Writes: Christopher Hitchens

What are the main principles of a banana republic?

A very salient one might be that it has a paper currency which is an international laughingstock: a definition that would immediately qualify today’s United States of America.

We may snicker at the thriller from Wasilla, who got her first passport only last year, yet millions of once well-traveled Americans are now forced to ask if they can afford even the simplest overseas trip when their folding money is apparently issued by the Boardwalk press of Atlantic City.

But still, the chief principle of banana-ism is that of kleptocracy, whereby those in positions of influence use their time in office to maximize their own gains, always ensuring that any shortfall is made up by those unfortunates whose daily life involves earning money rather than making it.

At all costs, therefore, the one principle that must not operate is the principle of accountability. In fact, if possible, even the similar-sounding term (deriving from the same root) of accountancy must be jettisoned as well.

Just listen to Christopher Cox, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, as he explained how the legal guardians of fair and honest play had made those principles go away. On September 26, he announced that “the last six months have made it abundantly clear that voluntary regulation does not work.” Now listen to how he enlarges on this somewhat lame statement.

It seems to him on reflection that “voluntary regulation” … [ MORE ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

Writes: CHARLES ONYANGO-OBBO

Kenya, and now Zimbabwe. Is power-sharing the panacea?

BOYS WILL ALWAYS BE BOYS. A few weeks ago, some male-dominated African lists on the Internet circulated the photos of Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s daughter Bona, and that of his opposition rival Morgan Tsvangirai’s, Rumbi (Zimbabweans have such wonderful names!)

Members were asked which one of them they thought was the more beautiful. Also, which one of the two they would like to marry.

I thought, knowing that most of the chaps that I knew on the lists were anti-Mugabe that Bona would lose.

However, when it comes to matters of women, most men will gladly leave politics at the door, so Bona got many admirers. In the end, it was very close.

   [Bona Mugabe (left) and Rumbi Tsvangirai][Click Pics To Enlarge]
Bona, as the daughter of a president, clearly was receiving the care of a well-paid beautician. She had a glossier look than Rumbi. Half the men, on the other hand, said Rumbi didn’t have Bona’s grim look (much like her father), and exuded more character.

Only one bloke, Thomas (not his real name) rose beyond the limited choices being offered, and said he would marry both! His position was slammed as unprincipled and weak, because he feared the responsibility of choice.

This seemingly frivolous Internet fun game, however, proves how unpredictable African politics can be, and demonstrated that what is ideal and “right” is not always the best and most practical.

Mugabe had sworn that he would never share power with Tsvangirai, after he lost the first round of elections and unleashed so much terror on Tsvangirai ahead of the second round, that the opposition had little choice but to pull out. This left Mugabe to run against himself, and claim a sham victory.

Zimbabwe just plunged further into crisis. Inflation rose to over 20 million per cent, and unemployment skyrocketed to 80 per cent.

As The Observer (London) reported in a long insightful piece, the central bank knocked 10 zeros off the Zimbabwe dollar at the beginning of August because shops and banks could not cope with calculations in the trillions.

When it was launched on August 1, the new dollar was Z$4 to the Pound, but on the black market, it immediately slumped to Z$25. It continued crashing dramatically, and within a month, the black market rate was Z$13,000.

With worthless bank notes, and too broke to print more, three weeks ago the Government announced that it would legalise the use of US dollars and South African Rand as everyday currency.

It would seem that shortly after, Mugabe finally realised that he had run out of wiggle room, and put in a call to South Africa President Thabo Mbeki, who had been mediating the power-sharing talks that seemed doomed to fail.

THE RESULT IS THAT ALL THE MEN who said they would marry Bona Mugabe, would now have a father-in-law with less power than he wielded two months ago.

Those who went for Rumbi Tsvangirai, expecting their father-in-law would be an opposition leader, who came close to becoming Zimbabwe’s president, but not close enough, would have one who is a prime minister and controlling about 51 per cent of the Government.

Thomas would be the greatest winner, with one father-in-law being president, and the other prime minister. It couldn’t be better. However, his fortunes have been scorned.

Daily Nation’s sister publication The East African had South African judge Johann Kriegler, who is heading the commission of inquiry into what went wrong in the December 2007 election, saying he thought these Mwai Kibaki-Raila Odinga, and now Mugabe-Tsvangirai power-sharing deals were undermining Africa’s democracy.

He argued that they offered presidents, who are not ready to retire when their time has come, or who have lost elections, to cling on to power. Within a day, there were many such reservations being aired about the Zimbabwe deal.

Kriegler’s view is particularly interesting, because he should be aware of what is touted as the most successful power-sharing deal in Africa — the transitional government between the African Nation Congress’ leader Nelson Mandela, and F. W. de Klerk, who was president and leader of the racist National Party that had jailed him for 27 years.

This is not to say there are no problems with governments where power is shared.

Because there can never be two winners in an election contest, they reward losers and turn the logic of elections — the idea that the person or party that is preferred by most voters should form government — on its head.

And while power-sharing might give unpopular incumbents a way back into power through a back door, they can also equally hand disorganised opposition groups a slice of power that they were denied at polls.

On balance, if Kenya’s example is anything to go by, the competition between coalition partners for the affection of the public seems to be the greatest incentive for performance there is.

And because they are wooing voters, each of the sides is eager to be seen as more enlightened than the other, and therefore tends to avoid being repressive. The result is that Kenya is probably freer today, than the previous time when it had been freest — the first years of Kibaki 2003-2007.

About The Author: Charles Onyango-Obbo is Uganda’s leading political commentator. He is Nation Media Group’s managing editor for convergence and new products. Charles writes for The Monitor, Uganda’s only independent daily and most influential newspaper and The East African, a NationMedia publication. Be sure to check out his Article Archive featuring hundreds of Charles’s greatest publications…..Click Here To Read More Articles By Onyango-Obbo

Popularity: 8% [?]

By: Rashid Suleiman

In the days before the Second Liberation, there were African presidents. Then there was the African president. His name was Kamuzu Banda.

Banda confounded both friend and foe. He blew cold and hot, played saviour and the devil all once. He was considered one of Africa’s most influential leaders in the last 50 years. Yet, he was among the last despots of the last century.

In sartorial elegance, he was more steadfast than Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire. He was never seen in public without his trademark black three-piece suits, flywhisk, walking stick, homburg hat and handkerchief.

In education, he was as learned as Dr Agostinho Neto of Angola or Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah.

Banda’s penchant for a flashy life saw him construct a sprawling 300-room palace, with a school and a supermarket.

In brutality, he was matched by Idi Amin Dada of Uganda, Sekou Toure of Guniea-Conakry, Michel Micombero of Burundi, Macias Nguema of Guinea-Malabo, and Mengistu Haile Mariam of Ethiopia.

In effecting a personality cult, he overshadowed accomplished purveyors of the art like Mobutu and Eyadema. He was the personification of eccentricity. He had battalions of women dancers who entertained him wherever he went.

He caused a stir in the early 1980s when he banned American pop group Simon and Garfunkel song Cecilia from the radio. This was at a time when his relationship with his mistress, Cecilia Tamanda Kadzamira, was going through a rocky period, and he clearly did not like the lyrics of the song (”Cecilia/I’m down on my knees/I’m begging you please to come home“).

Because of his conservatism, Malawi was one of the last countries to have television, in the 1990s.

In amassing a personal fortune estimated at $320 million, Banda proved that he was as greedy and fabulously wealthy as Mobutu.

Like Houphouet-Boigny or Mobutu he constructed a sprawling 300-room palace, complete with a school and a supermarket.

He was also a man of unprecedented feats. He is the only African who left his country and stayed out for 42 years but returned to lead it to independence and rule it for 33 years. He refused to return home at one time in fear that his newly found financial resources, earned as a doctor in England, would be wiped out by his extended family.

Man of many feats

Banda is the only first generation African president who remained a ‘bachelor’ till death. His lifelong partner Cecilia Tamanda Kadzamira was just a mere live-in official hostess.

Only Algeria’s Houari Boumedienne shared with Banda the dubious distinction of never having appointed a vice-president.

Banda is one of the few African presidents with multiple birthdays. For long, his official birthday was given as May 14, 1906. But when he died in 1997, his death certificate stated that he was 99 years old, meaning he was born in 1898. Oxford University Press record that he was born in 1902.

Banda was the only African president to establish diplomatic ties with apartheid South Africa. In 1972, he became the first foreign potentate to visit apartheid South Africa since King George VI of England in 1947.

Even by the high African standards, Banda was considered a dictator par excellence. Between 1970 and 1971, he declared himself president for life of both Malawi and the ruling Malawi Congress Party. Like Amin, it is said he murdered his enemies and fed their corpses to crocodiles. In a BBC interview in the early 1990s, he threatened that should Malawian exiles calling for introduction of multipartism return home, he will feed them to crocodiles.

At the height of his power, it is said only one person in Malawi rubbed Banda the wrong way and lived to tell the tale. It is still a mystery how Gwanda Chakuamba survived the bloody purges of the dictator. He was jailed for 22-years for treason and was released at the advent of multipartism in the only presidential pardon granted by Banda in his 33-year-rule.

Banda presided over a police state where any form of dissent brought sudden death, torture, exile or deportation.

The former dictator closely monitored and controlled his peoples’ lives. It was compulsory for all adult Malawians to be card carrying members of MCP. The party cards were to be carried at all times because of random police checks. The cards were sold even to unborn children. No picture, poster or clock was hanged higher than Banda’s official portrait that adorned walls of official buildings. He prescribed a dress code for men and women in Malawi and forced foreigners to conform to it.

Women were not allowed to bare their thighs or wear trousers. Men were banned from growing beards or long hair because it signalled dissent.

Male visitors to Malawi could be seized and forced to have a hair cut. Those wishing to get visas to Malawi in the 1970s were met with the following notice: ‘Female passengers will not be permitted to enter the country if wearing short dresses or trouser suit, except in transit or at lake holiday resorts or national parks. Skirts and dresses must cover the knees to conform with government regulations. The entry of hippies and men with long hair and flared trousers is forbidden‘.

Control Freak

Any foreigner who violated the rules was deported.

Moviegoers had to watch a video of Banda first before the main course. Kissing was not allowed in public and state agents cut out scenes that contained kissing in movies.

Picture - Kamuzu Banda, Ethiopia’s Haile Selassie, Kenya’s Jomo-Kenyatta and Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt - In The 60’s

All the movies were first viewed and edited by Banda’s censors before they were shown. The same was done to books. The secret police frequently opened private mail for editing. They tapped phone lines and cut off calls when a speaker said a critical word against the government. During Banda’s reign, TV was banned in Malawi.

His censors ripped out pages of publications like Time and Newsweek that they considered offensive to him. History that pre-dated Banda’s rise to power was discouraged and publications on the era were destroyed.

Despite his bad side, Banda is respected in some quarters and ranked with such luminaries like the late Sir Seretse Khama of Botswana, Kenyatta, Kaunda AND Houphouet-Boigny for the prestige they brought to their countries through the sheer force of their personalities and character. He has been hailed as a national and African hero though others denounce him as a despot.

It is said that Malawians will never achieve the unity they had under Banda. He is still remembered as a man who loved and cared for his people. He is credited with developing Malawi’s education, health, infrastructure and agriculture. Under his rule, the country became self-sufficient in food.

He has been hailed as a champion of women’s rights at a time when this was not fashionable in Africa. He founded an organisation to cater for women’s rights and needs. The Chitukuko Cha Amai m’Malawi was tasked with encouraging women to excel in government, education, the community, church and other spheres of life.

Though his date of birth is in dispute, there is little doubt that Banda was born in Kasungu in Nyasaland (the colonial name of Malawi) to Mphonogo Banda and his wife Akupingamnyama Phiri of the Chewa tribe.

In 1905, he was baptised by the Church of Scotland and took the name Hastings. Later he would add the Ngwazi (lion) as part of his name. Either in 1916 or 1917 he left with an uncle, Hanock Msokera Phiri, on foot to then Southern Rhodesia – the modern day Zimbabwe.

Young Banda

In 1917, he trekked from Zimbabwe to Johannesburg where he worked in the mines till 1925 when African Methodist Church Bishop WT Vernon offered to pay for his education so long as he made his way to America. He left for New York the same year and did his high school at Wilberforce Institute, the current Central State University in Ohio.

   Dr. Hastings Kamuzu Banda’s Mausoleum [Enlarge]
He graduated in 1928 and started earning money through public lectures organised by a Ghanaian educationist he had met in South Africa. During one of the lecturers, he met a Dr Herald who helped him enrol as a premedical student at Indian University. He transferred to University of Chicago and graduated with a B Phil, majoring in history, in 1931.

He studied medicine at Meharry Medical College and qualified as a doctor in 1937. He was forced to get a second medical degree to qualify to practise in the British Empire. He got the degree from the University of Edinburgh in 1941. He practised medicine in Newcastle and London but in 1946, he was prevailed upon to represent Nyasaland African Congress at the 5th Pan Africanist Congress. That marked his entry into politics.

While in England, he was fiercely opposed to the proposed federation of Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) and Nyasaland (Malawi) that became a reality in 1953. Two years earlier, he had been expected to return home but he chose to move to Ghana after a scandal in which he was accused of adultery with his receptionist. He moved together with the receptionist to Ghana.

After pleas from prominent Malawi politicians, Banda returned home in 1958 – 42 years after he left – to take up the leadership of the independence struggle and Nyasaland African Congress - the forerunner to Malawi Congress Party.

Strangely, he could not speak his mother tongue Chichewa and needed an interpreter. The job first fell to John Msonthi and later John Tembo, who became his strongman till death.

After stirring trouble in the colony, Banda and several of his colleagues were arrested in 1959 and jailed in Gweru in modern day Zimbabwe. He was released in 1960 and shipped to Britain for talks leading to independence. He became Prime Minister in 1963 and led the country to independence a year later.

Fall from grace

Right from the start of his political career, Banda made no secret that he was dictator. When a number of his ministers presented him with suggestions on how to reduce his powers a month after independence, he responded with tough action. He sacked four of them while two others resigned. All ‘detractors’ fled to exile.

In 1966, a new constitution made the country a one party republic with Banda as first president. He proceeded to rule the country as an unchallenged despot till the wind of change swept him out of power in the 1990s.

First, a special assembly stripped him of his powers in 1993 before Bakili Muluzi of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in the country’s first multiparty polls gave him a comprehensive whitewash the following year. He passed away in South Africa in 1997.

In his will, he instructed his long time companion, Cecilia Kadzamira, known throughout his rule as the “official hostess” to turn part of his home in his hometown of Kasungu, into a museum.

Popularity: 11% [?]

Introduction

There is nothing as glorious in the history of resistance to colonial oppression as seeing one man being able to successfully combine the will to resist, the ability to resist and the opportunity to resist, to finally win independence for his country. This is how heroes are created in a scenario of upheaval. There is also nothing as devastating in the history of a flourishing country as seeing a hero fall from fame because of blind and unbridled love for power, and dragging along with him the life of the entire country and the fate of millions. These are the two worlds of Zimbabwe’s President Robert Gabriel Mugabe.

Mugabe has remained in the spotlight of the international media for a long time. He has divided public opinion, generated unprecedented debates, created friends and foes. He has made history for reasons that are both good and bad, and shown unimaginable defiance to outside pressure. He has displayed a remarkable ability to swim through hot water, once again reminding the world about a statement he once made that while a cat has nine lives, he has ten.

Regrettably, in this political charade, Mugabe has gone to extremes to keep power. Like his peers in Africa, he has shown again that brutality against defenseless masses is only an instrument of policy, upholding the Machiavellian doctrine that “the end justifies the means.” To this, he has on many occasions alluded to the sacredness of his power from which “only God” can remove him. Power to Mugabe is not only a birth right but a divine right as well.

The story of Zimbabwe is the tale of a protracted struggle over land. When cut to size, it becomes the story of brutality and butchery short and simple. This circle of carnage has gone through two main phases. Before independence, it was cruelty and bestiality on blacks by whites. After independence (or precisely after the mid 1990s), it was “history reversed.” Blacks also turned against blacks as the politics over the land became increasingly complicate. As Zimbabwe’s crisis continues to undulate, it becomes increasingly clear that the politics surrounding this country’s land and resources is beyond the comprehension of the ordinary mind.

The world has watched Zimbabwe burn. And it continues to do so. What aggravates the situation is the interlocking and overlapping interests of outside players involved in Zimbabwe. This clash of interest has reached the Security Council of the UN where a fine line has been drawn between the anti-Mugabe West and the pro-Mugabe east. The debate over Zimbabwe has evolved from theme to theme, the latest being the renewed call for sanctions against Mugabe by the West.

Prelude to sanctions: Key milestones

Many debates about Zimbabwe have been laced with lies. Others have been coated with ignorance and many others have been interest-driven. Many more have been overtly biased while some carry very racist connotations and go as far as deliberately distorting history in to justify claims that are false, economic or political. This debate has been picked up by the media which has played a significant role in shaping public opinion about Zimbabwe both positively and negatively. This falsehood exists at both ends of the Zimbabwe debate. While Mugabe uses the state media to justify his claims to power, the more powerful western media beamed on Zimbabwe paints him as a devil with a tail and two horns. History along has the truth about Zimbabwe.

   Story continues below

From the 11th of February 1880, when John Cecil Rhodes duped the Ndebele King, Lobengula, to affix his signature on a document that deprived him of his land and authority, to independence on 17th April 1980, the history of Southern Rhodesia centered around land excision by successive white governments. After independence, it was a mixture of stories – independence, reconciliation, prosperity, constitutional amendments, land restoration, economic collapse, political unrest, regime change and then sanctions.

Before it came to sanctions, all was quite rosy between Mugabe and the West especially when the Zimbabwean President showed readiness to respect the Lancaster Constitution, the supreme document that defined the way forward for the new Zimbabwe. The “willing-seller, willing-buyer” clause of this constitution had restricted the government’s ability to interfere with private land. This clause was to run for ten interrupted years. Because of Mugabe’s compliance, he received friendly responses from the West. He was hailed as a good example of leadership in Africa and the West showed readiness to support land reforms. The U.S and Britain had earlier made very firm commitments to provide financial assistance at the Lancaster Conference. Added to these praises, mugabe was showered and adorned with honorary degrees and awards from British and American Universities. With this came his knighthood in 1994.

When the ten year period of Lancaster elapsed, Mugabe came under increasing pressure to respect his promise of restoring land to blacks. This period marked the beginning of trouble as Mugabe was caught between satisfying white land owners to ensure the support of western aid donors and meeting the demands of dispossessed blacks. Many other misfortunes added to this pressure. In 1991-1992, a catastrophic drought almost totally ravaged maize production. Another dry period followed in 1994-1995. Western sanctions started creeping in in 1998 and for the first time in his political life, Mugabe saw the birth of an opposition party the MDC (Movement for Democratic Change) in 1999.

Zimbabwe entered the 3rd millennium with a series of economic misfortunes. Britain and other aid donors including the IMF and World Bank had stopped aid to Zimbabwe. The MDC with the support of land owners vigorously challenged Mugabe in a referendum on the new constitution in 2000. If approved, the new constitution would have empowered the government to acquire land compulsorily without compensation. After loosing constitutional support for his reform program, Mugabe resorted to radicalism. Following a fierce wrangling with the judiciary, he made it clear that no court ruling would stop him from implementing his reforms because the issue was political and could only be solved through political means. Such developments culminated in the March 2000 invasions of white farms by war veterans under Mugabe’s watchful eyes. Mugabe initiated his farm seizures with a passionate appeal to history and posterity. “If there be trouble with the Zimbabwe land redistribution policy, let it be my day so that future generations of Zimbabwe may live in peace.” Till this day, Zimbabwe has not known peace.

The road to sanctions

Sanctions against Mugabe were unleashed in waves, depending on the depth of radicalism. The IMF, under the instigation of Britain and the U.S, imposed unpublicized sanctions against Zimbabwe in November 1998. These sanctions were imposed despite an earlier commitment made by this institution to support land reforms at a Donor’s Conference on Land Reform and Rehabilitation Phase 11 (LRRP 11) in Harare, 1998. The IMF embarked on an anti-Mugabe propaganda, warned off potential investors, froze desperately needed loans to Zimbabwe and refused to negotiate Zimbabwe’s debt.

The sanctions diplomacy took a higher gear in September 1999 when the IMF completely suspended its support for economic adjustment and reform in Zimbabwe. This move was followed by the International Development Association (IDA). This multilateral development bank suspended all structural adjustment loans to Zimbabwe. In May 2000, it suspended all other forms of lending, leaving Zimbabwe desperate for badly needed funds. With these strings on Mugabe’s neck, the western press started predicting his imminent collapse. .

When Mugabe refused to fall as soon as was predicted, America rushed to the forefront of sanctions. In March 2000, the U.S Senate passed the Zimbabwe Democracy Bill (ZDB). This bill called for a travel ban and the freezing of assets belonging to President Mugabe, his family and other top government officials. The ZDB sought to deny Zimbabwe access to international loans and credits. It called on Zimbabwe to respect existing ownership titles to property. This bill further aimed to support opposition groups within Zimbabwe and to fund projects aimed at undermining ZANU-PF. It also called on Zimbabwe to withdraw its forces from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Since the beginning of farm seizures in 2000, America has engaged Zimbabwe in a bitter diplomatic row, characterized by sanctions, threats and verbal exchanges. This period has also been very sensitive in American diplomacy, notably after the September 11 2001 attacks on America. In this bitter state of relations, President Bush ranked Mugabe’s Zimbabwe among the “six outposts of tyranny” in the world. In 2003, his government froze the assets of 77 Zimbabwe government officials including Mugabe. In 2005, Bush signed an “Executive Order” expanding the number of those affected by the U.S sanctions and 33 institutions whose assets where frozen in America. This sanctions list was further widened after the current election upheavals in 2008.

American hatred for Zimbabwe is equal to, or rivaled only by that of Britain. Ancestral home to majority of Rhodesian settlers, Britain stands at the center of Zimbabwe’s crisis. Britain stopped funding land reforms in 1997 on grounds that the land went to Mugabe’s cronies. And since then, there have been more excuses linked to political and human rights issues in Zimbabwe. In April 2001, Britain canceled an aid package to Zimbabwe worth $US 5million. The American-initiated ZDB received the complete blessings of Britain, especially its support for opposition activities. Unwilling to see Mugabe basking in the glory of the knighthood, the Queen stripped him of this title in June 2008.

In the British scheme of things, Zimbabwe will only know peace with Mugabe out of power. “We are likely going to be in for many more years of this kind of tyranny until Preisident Mugabe moves away,” said Jack Straw, British Foreign Secretary. When Straw tried in vain to whip African leaders into joining his anti-Mugabe campaign, he labeled the African attitude “a conspiracy of silence.” With this intransigence from African leaders, Britain relied on pressure from the U.S, EU and other European countries. British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, nodded with satisfaction when Zimbabwe was expelled from the Commonwealth in 2003, saying it was important for the Commonwealth to send “a strong signal to Zimbabwe.”

Australia was among the several European countries to heed to Anglo-American calls for sanctions against Mugabe. Like the U.S, Australia widened its sanctions list to include 127 names, adding to an initial list of people in the Zimbabwe government banned from doing business with Australian firms. Together with New Zealand, Australia lobbied the UN Security Council to indict Mugabe in the International Criminal Court. This European consensus on sanctions culminated in an EU sanction package carrying a travel ban on Mugabe, business and trade restrictions and an arms embargo.

These sanctions as crippling as they are, have not succeeded in achieving the desired goal of regime change. With a thunderous media blitz on Zimbabwe, the West hoped to use the 2008 Parliamentary and Presidential elections to make a good case for what they call the “restoration of democracy” in Zimbabwe. Alluding to western conspiracy and support for the opposition, Mugabe resorted to outright violence and intimidation, forcing the opposition to back out of the run-off elections. This left Mugabe with a “landslide victory” in the one candidate poll. His information Minister, George Charamba baptized this victory with a message to the West to “go hang.”

Though unable to kick Mugabe out of power, western propaganda paid off in the form of a crack that it inflicted on African sympathy and solidarity for Mugabe. A handful of African leaders raised concerns about the conduct of the elections, the violence involved and the credibility of the polls. Former South African President Nelson Mandela, qualified the situation in Zimbabwe as a “tragic failure of leadership.” With this limited diplomatic breakthrough, the U.S, with the support of Britain and France, drafted a sanctions resolution which it carried to the UN.

The recent debate over Zimbabwe in the Security Council marks the height of the diplomatic row between the West and the East over Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe. Never before in the history of the UN has the internal affair of a sovereign country reached the Security Council. It is a replay of the cold war-era tussle by Great powers over Africa. “Has the Cold War after all arrived at the UN?” asked Thalif Deen in the Sunday Times. Events building up to this debate date back to Mugabe’s manipulated victory in the last presidential elections. The western powers raised the problem of Zimbabwe at the G8 Summit in Japan and blamed African leaders for not bringing enough pressure to bear on Mugabe. They joined the U.S in tabling a sanctions resolution at the Security Council which was vetoed by China and Russia. “China and Russia have stood with Mugabe against the people of Zimbabwe,” said Zalmay Kalilzad, U.S Ambassador to the UN declared.

The depth and implications of western sanctions

Western sanctions against Mugabe have always been presented as being “narrowly targeted” or “mild.” Such words greatly conceal the full depth, scope and impact of these sanctions. It is true that Mugabe’s mismanagement of the economy, wrong policies and heavy-handedness have significantly contributed to Zimbabwe’s economic collapse. His huge and irrational “compensation” to war veterans, his costly venture into the DRC and the radical nature of his land reforms all struck a deadly blow at Zimbabwe’s once vibrant economy. Mugabe himself acknowledged this fact when he observed, “Having restored land to the people, we have learnt a host of lessons,” Continued he, “Chief among these is that of engaging more scientific methods to ensure greater productivity of all the resettled land….

These failures on Mugabe’s part notwithstanding, any attempt to completely dissociate Zimbabwe’s economic woes from western sanctions is grossly misleading and only enhances the hypocrisy and double standards surrounding the sanctions debate. When the EU unleashed sanctions in 2002 following earlier sanctions by the IMF and U.S, the political adviser to former Nigerian President Olusenngun Obasanjo observed, “They seem to want Mugabe’s head delivered on a platter of gold.” Six years on, the West will stop at nothing to get this head. The combined effects of western sanctions and Mugabe’s political and economic blunders have kept Zimbabwe crawling.

The full impact of western sanctions on Zimbabwe is conveyed in speech delivered to the U.S Congress in 2002 by Zimbabwe’s Ambassador to Congress in which he criticized western double standards in his country. “The campaign against my country has nothing to do with democracy, the rule of law or elections as they [the West] claim,” he said. “They imposed informal sanctions on the country, including attempts to prevent oil deliveries from reaching Zimbabwe. This resulted in gasoline queues and the closure of some factories.” He continued further, “They withheld spare parts for our machinery including spare parts for incubators and respirators for new-born babies.” This is what the West calls narrowly targeted sanctions. The effects are quite visible today in the form of hyperinflation. Zimbabwe’s exchange rate stands today at 900 billion Zimbabwe dollars to 1 U.S dollar.

What goes by the name of sanctions on Zimbabwe is the twin brother of the “regime change” objective of the West. It is Mugabe’s punishment for standing on the way of the West in Zimbabwe. Howard W. French for example recounts a statement made by a former U.S Ambassador to Zimbabwe. “Everyone felt that they had invested something to the success of Zimbabwe, so when it all started unraveling, everyone felt personally disappointed.” This historical statement betrays the hidden agenda of the West on Zimbabwe.

Mugabe may be a devil in the eyes of the West. But these same eyes are blind to, the atrocities of other devils in Africa. There is nothing Mugabe has done which is so strange in the continent. Plunder, torture, corruption, ethnic politics, mismanagement, election rigging and state brutality. Under normal room temperature and pressure, these are characteristics of Africa. These abuses thrive with the support of the same great powers of the West and East who cry foul over Zimabwe. That is why Mugabe recently challenged his “friends-turned-foes” in Africa to “point a finger” at him when some joined in the western chorus against him. As an individual, Mugabe remains firmly unshaken by sanctions as he barks left and right.

Arms embargoes have also helped to strengthen Mugabe’s “look east” policy especially towards China. “Clearly Zimbabwe is looking east,” he said, “and there is no turning back.” Besides its leverage on Zimbabwe’s land and minerals, China stands ready to turn in shiploads of weapons even at the heart of Zimbabwe’s election unrest. For these and other economic advantages, China is ready to veto any sanctions resolution against its proxy, Zimbabwe.

Among the several reasons advanced by the West for sanctioning Zimbabwe are talks about human rights abuses, torture and killing. It is rather unfortunate that these calls came at the wrong time. Not only are these evils common in Africa, but the West itself has its hands stained. The unjustified invasion of Iraq and the cruel hanging of its President in the eyes of the world have cast doubts on the credibility of Britain and the U.S as defenders of human rights and democracy. “Today in Iraq, with all their democracy, the oil pipelines are more secure than the women and children in the streets of Baghdad,” says Yaya Jammeh, President of Gambia and admirer of Mugabe.

Western travel bans on Mugabe have also proven ineffective and counterproductive. In his diplomatic tours around the world (including the West), Mugabe has on several occasions received a hero’s welcome, using this opportunity to present himself as a victim of aggression by the mighty. A good example of how Mugabe has turned this to his advantage was at the last EU-Africa Summit in Lisbon. This summit had been planned since April 2003 but failed to hold because African leaders refused sitting down without Mugabe. The conference finally held in December 2007 with the unmistakable presence of Mugabe while Gordon Brown, British Prime Minister stayed away. Mugabe singled out a “gang of four” which he blamed for arrogance towards Africa. This European arrogance and finger wagging attitude is largely responsible for African solidarity towards Mugabe. “Telling Africans they will be judged by how they line up on Zimbabwe is counterproductive….The West’s constant search for African leaders to anoint or vilify is resented on the continent and its track record, moreover is riddled with spots,” says Howard French.

Conclusion

In 2005, Tony Blair described Africa as a “scar on the conscience of the world.” Zimbabwe today has deteriorated beyond the level of a mere scar. Zimbabwe is a palpitating ulcer that leaves the body without peace or rest. Of all things in this world, what Zimbabwe needs most is peace, and all other things in biblical terms “shall be added unto it.” The ultimate lesson Zimbabwe has to learn from history, is the fact that peace in Zimbabwe will not, cannot come from outside. It has to be cultivated within Zimbabwe and nurtured by Zimbabweans. The evils of the Lancaster Constitution and its obnoxious “willing seller, willing-buyer” clause are enough indications that the West has a better agenda for Zimbabwe than peace. Also, China’s flourishing arms trade with Mugabe does not in any way walk the path of peace.

As the West continues to seek Mugabe’s head, there are very slim possibilities that it will tone down its rhetoric about sanctions even though this issue has hit a hard rock at the UN Security Council. China and Russia will seize this opportunity to dig deeper into Zimbabwe’s bowels for minerals and other economic advantages especially as Mugabe has vowed to look east.

This places the destiny of Zimbabwe squarely in the palms of Mugabe, Morgan Tsvangarai and South African President Thabo Mbeki who stands between them in the ongoing mediation efforts which many see as “a window of opportunity.” Africa awaits a “triumph of reason” in these negotiations. There is no better way of telling the world that “African Renaissance” and “African solutions to African problems” are real manifestations of African independence. These attempts at negotiation will however amount to nothing if Mugabe and Tsvangarai cannot look beyond individual and party differences and unite against outside manipulation. Zimbabwe cannot survive without the outside world but it most choose its friends with care bearing in mind that peace will return to that country only when it works along the line which Mandela saw as being “… partnership with those who wish it well.”

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   A USAToday Editorial: Accountability in Darfur

For five and a half years, government-backed forces in Sudan have committed unspeakable acts  — murder, rape, torching villages  — in the vast western province of Darfur. About a quarter of a million people have died, with millions displaced.

In 2004, the U.S. government condemned this for what it is: genocide. But efforts to stop it, even sending in thousands of international peacekeepers, haven’t ended the horror.

On Monday, the International Criminal Court, a tribunal set up in The Hague, Netherlands, in 2002 to prosecute individuals for crimes against humanity, took a bold action. Its prosecutor asked its judges to indict Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on war crimes and genocide charges — the court’s first indictment of a sitting head of state. (Two others, Yugoslavia’s Slobodan Milosevic and Liberia’s Charles Taylor, were indicted by special nited Nations courts.)

The value of the criminal court’s extraordinary decision is that it continues a movement over the past decade of putting leaders of countries on notice that they might not get away with terrible crimes against their people. That trend gained momentum after Rwanda’s 1994 genocide, in which the world stood by as 800,000 were slaughtered.

Each new effort can also put new pressure on countries that do business with tyrants. China has lucrative oil deals with Sudan and is its main arms supplier. The indictment gives China additional incentive to use its leverage to burnish its image as it prepares to host next month’s Olympic Games.

The potential downside is that the indictment could provoke a backlash by al-Bashir. He has played a game of promising to comply with efforts to end the genocide, including allowing in foreign peacekeepers.

In reality, he has aided the horror. Now, he could end all pretense. Already, worrisome new attacks on peacekeepers include one last week in which seven were killed and 22 injured. The U.N. said Monday it was withdrawing some non-essential staff.

Al-Bashir certainly won’t hand himself over. He is more likely to model himself on a fellow African tyrant, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, who unleashed a murderous onslaught on anyone who opposes him after it became clear he would lose this year’s election.

Like Mugabe, al-Bashir might be counting on help from China and Russia. Both are frequently accused of human rights violations and fear international moves that infringe on national sovereignty. Appallingly, they used their U.N. Security Council vetoes last week to block new sanctions against Zimbabwe.

One organization might have more influence than the international court or U.N. on al-Bashir and Mugabe. That organization
is the African Union.

Its members, led by powerful South Africa, have behaved more like a cozy old boys’ network.
On Monday, they even asked the court to stop the indictment. They should be more concerned with getting the thugs in their club to stop the killing.

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY:

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