This is a letter written to friends weekly about the situation in Zimbabwe
12th January 2008
Dear Friends.
For Zimbabweans at home and in the diaspora watching the tragedy unfolding in Kenya is rather like seeing past, present and future in one blinding flash. We are forcibly reminded of our own recent past with its rigged elections and we see what may well be our immediate future; the past and the future are blended into the present reality of Kenya’s cataclysmic upheaval.
Are there lessons to be learnt from Kenya’s experience, Zimbabwe’s political analysts ask. The major difference between the two countries as I see it is that superficially Kenya appeared to be a peaceful prosperous democracy with a free press and a flourishing economy. Zimbabwe, on the other hand exhibits all the signs of imminent collapse. No one expected Kenya to burst into flames, that’s what made the present upheaval so shocking, whereas most observers are astonished at how Zimbabwe manages to stagger on.
For students of African politics, Kenya and Zimbabwe have always been considered roughly comparable, sharing as they do a similar colonial experience with settler occupation of huge areas of land and a bitter struggle to gain independence. What unites the two countries now is the shared experience of stolen elections and the ensuing sense of injustice and unfairness felt by the mass of the population. When that happens, it is very easy for politicians to tap into those deeply-held grievances and persuade a suffering and impoverished people that it is all the fault of some other ethnic group. It is the ‘blame someone else’ syndrome that we are so familiar with in Robert Mugabe’s rhetoric.
What we have not seen in the Zimbabwean situation, even after patently rigged elections, is the rush of international big names eager to add their voices to the so-called negotiations to bring about a peaceful solution. This last week has seen Jendayi Fraser the US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs, Desmond Tutu, Joachim Chissano, the former President of Mozambique, and Ghana’s John Kufor, the President of the AU, among others, all rushing in to broker peace talks. President Kufor has now left Kenya having failed to bring the warring sides to the negotiating table and his role has been handed over to Kofi Annan, the former UN Secretary General. It is hard not to conclude that the only reason all these big names are in Kenya is the outbreak of violence following the rigged election. The violence that these prominent people have all condemned is the very reason they are there in Kenya; violence on the streets certainly concentrated their minds. An estimated death toll of between five and six hundred people and a quarter of a million made homeless is, one could argue, a strong enough reason for international intervention. Zimbabweans, however, will remember with some bitterness that Operation Murambatsvina made seven hundred thousand people homeless, destroying their livelihoods and homes in one fell swoop and causing countless numbers of deaths.
The world’s response was a strongly worded Report to the UN – and that was it.
Kenya, it seems, is another matter; Jendayi Fraser remarked that there were faults on both sides. She was talking about the highly suspect election statistics but she must surely know that it was the Kenyan President and his government, not the opposition leader Raila Odinga, who appointed the Electoral Commission, organised the election and counted the votes? Joseph Stalin is reported to have once said ‘ It’s not who votes that counts – but who counts the votes.’ The fact is that without an absolutely impartial election machine, democracy cannot begin to flourish.
It’s hard to see how Kofi Annan or any other eminent person can bring a successful conclusion to negotiations in Kenya unless there is an acceptance that the count was rigged and the only way forward is a fresh election under international supervision. Odinga has promised to keep up the pressure, calling for mass rallies. ‘Just provoking the government’ say some commentators but what other way does the opposition have of expressing the people’s profound dissatisfaction with the stolen election?
Meanwhile in Zimbabwe, our own negotiations between Zanu PF and the MDC appear to have ground to a halt. Talks cannot resume, we are told, because Mr Chinamassa, the Zanu representative, is having an extended Christmas break. This, while ordinary Zimbabweans experience the unspeakable misery of endless queues in the pouring rain for cash, for non-existent food and non-existent transport. Worst of all are the unprecedented floods not only in remote rural areas but in the urban high-density suburbs where house walls collapse and flimsy shelters are swept away in swirling muddy water and raw sewerage. But Mr Chinamassa is away on holiday and the crucial talks that will determine the country’s future are put on hold – again. Chinamassa’s boss, too, is away on his annual vacation, somewhere in Malaysia we are told. Was it not Robert Mugabe who said two months ago, ‘ Their welfare is my welfare, their suffering is my suffering.’ Ordinary Zimbabweans are surely entitled to ask whether their leaders actually give a damn about them. It’s hard to believe that anyone in their right mind would willingly vote for a party that has caused such desperate suffering and shows such callous disregard for the people’s welfare.
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network issued a report this week on voter education and registration. The report revealed that Zanu PF is handing out free ploughs to the people but there’s a catch. The recipient must be a paid–up member of the ruling party, able to produce a party card and chant three party slogans. Furthermore, some villagers are being told that the ploughs are free but only on condition the party wins in that area. No win, no plough.
If Robert Mugabe gets his way the elections in Zimbabwe are less than three months away. Can anyone seriously believe that the elections will be free and fair? If there is a lesson to be learned from Kenya it must be that Zimbabweans themselves have the power to bring about change but we should never forget that it comes at a high price.
Yours in the struggle. PH
