapse with some former members revealing that the grouping failed to come up with a strategy and a narrative to drive its vision.

MC, whose membership included over 60 organisations, was caught in the political crosshairs when they met President Emmerson Mnangagwa at the Bulawayo State House in March, to discuss some of the pertinent issues affecting the region, including the emotive Gukurahundi atrocities.

The meeting attracted a lot of criticism from several quarters with some people accusing MC of attempting to spruce up the president`s image in the region.

The consortium became a subject of debate at a recent Critical Thinking Workshop, during a session on Civil Society and State Politics in Matabeleland where participants questioned the role of grouping.

Participants questioned whether the consortium was a practical solution to the region’s challenges and if its approach to the government was wise.

Former spokesperson of the collective, Dumisani Nkomo, who has since left the grouping, said the idea was well-intentioned but acknowledged that they lacked a strategy on how to control its narrative.

Nkomo admitted he was involved in the formation of the coalition, from the genesis, to the meeting at State House in Bulawayo and other preparatory meetings that took place.

“The idea and issues of the collective were clear and they were clearly identified historical issues that were affecting the region. There were four key issues: Gukurahundi and National healing, devolution of power, the issue of equalisation and economic recovery plus structural inclusion,” he said.

The collective, Nkomo said, involved about 60 organisations, which made the collective the largest coalition in Matabeleland.

“We reflected on those particular four issues over two days. What then lacked was strategy because we wanted to do consultations in Matabeleland South, Matabeleland North and Bulawayo but there were no resources for that. So eventually we found ourselves in a space where we said we are going to engage the National Peace Reconciliation Commission, which we did,” he said.

He also said they planned to engage the chiefs and started working with the traditional leaders two years ago.

“We met with Chief Ndiweni and others. The idea was the chiefs would come from another angle as traditional leaders and push the agenda of Gukurahundi and devolution and so forth,” the activist noted.

The presentations by the collective before President Mnangagwa were good and Nkomo said the presenters laid the issues straight to him.

“We spoke of devolution and its immediate implementation, that government must put money into the Zambezi water project, the prioritisation of locals’ employment, issue of languages and culture. Unfortunately, Gukurahundi then took precedence from a presentation under social inclusion,” he said.

But, Nkomo concedes failure to manage the success, if any, and the narrative was to be the collective’s downfall.

“We were not in charge and in the end, we didn’t own the narrative, which the state began to run with. The narrative also came from social media and it became so toxic that beyond that, the meeting was about massaging Mnangagwa’s ego,” he said.

He also conceded that the collective’s leadership became too excited and naïve as well.

“At times you have to distinguish advocacy work and what the rules of engagement are. Eventually, some within the collective became coopted. But the collective idea was something good yet it mutated into a monster. Its genesis and position of issues were well-intentioned but media management was terrible, the advocacy strategy – terrible, risk management strategy – terrible,” the activist said.

Nkomo said the collective’s failures were a lesson learned as they failed to do political analysis of their meeting with President Mnangagwa.

“We failed to do power mapping again in political analysis we didn’t factor in G40, how it would respond because they felt we are cleaning up Mnangagwa. We didn’t factor Mnangagwa had an agenda as well, obviously a tick in his box to say we met the collective and Gukurahundi is being dealt with. For him it was a public relations exercise so we didn’t do in-depth political analysis,” he noted.

“I think some were too excited to meet the president and some people lost it. If you spend so much time in the trenches and didn’t have much engagement then there is an opportunity to engage some people become confused. When they do that for the first time and don’t have the skill or craft competence to actually engage in that level of advocacy, so it was a lesson learned…”

Mbuso Fuzwayo, secretary-general of Ibhetshu Likazulu which is part of the collective said he believed organisations in Matabeleland must work together.

“Now the challenge is how to deal with the leadership of the collective,” he said, noting challenges that came with how those in leadership behaved.

“We have said funding is not the main thrust of the collective but rather the issues of Matabeleland that we must talk about.”