Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-5nwft Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-27T23:24:15.660Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

From South Africa with love: the malayisha system and Ndebele households' quest for livelihood reconstruction in south-western Zimbabwe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 November 2011

Vusilizwe Thebe
Vusilizwe Thebe*
Affiliation:
Department of Development Studies, National University of Lesotho, PO ROMA 180, Lesotho
*
Email: vusilizwe@yahoo.co.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In the 1980s and early 1990s, sending remittances from South Africa posed major challenges for Ndebele migrants. As a result households receiving remittances only did so at irregular intervals. With increased diasporisation into South Africa, it was to be expected that new channels would open up. This article explores what is known as the malayisha system, its role and significance as an informal channel of remittances into Ndebele society. It argues that the system bridged the geographical gap between Matabeleland and Johannesburg, averting food insecurity and poverty for semi-proletarian households in Matabeleland. By facilitating the movement of goods and people between Matabeleland and South Africa, the system became instrumental in the quest of households to reconstruct their livelihoods after the destruction of their rural–urban-based livelihoods in Zimbabwe due to perennial droughts and ESAP. As a result, the services of omalayisha are highly sought-after, by both the migrant community in South Africa and households in Matabeleland.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 4 , December 2011 , pp. 647 - 670
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alexander, J. 1991. ‘The unsettled land: the politics of land distribution in Matabeleland, 1980–1990’, Journal of Southern African Studies 17, 4: 581–610.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alexander, J. 1994. ‘State, peasantry and resettlement in Zimbabwe’, Review of African Political Economy 61: 325–45.Google Scholar
Alexander, J. 1998. ‘Dissident perspectives on Zimbabwe's post-independence war’, Africa 68, 2: 151–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alexander, J. & McGregor, J.. 2001. ‘Elections, land and the politics of opposition in Matabeleland’, Journal of Agrarian Change 1, 4: 510–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alexander, J. & McGregor, J.. 2005. ‘Hunger, violence and the moral economy of war in Zimbabwe’, in Broch-Due, V., ed. Violence and Belonging: the quest for identity in post-colonial Africa. New York: Routledge: 75–90.Google Scholar
Alexander, J., McGregor, J. & Ranger, T.. 2000. Violence and Memory: one hundred years in the ‘dark forests’ of Matabeleland. Oxford: James Currey.Google Scholar
Arrighi, G. 1966. ‘The political economy of Rhodesia’, New Left Review 1, 39: 35–65.Google Scholar
Bird, K. & Shepherd, A.. 2003. ‘Livelihoods and chronic poverty in semi-arid Zimbabwe’, World Development 31, 3: 591–610.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boahen, A. A. 1985. General History of Africa VII: Africa under colonial domination, 1880 – 1935. London: James Currey.Google Scholar
Bush, R. 2003. ‘Editorial: Zimbabwe out in the cold?’, Review of African Political Economy 30, 98: 535–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bush, R. & Cliffe, L.. 1984. ‘Agrarian policy in migrant labour societies: reform or transformation in Zimbabwe?’, Review of African Political Economy 29: 77–94.Google Scholar
Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP). 2008. Gukurahundi in Zimbabwe: a report on the disturbances in Matabeleland and Midlands 1980–1988. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
CCJP & Legal Resources Foundation (LRF). 1997. Breaking the Silence, Building True Peace: a report on the disturbances in Matabeleland and the Midlands, 1980–1989. Harare: CCJP & LRF.Google Scholar
Chigora, P. & Guzura, T.. 2008. ‘A history that haunts the present generation: an analysis of the origins of the land problem in Zimbabwe’, Journal of Sustainable Development in Africa 10, 2: 514–37.Google Scholar
Chimhowu, E. & Hulme, D.. 2006. ‘Livelihood dynamics in planned and spontaneous resettlement in Zimbabwe: converging and vulnerable’, World Development 34, 4: 728–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duggan, W. R. 1990. ‘The Native Land Husbandry Act of 1951 and the rural African middle class of Southern Rhodesia’, African Affairs 79, 315: 227–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lebert, T. 2006. ‘An introduction to land and agrarian reform in Zimbabwe’, in Rosset, P., Patel, R. & Courville, M., eds. Promised Land: competing visions of agrarian reform. Pretoria: Land Research Action Network, 40–56.Google Scholar
Maphosa, F. 2010. ‘Transnationalism and undocumented migration between Zimbabwe and South Africa’, in Crush, J. & Tevera, D., eds. Zimbabwe's Exodus: crisis, migration, survival. Cape Town: SAMP, 346–60.Google Scholar
Moore, D. 2001. ‘Is the land the economy and the economy the land? Primitive accumulation in Zimbabwe’, Journal of Contemporary African Studies 19, 2: 253–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moyana, H. V. 1984. The Political Economy of Land in Zimbabwe. Gweru: Mambo Press.Google Scholar
Musemwa, M. 2006. ‘Disciplining a “dissident” city: hydropolitics in the city of Bulawayo, Matabeleland, Zimbabwe, 1980–1994’, Journal of Southern African Studies 32, 2: 239–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muzondidya, J. & Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J.. 2007. ‘“Echoing silences”: ethnicity in post-colonial Zimbabwe, 1980–2007’, African Journal of Conflict Resolution 7, 2: 275–97.Google Scholar
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J. 2008. ‘Nation building in Zimbabwe and the challenge of Ndebele particularism’, African Journal of Conflict Resolution 8, 1: 27–55.Google Scholar
Phimister, I. 1993. ‘Rethinking the reserves: Southern Rhodesia's Land Husbandry Act reviewed’, Journal of Southern African Studies 19, 2: 225–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Potts, D. & Mutambirwa, C.. 1990. ‘Rural-urban linkages in contemporary Harare: why migrants need their land’, Journal of Southern African Studies 16, 4: 677–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prescott, J. R. V. 1961. ‘Overpopulation and overstocking in native areas of Matabeleland’, Geographical Journal 127, 2: 212–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richards, I. A. 1958. ‘A changing pattern of agriculture in East Africa: the Bemba of Northern Rhodesia’, Geography Journal 124, 3: 302–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rutherford, B. & Addison, L.. 2007. ‘Zimbabwean farm workers in northern South Africa’, Review of African Political Economy 34, 114: 619–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sibanda, O. 2010. ‘Social ties and the dynamics of integration in the city of Johannesburg among Zimbabwe migrants’, Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology 1, 1–2: 47–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Solidarity Peace Trust (SPT). 2009. Economic Survival Strategies in Matabeleland: a preliminary study. Port Shepstone: SPT.Google Scholar
Stoneman, C. & Cliffe, L.. 1989. Zimbabwe's Political Economy and Society. London: Pinter.Google Scholar
Thebe, V. 2009. Searching for a New Rural Development Narrative: rural reality and the state's peasant models in Zimbabwe's land reform policy (1980–2003). Koln: Lambert Academic Publishing AG.Google Scholar
Thebe, V. 2010. ‘Rural development policy cross-roads in a post-Zanu (PF) era’, Journal of Sustainable Development in Africa 12, 3: 87–106.Google Scholar
Thompson, G. 2004. ‘Cultivating conflict: agricultural “betterment”, the Native Land Husbandry Act (NLHA) and ungovernability in colonial Zimbabwe, 1951–1962’, African Development 29, 3: 1–39.Google Scholar
Wolmer, W. & Scoones, I.. 2000. ‘The science of “civilized” agriculture: the mixed farming discourse in Zimbabwe’, African Affairs 99, 397: 575–600.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Worby, L. E. 2001. ‘A redivided land? New agrarian conflicts and questions in Zimbabwe’, Journal of Agrarian Change 1, 4: 475–509.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zinyama, L. 2002. ‘International migration and Zimbabwe: an overview’, in Tevera, D. & Zinyama, L., eds. Zimbabweans Who Move: perspectives on international migration in Zimbabwe. Migration Policy Series 25. Cape Town: SAMP, 7–25.Google Scholar

Online media

IRIN 19.11.2004. ‘South Africa: Gvt says no bias against asylum seekers from Zimbabwe’, available at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?reportid=52118.

Reuters 27.6.2007. ‘Chronology of Zimbabwe's economic crisis’, available at: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2007/06/27/uk-zimbabwe-inflation-idUKL2714678920070627.

Interviews [all names have been changed for security reasons]

Doreen: Ndebele migrant in Johannesburg, 30.10.2009

Dube: umalayisha, Beitbridge, 7.1.2009

Felicity Nhliziyo: Ndebele migrant working in the hospitality sector, Pretoria, 23.7.2008

Knowledge Nleya: Ndebele migrant working in the hospitality sector, Pretoria, 21.6.2008

Mabhena: Ndebele migrant working in the private education sector, Pretoria, 27.6.2008

Mangena: one of the pioneers of the cross-border cargo service, Plumtree border post, 16.12.2008

Manjobo Ncube: returning migrant, Bulawayo, 17.12.2008

Mathema: umalayisha servicing both the Bulawayo & Plumtree routes, 21.12.2009

Mathonsi: umalayisha servicing the Madlambuzi area, Plumtree District, 16.12.2008

Mbambo: umalayisha, Beitbridge, 7.1.2009

Mpofu: umalayisha, Plumtree, 16.12.2008

Mpungose: umalayisha servicing the Mangwe area, Plumtree District, 21.12.2009

Ncube: Ndebele migrant working in the hospitality sector, Johannesburg, 30.10.2009

Ndlovu: umalayisha, Beitbridge, 7.1.2009

Nkomo: umalayisha, Plumtree, 16.12.2008

Nkonjeni: umalayisha servicing the Johannesburg/Bulawayo route, 24.12.2009

Nkosi: umalayisha, Pretoria, 02.06.2008