Lotti Nkomo is a Postdoctoral Fellow. He holds a BA (Hons) Economic History from the University of Zimbabwe (2006) , an MA in Africa Studies (with distinction) from the University of the Free State (2015), and a PhD in Africa Studies also from the University of the Free State. His research interests focus on Zimbabwe’s political relations with regional states; traditional leaders and politics in Zimbabwe since 1980; and electoral violence in post-2000 Zimbabwe. He has published on some of these themes in regional and international journals. He is currently working towards a monograph provisionally entitled “Zimbabwe-South Africa Relations, 1980–2017”, which examines Zimbabwe’s post-independence political and diplomatic relations with South Africa.
Publications
L. Nkomo, 'Councils, councillors and profiteers: Urban land speculation and contestations in Southern Rhodesia in the 1940s', Journal of Southern African Studies, 46 (6) 2020, 1163-1181.
L. Nkomo, 'Winds of small change: Chiefs, chiefly powers, evolving politics and the state in Zimbabwe, 1985–1999'. Southern Journal for Contemporary History, 45 (2) 2020, 152-180.
L. Nkomo, Review: Sarah Dorman, Understanding Zimbabwe: From liberation to authoritarianism, London, Hurst Publishers, 2016, in African Historical Review, Vol. 49 (2) 2017, pp. 115–18.
L. Nkomo, Review: George Karekwaivanane, The struggle over state power in Zimbabwe: Law and politics since 1950, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017, in Historia, Vol. 63 (2) 2018, pp. 188-92.
L. Nkomo, Review: Joseph Mujere, Land, migration and belonging: A history of the Basotho in Southern Rhodesia, c. 1890–1960s, New York, James Currey, 2019, in Southern Journal for Contemporary History, Vol. 44 (2) 2019, pp. 135-39.
Awards/Fellowships
Postdoctoral Fellowship UFS, 2019
Erasmus+ mobility, Thesis writing, Bologna, Italy, 2017
PhD scholarship award, UFS, 2016
UFS Merit Award for graduating with distinction, 2015
MA scholarship award, UFS, 2014