Where the power lies: multiple stakeholder politics over natural ...

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Box 2.1 Follow-up interviews after the meeting
Woman villager 1:
No, don’t listen to the Chondoita, it’s his habit to disrupt meetings, he wants to ruin
things for us but we all know he has bought a stand in another area and wants to leave.
Woman villager 2:
I wanted to speak, I was going to tell them the truth, they know me, I am not afraid, I
raised my hand many times and no one gave me a chance to speak.
Secretary of microcredit scheme:
There were some tense moments. You don’t dare to speak when they are speaking (‘they’
refers to Mavende mother of the deputy chairperson). Today was nothing, often they
are worse at other meetings (referring to the latter’s intimidating antics).
Woman villager 3:
I wanted the list of the defaulters to be read, but I was silenced. Someone stopped me
from asking that this be done. I wanted to insist that they pay the money. When I looked
at you people from IES, I felt pity because I saw you were pitiful and angry, especially
when you were talking. You should not get angry, it is just politics. That Ngonyama
family do not want to pay their dues.
Woman villager 4:
These meetings are difficult. The rich people don’t want to pay. I borrowed Z$1000. I did
not use it all; I was scared that I would not be able to pay it back. I don’t owe anything,
but this year, I want to borrow something. But there is nothing to borrow.
She is the sister of one traditional leader; a niece of the other and is suspected of having
had a relationship with the third leader. One example given to try and emphasise the
extent of her power was recounted by a local respondent here:
‘This is her habit, she never arrives on time. Sometimes people are brave and they
make decisions, but she arrives before people disperse and she takes over as if there
was no discussion before she arrived. She completely ignores everything they decided
on and makes new decisions. People grumble but no one openly confronts her, so
often her decisions stand. Once she even made people uproot the poles for a fence
and put them in a different place. She is not even the real chairperson. We have
tried twice now to remove her but failed, she just does not recognise the new people.’
(Romwe Field Notes 10/2001)
However, some respondents noted that sometimes, these powerful individuals don’t need
to even be present for their decisions to be adopted; other stakeholders will defer decisions
until former are around or may even try to anticipate what the influential people would
want or support. The process and data collected are presented in Box 2.2.
However, the process of relationship mapping is time consuming and at times sensitive,
particularly where there are leadership disputes or threats of witchcraft. In most cases
village level organizations tend to be controlled and constituted by a small group of
individuals. These few individuals also monopolize key positions in other organizations.
It is also important that one understands how stakeholders develop practices and
techniques of legitimating, social control, confrontation and avoidance. In this case,
other stakeholders in Romwe describe how the Marende raises her voice and gives people
piercing looks, walks about threateningly or even gets involved in fist fights.