Zim Streets Renamed After Mnangagwa

Zimbabwe’s cabinet has approved a proposal to rename several streets in the country after the president, Emerson Mnangagwa.

The 10 streets are being renamed as part of a wider project to rename both streets and buildings across the country.

The Zimbabwe Herald, the state-run newspaper, said “The name changes are aimed at honouring the country’s national heroes, as well as nationalists from the region”.

But it’s not just Africans that are being honoured, and several prominent left-wing revolutionaries have also been recognised, including Cuba’s former ruler Fidel Castro, and Russia’s Leonid Brezhnev.

Zimbabwe’s acting Information Minister, Mangaliso Ndlovu, told The Herald “Cabinet noted that through the process of naming, every community or society defines its identity and culture, tells its history and espouses its values and beliefs, norms and world view”.

Several of the names that are being replaced refer to the country’s colonial past.

But the changes do not seem to have gone down too well with many Zimbabweans, who say the government is trying to deflect attention away from the real problems the nation faces. 

People have taken to Twitter, where the policy was announced by Nick Mangwana, the permanent secretary for Information, to vent their frustrations.

The news also comes just days after police in Harare brutally dispersed a rally of MDC supporters where the party’s leader, Nelson Chamisa, was due to speak.

Videos were widely circulated online of men and women being beaten as they attempted to flee the scene, in conjunction with the indiscriminate use of water cannon and tear gas.