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The plight of Zimbabwe: A crisis in the leadership of Robert Mugabe

[ Posted On: 2007-06-10 ]

The 20th Century produced very effective African leaders of liberation. Nationalists like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Sekou Toure of Guinea fought against great odds to gain us independence. There were many other brilliant liberation fighters all over the continent who helped Africa end its colonial bondage.

But leaders of liberation were not necessarily leaders of development. One African leader after another let Africa down in the struggle to improve the material well-being of the African people. Only a few African leaders since independence have demonstrated skills of development on the ground.

Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe was a brilliant for political liberation of his country, but a disastrous fighter for economic liberation. If he had handled the land redistribution issue properly, he would have been celebrated by history as both a political liberator and an economic emancipator. But it was not to be.

I have watched Mugabe’s transition from my 1982 interview with him to our conversation in his new economic defiance. Two years after Zimbabwe’s independence, I complained to then Prime Minister Robert Mugabe that I had personally witnessed more racism in one week in Harare (then Salisbury) than I normally see in a year in the United States, or than I had witnessed in Kenya in the preceding decade.

I had witnessed the racism in how whites treated blacks in restaurants, hotels, in offices and in the streets.

I asked Prime Minister Mugabe: "Why do you permit such racism in post-colonial Zimbabwe?"

Mugabe answered that there were three ways of reforming people. One was by persuasion; second, was by setting them a positive example; and only in the last resort were coercion and threats to be used.

When I met Mugabe in this new millennium, I asked him if he had tried persuasion and setting a good example before resorting to coercion and threats regarding the white farmers of Zimbabwe.

Of course, Mugabe was now President rather than Prime Minister. He accused me of taking it too much for granted that the initiative to invade White farms was taken by him.

He emphasised that the veterans of the liberation struggle who had concluded that political liberation, without fundamental land reform, was a contradiction took the initiative.

In the face of the veteran’s invasion of white farms, Mugabe continued, he was faced with an agonising choice. He could have sent the police to protect the white farms.

In a violent confrontation, the police would have been humiliated/decimated.

He could have sent the national army. But the army could have mutinied and defied the Head of State on such orders. Or the army could have obeyed the Head of State and the confrontation resulted easily resulted in a blood bath.

President Mugabe decided to support the goals of the liberation veterans and reform even if Mugabe disagreed with their unorthodox methods invading the white farms.

I believed that the Zimbabwe Head of State had other options, including a combination of carrots as well as sticks in his confrontations with both the liberation veterans and the white farmers. President Mugabe and I agreed to disagree.

What should/could South Africa do today in the face of even further deterioration of the situation in Zimbabwe? Of course, military attempt at ‘regime change’ is totally unacceptable. Iraq has taught us what unforeseen consequences can occur in a militarily induced regime change.

South Africa has less belligerent options of inducing change in Zimbabwe, including economic sanctions of trade and investment, sanctions of strict visa requirements for the Zimbabwe elite into South Africa, and sanctions of bank accounts and capital flow between Zimbabwe and South Africa.

I would also recommend special carrots for President Mugabe himself. Mugabe is in his 80s and should be pressured not only with sanctions but also with offers of carrots if he agreed to retire soon. The carrots could include being honoured as a Pan-African elder statesman after retirement. A beautiful beach home for Robert Mugabe in retirement in Cape Town might also be considered by all concerned.

Above all, we should remember that although the crisis in Zimbabwe is among the most widely-publicised of all of African calamities, Zimbabwe’s problems are relatively benign as compared to the crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo even after elections, the crisis of Darfur, or the crisis in Northern Uganda. Quite frankly, the Zimbabwe crisis is also benign as compared to Nigeria, let alone Somalia.

In Zimbabwe there is no large-scale blood-letting as in Somalia, Darfur or Ethiopia. Nor is there in Zimbabwe large-scale detentions without trials as there is in Guantanamo Bay under the United States Gulag.

However, while in places like Somalia, Nigeria and the Congo, the crises are virtually organic, caused by immense sociological and structural forces. In Zimbabwe and the United States the crisis is one of leadership.

A change in the policies of the current leadership, or a change in actual regime in Zimbabwe or the United States, could transform the prospects for peace and reconciliation.

Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard

About The Author(s): Prof. Ali Mazrui is Chancellor of Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture, Kenya.

| View Profile & All Articles By: Ali A. Mazrui |

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