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The Zimbabwe Mission in London with offices at Zimbabwe House is there to assist Zimbabwean citizens

Nick Mangwana View From The Diaspora
Failure in life, when not harnessed, tends to generate self-pity. One cannot have self-pity without finding someone else to blame for the condition they find themselves in. In most cases the easiest person to blame if one wants to play the victim is the State.

The only problem with that is that it is very easy to point fingers than to accept one’s own frailties. This condition applies to both the individual and the State. There should be someone big elsewhere whose overwhelming influence has to be used to explain whatever situation a State or Individual finds themselves in.

So the State tends to blame other States which are bigger and more powerful than it.

The individual blames the “system”.

All around humanity there is a chain of victim-hood whose other name should just be “failure”.

At the individual level, anyone who asks the individual that fails to actualise the self-reflect and introspect are accused of blaming the victim. Strangely both governments and individuals want to take credit for successes but completely disown their failures and dump the buck at someone else’s door step.

In the Western world individuals that fail have a tendency of somehow finding fault with their parents or upbringing? There is a good justification (with cause) that blame has taken the place of self exertion and intellect. One’s own sloth should never end with blame on others.

We have had excuses and blame for rigged elections and uneven playing fields whenever the opposition cannot get their hands on power. We have had individuals whose things did not work for them in the diaspora for different reasons and now have taken to blaming the Zimbabwean Embassy because that’s the closest thing to the State of Zimbabwe. We have seen these demonstrations and a lot of grandstanding against the Zimbabwean Mission in London. Whenever there is news that Zimbabwe is on its way to mending relations, these individuals find this as bad news and they rush to unfurl unflattering banners and pull off some more self-seeking histrionics.

Lately there was an article in one of the local British papers which went viral and a few tears were shed for the individual concerned. In this article the man concerned said they had fled Zimbabwe, came to the UK.

Things did not work for them. They are now trying to go back home. However they no longer have any Zimbabwean IDs. They articulated their seemingly heart rending story which they said they went to the Zimbabwean Embassy in London to try to apply for a passport to go home and the consular staff was not interested because of their failed asylum status.

They said that they were meant to be given £2500 by the International Organisation for Migration. The reason they say they were denied any papers was that they had sought asylum and the Zimbabwean Mission in London frowns on that. Unfortunately in the article and all the subsequent publications, there is no record of an attempt to get a comment from those who represent Zimbabwe in the UK and Ireland.

This columnist in his other capacity works very closely with Zimbabwe’s representatives in London and has seen a lot of asylum seekers being assisted to go back to Zimbabwe. However not being a spokesman for the said Mission cannot make comments on this particular case but will state how the system is and that the system works. There is a case here for people not to continue maligning national institutions without cause.

Now this is how the system works;

Zimbabweans like any other people can lose all their forms of identity. There are a plethora of reasons why this can happen. It can be through a house fire where nothing or little is recovered.

It can also be a flood, hurricane or any natural disaster. It can also be that someone was travelling with all their personal identity documents and their luggage is stolen.

The system is primed to deal with all these scenarios including those that deliberately destroy their documents to make themselves Stateless so as to make it difficult for the host countries to deport them back to the home country.

When any of the above tragic situations happen, one simply goes to the Zimbabwean Embassy and they are interviewed. This involves just giving one’s life story, where they were born, where they went to school and where they lived. Of course speaking the language is a big help. The story of a genuine Zimbabwean is easily verifiable and of course a Nigerian pretending to be a Zimbabwean is easily sussed and smoked out. Once the officer is certified that one is genuinely a Zimbabwean, they are issued with what is called a Temporary Travel Document (TTD). This will enable the individual a one way travel to Zimbabwe where they will go and sort out their papers by getting a copy of their birth certificate and national Identity card and then apply for another passport in the normal way. Of course in some cases a police report has to be produced.

How about in cases where there are no Zimbabwean Embassies say in Turkey or Greece? The Vienna Convention on Consular Relations provides for another country to provide a TTD to non-nationals which they can use the same way they would one issued by their own consular.

They then would use that one way to get to their own country where they will then sort their documents. This is how the system is supposed to run. And this is how the system actually runs. The caveat to this whole system that what is issued is a travel document.

This means it is only issued when one says they are going back home. It is not used as a form of ID in the hosting country. And the Embassy can only issue it when the individual indicates that they are travelling back home.

There are those readers who for their own reasons would believe that this is propaganda. This is a position they are entitled to. But if they look back they would realise that wherever national institutions are not providing the service they are meant to provide this column would expose highlight and criticise. It is not patriotic to provide a shoddy or substandard service to Zimbabweans. It is equally unpatriotic for anyone to collude with a defective system. But there are always two sides to a story.

It is equally unpatriotic to attack everything that is Zimbabwean and then turn around and cry foul when there are no jobs because there has been flight of investment because of the bad vibe generated by the citizenry. The Zimbabwean Embassy wherever it is, is part of the sovereign. Attacking it and its functions is an attack on the motherland.

The Zimbabwean Embassy has facilitated for the return of convicted Zimbabwean criminals who are deported from the UK whose presence has been deemed not to be in the national interests of Great Britain. Papers have been provided where none were available for that repatriation. It is not only those who come to London who get consular services from the Embassy. They even do regular outreach programmes.

The very organised Zimbabweans in Ireland can bear witness that about twice a year in the first quarter and last quarter of the year Zimbabwe Consular staff comes to them to provide documentation services to Zimbabweans there. It has to be said for some strange but fascinating reason, Zimbabweans in Ireland do not appear to be as polarised as those in the England, Scotland and Ireland. They are reported to be quite organised, united and friendlier to those that represent our home country on these shores.

Zimbabwe like any other country has a lot of positives and some negatives. Negatives in the hands of foreigners are demeaning to the citizen. This is why a lot of citizens would take it personally when their national flag is desecrated by a citizen of a different country. For in that national flag do the people get their mojo.

There has been a trendy of concern that has gone among the African people.

Somehow people have felt the need to portray themselves as victims of very oppressive regimes at home when they visit or live in foreign countries. It is understandable to that some people had to do what they had to do to regularise their stay in a foreign country.

Some had blamed their families for some misdeeds. Some had blamed their national leaders and some had to manufacture victims out nothing. It worked in many cases.

And everyone understands and says, good for them. But when someone makes a victim of Zimbabwe in their pursuit of personal glory then a line has to be drawn somewhere. For, 13 million Zimbabweans should not be sacrificed for either personal aggrandisement or to fulfil whatever agenda of any individual. It doesn’t matter who that individual is. The country has to come first.