African Journal of Public Affairs

This article aims to show that competing demands on environmental resources have, more often than not, exacerbated vulnerability of poor rural agricultural communities. Artisanal and small-scale mining and irrigation-based farming are the main sources of rural livelihood used to cope with vulnerability in the drought-prone Mawabeni rural communities of Umzingwane District in Zimbabwe. Irrigation farming in Umzingwane District depends heavily on sustainable water supply and unpolluted land. Similarly, artisanal mining (ASM) depends on water for panning processes. Poor people’s vulnerability often increases when irrigation development demand and artisanal mining operations compete for resources such as time, labour and water. The article explores the effects of ASM activities on sustainable agriculture productivity with specific focus on the irrigation scheme in Umzingwane District of Southern Matabeleland. A qualitative descriptive survey design and purposive sampling technique were used to select the study area, participants and to analyse data. The article concludes that ASM has caused a radical shift of able-bodied labour from irrigation farming to ASM thereby decreasing the productive capacity of the irrigation scheme. Notwithstanding the presence of locally-based extension officers from the Ministry of Lands, Mechanisation and Extension Services and traditional leaders who are instrumental in the provision of institutional support and guidance as well as access to external support and attracting social networks with farming inputs, the ASM activities have impacted negatively on farming in Umzingwane District.

This article explores the constraints for free movement of people in Africa, with specific reference to that between Lesotho and South Africa. International migration involves movement of people across-borders from one country to another; and, motives for this phenomenon are complex and debatable, including economic, political, social, environmental and so on. The article adopts a case study and qualitative approach in order to closely explore the dynamics of such international migration, especially the factors that impedes free movement. Whereas some African countries have desired free movement of people, its realisation has remained a pipedream. To this extent, this article uses descriptive analysis to identify relevant variables and explore their impact on the effective implementation of free movement between Lesotho and South Africa. The article finds that the South African Government has, ironically, continued to tighten border controls whereas Lesotho has appeared to show the will to give pragmatic effect to the principle of free movement of people. Rather than mere implementation of the agreed upon principles, the article concludes that there are pertinent realities that drive states’ actions in respect of their interactions on the continent.

This article presents a conceptual analysis of the relationship between global media hegemony and transformation trajectories within post-colonial African states. It acknowledges that Africa’s independence precipitated government reorientation, if not just rhetoric, towards the construction of “developmental state” in the hope of redressing erstwhile colonial practices and establishing a new progressive social order. In many contexts, this drive ushered noble structural changes that promised stable institutions, constitutionality and good governance. To the contrary, the past two decades have witnessed evidence of weak political and socio-economic systems, largely blamed on inter alia, dictatorship, maladministration and poor implementation of policies. Notwithstanding these dynamics, the article argues that success of transformation process derives from a mediated dialogue founded on an organic communication modal system. Most African post-colonial states ignored this principle upon attaining freedom and, in some cases, they have entrusted it to bureaucrats who covetously protected the communication infrastructure from “posterities” of western indoctrination. Thus, the formal abolition of colonial administration scarcely altered the skewed media ownership and control market structure in the continent. Propositions within the Electronic Colonialism Theory (ECT) and World System Theory (WST) are explicit on how the global media have continued to be agents of the former colonial powers facilitating sustained “barrages” of divisive neo-liberalist content to an uncritical mass of African audiences.