Zimbabwe: The fundamentals

Zimbabwe: The fundamentals What is going on in Zimbabwe is not just an election crisis, it is a war. Britain is inflicting a war of recolonization on Zimbabwe under the guise of promoting democracy. For the last seven years, Britain, with its European and Diaspora allies— The EU, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the USA-- has waged economic war on Zimbabwe through sanctions and sabotage: after all, these are classic weapons of economic war. Britain has been making propaganda war on Zimbabwe through a demonization and disinformation campaign in the global media. Britain has been waging political war on Zimbabwe using its MDC agents to fight elections. And frustrated by its failure thus far to effect regime change in Zimbabwe, Britain is gearing up to make military war on Zimbabwe, either through a UN intervention, or through a unilateral invasion, or by prompting the MDC to start an armed struggle against the Zimbabwean government. After Britain failed to persuade the UN Security Council to impose UN sanctions on Zimbabwe, Gordon Brown made it clear on the BBC [July 15, 2008] that he is determined to maintain “political pressure” on Zimbabwe until it “returns to democracy”. And on that same day, in its program “World have your say” which was broadcast from the Central Methodist Church in Johannesburg, South Africa, the BBC presenter openly went about inciting the MDC refugees there to go home and take up AK-47s and begin an armed struggle. And back in 2007, there were reports, by Grands-Lacs Confidentiel, that at a camp in Rusoma on the border between Rwanda and Tanzania, British and American instructors were training mercenaries recruited from Malawi, Zambia, Botswana and Zimbabwe itself, to invade Zimbabwe. What is all this for? Black Africans need to understand what exactly is going in if they are to do their duty towards their Black kith and kin in Zimbabwe. Contrary to the impression long created by British propaganda, the principals in this war or crisis are not Mugabe vs. Tsvangerai but Zimbabwe vs. Britain; and first Tony Blair and now Gordon Brown vs. Robert Mugabe. Tsvangerai is simply a creature and puppet of Britain. The MDC is simply the local political mercenaries that Britain is using to wage its war on the people of Zimbabwe. Despite the assertions of the sanctioners, their sanctions do not target just Mugabe and his cronies. They have targeted the entire Zimbabwe population. They have done so from the start. For example. It was reported in 2002 that “a ship carrying fuel intended for Zimbabwe was unable to offload its cargo at the port of Beira in Mozambique. British Petroleum, which owns the fuel storage facilities at the port, refused to accept the fuel because Zimbabwe owed the firm $3 million. Approximately 70 percent of Zimbabwe's fuel is shipped from Libya through the port of Beira, where it is transferred to pipelines. The lack of foreign currency has prevented Zimbabwe from meeting its payments to British Petroleum, and [this] could mean a near-total cutoff of fuel, bringing down production in virtually all sectors of Zimbabwe's economy.” We are, perhaps expected to naively believe that the lack of foreign exchange which led to BP’s interdiction of fuel supplies was a result of sanctions that targeted just Mugabe and his cronies! Or was that the direct effect of land reform and mismanagement, as all the woes of the Zimbabwean economy are alleged to be? Well, land redistribution does not produce fuel shortages or cause factories to shut down: when manufacturers deliberately fail to supply goods, despite being supplied with foreign and local currency by the government, that is sabotage, not land reform or mismanagement by government. When syndicates organize the smuggling to Mozambique of locally grown sugar and cattle, while acute shortages afflict the people, that is sabotage or economic warfare, not mismanagement or land reform. Thus we must understand that the acute shortages driving the astronomical inflation are the result of regime change sanctions and sabotage rather than land reform. And what has been the purpose of it all? We should recall that former US Assistant Secretary of State on African Affairs, Chester Crocker said in a 2005 testimony to the US Senate for the Zimbabwe Democracy Act [i.e. sanctions and regime change legislation] "To separate the Zimbabwean people from ZANU-PF we are going to have to make their economy scream, and I hope you senators have the stomach for what you have to do." (Democracy Now!, April 1st, 2005). And that is precisely what is happening. The economy is indeed screaming, by enemy design. The enemy intended to so torture the Zimbabwean people that they would reject ZANU-PF at the polls. Having failed to do so, they are scheming to either invade Zimbabwe or to fund an armed struggle there. All this is allegedly to return Zimbabwe to democracy; to punish its leadership for election violence, alleged election rigging and violations of “human rights”. That can hardly be the true motive. After all, aren’t the UK and the USA on cozy terms with other election riggers, e.g. Mwai Kibaki in Kenya, who happen to be obedient servants to imperialism? So, what are Mugabe’s real and unforgivable sins that have called forth such premeditated torture of the Zimbabwean population? Top among his sins are: 1] the expropriation of land from the white settlers whose ancestors had stolen it by force a century earlier. If Mugabe completes his land restitution project, his example might give blacks ideas on what to do, in Namibia and South Africa especially! 2] the indigenisation of the mining industries by taking over 51% of their shares for indigenous Zimbabweans; and that 3] Mugabe "balks at reforming his unproductive state-dominated economy", as The Washington Post, in an editorial on February 1, 2000, complained. This was a reference to Mugabe’s breaking away from the neo-liberal tutelage and doctrines of the IMF and pursuing “socialist” policies of state domination of the economy. In this post-Soviet era, departure from the orthodox neo-liberal “free market” doctrines is an unforgivable heresy. If Mugabe gets away with all this and succeeds, Zimbabwe, like Cuba, would become a model for other countries on how to escape the economic stranglehold of neo-colonialism. Zimbabwe would become an example, terrible for imperialism and its exploitation of Black Africa. So there you have it. It is to forestall the domino effect of the ZANU-PF example that Zimbabweans are being tortured with sanctions and threatened with war. Shouldn’t Tony Blair and Gordon Brown be charged to the ICC in De Hague for these crimes against black humanity? We must put the current crisis in the context of developments since Rhodesia declared UDI in 1965 and touched off the 15 years Zimbabwean liberation war, the Chimurenga, to recover the land. The Lancaster House Conference was called to save the imperialists from the humiliation of an unconditional surrender by the white Rhodesians to black insurrectionists. Something like that had not happened since Haiti’s victory over Napoleon’s army in 1803. At Lancaster House, ZANU-PF was robbed of the fruits of its battlefield victory over the white settlers. That agreement, which Mugabe was forced by other African countries to accept, delayed the takeover of the land for an initial ten years. Then Mugabe was persuaded by the Commonwealth Secretariat to hold off on summary land reclamation—lest the sight of it happening in next door Zimbabwe should cause white fright and intransigence among the white settlers in South Africa and jeopardize the struggle against Apartheid. Thus for 15 years, ZANU was obliged to put off any radical land reclamation process. Then, in 1997, in the new post-Soviet global political climate, Britain was emboldened to explicitly renege on the Lancaster House Agreement. It thereafter moved to completely reverse the battlefield defeat of its white Rhodesian kith and kin. This was true to the old Elizabethan tactic of defusing a crisis by delay and deceit. Lancaster house was an example of the rule that imperialism negotiates only when on the verge of being defeated, and only for the purpose of robbing its adversaries of victory. Then when it has recovered its poise, it will assuredly counter attack. This post 1979 saga illustrates Cabral’s dictum that “compromises with imperialism are counter-productive.” Given these fundamentals of the Zimbabwe case, what is our correct Pan-Africanist duty? First of all, we should not base our views on Zimbabwe on the propaganda disseminated by a western media which serves the agenda of imperialism. It is distressing to see African newspapers serving as megaphones for Africa's imperialist enemies. Pan-Africanists, including pan-Africanist media, parties and governments, urgently need to start depending on our own sources in formulating positions on all issues. This is in keeping with Cabral’s sacred principle that we should be absolutely independent in our way of thinking and acting; and in tackling questions and answering them. Secondly, Pan-Africanism, to the extent that it is still an anti-imperialist movement, cannot accommodate itself to this imperialist offensive, but must mobilize support for an anti-imperialist Zimbabwe. Its struggle for economic decolonisation should be applauded and given even more support than Black Africa gave to fraternal struggles for political decolonisation. It is heartening that African efforts to resolve the election crisis between ZANU-PF and the MDC are going ahead. But what will be required to make them succeed? Since the MDC is merely a puppet of the British Government, no negotiated settlement is possible unless Britain instructs Tsvangerai to accept it. We need, therefore, to focus on how to end, not just the foreign instigated electoral conflict, but also the underlying war between Britain and Zimbabwe over land and the decolonisation of the Zimbabwean economy. So long as Britain persists with its sanctions and with threats of inspiring an armed struggle by MDC, so long as Britain insists on returning Zimbabwe to the colonial status where a few white settlers held half of Zimbabwe’s best land, so long as Britain insists on installing a government subservient to itself in Zimbabwe, we must realize that there will be no settlement before unconditional victory by either the British recolonizers or the Zimbabwean anti-colonialists. For ZANU-PF’s exemplary project of economic decolonisation to succeed, a global anti-war movement is called for to constrain Britain from fomenting armed conflict in Zimbabwe. Fostering such a movement is our third Pan-Africanist duty to Zimbabweans --------------- Feel free notice Please feel free to fwd this document to any Pan-African persons, or to publish and reproduce it, unedited and in its entirety, to the Pan-African community, provided you credit the author, do not change, cut or add any word or otherwise mutilate the piece, i.e. publish as is or don’t at all. If posted at a website, please email a copy of the web page to sundoor777@hyperia.com For print media use, please obtain prior written permission, and then send two (2) copies of the publication wherein used, to Chinweizu, P. O. Box 988, Festac Town, Lagos, Nigeria. For further information please contact Chinweizu sundoor777@hyperia.com All rights reserved. © Chinweizu 2008

First : I am a Black Zimbawean with more respect in any Harare ghetto than Mugabe. I sang, wrote and pushed about land redistribution when the honourable Father Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo was doing the same and Mugabe was busy trying out and shopping suits of the highest Royal Flavour at Harrods.

Please do not be misled about Lancaster house commitments...Mugabe has never been held by any commitments...not even his own. You DO NOT KNOW WHO YOU TALK ABOUT. The discussions on land were progressing well mediated by Obasanjo (nigerian President) when Mugabe in typical stranded rudebwuoy style began pulling his sleeves and encouraging war veterans and ZANU PF militia to invade the farms. Farms were invaded, both black (farm workers)and white people beaten, tortured and raped and their property stolen. I say Mugabe destroyed his country because you only need to look at productivity 8 years ago compared to today...AGain I repeat YOU DO NOT KNOW WHO YOU TALK ABOUT. You are in search of black heros. Mugabe is not one of them...Sonn after 1980 he tried to exterminate the Ndebele Tribe from where an uprising had emerged. He killed mothers and fathers just because their children had risen against him in support of the Honourable late Father Zimbabwe: Joshua Nkomo Please consult your HIstory books or educated PAna African friends and they will tell you about Mugabe. Fine, he did join and inspire the liberators during the war of liberation but because of his dishonest ways , selfishness and dictatorial tendencies...he has lost all the respect he had gained. You can even check with his own party hierarchy...they are behind him only beacuse they fear him and he affords them a living nobody believes he will deliver for Zimbabwe...thats why last year saw many people discussing his successorship...who he dealt with ruthlessly.

Do you know that a TWO DAYS AFTER ELECTIONS ENDED it was announced that the country had run out of maize and all other basic commodities such as fuel, beef, cooking oil etc. Everyone knows wherenthe maize went...it was used to buy rural votes and Mugabe acknowledged this on international TV.

Please do not give me any of that 'Africanness' Talk... I am not there to prove my identity to you. Ndiri mwana wevhu anobva Ku Masvingo guta rakare kare renyika yeZimbabwe.

I am a level above 'just talk' having researched urban and rural Zimbabwean opinions which form the basis of my understanding ZImbabwean needs. Ask yourself why in 3 years Zimbabweans abroad have grown from a few thousands to million farm s (in a country with 11 miilion people) if everything was rosy and there was a lot of land to farm. My brother in law and mother were removed from farms after huge investments into the farms which were given to Mugabe loyalists - together with the crop they had farmed. And you ask me for my credentials.

I could write the whole day...but if you are serious about Zimbabwe...read Zimbabwean newspapers both Zanu PF propaganda and surviving independent newspapers.

I will say it again and again...THE LAND ISSUE WAS MEANT TO DIVERT NEGATIVE INITIATIVES BY MUGABE SUCH AS THE DRC WAR AND MEANT TO PROP HIS POSITION BY MAKING AN EMOTIONAL APPEAL BASED ON LAND.

Do you know what his campaign pltaform for the just ended election was: 'The Anti-Blair Election'. Seriously...in a country with 75% unemployement US$1=Zim $18000, 150% inflation, near stagnant growth rate. Is this man serious?

Go and look for African heroes elsewhere...even Obasanjo has dumped him...he saw that this man has gone crazy. Mbeki is just too courteous....And he flew all the way to Vatican for the funeral when he cannot even face the Archbishop of Bulawayo. Of course who cares about the Vatican in Zimbabwe...except Mugabe OF COURSE.

Wait until Jonathan Moyo's (his ex Propaganda Chief) book on Serving in Mugabe's Regime is released then you can talk from a knowledgeable point of view...now seem too emotional to picture Mugabe as a Black Hero ...at the expense of us Zimbabweans. You may think you are doing just to black liberation but are you being fair to the Zimbabweans who today do not have any food to eat - this is true?

Think again Rasta.

zimbawean ras on zimbabwe.

RAS J

Replies

NYMetro

Tichaona Chinyelu July 29, 2008 at 2:12pm

I think that we African people have to be very careful of assuming that because white colonial powers ("former" and current) are attacking a black leader (wherever that leader is located in the world), the policies, beliefs and practices of that black leader should automatically be defended. Mugabe may not be Mobutu but it appears that he's heading strong in that direction in his effort to hold onto Zanu PF power over the country.
Chicago-Midwest

Ras Jon July 29, 2008 at 12:49pm

First : I am a Black Zimbawean with more respect in any Harare ghetto than Mugabe. I sang, wrote and pushed about land redistribution when the honourable Father Zimbabwe, Joshua Nkomo was doing the same and Mugabe was busy trying out and shopping suits of the highest Royal Flavour at Harrods.

Please do not be misled about Lancaster house commitments...Mugabe has never been held by any commitments...not even his own. You DO NOT KNOW WHO YOU TALK ABOUT. The discussions on land were progressing well mediated by Obasanjo (nigerian President) when Mugabe in typical stranded rudebwuoy style began pulling his sleeves and encouraging war veterans and ZANU PF militia to invade the farms. Farms were invaded, both black (farm workers)and white people beaten, tortured and raped and their property stolen. I say Mugabe destroyed his country because you only need to look at productivity 8 years ago compared to today...AGain I repeat YOU DO NOT KNOW WHO YOU TALK ABOUT. You are in search of black heros. Mugabe is not one of them...Sonn after 1980 he tried to exterminate the Ndebele Tribe from where an uprising had emerged. He killed mothers and fathers just because their children had risen against him in support of the Honourable late Father Zimbabwe: Joshua Nkomo Please consult your HIstory books or educated PAna African friends and they will tell you about Mugabe. Fine, he did join and inspire the liberators during the war of liberation but because of his dishonest ways , selfishness and dictatorial tendencies...he has lost all the respect he had gained. You can even check with his own party hierarchy...they are behind him only beacuse they fear him and he affords them a living nobody believes he will deliver for Zimbabwe...thats why last year saw many people discussing his successorship...who he dealt with ruthlessly.

Do you know that a TWO DAYS AFTER ELECTIONS ENDED it was announced that the country had run out of maize and all other basic commodities such as fuel, beef, cooking oil etc. Everyone knows wherenthe maize went...it was used to buy rural votes and Mugabe acknowledged this on international TV.

Please do not give me any of that 'Africanness' Talk... I am not there to prove my identity to you. Ndiri mwana wevhu anobva Ku Masvingo guta rakare kare renyika yeZimbabwe.

I am a level above 'just talk' having researched urban and rural Zimbabwean opinions which form the basis of my understanding ZImbabwean needs. Ask yourself why in 3 years Zimbabweans abroad have grown from a few thousands to million farm s (in a country with 11 miilion people) if everything was rosy and there was a lot of land to farm. My brother in law and mother were removed from farms after huge investments into the farms which were given to Mugabe loyalists - together with the crop they had farmed. And you ask me for my credentials.

I could write the whole day...but if you are serious about Zimbabwe...read Zimbabwean newspapers both Zanu PF propaganda and surviving independent newspapers.

I will say it again and again...THE LAND ISSUE WAS MEANT TO DIVERT NEGATIVE INITIATIVES BY MUGABE SUCH AS THE DRC WAR AND MEANT TO PROP HIS POSITION BY MAKING AN EMOTIONAL APPEAL BASED ON LAND.

Do you know what his campaign pltaform for the just ended election was: 'The Anti-Blair Election'. Seriously...in a country with 75% unemployement US$1=Zim $18000, 150% inflation, near stagnant growth rate. Is this man serious?

Go and look for African heroes elsewhere...even Obasanjo has dumped him...he saw that this man has gone crazy. Mbeki is just too courteous....And he flew all the way to Vatican for the funeral when he cannot even face the Archbishop of Bulawayo. Of course who cares about the Vatican in Zimbabwe...except Mugabe OF COURSE.

Wait until Jonathan Moyo's (his ex Propaganda Chief) book on Serving in Mugabe's Regime is released then you can talk from a knowledgeable point of view...now seem too emotional to picture Mugabe as a Black Hero ...at the expense of us Zimbabweans. You may think you are doing just to black liberation but are you being fair to the Zimbabweans who today do not have any food to eat - this is true?

Think again Rasta.

zimbawean ras on zimbabwe.

RAS J
Chicago-Midwest

Ras Jon July 29, 2008 at 12:46pm

Ayinde..and all the others who support Robert Mugabe on the basis that he did well for Zimbabwe by invading and destroying white owned farms, hear me a little: Mugabe is an evil man who uses the good to justify the bad. Giving land to the poor to empower them is the good...but this is not the hallmark of Mugabe's regime. Firstly the land issue was only adopted last minute before the 2000 elections because it was the last card to play - divide the people on race; let the people hate MDC because it has a few white men in its party structures - send it to hell by associating it with recolonisation because it suggests a cleverer non politicised approach to redistribute land and eal with the issues bedevilling Zimbabwe. Secondly Mugabe's beiggest mistake was participation in the DRC where his generals looted diamonds and have been implicated by UN reports at the expense of Zimbabweans. Zimbabwean spent more than two years in the DRC...exhausting the foreign currency reserves that it badly needed on a war which benefitted only Mugabe's generals...
Thirdly...Rural Zimbabweans are too afraid to contemplate alternatives to Mugabe. THis is so open to obvious to anyone who has spent time in Zimbabwe on a genuine cause. Fourthly...land redistribution was not a priority for Zimbabweans and was even under consideration by the land committee set up at the Vic Falls Land summit...everything was on course. Being a researcher having done the most validated opinion polls in Zimbabwe bewteen 1998 and 2003 - I can confidently inform that Zimbabweans were worried about rising unemployment and food prices than fast tracked land reform. I can also confidently inform you that human rights abuses were so rampant that my co-workers particularly thos doing fieldwork were often arrested and sometimes kidnapped by war veterans and Zanu PF militia.

Even Mugabe's former information minister has said all these bad things about Mugabe - even though he was party to all the wrongs.

Black consciousness movements should be wary of bad black leaders who do bad and use the good to support their bad. It is not all that white peple do that is bad and it is not all that black people do that is good. In this case Mugabe is doing wrong that is why almosts all urban areas voted against him - because they can withstand the intimidation unlike the rural folks.
Talk to Zimbabweans to understand the Zim situation ..even Zanu PF people will inform you that the boss needs to go..but those who openly said it before the Zanu Congress last year were punished and expelled from the party.

Get your facts right.
- Chicago-Midwest
  
  Ras Jon > Ras Jon July 29, 2008 at 12:47pm
  
  BY the way did you see photos of Mugabe stretching out to greet Prince Charles his personal hero. After all his anti British talk. This man is an embarrassment. Please open Newszimbabwe.com and have a laugh...if the photos are still there.
  
  Messages In This Thread
  These post are from a zimbawean ras friend of mine, who knows all to well what goes on there
  
  RAS J
  
  http://Newszimbabwe.com/

This reply was deleted.

Who I am for Africa and Africans?

Replies