In January 2024, there were over 2 million social media users in Zimbabwe. This is a significant increase in the use of social media because in January 2022 the number of social media users stood at 1.55 million. In light of this, it is high time for the Zimbabwean authorities to recognise the peacebuilding potential of social media.
The Zimbabwean government, like any other across the world, needs to realise that social media platforms’ capacity to mobilise discontented citizens for protests can be used by policymakers to engage the citizens and enhance the formulation and development of pro-peace and development policy initiatives. Both online activism and protests in Zimbabwe are predominantly meant to register citizens’ displeasure against the worsening social, economic and political conditions in the country and the government should not see them as essentially anti-peace. For instance, in 2016 the extensive use of social media platforms by youth-led protest movements such as Occupy Africa Unity Square and the Tajamuka/Sesjikile (We Have Rebelled) Campaign was triggered by the introduction of Statutory Instrument 64 of 2016. This barred citizens without import licences from continuing to buy in bulk an array of goods, especially basic commodities, outside the country amid a deteriorating socio-economic and political environment. The country was facing a multifaceted crisis that expressed itself in the delayed payment of civil servants’ salaries, unreformed electoral laws, corruption, and the introduction of the surrogate currency, the bond note.
More so, in 2019, a 150% increase in the price of fuel amid a fast-deteriorating economic environment triggered protests. The protests were part and parcel of online activism by civil society organisations such as the #ThisFlag of Pastor Evan Mawarire and the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions. However, this could also have been an opportunity for the government to meaningfully engage citizens online by gathering their grievances and instituting relevant policies and measures to address them. There was no need to resort to internet shutdowns that violate citizens’ fundamental civic and political rights such as the freedom of association and assembly and the right to demonstrate and petition. The government’s predilection to view social media negatively and securitising its use for online activism and mobilisation and coordination of protests by imposing internet shutdowns doubtlessly forecloses opportunities for engagement with citizens. The dominance of a negative peace approach to governance encourages the government to just blame the social media platforms for online activism and protests leaving their root causes, especially citizens’ failure to access basic services, unaddressed thus undermining peace in the long run.
What comes to the fore from the foregoing is that embracing social media platforms is likely to offer broader policy engagement opportunities thereby promoting positive peace and minimising protests by disgruntled citizens. Social media platforms offer governments the ability to, among other issues, gather citizens’ needs and grievances to use the data to improve the citizens’ lives rather than solely for surveillance purposes. As in other countries, citizens’ trust and support can be built when the government shares updates on its work in different sectors including law enforcement, crime prevention, service delivery and correcting any misinformation on social media platforms.
When the government uses social media to keep citizens informed about what it is doing about the social and economic issues that affect their lives every day, it is likely to dissuade them from resorting to violent dissent. This means that social media platforms now offer new possibilities of engagement, participation and accountability with far-reaching effects on positive peace. This is the case, especially considering that social media platforms’ strengths include the ability to spread information to more people culminating in the hearing of more voices, and building durable peace through purposeful discussion.
Enock Ndawana
Enock Ndawana is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Johannesburg. He has published extensively on African military and security affairs and has recently developed an interest in digital peacebuilding.
