AS Zimbabwe hosted the SADC Transfrontier Conservation Areas (TFCAs) International Conference and Summit of Heads of State and Government this last week, the key issue of regional integration and colonial borders once again came to the fore.
That Africans are one is not just rhetoric.
It is an invaluable fact of life that is anchored on our history, our culture, our identity, crucially, our suffering and successes as a people.
Ours has been an excruciating past of dominance, divisions and exploitation by the other race.
We have explained extensively time and again that the borders are mere crossing points that do at all not define or determine our collective aspirations, respective destinies and who we are.
While the barricades created by these borders were initially designed to parcel out Africa to colonialists, they have done little to fragment the people, especially in Southern Africa where our collective suffering under colonialism and subsequent struggles for freedom have bound us together as one people.
So much that those historical ties are clearly defined not only by the Mutapa Empire which was arguably the largest kingdom in Sub-Saharan Africa but by our flora and fauna and the immense benefits they bring to communities from across the SADC region and beyond.
According to the 1999 SADC Protocol on Wildlife Conservation and Law Enforcement, TFCAs are a “component of a large ecological region that straddles the boundaries of two or more countries encompassing one or more protected areas as well as multiple resource use areas”.
It goes on:
“TFCAs are founded with the aim of collaboratively managing shared natural and cultural resources across international boundaries for improved biodiversity conservation and socio-economic development.
“The United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) list all conservation areas worldwide.”
SADC has 18 TFCAs, all determined by UNEP-WCMC.
Therein lies another problem for Africans when it comes to preserving our heritage and, with it, our future.
Our success in managing our resources is purely by design, not from ‘expert’ advice by some of these international organisations.
This experience in co-existence with our environment and animals is a rich heritage that has been passed from generation to generation by our forefathers.
If anything, these international organisations must be drawing lessons from us on how to co-exist with and in our environment.
It is because of that tantalising wildlife and vast resources that we find ourselves defined by these markings called borders not by the colour of our skin and our agonising journey from the past into the future.
Harare is a key player in two critical TFCAS, notably the Kavango-Zambezi (KAZA) TFCA which lies in the Kavango and Zambezi river basins where Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe converge.
The KAZA TFCA is larger than Germany and Austria combined and is almost twice the size of the UK, according to the Kavango website.
The country is also part of the Greater Limpopo TFCA which includes Mozambique and South Africa and possesses some of the established wildlife areas in the globe.
With a combined total area of 35 000km, almost the size of the Netherlands, the TFCA is a key tourist destination in the globe.
The inescapable common denominator to all these natural wonders lingers large on regional solidarity in these countries’ past and future — the independence and freedom of the masses.
Their combined efforts in the attainment of independence cuts across borders and ensured that the people in the region fought as one people.
When Mozambique and Zambia housed our freedom fighters, they were not providing refuge to the people of Zimbabwe but fellow Africans.
When Zimbabwe provided bases to the ANC the idea of borders was nowhere in the scheme of things.
They were providing shelter and tactical support to their brothers and sisters in arms.
Hence the pervading solidarity in exploiting our resources as one people as well as tackling the ever emerging challenges confronting our people and region.
The animals do not have such problems as they can freely cross borders and find residence anywhere across the region!
The more than 500 delegates who graced the gathering may well have duly felt at home in Zimbabwe as they would anywhere on the continent.
Zimbabwe’s CAMPFIRE has been crucial in facilitating wildlife movement, boosting tourism as well supporting local communities.
This is over and above several other agreements that Zimbabwe has entered into with sister countries in the region.
On July 18 2024, the country entered into a Tripartite Transfrontier Conservation Area Memorandum of Agreement with Mozambique and Zambia, a transboundary initiative for shared natural resources, infrastructural development and policy harmonisation.
While this was a written agreement which represented a new era of cooperation, our ties are inscribed by our blood on our soil and resources as well as diversity, unity, peace and development.
Just as it was in the past, these protocols are designed to achieve sustainable development for the people of the SADC region and the rest of the African continent in harmony with their environment for the benefit of the masses.
The collective dream is for the people to have access to their resources far away from the vagaries of colonialism and neo-colonialism.
Yesteryear collaboration and unity is key in attaining these objectives through active participation of the masses to build the Africa we want for posterity