Three months. That is the amount of time the UK Government gave undocumented Zimbabweans before broaching the subject of enforcing their return following Mugabe’s ouster on 21 November 2017. Time to come down from the lingering false high induced by Mugabe’ s departure, back to a crashing reality and forlorn acceptance that, “Hapana zvambochinja muZimbabwe”, ie nothing much has changed in Zimbabwe.
Apparently, it has been reported by various Zimbabwean media outlets on 13 February 2018, that one of Zimbabwe’s Vice Presidents, Kembo Mohadi met with the British Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Ms Catriona Lang in Harare. An interesting array of subjects came up for discussion, however the one that has made the headlines is an announcement by the British Government of its intention to repatriate some 2500 undocumented Zimbabweans residing in the UK. It has been reported that the Vice President told journalists after the meeting that, “ Zimbabwean has no problems receiving its nationals back but would want them vetted to ensure they are genuine Zimbabweans before taking them back”.