The situation in Zimbabwe seems to be stuck in neutral, with ZANU-PF leadership seemingly stalling and looking for a way to hold on to power. One would hope that, at this point, some good might come of the controversial "engagement" approach taken by South Africa and others where African heads of state might indicate to Mugabe that a further crackdown at this point would be unacceptable.
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Holding Pattern
05 Apr 2008 10:49 am
Comments (22)
One would hope that, at this point, some good might come of the controversial "engagement" approach taken by South Africa and others where African heads of state might indicate to Mugabe that a further crackdown at this point would be unacceptable.
Matthew:
If this were some sort of controversy at the country club, your comment might have some value.
However, in this comment, it seems pretty adelpated - to say the least.
I simply can't see a decent outcome to this situation. However it plays out, it's almost certainly going to be a catastrophe.
"The situation in Zimbabwe seems to be stuck in neutral..."
The situation in Zimbabwe is stuck in the status quo ante, but not in neutral. The situation IS anti-human rights, anti-democratic, pro-autocracy, impoverished, etc... that's not a neutral position, it is a decidedly negative one.
The fact that there has been no progress does not indicate neutrality, it indicates that the Mugabe forces are still in control and winning. This is clearly a case of no movement being the worst possible outcome, and indicates a high potential of violence and increased repression.
It's hard to read between press report lines, but (given history) it's likely that the main struggle is going on inside Mugabe's party. Mugabe's own notable absence from the public eye suggests pretty strongly that he is no longer in charge, for whatever reason. Most likely, many of his creatures fear both losing their privileges and also the potential for prosecution or violence against them if his regime loses power. Such people are structurally 'dead-enders' who will urge him to stay in power by any means possible (even though, ultimately, the very methods needed will ultimately make the fall all the more violent and chaotic and dangerous for them).
Others, less tainted or more ambitious, may look at a post-Mugabe period as a time to move beyond being creatures of a failing dictator, and may be willing to cut deals with the election winners or with outside parties, such as the South African government.
There's no predicting the outcome of this intraparty struggle. From Tsvangirai's perspective, and those who support him, this is an extremely dangerous but promising moment. It's clear that many within the ZANU-PF have seen the writing on the wall, as shown by the breakaway faction that ran against Mugabe. Most often, in these situations, it's the military faction leaders who will determine the short term outcome, since only they have the means to allow or prevent the opposition from taking power.
In past moments like this, also, there's often a division between 'regular' military officers and the 'security forces' (since every dictator keeps his own personal security separate from the military). The security force leaders are usually the most compromised, and therefore the most intransigent, but their methods are inadequate to suppress widespread opposition without the army.
Look for: 1) a coalition of security force types and generals who decide to prop up Mugabe as long as he's alive (to be followed, no doubt, by a vicious succession dispute, e.g. Turkmenistan), or 2) a movement by a most of the military leaders to acclaim Tsvangirai, which would be followed by brisk and most likely brutal action against the security forces and creatures. Of course, there's lots of other constellations possible, but it will be a tough and potentially very dangerous few days for the people of Zimbabwe, I'm afraid.
I'm no Africa expert, but that's not how "engagement" works.
"a movement by a most of the military leaders to acclaim Tsvangirai, which would be followed by brisk and most likely brutal action against the security forces and creatures."
Or threats could be enough.
I've read somewhere that during the Orange Revolution, the Security Forces of the Ministry of Interior did actually plan on repress the protests (or force them to get violent by using infiltrated civilian mobs). The army got word of it and discretely deployed troops around Kyiv and told the Security Forces that they would defend the civilian protesters.
If the army prevents Mugabe from using violence (directly or in response of opposition violence), the stalemate will go to the opposition way. And the rumours that have been floating are that repression/threat/menace is increasingly carried by the CIO and the militia and not the Police or the Army.
That said, no African head of State would indicate that further crackdowns are impossible. It's not in their interest to suggest that there's a limit to repression and that such a limit can defined from outside. Most of them are dictators who are just smart enough to not bring attention to them by not attacking white people.
"Maybe Mugabe should go to the U.N and present the writings of John Yoo as justification for a campaign of torture aimed at quelling the opposition. Sort of a "goose & gander" defense."
That's clever, Steve Duncan, but if you want to paint Mugabe as an extreme caricature of any American political figure, he's more John Edwards than John Yoo. Mugabe took populism to its logical extreme and it wrecked his country.
Ugh.
Does anyone but Fred find Mugabe's extremism "logical"?
Does anyone but aleks not understand the meaning of the phrase "logical extreme"?
That's clever, Steve Duncan, but if you want to paint Mugabe as an extreme caricature of any American political figure, he's more John Edwards than John Yoo. Mugabe took populism to its logical extreme and it wrecked his country.
That doesn't work because Mugabe's populism is more based on opportunism than principles.
He is indeed closer to small-government isolationist, strict-constitutionalist, liberty advocate republicans who sudenly spent billions on wars, defended the unitary executive and torture when they realized that it would give them a political advantage.
Mugabe litterally became Rhodesia when the winds of change started blowing.
The thing people in the West continually forget is how popular Mugabe really is in the Zibabwean countryside. He is deity in Africa who freed Zimbabwe from Ian Smith et al. This is why South Africa and others have to tread carefully, he is a hero to many blacks on the continent. Look at South Africa where Mbeki has been sidelined by Jacob Zuma, who is viewed skeptically in the West for his idiotic and dangerous pronouncements on HIV/AIDS spread, but at the same time he commands huge popular support for his appeal to Zulu nationalism and his history fighting in the ANC.
Eventually, African countries and their leaders will have to start taking responsibility for their actions. But somehow it seems that this will not happen until all those who were involved in the struggle against colonialism have died off. (Unfortunately, taking a lot of their countries' people with them.)
Figure roughly another 20 years of deprivation. Meanwhile, cry for the people of Africa.
Europhobe,
Indeed. When I lived in Africa the occasional English-language African media that I came across was extremely pro-Mugabe.
Fred,
I do think that Zimbabwe's problems stem more from Mugabe's corruption and opportunism (and brutality) than any excess of ideology. Tanzania's leader during the 1960s and 1970s was far more genuinely radical and socialist than Mugabe, and Tanzania (for all its real problems) never remotely fell into the kind of misery that Zimbabwe is in now. One could say similar things about a number of other socialist African states.
Europhobe,
I haven't been to the Zimbabwe rural areas lately, but I do know that several hundred of the MDC supporters have been murdered by state supported gangs since 2000, and Tsvangirai's election agent and driver were doused in gasoline and burned to death.
I'd guess that it's kinda hard to determine exactly what the rural folk of Zimbabwe are thinking. When one third of the population has left the country, and Mugabe gets 43% of a vote with his thumb firmly on the scale, I'd guess rural people in Zimbabwe are thinking much like the city folk.
There's been a weird tendency among some on the Pacifica Radio wing of the American left to dismiss all the media attention on Zimbabwe as motivated by racist concern for the plight of the white farmers, when the country's been one of the true humanitarian catastrophes of the past several years, with murderous repression against the domestic opposition and the population plummeting from starvation and emigration in what was formerly the bread basket of southern Africa. One could ask why Darfur has gotten so much more attention than Zimbabwe...or the even worse disaster in the Congo, for that matter.
as motivated by racist concern for the plight of the white farmers, when the country's been one of the true humanitarian catastrophes of the past several years, with murderous repression against the domestic opposition and the population plummeting from starvation and emigration
May be because the attention preceeded the catastrophe ? And may be because the attention preceeding the catastrophe has been bigger than the attention about the even bigger catastrophe in DRC ?
And in the leftist circles where all attention about evil-doing by third world regimes is seen as racist/capitalist/imperialist/pro-american conspiracy or bias, the attention on Darfur is dismissed as part of the anti-arab, war on terror agenda. At the end, it's the lack of attention on DRC where there's no white victims and no arab murderers that is the proof.
Mugabe basically proved right Ayn Rand's scenario in Atlas Shrugged: he expropriated property for the productive class (the white farmers) and gave it to the rabble. And then the country went from being an agricultural exporter to an economic basket case.
Does anyone but aleks not understand the meaning of the phrase "logical extreme"?
Posted by Fred | April 5, 2008 1:58 PM
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I understand the phrase completely. And Mugabe is no more the "logical extreme" of Edwards' populism than Attila the Hun is of McCain's rabid aggression.
Mugabe basically proved right Ayn Rand's scenario in Atlas Shrugged: he expropriated property for the productive class (the white farmers) and gave it to the rabble. And then the country went from being an agricultural exporter to an economic basket case.
Posted by Juan | April 5, 2008 7:59 PM
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Except that he didn't give that property to the "rabble" (black farmers) but to himself and his cronies.
wj,
Eventually, African countries and their leaders will have to start taking responsibility for their actions. But somehow it seems this will not happen until all those who were involved in the struggle against colonialism have died off
Zimbabwe acquired independence 20 after most of Africa. I don't see the rest of Africa has progressed much as a result of the removal of their first wave of leaders. I don't understand your point.
Comments closed April 19, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
Maybe Mugabe should go to the U.N and present the writings of John Yoo as justification for a campaign of torture aimed at quelling the opposition. Sort of a "goose & gander" defense.
Posted by steve duncan | April 5, 2008 10:59 AM