Southern African Development Community members this week threw their weight behind Zimbabwe’s US$8 billion aid appeal. Unsurprisingly, they did not commit any of their own money to the desperately-needed financial package required to lift their neighbour out of the economic quagmire resulting from three decades of corruption and misrule by Robert Mugabe and his thievocracy.
Last week, President Robert Mugabe appealed to the international community - read Britain, the European Union and the United States - to give financial support to the new inclusive government in Harare. This was backed up by South Africa’s minister of finance, Trevor Manuel, who said the donor community should inject cash urgently into Zimbabwe’s treasury rather than giving it to humanitarian agencies.
As the so-called inclusive government enters its third week it is becoming increasingly apparent that the aged dictator Robert Mugabe and his henchmen are totally unwilling to share power in any way and have no intention of giving up without a fight. They are making things absolutely impossible for the MDC ministers to function. This was expected from the top echelons of Mugabe’s patronage system – as they have everything to lose and nothing to gain.
Zimbabwe’s new minister of finance Tendai Biti told the press this week he had the worst job in the world. I could not agree with him more. The poor chap has to balance the books of the Zimbabwe government after more than a decade utter chaos and wholesale theft, not to mention carefree looting of state coffers and profligate patronage spending to buy the support of the army, police, war vets and youth militias.All this, together with massive spending on weapons and the maintenance of an inflated cabinet, was done with borrowed money. Hyperinflation of millions of percent made the situation even more unmanageable. Mugabe’s solution was simply to print more and more money.
By the end of this week Zimbabwe will have what was impossible to imagine just a few months ago – Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai sitting down together with their joint cabinet and discussing, hopefully in a civilized manner, how to tackle the man-made disaster that has all but destroyed my country.The mistrust runs deep – with justification. Mugabe’s Zanu (PF) has never played fair. Even at this stage, they are still trying to trick and crook their way to holding on to absolute power - and the enormous financial gains that have resulted from it over the past three decades.
Like many millions around the world I watched the inauguration this week of Barack Obama. The contrast between him and the man who rules my country with a rod of iron and a heart of stone could not have been greater.
The Zimbabwe Government is behaving like a terrorist organisation. It admitted in the high court last week that its police force kidnaps innocent civilians and holds them incommunicado for weeks, while lawyers and relatives search for them – fearing the worst.
