peaceful de-colonisation process began to evaporate rapidly, with the escalating political crisis culminating in UDI five years later. In general terms, therefore, the symposium saw the pre-1960 period (from approximately 1890) as being in need of scrutiny both to reveal specific human rights abuses and to place the more recent period (i.e. the past 44 years) in context and perspective. Even if a TJRC is to examine events only since 1960 this will be a huge task, in the sense that the sheer scale of events (UDI and the liberation war, Gukurahundi, and the period since 2000) will in themselves be extremely demanding. Is it therefore realistic to go back ‘to the beginning’ by casting the net over an earlier 70 years? Furthermore, why stop at 1890 and the advent of British colonialism; why not look at the pre-colonial struggles between Africans themselves, the grossly over-simplified and historically dubious conflict between ‘Ndbele and Shona’? Those present at the symposium did not have the time to debate fully these practical problems. Nevertheless, there was a clear consensus that the abuses of the last four and half decades cannot be properly investigated unless the build-up to this period is also closely examined. If this approach is to be followed it will contrast sharply with the course taken in South Africa, where the ambit of the TRC was limited to the period after 1960 only, rather than attempting the truly gargantuan task of examining over 300 years of human rights violations. Is 70 years more feasible than 300? It is submitted here that Zimbabwe civil society should seriously consider re-visiting this issue. Certainly the pre-1960 period is critical to an understanding of what lead to UDI, the war and postIndependence developments: the racially-based legal, social and economic imbalances arising from colonialism which necessitated the liberation struggle and which festered after Independence. The questions, though, are whether a TJRC is the correct vehicle to look at both these periods, and if so whether the ideal is to have two ‘committees’ working at the same time or whether the earlier period would be examined before the TJRC moves on to the post- 15