At the turn of the millennium, China and Zimbabwe revived relations after the African nation had cut ties with its former coloniser, Britain. When the British left, trade doors were opened; Chinese companies snapped up lucrative tenders for national projects and became a dominant player in Zimbabwe.
Experts state that in 2011 alone, Chinese investments pumped US$460 million into the Zimbabwean economy. The Asian giant consistently ranks among Zimbabwe’s top five trade partners – the volume of trade between the two countries surpasses US$1.1 billion annually.
But how is this relationship playing out for ordinary Zimbabwean workers? This paper shall examine the nature and extent of labour rights abuses by Chinese companies operating in Zimbabwe. Its premise, though, is that the flouting of labour regulations cannot be blamed solely on investors’ conduct. Instead, such flouting is evidence of disrespect for Zimbabwe’s working class that is embedded within its own regulatory environment. In fact, there is much deeper abuse of workers in Zimbabwe by locals than there is by Chinese companies. This is because the company is complicatedly informalised. Because Chinese companies tend to , their abuses make headlines more often than local examples do.
Zimbabwe has a long-standing legacy of worker abuse. There are weaknesses embedded in its labour rights enforcement institutions that are beyond the control of international investors operating in the country.
Historic relations
China–Zimbabwe relations were birthed during the colonial period when the former late President Robert Mugabe was given support by the Asian nation in his quest to outwit the colonial forces of Rhodesia. Mugabe turned to China after the Soviet Union turned down his request to support the military wing of his party, the Zimbabwe African National Union, in favour of his rival Joshua Nkomo’s Zimbabwe African People’s Union.
On 18 April 1980, as Zimbabwe celebrated its independence from colonial rule, Mugabe met with Chinese officials to formally establish diplomatic ties. Two months later then vice-president Simon Vengesai Muzenda visited Beijing to express his thanks; Mugabe followed the next year.
But between 1980 and the year 2000, relations between the two countries did not extend to huge economic contact. The Southern African nation was still pursuing a somewhat close relationship with Britain as part of a policy of reconciliation.
Then came the government’s fall-out with white commercial farmers during the late 1990s and the inception of the Fast Track Land Reform Exercise which evicted those farmers from their properties. Relations between Zimbabwe and the West deteriorated. China stepped into the vacuum.
Ties between the two nations have deepened since then, in line with Zimbabwe's Look East Policy. China has become Zimbabwe’s all-weather friend.
Chinese investments in Zimbabwe
China has snapped up high-value projects in Zimbabwe, including work on fixing water infrastructure and rehabilitating sewerage systems for the Harare City Council, to the tune of US$144 million. The project was financed by China’s Exim Bank.
Another project was the completion of the US$ 98 million Zimbabwe National Defence College, constructed by Anhui Foreign and Economic Construction Company, again through an interest-heavy loan from China’s Exim Bank. This was celebrated at a time when Zimbabwe’s credit rating had been downgraded to “junk” status by multilateral lending institutions. Other projects include the Matabeleland Zambezi Water Pipeline – first mooted by colonial settlers in 1912 and finally taking shape – as well as development of the Kunzvi Dam. Chinese firms are also engaged in massive power and energy projects in Zimbabwe.
It's not just large, national-scale projects that draw Chinese investors and companies. They are working across all spheres of Zimbabwe’s economy. This means Chinese companies are major employers – and with that comes the risk of potential labour rights violations and issues.
Labour rights dilemmas
There have been several instances of Chinese companies running foul of labour laws. For instance, in 2011 employees took a Chinese-run construction company, Sogecoa Zimbabwe (Pvt) Company to court amid allegations of exploitation and rights violations. Sogecoa is a sister to the diamond company, Anjin, which was among those awarded licences to mine Marange diamonds. The workers said they were being paid a measly US$4 a day for working long hours. This was far below gazetted rates of between US$1, 06 and $1, 51 per hour with a 44-hour week.
But this is by no means a problem unique to Chinese companies in Zimbabwe. Many workers were left hamstrung by history: the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions has accused government of pursuing an anti-labour stance by adopting bad economic policies which devalued the local currency; the fast tracked land reform exercise meant many workers in the agricultural sector had been rendered jobless; and, the manner in which white commercial farmers were forced out of the country meant they weren’t able to settle pension and salary obligations. Zimbabwe has a traceable history of disregarding labour rights long before Chinese companies came on board.
Labour institutions like unions and National Employment Councils, mandated to legally enforce labour rights, were already weak at the turn of the millennium as the government pursued a policy to salvage the economy at the expense of workers’ rights.
Still, complaints against Chinese employers and companies continue to dominate the headlines.
The National Union of Quarry Workers of Zimbabwe has accused Chinese employers at Ngezi Mine in Zvishavane of ill-treating and underpaying their workers. Union leader Onias Munenga was quoted in the press as saying the Chinese miners were not abiding by the country’s labour laws. There have also been complaints from the construction sector.
In a recent and terrible example of this issue, in 2020 a Chinese national named Zhang Xuelin, who doubled as proprietor and General Manager of Reeden Mine near the city of Gweru, allegedly shot and injured workers Wendy Chikwaira and Kennedy Tachiona, according to the New Zimbabwe news website. The two had reportedly approached their boss to demand their unpaid wages. A brawl followed and the pair were shot – Tachiona apparently three times in both legs. In response, the Chinese Embassy in Harare issued a statement, expressing hope that the incident would not damage their country's relations with Zimbabwe. Others in the Chinese community denounced the shooting – a reminder that it’s important to distinguish between individual criminal acts and Chinese abuses.
Meanwhile, the shooter fled the country and was exonerated by President Emmerson Mnangagwa. This is evidence, surely, of internal weaknesses rather than widespread Chinese misconduct.
Another example of the blurred lines between Chinese behaviour and Zimbabwe’s own responsibilities can be found in the diamond mining sector. In Chiadzwa, Manicaland, thousands of villagers were displaced from their villages and relocated to Arda Transau , a state-owned farm in Odzi, to make way for a diamond mine. The villagers were promised better lives by both the government and several Chinese mining companies. Yet, much of the blame is heaped solely on the Chinese companies while, as Newsday noted in a report on 21 March 2021, Zimbabwe’s government failed to enforce the expected basic standards.
The Zimbabwe Environmental Association (ZELA) makes an interesting observation: “As the Chinese footprint is surging especially in Zimbabwe’s extractive sector, there has been an increase in alleged cases of unfair labor practices, human rights abuse and disregard of environmental regulations by the Chinese.”
The environmental lobby group then traces the real problem to its roots. China needs the strategic mineral resources available in Zimbabwe, while the latter needs the income from these resources, especially after its show of defiance against the West. Zimbabwean elites have found a commercial partner in China with capital to finance mining and provide a market. It is therefore the desperation of Zimbabwe’s government to generate income that underpins inherent weaknesses in the institutions that ought to project workers. Chinese companies alone cannot be blamed.
Instead, Zimbabwe must look to its own culture of disrespecting workers’ rights.
A bad track record
Zimbabwe’s record of ill- treating workers predates the arrival of Chinese capital in the country. Records of the International Labour Organisation indicate that as early as 2004 and several years thereafter, labour abuses were rife. In some instances, the government would not accept the ILO’s commissions of enquiry into its activities.
The courts do not always protect workers, either. On 17 July 2015 Zimbabwe’s Supreme Court ruled that workers could be dismissed with only two weeks’ notice. This further weakened employees’ already precarious position in the labour market.
Another internationally respected lobby group, the International Trade Union Confederation, has consistently rated Zimbabwe as one of the world’s worst countries for the working class due to rampant abuse of workers rights through government institutions and weak legislation.
A study by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has shown that Zimbabwe has the second largest informal sector in the world. Only Bolivia, in South America, has a larger informal sector. Yet to date, the National Social Security Authority, which is mandated to trace, detect and address workplace deficits does not deal with the informal sector. This means it effectively ignores the widespread labour rights abuses in the sector
It appears that Chinese companies become more visible because they are the dominant or large-scale employers in a highly informalised economy where millions of abuses go unnoticed due to the haphazard nature of organised labour.
Conclusion
While Chinese companies are found wanting on the issue of abusing labour rights in Zimbabwe, the country’s record of workers rights abuses predates the arrival of the Asian nation’s companies into the Southern Africa nation. For decades, Zimbabwe has been listed by globally acclaimed labour institutions for flouting labour regulations – yet very few of these lists mention Chinese companies as the main offender.
Labour rights abuses by local employers largely go unnoticed because there’s little tracking of workers’ experiences in the informal sector.
It is also important to note that Zimbabwe’s labour legal framework does not adequately protect workers’ rights; this leaves them prone to abuse by any employer, regardless of nationality.
Chinese companies in Zimbabwe operate investments concentrated in agriculture, mining, construction, trade and tourism which coincidentally happen to employ the majority of the populace. This makes any allegation against the companies automatically big news, but it is not representative of the actual state of affairs around workers’ rights in Zimbabwe.
About the author
Alois Vinga is Zimbabwean journalist who holds a Diploma in Communication & Journalism, Bachelor of Arts Degree in Media Studies, post-graduate diploma In Education and is currently reading for a Masters in Development Practice with the Midlands State University. He holds three media reporting awards in Labour and Gender and Disability Reporting.