An examination of the Gukurahundi genocide in Zimbabwe

• Author: Malunga, S.
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.47348/AYIH/2021/a1
• Published date: 15 December 2022
• Date: 15 December 2022
• Citation: (2021) African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law 1
• Pages: 1-45

1

The killing elds of Matabeleland:

An examination of the Gukurahundi

genocide in Zimbabwe

Siphosami Malunga*

Abstract

This artic le examines the Guku rahundi atrocities commit ted in Matabele-

land in the 1980s to determ ine whether they constitute the internat ional

crime of genocide. Thi s article analyses t he legal requirements – con-

ventions, jurisprudence a nd scholarly writings regard ing genocide – and

assesses the Guku rahundi atrocities again st these requirements. The r st

section is the introduc tion, which highlights some know n genocides in

history and provides an out line of the article. The second sect ion comprises

an overview of the cr ime of genocide and its prosecution before the ad hoc

tribunals, wh ile the third section u npacks the notion of the four protected

membership groups. The four th and fth sec tions evaluates the physical and

mental elements of the crime of geno cide with the aid of the jurispr udence of

the ad hoc tribunal s as well as the International Crimin al Court. The sixth,

seventh and eighth sect ions apply the legal requirements and jurispr udence

to the Gukurahund i atrocities. The ninth section prov ides some concluding

observations, arg uing that the Fifth Br igade of the Zimbabwe National Army

committed genocide from 1983 to 1987 as envisaged u nder international

law. In each section, the Gukur ahundi atrocities are evaluated against legal

requirements: conventions, juris prudence and the work of leading scholars.

Keywords: Zimbabwe, genocide, Gukurahundi atrocities, international

crimes, individual criminal responsibility, accountability

‘We have been deployed to kill, we are not to leave anyone except

trees’ – Gukurahundi perpetrator1

1 INTRODUCTION

Barely three years a fter attaining its independence from the United

Kingdom in 1980, Zimbabwe was plunged into a deadly conict

that left 20,000 c ivilians dead, thousands more tortu red, raped and

brutalised, and their homes and a ll their possessions destroyed.

* LLB (Zimbabwe) LLM (Oslo) PhD ca ndidate (International Law) ( Wits).

This art icle forms part of the author’s doctoral resea rch thesis.

1 See Pathisa Nyath i The Story of a ZPRA Cadre: Nichola s Macala Dube:

‘Ben Mvelase’ Biography (2014) 2 51–263.

https://doi.org/10.47348/AYIH/2021/a1

(2021) African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law 1

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2 AFRICAN YEARBOOK ON INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW

https://doi.org/10.47348/AYIH/2021/a1

The bloody campaign – also k nown as Gukurahundi – undert aken

by the Fifth Brigade of the Zi mbabwe National Army (ZNA) between

1983 and 1987 occurred in the context of a conict in Matabeleland

that the government characterised as ‘dist urbances’.2 The nature,

scale, gravity and magnit ude of the atrocities attracted considerable

report age,3 amidst allegations that they constituted genocide.

This article therefore examines the Gukurahundi atrocities committed

in Matabeleland in the 1980s to determine whether t hey constitute

the international crime of genocide. Genocide has be en committed

numerous times in the past hundred or so years . One of the earliest

recorded genocides is the Herero and Nama genocide which took place

from 1904 to 1907, claiming at least 20 0,000 lives and 80% of the

Herero population and 10% of the Nama population.4 The Ger mans

acknowledged this genocide and offered an apology in 2 021. The mass

killing of bet ween 600,000 and 1.5 million Ar menians by the Ottoman

Empi re in 1915, 5 the mass starvation of almost four million Ukra inians

by Stalin in the Holodomor in 1932,6 the Holocaust of six million Jews

2 The Zimbabwean gover nment appointed a Commission of Enqui ry into the

‘disturbances’ in M atabeleland, known as the Chiha mbakwe Commission, but

the report was never made p ublic.

3 Catholic Commission for Just ice and Peace in Zimbabwe and t he Legal

Resources Foundation ‘Br eaking the Silence, Bu ilding True Peace: A Report of

the Disturba nces in Matabeleland and the M idlands 1980 to 1988’ (‘Breaki ng

the Silence’). See als o Bill Berkeley and Elliot Schrage Zimbabwe, Wages of War:

A Report on Human Rights (1986); Stua rt Doran Kingdom, Power, Glory: Mugabe,

ZANU and the Que st for Supremacy: 1960–1987 (2017); Jocelyn Alexander

‘Dissident Perspec tives on Zimbabwe’s Post-Independence War’ (1998)

68:2 Africa 151–182; K Yap Uprooting the Weeds: Power, Ethnicity and Violence

in the Matabeleland Conict Ph D thesis, University of Amster dam, 2001,

available at 449c-b427-

fa0 6f1a 51cbf > (accessed on 30 August 2 022).

4 Melanie Bracht Genoc ide in German South West Africa and the Herero Rep arations

Movement (2015) available at

theses/37> (accessed on 30 August 2022). See a lso Allan D Cooper ‘Repar ations

for the Herero Genocide: D ening the Limits of I nternational Litigation’(2007)

106:42 2 Af rican Affairs 113–126; ‘Ge rmany ofcially re cognizes colonial- era

Namibia genocide’ DW N ews 28 May 2021.

5 See Taner Akçam A Shamef ul Act: The Armenian G enocide and the Questio n of

Turkish Responsibility (2006); Taner A kçam The Young Turks’ Crime Against

Humanity: The Ar menian Genocide and Eth nic Cleansing in the Ottoman Empire

(2012); Jennifer M Dixon ‘Norm s, Narratives, and Scholar ship on the

Armenian G enocide’ (2015) 47: 4Internat ional Journal of Middle East Stu dies

796–80 0; Mark Baker ‘The A rmenian Genocide a nd its Denial: A Review of

Recent Scholarship’(2015) 53 New Perspect ives on Turkey 197–212 .

6 Robert Conquest The Har vest of Sorrow: Soviet Collect ivization and the Terror-

Famine (1986); Andr ea Graziosi ‘The Soviet 1931–1933 Famines and the

Ukraini an Holodomor: Is a New Interpretation Possible, a nd What Would its

Consequences be?’ (20 05) 27 Harvard Ukrainian Studies 97–115; Yurii Sh apoval

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THE KILLING FIELDS OF MATABELELAND 3

https://doi.org/10.47348/AYIH/2021/a1

by the Nazis in Germa ny between 1941 and 1945,7 the mass murder

of two million Cambod ians by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia in t he

1970s, 8 and the mass murder of between 500,00 0 and 800,000 Tutsis

in Rwanda in 19949 are some of the world’s most shocking genocides.10

2 OVERVIEW

The crime of genocide is one of the gravest international cri mes.11

Lemkin created t he term ‘genocide’ by combining the Greek word

‘genos’ (meaning race or tribe) and the Latin word ‘– cide’ (meaning

killing).12 Although the term gained rapid prominence after the

Nuremberg Tribunal, the Charter of t he International Military Tribunal

made no reference to it, nor was it prosecuted as such.13 Instead, the

Nuremberg Tribunal (IM T) prosecuted perpetrators for cri mes against

humanity. Many of the crimes related to genocide were subsumed

under that charge.14 The International Crim inal Tribunal for the

former Yugoslavia (ICTY)15 and the International Criminal Tribunal

for Rwanda (ICTR) rst prosecuted genocide as a sta ndalone crime

45 years after Nuremberg in t he case of Akayesu.16 The ju risprudenc e

‘Understand ing the Causes a nd Consequences of t he Famine-G enocide

of 1932–1933 in Ukraine: The Sig nicance of Newly Discovered A rchival

Documents’ in Taras Hunc zak and Roman Serby n (eds) Famine in Ukraine,

1932–1933: Genocide b y Other Means (2 007 ) 84 –9 7.

7 The National WW II Museum ‘The Holocaust ’, available at

nationalww2muse um.org/war/articles/holocaust> (access ed on 2 March 2022).

8 The Prosecutor v Kai ng Guek Eav (‘Duch’) Trial Judgment Case No 0 01/18-07-

2007-ECCC/TC, E CCC, T.Ch., 26 July 2010. See also ‘Khmer Rouge: Ca mbodia’s

years of brutal ity’ BBC News 16 November 2018.

9 Tali Nates ‘Remembering t he genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda 27 years

later’ UN Af rica Renewal 7 April 2021.

10 Kriangsak Kittichaisaree International Criminal L aw (2001) 69.

11 William Schabas Genocide in International La w: The Crime of Crimes (2000).

12 Raphael Lemki n ‘Genocide as a Crime unde r International Law’ (1947) 41

AJIL 145; Marco Odello and Piotr Ł ubiński (eds) The Concept of Genocide i n

International Cr iminal Law: Developments af ter Lemkin (2020); Ion Ristea ‘ The

Concept of Genocide in I nternational Law’ (2011) 3:1Geopolitics, History, and

International Relat ions221–226; GJ Andreopolous (ed) Genocide: Conceptual and

Historical Dimensions (1994); Matthew Lippman ‘The Drafti ng and Development

of the 1948 Convention on Genocide and t he Politics of International Law’ in

The Genocide Con vention: The Legacy of 60 Years (2012).

13 Carsten Stah n A Critical Introduction to Intern ational Criminal Law (2019) 33.

14 Ibid.

15 The rst convict ion for genocide occurred i n the case of Prosecutor v Krst ić

IT-98-33, ICTY Tria l Chamber of 2 August 20 01; see also art 4(2) of the

ICTY Stat ute.

16 Prosecutor v Akayesu IC TR-96-4 -A, ICTR Trial Chambe r Judgment of 2 September

1998. See also ar t 2(2) of the ICTR Statute; Payam Ak havan ‘The Crime of

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