Eight years ago, when I was Africa minister, I recall being asked what would happen to Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe. My prediction – that it would get worse and worse – is unfortunately proving distressingly and horribly true.
Mugabe has stolen elections before. But, in this latest one, the verdict of his long-suffering people has been resounding. This is why the announcement of the official results has been held back; so that they can be suitably moulded.
But no amount of poll rigging (including using dead voters), intimidation or brutality against opponents could hide the bravery of Zimbabweans in resolutely voting against him, as confirmed by, amongst others, independent monitors.
For the first time Zimbabweans could see election results as they were posted up in their own community. Also for the first time, they have been able to safeguard the ballot by sending these results to independent monitoring centres, which show a clear win for the opposition Leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
This is a moment of truth for Africa and especially Zimbabwe’s southern African neighbours. An African solution to this African crisis is needed now even more than before, when prevarication and complicity from African leaders has enabled Mugabe to persist with his despotic rule. Though embarrassed by Mugabe, they have deferred to him as the heroic liberation leader of decades ago rather than the corrupt tyrant he became. In so doing they have turned their backs on the people. It was left to Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu to give voice to principle.
For me this has been painfully poignant. With many others I was thrilled at Mugabe’s 1980 landslide win in the country’s first-ever democratic election after generations of racist white minority rule. I vividly recall black electors queuing in their millions as dawn broke, allowed to vote for the very first time. But over the past ten years, Mugabe has savagely prostituted the freedom struggle he once led so ably. With murder, torture, maiming, incarceration and intimidation of opponents, he copied the very techniques of repression used against him and his comrades in that struggle.
This was once the jewel in Africa’s crown, a beautiful and hospitable land to visit, with the highest standards of education on the continent, good infrastructure, and a strong and growing economy. Yet Mugabe has all but destroyed the country, turning a booming agricultural sector – breadbasket not just for his people but surrounding nations too – into a barren wasteland, with food imported and its distribution manipulated to garner political support for the ruling clique.
Deploying the rhetoric of anti-colonialism to force white farmers off his land, he deprived in each case an average 100 black workers of their jobs and homes, handing over farms to incompetent cronies who allowed fertile fields to turn into dustbowls. With incompetence and corruption institutionalised, inflation has surged to a mind-boggling 100,000 per cent (the necessary currency notes for bread today being heavier than the loaf itself). Unemployment is a staggering 80 per cent, power cuts are rife and starvation widespread.The impact on neighbours has also been destabilising. Millions of refugees have escaped into South Africa and other nations, with all the pressures that means. His black tyranny is an ugly stain on Africa, for me almost as abhorrent as the white tyranny of apartheid my parents and I fought so hard to defeat.
What people have been unwilling to acknowledge about Mugabe is that he has never been susceptible to diplomacy. I recall trying to disabuse some of my Foreign Office officials of this, and also arguing with friends in southern African governments. The truth is that Zimbabwe represents a colossal failure of diplomacy – for Britain, for South Africa, the EU, UN, Commonwealth – for everyone concerned. And the consequences have been shocking.
Already there are reports that opposition Movement for Democratic Change leaders have gone underground because their lives are in danger. The MDC say they are determined to avoid another Kenya, and have urged their supporters to remain calm – despite increasing provocation from Mugabe’s forces. A prominent MDC leader and newly-elected MP, Mrs Sekai Holland (a grandmother who was savagely beaten last year, and who is now in hiding) sent out this message: ‘Non-violence is our battlecry. That will empower us to deliver the Zimbabwe we want.’
The international community must insist that the democratic verdict is upheld and that there is an orderly transfer of power, with Mugabe and his elite offered a safe passage if they wish. This requires global engagement from the United Nations in New York to Beijing (which has been bankrolling Mugabe as it buys up the country’s rich resources). Above all it requires Zimbabwe’s neighbours in the Southern Africa Development Community to engage and speak with the same voice of democracy, as should Europe and the UN. Pretoria could if necessary pull the plug on the regime by calling in debts and banning all forms of economic assistance.
Meanwhile, there should be an international movement of solidarity with Zimbabweans and against Mugabe, both to support local resistance and to lobby governments and global institutions. The people of Zimbabwe need our help. And they need it now.