ANTINOMIES OF AFRO-RADICAL AND LIBERAL DEMOCRATIC DECOLONIZATION IN ZIMBABWE AND SOUTH AFRICA IN SUE NYATHI’S THE GOLD-DIGGERS (2018)

Abstract

The question of decolonization has pervaded the history and imaginaries of South Africa and Zimbabwe for long and is still topical in the present era. The threat of the persistent logic of coloniality threatens to destabilize political sovereignty and socio-economic freedom in both nations and this has compelled some members of society and the nation’s institutions and social movements to engage in urgency seeking to find new ways at achieving a decolonial turn. Post-apartheid South Africa and independent Zimbabwe have engaged in debates and campaigns focusing on the need for social, political, economic, gender, curriculum and epistemic decolonization that will extricate each nation from the continued effects of colonialism and apartheid. This article analyzes the nature of decolonial interventions experienced in South Africa and Zimbabwe that is depicted in Sue Nyathi’s novel The Gold- Diggers (2018). As with other decolonial initiatives in former colonized nations globally, Zimbabwe’s and South Africa’s decolonial projects remain entwined within global imperial designs, defined by decolonial scholars as global coloniality (worldwide colonial matrices of power in the areas of knowledge, power and being that continue to plague former colonized territories) and post-colonial modes of self-governance. The African National Congress’ initial decolonial approach focused on fostering inclusivity and unity in diversity while Zimbabwe started on a reconciliatory note in the 1980s and moved towards radical decolonization in the post-2000 period. Thus, this study examines Nyathi’s representations of state-imposed and socially motivated approaches of decolonization in South Africa and Zimbabwe. The study, which explores how the two countries’ approaches to, and interpretations of decolonization are depicted, focuses on issues related to the decolonial question such as colonial and apartheid legacies, violence, corruption, exploitation, social, economic and political discrepancies, xenophobia, dehumanization, gender and the abuse of human rights. The overarching argument is that decolonial initiatives of both countries are constrained by colonial matrices of power and contemporary challenges of self-governance. A key finding of this analysis is that the Nyathi’s novel poignantly reflects on the decolonial question in Zimbabwe and South Africa in ways that resonate with most former colonized territories, while simultaneously broadening the contours of the socio-political debates about the decolonial phenomenon.