Real political empowerment or political Gimmick? An experience of women with guns under ZANU PF during the liberation struggle 1972-1980

Abstract

During and after the liberation struggle, ZANU PF boasted of having liberated women from the clutches of patriarchy by according women the same status with men in the liberation struggle. The party posed as the liberator of its women folk and mythologized female emancipation upon which it could congratulate itself. These writers’ will demonstrate in these and other matters that the political empowerment of women in the liberation struggle was nothing but a political gimmick for the party to win the war and get international sympathy as a socialist democratic party. Key words: Gender, women, empowerment, liberation struggle, ZANU PF, Zimbabwe.