2008 Articles 25 Dec Kingdom Come 21 Dec Christmas 15 Dec Step Forward 5 Dec Beginning 1 Dec Amendment 30 Nov Facilitation 26 Nov Genocide 24 Nov Running Out 17 Nov Crisis 15 Nov Somalia 12 Nov What Next? 8 Nov Leadership 2 Nov Chipo 1 Nov Rome Burns 29 Oct Failure 25 Oct High Noon 19 Oct Never Easy 10 Oct Abyss 8 Oct Filibustering 4 Oct Chaos in Zim 29 Sept A Mule? 21 Sept On Step 16 Sept The End 12 Sept New Beginning 11 Sept Deal? 6 Sept Consequences 3 Sept Need a Deal 2 Sept Dollar Died 31 Aug Steering 29 Aug Unstuck 23 Aug Betrayed 18 Aug The Devil 13 Aug 13 Aug 08 12 Aug Today 11 Aug Cliffhanger 8 Aug Whats Going On 27 Jul Progress 22 Jul Agree to talk 21 Jul Mbeki kicks 16 Jul Crunch Time 13 Jul Economics 9 Jul Reality Looms 2 Jul Where? 30 Jun Looking Glass 26 Jun Battle 22 Jun What Now? 21 Jun The Commitment 16 Jun Do or Die 13 Jun Morning After 10 Jun Closing Doors 26 May Current Outlook 24 May Fan Club 19 May Tyranny 17 May End Game 15 May Flushing 8 May Violence 6 May Bizarre Process 25 Apr Cornered 20 Apr Electoral Fraud 19 Apr Jesse 17 Apr This Farce 11 Apr The Devil 6 Apr Wounded Buffalo 1 Apr Dying Kick 31 Mar Politcl Tsunami 27 Mar Current Situ. 26 Mar 4 days to go 21 Mar 8 days to go 15 Mar Election Time 27 Feb Games Begin 17 Feb Public Office 11 Feb Choices 4 Feb Decision Time 26 Jan Ambushed 25 Jan The Struggle 20 Jan Truth or Fiction 12 Jan Mugabe Mistake 8 Jan Surprise 2 Jan Kenya Lessons
Articles:- 2024 2023 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004-01
|
|
|
|
|
Its do or die time
At Church this morning in Midrand, two men who had just arrived in South
Africa
looking for work approached me. They were both experienced teachers and both
were MDC people. They simply told me that they had no choice but to try and
find work in South Africa - any sort of work, to survive and to send some
funds home to keep their families alive.
They are micros of the flood tide of humanity that is now moving south from
Zimbabwe. Desperately needed at home, committed to their country, but faced
with no other choice but to flee the country of their birth for a squatter
camp
somewhere in South Africa and then to try and eek out an existence doing
whatever they can find to do.
Yesterday I watched Mugabe speak at a funeral in Harare where he said that
he
would never allow the MDC to take power. There was no doubt about his
meaning
- he was very clear and the language graphic. Interviewed on SABC the poor
Zimbabwean Ambassador to South Africa was asked to confirm that this was the
position of the Zimbabwe government. What else could he say but that the
media
in SA had misconstrued Mugabe's remarks!! Nothing could be further from the
truth and S K Moyo knows that full well.
I also watched the SA Deputy Foreign Minister, Aziz Paghad respond to
journalists at a media briefing and saying that 'all these things' (reports
of violence, illegal detention, denial of ordinary democratic rights) were
the
responsibility of the SADC observer mission that was now on the ground. He
said
the mission had a wide mandate. I see that the US has been asked to pay for
the
SADC mission - what happened to sovereignty?
Mugabe's remarks about his declared intent to deny a transfer of power to
the
MDC no matter what the outcome of the election is both an acceptance of the
fact that he is likely to be defeated and a flat refusal to accept that the
people of Zimbabwe have the right to vote and decide in secrecy as to who
their
new leadership should be. Here we are three months after the 29th of March
and
not one of the results of that election has been implemented. Not a single
Council has been sworn into position, not a single MP or Senator has been
sworn
in and all Ministers, even those who were defeated in the election, remain
in
office and drawing their full allowances.
This is a frontal attack on democracy by a full member of the SADC and the
AU.
It is a direct challenge to Mbeki and his team of facilitators who have
worked
for 15 months to bring about this very electoral process. All that has been
said and done by anyone with direct responsibility for this shameful state
of
affairs is to wring their hands ineffectually and say that 'what more could
they do'? Mbeki's snide remarks in the House of Assembly in Cape Town this
week of 'do you want us to throw stones at Mugabe?' fall into this
category. My personal response would have been that it might help! Certainly
preferable to a bland silence that Mugabe rightly interprets as acceptance
and
approval.
At home the US dollar has cruised to Z$4 billion even with three zero's
knocked off at the end. A payment through a bank is now halved in valued
when
it is finally credited to your account. Cash is impossible to come by and
the
payment of the very large denomination bills by financial institutions
simply
creates problems for both customers and the business community.
There is no food in the markets - bread is almost unobtainable, maize meal,
the basic staple food, is only available in small quantities and via Zanu PF
political structures - and I thought that the manipulation of food supplies
was a crime against humanity? Government institutions that can only adjust
their prices after consultation simply cannot keep pace with the situation -
a return flight on Air Zimbabwe to London is about US$200 - a real bargain
in
any language and that is business class!
In the hope that change might happen after the election, many have held on
and
kept their businesses open, paid staff and sacrificed. If the outcome of the
run off on 27 June 2008 is one that retains the status quo many, if not
most,
will reach the end of their tether.
Recently I have become more and more irritated with the frequent claim by
Mugabe
that the MDC is a puppet of the West - in particular, Britain and the United
States. Mbeki shares this view even though he knows full well that the MDC
is a
homegrown opposition movement based on a mass membership. Not so, Bright
Mutonga, the Zimbabwean government spokesman at present, went even further
and
said last week that the US had given MDC and other NGO organizations US$6
million and that Britain had given these same groups over 3 million pounds.
Apart from the fact that the MDC has seen very little funding from any
overseas
sources since its inception and very little from the business community and
none at all from the British administration, it is difficult to refute such
puerile arguments. We are not a liberation movement - but many of our
leadership served in the liberation struggle even helped lead that struggle.
We
do not want to back to that route as a means of 'regime change' - we
simply want our democratic rights as citizens of an independent state to be
respected. Is that such a threat to present leadership in many African
States
that they are prepared to allow Mugabe and his henchmen to get away with the
farce that is taking place here right at this time.
I watched Tendai Biti go to Court on Saturday in chains and shackles - what
a
mockery of everything that the South African and SADC leadership is saying
that
they stand for. Three days ago he was in sponsored talks in Pretoria on the
possibility of a negotiated outcome to the present impasse. He was given
assurances that his personal safety and security would be respected. This is
simply not good enough and I hope that the leaders of the G8 make that point
to
any African leaders with whom they have to deal in future. At the same time
what
courage he has showed, the shame is on South Africa!.
If African leadership fails us again on the 27th June, it will be a step too
far
for Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans. If you want a shooting war then so be it, but
do
not blame us when we start. Do you want South Africa to find itself firmly
fixed on that slippery slope that so many African States have ended up on
and
to slide into corruption, negative growth, the collapse of economic and
social
institutions and despotic authoritarian leadership?
Or are we going to see African leadership standing by their numerous
commitments
to principle and insisting that the Zanu PF regime step aside and go into
political opposition in a new dispensation. That would make all the
difference,
its do or die time.
Eddie Cross
Johannesburg, 15th June 2008
|