Silence as an endogenous mode of post-conflict healing and reconciliation: Zimbabwe post 2008 election violence

Zimbabwe has had several conflicts that impacted negatively on the societies’ relationships. These broken relationships were addressed through a variety of means; legal court intervention, social mediation and forgiveness and compensation amongst others. Following the 2008 election violence in Zimbabwe, that saw thousands of people killed, maimed and displaced, there was a need for some redress of the relationships that were broken. However, that did not take place. A study was undertaken to analyse how the society had responded to the post-conflict effects and it was established from both the literature reviewed and interviews conducted that the society had generally adopted silence as an approach of healing and reconciliation following government's inaction towards achieving a sound national healing and reconciliation agenda. (121)