On Zimbabwe: Get it right

On Zimbabwe:

I have to respectfully disagree with the basic premise of the last posting on Zimbabwe. The main argument seems to be this: get rid of Mugabe, allow the MDC take power, and democracy (whatever the poster means by this) in Zimbabwe will flourish, thus ending the current crisis in this embattled nation. There are several problems here:

1. The post confuses effects with causes. Zimbabwe's economic crisis is *not* the direct result of repatriating British-owned and controlled farms. Nor is it the simple product of Mugabe's position as President of Zimbabwe, since he's been in power for some time now -- including previous periods of economic prosperity. Rather, Zimbabwe's current economic crisis is the direct result of British and U.S. economic sanctions leveled at the country in retaliation for repatriating white-owned lands back to the people of Zimbabwe.

2. Relatedly, neo-colonialism in the form of white control of African land and natural resources is not "democracy." As America's imperialist mis-adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan clearly show, "democracy" can never be achieved when a nation's resources are controlled by another. The post seems to say that, "Well, yeah, European imperialist exploitation of Zimbabwe is bad, but, hey, it's OK so long as we have democracy." Democracy as imperialism is imperialism just the same.

3. No historic context is given in the post for the land repatriation program. Nor does the post acknowledge that the power-hungry Mugabe was the key leader in Zimbabwe's successful struggle against brutal British colonial occupation and subjugation. This acknowledgement does not validate abuses of power (although it does raise the question of who determines this, and how). It would provide more historic context for understanding the complexities of resolving the current crisis.

4. The MDC has a CIA problem. It is no secret that MDC works openly with "Freedom House," a U.S.-government funded organization that serves as a major right-wing proxy for the CIA. Freedom House has already been expelled from Iran, Uzbekistan, and other countries for trying to organize right-wing coups in these countries. To dismiss the CIA's involvement in Zimbabwe as "conspiracy theory" is unfortunate and counter-productive. CIA-backed "democracy" in Africa is never a good thing. It didn't work well for South America years ago, and will not work for Zimbabwe today.

5. Finally, in this world of global imperialism and neo-colonialism in Africa, simply jumping on the opposite side of a tyrant does not necessarily mean you'll land on the side of a liberator. As socialists, we should make sure that we are not caught up in liberalist imagery of simple "tyrants" and "bad men." A fruitful analysis of Zimbabwe should begin with structural analysis, economic analysis that looks at who controls the means of production and examines the nature of the distribution of wealth. Simply cheerleading "the opposition" does little to transform the conditions responsible for producing crisis conditions in the first place.

Some things are matters of simple common sense. But other things are quite complex. Simplistic discourse on complex subjects such as Zimbabwe is unhelpful, if not counter productive and wrong. Too much is at stake to not get it right.

The article below lends some historical perspective.

http://www.blackcommentator.com/10_zimbabwe_pr.html

Zimbabwe's Mugabe and White Farmers
by Dr. A. Chika Onyeani, Guest Commentator

In Zimbabwe, white farmers are still being defiant to the order issued by the government of President Robert Mugabe that they should vacate farm lands that government has targeted for take over. Others have decided to obey the order. Unfortunately, the issue of land re-distribution, or "seizure" as the foreign media would have us believe, has been the most misunderstood, to the extent that it has been lumped together with the politics of President Mugabe. But the issue of politics in Zimbabwe, and ultimately that of Mugabe, should not be allowed to becloud the attempt by the country to the equitable re-distribution of land stolen by whites in the first instance without compensation to its rightful African owners.

While white farmers continue to shed crocodile tears, it is a matter of record that in a land of more than 11 million people, the whites who make up less than 2% of the population, control more than 60% of the arable land. It is also a matter of record that although 95% of the white farmers have received notice to quit the land, those whose land has been taken over have all received compensation, and of the 500 who have agreed to leave peacefully some have also already been paid.

It seems the height of hypocrisy that the world should be focused on the plight and non-payment of compensation to white farmers, without as much as a mention of the savagery with which the Black African owners were massacred and their lands seized without compensation. The word Bulawayo, the second largest city in Zimbabwe, is an Ndebele word for "slaughter," and it refers to the savagery of the British settlers, including the infamous Cecil Rhodes who had crushed the attempt by the indigenes to fight back, leading King Lobengula to swallow poison rather than be captured. Or should we forget the savagery of the bestial Sir Frederick Carrington, who had publicly advocated that the entire Ndebele race should be forcefully removed or be exterminated.

Or that of profligate Ian Smith, who seized the government in 1965 and unilaterally declared the then Southern Rhodesia independent, when he refused to apologize for the atrocities he committed while he held office. In fact, he even boasted that he had no regrets about the estimated 30,000 Zimbabweans killed during his rule. Said Smith, "the more we killed, the happier we were."

As the Zimbabwe minister of industry and commerce, Nathan Shamuyarira once said, "The land we are talking about was occupied entirely by our people, the indigenous people of the country, until 1890. The [the British] reserved the best resources - land, cattle, forestation, what have you - for themselves.... What the bill simply states is that Zimbabwe belongs to the indigenous people of Zimbabwe. It does not belong to anyone else."

It should also be remembered that in the early 1900s, African agriculture competed head to head with white settler farmers for the market of the growing towns and mining centers in the country. However, in 1915, the Native Reserves Commission expropriated more of the high potential land and initiated a new form of taxation to suppress the indigenous competition. By the 1930s, the corn purchasing board had established regulation which discriminated against African corn, while the state moved more Africans to the non-fertile communal lands. The result of this was that the Africans who had wedged such competition against the white settlers were rendered idle, and forced to indenture themselves as laborers to the white farmers.

As we noted earlier, despite all the vociferous claims of injustice by the white farmers, the fact is that most of those whose land has been seized have been compensated by the Zimbabwe government. In point of fact, the new law passed by the Zimbabwe Parliament addresses the issue of some farmers having as many as 20 or more arable farms, some of which they have left fallow, while Africans are left with nothing.

Again, some of us, including this writer, have allowed our warped perception of Robert Mugabe's politics to becloud the other issue of compensating the white farmers. Britain, which has been acting like the ostrich it is, giving the impression that it wants real solution to the land issue, should be held totally accountable for what is happening today in Zimbabwe. As the Zimbabwe government has rightly contended, the responsibility for compensating the farmers lies with Britain, since the then British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had agreed to provide the funds as a condition of Mr. Mugabe signing the Lancaster House agreement, which finalized Zimbabwe's independence 22 years ago.

"That agreement," according to Shamuyarira, "was abruptly abandoned when the Blair government came to power. The British Minister, Mr. Cook, has now indicated that the British government would contribute to a resettlement program. That is a good change of position." The agreement had further made it clear that if Britain failed to pay the compensation, then Zimbabwe had no obligation to pay for the land taken back for resettlement of landless Africans.

That agreement had barred the new Zimbabwe government of 1980 from grabbing privately-owned farmland for the first 10 years. For that guarantee, Britain had agreed that it would match a dollar for every dollar that this new independent Zimbabwean government would put as compensation to buy back the farms.

The British government of Tony Blair is now arguing that Zimbabwe had not put in place the mechanism for distributing land to the poor of Zimbabwe. "We agree," said the British government, "that there is a very strong case for land redistribution in Zimbabwe....Unfortunately, the government of Zimbabwe has not put in place a program of land reform that would provide land to the poor of Zimbabwe."

Now, Britain is looking out for the poor in Zimbabwe rather than fulfilling its obligation under the Lancaster agreement of 1979.

Those of us who have pointed accusing fingers at the politics of President Mugabe, should do our homework. Robbers and murderers should not be allowed to keep the fruits of their ill-gotten gains. Zimbabwe belongs to Africans, even the whites who consider themselves Africans, but the land does not belong to murderers who savagely exterminated Black Africans and seized the land without compensation. That would be a great misapplication of justice.

Dr. Chika A. Onyeani can be contacted at afrstime@aol.com.