Re: [A-List] Zimbabwe's political opposition deploys its own WMD claim

[Patrick Bond <pbond@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

james daly wrote:
>         Zimbabwe's political opposition deploys its own WMD claim
>         By Stephen Gowans
>   

James, what a curious man you are to post this sad Mugabe propagandist's 
material on a day of int'l labour solidarity with Zimbabwe, and at a 
time Zanu and their paramilitaries are waging open war on poor and 
working-class Zimbabweans, urban and rural. Are you simply not paying 
attention? Do you perhaps need some pan-Africanist, socialist, labour or 
merely empirical information about the meltdown? Read below. Three-month 
old Gowans manure smells as bad as it does when freshly posted.


****
*

On 23rd June the International Trade Union Movement has called a day of 
action on Zimbabwe as on that day two trade union leaders are due to 
appear in court again and trade unionists and trade unions are under 
attack in Zimbabwe..



In Britain the Trade Union Congress (TUC), supported by ACTSA has called 
a demonstration on 23 June from 12.30 to 2 pm outside the Zimbabwe 
Embassy.( details attached).



Those in Britain are urged to support this demonstration.



But it is hoped there will demonstrations throughout the world. Check if 
there is one in your city.  The international trade union movement is 
calling for these so do support the trade union movement.  If not and 
there is a Zimbabwe diplomatic mission in your city/country then can you 
organise a demonstration?  You are also encouraged to send letters to 
the Zimbabwean representative in/for your country- a model version from 
the International Trade Union Congress (ITUC) is attached and copy this 
to the ITUC. Also attached is a model/draft from ACTSA you could send to 
the Minister of Justice in Zimbabwe.



You are encouraged to take action now and on the 23 June. It maybe that 
some organisations are unable to take action as the organisation but 
consider if you could pass the information to your supporters.



Thanks and apologies for any cross posting.



Tony Dykes



Director, ACTSA (Action for Southern Africa)



email: tony.dykes@xxxxxxxxx


***


WE, the General Council members of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), meeting at the Quality International Hotel in Harare today 21 June 2008 to, among other things, discuss the 27 June 2008 Presidential Election Run-off ; 


Having,

*	Discussed the violent environment prior to the holding the Presidential Election Run Off of 27 June 2008; 
*	The conduct of political parties during the campaigning period; and 
*	The State's preparedness for holding a free and fair election 



Observing that,



*	Political violence in the country has reached alarming if not catastrophic proportions; 
*	That the 27 June Presidential election is not an election, but a declaration of war against the people of Zimbabwe by the ruling party;  
*	Dozens of people have been murdered due to political motivated violence; 
*	Thousands of people have been threatened with deaths,  beaten, tortured and harassed for expressing or supporting the opposition political party; 
*	People are being forced to attend political rallies failure of which they are being beaten up; 
*	Deployment and sprouting of several bases led by the ruling party militia that are harassing and perpetrating violence; 
*	The usual poling officers, that is teachers and other civil servants, have been sidelined in the running of elections in favour of ruling party supporters; 
*	Thousands of people have been displaced through political violence and thereby unable to vote; 
*	The State President has made it clear that he will not accept defeat even if he loses the elections. 
*	Very few local observers have been accredited to oversee the conduct of the elections; 
*	Continuous harassment of workers on their way to and from work by youths militia who have been deployed in suburbs; 
*	Opposition party agents have been harassed, some killed and therefore unable to monitor what may happen in some wards on the day of the election; 
*	The opposition has not been granted permission to campaign; 
*	There is a complete black out of the opposition in the public media and in case where it is mentioned, has always been in negative light; 
*	 Potential voters are being threatened if that they are names would be recorded if they voted for the opposition; 



We therefore hereby resolve that:

*	We will not accept an outcome of a flawed election; 
*	The Government immediately disband bases in all suburbs and unofficial road blocks manned by the youths militia; 
*	The government stop violence and allow local observers that were accredited for the March 29, 2008 Harmonised Elections to observe the Presidential Run Off. 
*	There be equal and unbiased access to the Public Media by all contesting parties. 

Last Tarabuku
Acting Information Officer
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
P.O Box 3549
Harare, Zimbabwe



Telephone 263-4-794702/794742
Cell 263 11 620 231
Fax 263-4- 728484
E-mail info@xxxxxxxxxx
Website www.zctu.co.zw <http://www.zctu.co.zw/> 

***

MDC Mayor’s wife found dead and ZESN observer murdered



By Tererai Karimakwenda

June 18, 2008



The dead body of the wife of MDC Councilor Emmanuel Chiroto, who was 
elected Harare Mayor on Sunday, is reported to have been found at a 
nearby farm on Tuesday. 27 year-old Abigail Chiroto had been abducted, 
along with her 4 year-old son, by a gang of armed ZANU-PF thugs that 
came looking for her husband on Monday. Chiroto was not home so they 
petrol bombed his property before taking his family. The child was 
dumped at Marlborough police station later that day, and the husband is 
now in hiding.



Chiroto was the chief election agent for Trudy Stevenson, who was an MDC 
parliamentary candidate in 2005. Stevenson said the security guards at 
the house ran away when 2 twin cabs showed up without license plates. 
“This is the death squad, and they were armed,” she added. The outspoken 
MDC official said Chiroto’s wife was still blindfolded when her body was 
found. She had tried to grab her child and run but was too slow and got 
caught.



A report in The Telegraph newspaper on Tuesday quotes the Harare Mayor 
as saying: "I knew when I heard that a woman's body had been found that 
it was her."



Meanwhile, another murder was reported by the Zimbabwe Election Support 
Network (ZESN). The group said they are outraged and saddened by the 
‘brutal, calculated and cold blooded’ murder of Elliot Machipisa, a ZESN 
observer in Karuru, Hurungwe. Machipisa and his family were attacked in 
the morning on Tuesday. According to ZESN, the attack left his wife in 
critical condition and hospitalised at Karuru Clinic. There had been 
sustained threats of violence targeting all individuals living in the 
area who acted as observers for ZESN in the March 29th elections. A 
military style base was set up on the same day at Karuru Township and is 
being manned by ZANU PF militia, commanded by war veterans.



Despite the presence of observers and a United Nations envoy in 
Zimbabwe, the ruling party’s campaign of violence, abductions and 
intimidation has not ended. We are receiving reports from all around the 
country about ZANU-PF youth militia who are abducting suspected MDC 
supporters and officials, and bringing them to designated bases where 
they are beaten severely before being released.



John Ngorima, a 74 year-old farm caretaker and manager in Chiredzi, was 
reportedly abducted on Tuesday afternoon by a group of about 9 people 
who drove away with him in a white Mitsubishi pickup. Witnesses alleged 
that the car was driven by Lieutenant Edson Ndhlovu. Ngorima was driven 
over 20 kilometres from his home and was severely beaten by the group, 
who accused him of voting for the MDC. But it turns out that Ngorima had 
been unable to vote on March 29 because his name had been removed from 
the voters’ role. He walked home in the dark with severe injuries. 
Police were informed but no arrests have been made.



We received a report from Bikita, East of Masvingo that on June 9th the 
youth militia attacked the councilor for ward 10, Wilson Mabhoko, and 
his legs and ears were cut off. Chiredzi farmer Gerry Whitehead said 
Mabhoko is being treated at Silveira Hospital. Once again, the police 
have done nothing about the incident.



Takalani Matibe, the MDC MP for Chegutu West, on Wednesday reported that 
dynamite was thrown into his house and he was threatened with death.



The strategy of abducting the relatives or close associates of intended 
targets is now being used by state agents in an attempt to forcibly 
obtain information about their whereabouts. The wives of at least 2 MDC 
MPs were burned to death in the last month and many family members have 
been abducted. More than 60 Zimbabweans have lost their lives in the 
post-election violence perpetrated by thugs under the direction of the 
Mugabe regime. It is believed that Mugabe wants to postpone the run-off 
poll against MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, using the violence as the excuse.


***

Forced underground
The Zanu-PF regime of Robert Mugabe has stepped up its repression in the lead-up to the June 27 presidential election run-off against Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change. The offices of the International Socialist Organisation have been closed down as part of the regime's crackdown against all opposition groups. Peter Manson spoke to ISO leader Munyaradzi Gwisai


PM: What happened when your office was raided by the authorities?

MG: Initially they came two weeks ago. They confiscated some material and raised an issue about our latest Socialist Worker, claiming it was inciting violence. This was because we had argued in the paper that the crisis was not going to be resolved through elections, but through mass action. We said that the way forward for the Movement for Democratic Change and civil society was to create a united front and mobilise against the regime. They said what we had written was very similar to what Wellington Chibebe, general secretary of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, had been saying when they arrested him last month.

Then on June 12 they came over and ordered the closure of all the civic organisations in Zimrights House - Zimrights is the NGO that owns the complex where we rent our office. Also affected were the National Constitutional Assembly and the Zimbabwe National Students Union. That very same day the offices of a variety of civic groups, including the Zimbabwe Social Forum, were also ordered to close. But nobody was arrested in our complex, as far as I know, and we were able to rescue our materials and computer, but our operations are now virtually underground.

Mugabe has said that most of the money coming from the imperialists is being channelled via the NGOs. Of course, many do get funds from the west and the intervention by the west in this election is significant. But the stepping up of the repression is now unambiguous.

PM: There are reports in the western press about Zanu-PF denying food to MDC supporters unless they hand in their identification papers, which would prevent them voting. Are these reports true and do you think the repression will succeed in delivering a Mugabe victory?

MG: Some of these stories are a load of trash. There might be one or two incidents in the countryside of people being told to hand over their identification papers and it is true the regime has started issuing new identification documents - informally we hear that in Zanu-PF's rural strongholds people are being wrongly registered. But these stories serve to disguise the regime's real preparations to rig the elections nationally.

The regime will close off key rural areas and the MDC will be lucky to have polling access there. Mugabe has openly declared that, whatever the result of the election, he will not hand over power to Tsvangirai. He will only hand over power to a leadership that he believes is consistent with the 'ideals of the liberation struggle'.

There is a fear that these methods might work. I would say at this stage it's a 50-50 election. The difference really is only around 130,000 votes, so the strategy of the regime is to displace a significant number of MDC voters in the rural areas they control. Combined with the disarray that the MDC and its allies are now in, this is giving Mugabe a good chance of victory.

The MDC banked everything on change through elections and had no plan B. Their strategy for taking on the dictatorship was one based exclusively on elections. The ISO has been arguing against this from the left for over a year. We have said that a resolution of the Zimbabwean crisis is not going to come through elections or similar means. A resolution will only come through the mass mobilisation of the opposition, organised labour and civic society through a united front.

Initially we argued for a boycott of the election. We said that elections should only be viewed as a mobilising tactic to take on the regime in the cities, in our factories, in our campuses, rather than a general strategy. Unfortunately many people got excited and fell into election mode.

The movement is now paying a heavy price for its failure to appreciate the true character of the Mugabe dictatorship and its naive illusions in the possibility of a peaceful transformation. The MDC - and the movement in general - is also paying a heavy price for the marginalisation of the MDC's working class and left activists in favour of a bourgeois and middle class elite who have no experience of struggle and who thought that the regime was about to fall and they would reap the reward.

PM: But what else can we expect of the bourgeoisie? Surely they have to rely on either constitutional means or top-down non-constitutional means with the support of imperialism?

MG: That is too sweeping. Historically we do know that bourgeois and middle class elements can take the road of mass mobilisation - look at the movement in Iran in the late 70s. Or look at the movements in eastern Europe directed by western involvement. Even more recently is the example of Kenya. There was a bourgeois opposition that was able to organise on the streets.

But in Zimbabwe, immediately after the March 29 elections, instead of leading the movement forward the MDC elite were calling for restraint. And then Tsvangirai ran away to South Africa, leaving a complete vacuum of leadership on the ground.

There is no doubt about it - the regime is rooted among the population with a solid social base. Despite the catastrophic economic collapse, Zanu-PF still won more popular votes in parliament than the MDC in the March 29 parliamentary elections. Mugabe might have lost on the streets, but if you count the actual votes, his party won more than the MDC in elections to the House of Assembly and Senate.

Zanu-PF won an absolute majority of votes in five of the country's 10 provinces, plus a simple majority in another province. By contrast the MDC won two provinces with an absolute majority and two with a simple majority. But because we use first past the post, not proportional representation, Zanu-PF's votes were not translated into a majority in parliament. It was only Mugabe himself, in the presidential election, who did worse in terms of the popular vote.

But it is also true that in the key sections of society - that is, in the industrial and economic centres - the MDC had a total whitewash in virtually all towns big and small. It is clear that the working class is solidly behind the MDC, while Zanu-PF's support comes from the rural provinces. And for the first time the MDC was able to make inroads in two major rural provinces - two drought-hit regions, where there had been a disaster in terms of food and where the international aid organisations had been very active in giving food relief.

There has also been the dislocation of many working class people from the cities into the rural areas two years ago, which has escalated with the economic collapse. So there is now a core of working class people in the rural areas who can form a powerful base around which to organise for the opposition. In the rural areas MDC supporters have started organising themselves and hitting back, which is sending the regime into a frenzy. But they are not getting proper leadership. The MDC is completely cowardly. You don't see people putting on MDC T-shirts or putting up MDC posters.

PM: So what do you expect to happen after June 27?

MG: Zanu-PF are finalising their strategy and there are two scenarios after the election. First, a quick announcement that Mugabe has won - all potential centres of opposition are being or have been hit to ensure that they will not be able to rise up the way the opposition was able to rise up in Kenya. After making sure of that, they will then offer a government of national unity to the MDC.

The second option is, if Tsvangirai wins, Mugabe will refuse to accept the result, as he did after March 29. That would escalate the pressure massively, aimed at making the result irrelevant. In those circumstances they would still aim for a government of national unity.

A scenario that is most unlikely is that of the regime accepting defeat. If they were really ready to hand over power, the kind of moves they are now making against the opposition would put them in big trouble if they lost.

But the working class and the radical opposition must not sit back. They must urgently regroup to mobilise not only for the vote, but, more importantly, for the bigger strategy of defending that vote and fighting back against the regime through united front activity.

We must base our strategy on self-activity, not on an ideology that sees the west and its programme of neoliberalism as the way forward. That is why we are appealing for international solidarity. They have closed our offices, but they have not closed our movement.


Send donations to the ISO to

FirstDirect Bank, 40 Wakefield Road, Leeds, LS98 1FO
Account name: John Page
Sort code: 40-47-78
Account number: 1118 5489

Please email details of deposits to: iso.zim@xxxxxxxxx


***


PAN-AFRICANISTS: OUR COLLECTIVE DUTY TO ZIMBABWE
Horace Campbell and Eusi Kwayana

Experiences in Guyana, in Kenya and in Zimbabwe have taught us that it 
is a mistake to adopt western standards of victory as our own, write 
Horace Campbell and Eusi Kwayana. Victory for us must mean 
reconciliation of divided populations. Reconciliation will fail utterly 
if it is imposed; or allows free rein to corruption, militarism or if it 
ignores the choices of the people in valid elections. We have 
responsibility as progressives and Pan-Africanists to Zimbabwe.
====

Zimbabwe, a week before the run off elections for the Presidency, 
presents many progressive Pan Africanists with a conflict, be it in 
analysis or action.

There are four main competing interests in Zimbabwe, as it is today. 
First, but not in order of importance are the interests of the ruling 
party and its supporters. These are followed by those of the Opposition, 
the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and its supporters. Next are 
the vested interests of the white minority settlers supported heavily by 
the United Kingdom and the neo-conservatives of the Bush Administration 
in the United States. Finally, but first in rating, there are the 
interests of all the producers (workers, poor peasants, farm workers, 
traditional healers, cultural workers, students, traders, hawkers etc.) 
in Zimbabwe. This last group has been rendered poor and powerless by the 
present government of Robert Mugabe and the ruling party, the Zimbabwe 
African National Union, Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF).

In the past weeks the state-run daily, The Herald, reported that 
President Mugabe has warned that he will take the country to war to keep 
the ruling party in power. The Herald quoted Mr. Mugabe as saying he 
will not let the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) take 
power. Mr. Mugabe on many occasions said that an opposition victory 
would be tantamount to giving the country back to its former colonial 
master. The president has repeatedly accused the MDC of being sponsored 
by Britain. Mugabe declared in a speech that:

“We fought for this country, and a lot of blood was shed…We are not 
going to give up our country because of a mere X. How can a ballpoint 
fight with a gun?”

This kind of talk is dangerous and should be condemned by pan 
Africanists and decent persons everywhere.

ZIMBABWE AND THE QUESTION OF IMPERIALISM

First, there should be an attempt to clear the landscape of certain 
obstacles. Zimbabwe was in growing trouble before the sanctions imposed 
by the governments of Britain and the United States. Still, the attempt 
to bully a small country’s ruler who was in turn bullying his 
compatriots draped Robert Mugabe in the role of a hero against 
imperialism. The attempt encouraged a blundering ruler to stay on 
course. The ZANU-PF forces and sympathizers have blamed the disastrous 
economic situation on the sanctions. Yet, the political leaders have 
accumulated wealth in such a conspicuous manner that their consumption 
of luxury goods stands out in a country where more than 80 per cent of 
the eligible workers are unemployed. Millions more Zimbabweans have been 
rendered as economic refugees in Africa and beyond.

Zimbabwe‘s situation has some striking parallels with that of the recent 
history of Guyana in the Caribbean, where rivalry between anti-colonial 
forces started long before independence and was only draped in flags at 
the moment of Uhuru, without serious attempts at a deep resolution of 
the difficulties. Once in power the Burnham regime did nothing to 
resolve the ethnic conflict but superimposed on it a parliamentary 
dictatorship. Forbes Burnham consolidated this dictatorship while 
brandishing non-alignment and support for African Liberation. Yet, 
Walter Rodney was assassinated by the regime of the Peoples National 
Congress in 1980 because he was part of a movement that wanted to 
transcend the politics of division and exploitation. It is this kind of 
anti imperialism that has been used by many dictators to cover up the 
repression of their own citizens.

In Africa, the home of Ubuntu, there was no thought of employing 
indigenous mechanism of conflict resolution. Instead the Zimbabwe 
maximum leader adopted methods of control patterned on the deformed 
systems of Eastern Europe. He ignored the option of applying Ubuntu (or 
its national expression - in Zimbabwe as hunhu) as a way of healing. As 
in Guyana there was a reliance on external forms and vanguardism. We did 
not learn, whether in Zimbabwe or Guyana, to surround universal science 
with our own ethos.

MANIPULATING ETHNIC AND REGIONAL DIFFERENCES

In 1987 the fusion of ZANU with the Patriotic Front led by Joshua Nkomo 
was done in such a way that the post-colonial world knew little about 
it, except that it led to the virtual silencing of the section of the 
liberation front that had been led by Joshua Nkomo. In the merger of the 
two wings of the national liberation movement there was also too much 
reliance placed on foreign tutelage, much of it from trusted allies of 
African liberation. This fusion had been orchestrated to end the 
divisions within the political leadership of Zimbabwe. One of the 
tragedies of the post liberation Zimbabwean society was the massacre of 
thousands of citizens of the Southwestern region of the country. 
Progressive Pan Africanists were silent when these massacres of the 
Ndebele took place in the early eighties. We, by and large, ignored 
these atrocities in the interests of solidarity with the dominant force 
in the country, and the need to not to make too much of small 
skirmishes, lest we “play into the hands of imperialism”

The best way for us (as African, Asian or Caribbean peoples) to keep the 
enemy at bay is to have a praxis of respect for all national forces and 
apply the highest principles of our culture as an indigenous method for 
the resolution of conflict.

Of late the western media and certain forces within the United Nations 
have been reporting the possibility of talks of power sharing, and the 
arrangement of some form of a transitional authority. While the spirit 
of these discussions may be guided by the search for social peace, it is 
urgent that these discussions between the various elements are not 
carried out behind the backs of the people and do nothing to undermine 
the political will of the people. But above all there must be an 
engagement by all to ensure that the elections and its aftermath does 
not deteriorate into the kind of violence and destruction that was 
witnessed in Kenya after the elections of December 27, 2007. At all 
costs, war must be avoided. The present leadership cannot expect to be 
supported when it terrorizes its own people and unleashes the very same 
Rhodesian military apparatus (the Joint Operation Command) against the 
opposition and unarmed civilians.

The present situation in Zimbabwe is confused by the circumstance that 
President Robert Mugabe has been a heroic figure in the continent of 
Africa, the Diaspora, among African observers and well-wishers. And he 
would have remained so, if the Pan African world had assisted 
Zimbabweans with friendly criticism of the government when the flaws 
began to show. Instead, the whole movement and the international left, 
including us, remained silent, some longer than others, hoping that such 
a well-resourced government would correct its own shortcomings. Earlier 
we had special cause to be partisan to Robert Mugabe, who had extended 
solidarity to our colleague Walter Rodney when he was being persecuted 
by the Guyana government.

It does not worry those who would defend the Zimbabwe government 
absolutely and in all circumstances that the imperialists have their 
embassies and observation posts and espionage networks in all of these 
places and are fully posted on developments in Zimbabwe. In this they 
have an advantage over those in the diaspora whose leaders think it is 
good policy to hide the truth from their constituencies about what is 
really going on in Zimbabwe. Those in the Global Pan African world who 
continue to defend Mugabe have in effect kept their constituencies in 
ignorance of information essential for human development in the name of 
solidarity. This is not the way to help the millions of working people 
learn how to govern.

ZIMBABWE AND LAND

Even in the ranks of those who feel compelled to defend Mr. Mugabe 
against British and US imperialists we feel bound to point out that it 
took twenty years after independence for the Zimbabwean government to 
heed the call of the peasantry for the reclamation of the land. Those 
who refuse to be critical of the Mugabe government repeat the claim that 
the Lancaster agreement had imposed constitutional constraints that 
prevented the redistribution of the land to the people. However, in 1992 
the Parliament of Zimbabwe had unanimously passed the Land Acquisition 
Act that gave the government the power to redistribute the land. 
Instead, the government of Mugabe dithered and hedged seeking to 
conciliate international capital and the commercial farmers.

It was only after the massive opposition from the working people in 1997 
and after the loss of the referendum of February 2000 that the ZANU 
leadership opportunistically launched the Fast Track Land reform 
process. This opportunism has only been surmounted by the fact that the 
best land went to the political elite who was not real farmers. 
Opportunism and cronyism exposed the reality that for land reform to be 
beneficial for the mass of the population, reform must involve the 
political empowerment of the poor, especially farm workers. The new 
black landowners did not treat the farm workers any better than the 
previous settlers. If anything, this experience exposed the reality that 
the issues of the health and safety of farm workers and their children 
are just as important as the question of land ownership. Farm workers 
whether working on farms owned by blacks or whites must be paid a living 
wage and must have adequate protection from pesticides. They must be 
accorded full political and economical rights instead of being forced to 
live in a semi-slavery state.

The experiences of land acquisition in Zimbabwe pointed to the reality 
that land reclamation by itself could not solve the problems of the 
Zimbabwean society. There had to be transformation of the credit, 
transportation, agricultural marketing, seed production, distribution of 
fertilizers, water management and all of the aspects of economic 
relations associated with agriculture. Workers and poor peasants in all 
parts of Southern Africa must strengthen their organizations so that 
land reform is not carried out in their names yet leave them in greater 
impoverishment.

TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY

We want to go on record in saying that neither the government of Britain 
nor the government of the United States has the moral authority to 
oppose the present government of Zimbabwe. Imperialists and neo- 
conservatives have their own agenda when imposing sanctions and we are 
against sanctions in Zimbabwe. Progressive Pan Africanists must remain 
vigilant so that brutal oppression of the Zimbabwean peoples is not 
countenanced in the name of anti-imperialism.

These sanctions have not prevented the rulers of Zimbabwe from looting 
the Treasury and participating in the very same forms of speculative 
capitalism that is lauded by neo-liberals. Under the ZANU-PF leadership 
the Zimbabwe Stocks Exchange {ZSE} has ballooned to phenomenal levels as 
a result of the speculative activities of the rulers in Zimbabwe. In a 
country where the economic crisis has meant increased poverty for two 
years the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange offered investors the highest returns 
in Africa. For two years in a row, 2005 and 2006, the Africa Stock 
Exchanges Association (ASEA) reported that the ZSE was the best 
performing Stock Market in Africa.

Robert Mugabe and the ZANU-PF may be against imperialism but this group 
is not against capitalism or the looting of the assets of the society. 
The government of Cuba has been blockaded by the United States for more 
than forty years. Yet this government did not support a small class that 
looted and got rich while the majority of the population remained poor 
and terrorized.

Those who support the working peoples of Zimbabwe must insist on 
transparency in dealing with transnational corporations and the 
integrity of the ruling personnel in their day-to-day activities. This 
call for accountability is especially important in so far as though we 
are opposed to the threat of war coming from ZANU PF we are not 
encouraged by the policies and posture of the leadership of the MDC. 
These elements have displayed an amazing level of intellectual 
subservience to the West and to the ideas of the International Monetary 
Fund and the World Bank. Zimbabwe needs leaders who place the interest 
of the working people first. It is proper that all progressives support 
the Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative of the United Nations so that 
corrupt leaders cannot stash away funds when the people suffer.

ENDING THE SILENCE OF PROGRESSIVE PAN AFRICANISTS

We should not remain silent when thousands of Zimbabwean women are 
arrested and disgraced as prostitutes, when, as elsewhere, virgins are 
despoiled by men in search of cures.

We should not be silent when homosexuals are subjected to cruel and 
inhumane treatment, student movements repressed, and when unarmed people 
are subject to a level of police and militia brutality none of us would 
ignore in our countries of residence.

One of the most despicable acts of the Mugabe regime was the forced 
removal of more than 700,000 poor people from the urban areas in 2005. 
When the apartheid regime used the same coercive forces to carry out 
forced removals we went up in arms against it. This brutal act by the 
ZANU-PF went without condemnation from the Pan African movement.

When we ponder the considerable diplomatic and political resources of 
the African continent, we find it is not impossible for a dual policy of 
conditional opposition to the sanctions to be combined with a policy of 
respect for all Zimbabweans, and their equal entitlement to human rights 
(regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and religious or 
political opinion).

Experiences in Guyana, in Kenya and in Zimbabwe have taught us that it 
is a mistake to adopt western standards of victory as our own. Victory 
for us must mean reconciliation of divided populations. This in each 
case may best be approached through widespread national conversation 
spelling out its purpose. Reconciliation will fail utterly if it is 
imposed; or allows free rein to corruption, militarism or if it ignores 
the choices of the people in valid elections.

The Republic of South Africa has one of the world’s most advanced 
constitutions, because after the experience of Apartheid, the people 
resolved to hold their democracy to the highest human standards. These 
aspirations are now being undermined by a political leadership that 
provides cover for the repression in Zimbabwe while remaining virtually 
silent in the face of xenophobic violence against Africans who believed 
in Pan Africanism.

In the USA millions of African American and Latino students are held 
back because too many educators implicitly believe in a Bell Curve and 
have low expectations of black and Latino students. We are aware of the 
embedded anti- people challenges imposed on African countries from 
outside affecting their competitiveness and ability to transform their 
societies. However, we recognize no Bell Curve regarding the leaders’ 
potential for setting examples of conduct and governance which rank 
among the best available.

In a few days Zimbabwe will hold a run -off election between the Zanu PF 
and the MDC. The first, the ruling party, has discredited itself. The 
challengers do not seem to be a party of Reconstruction, but it reflects 
popular discontent. Any thuggery and strong arm methods, arrest and 
harassment of opposition candidates, intimidation and other forms of 
bullying and repression must be seen as a deliberate attempt to once and 
for all disable Zimbabwe’s popular will. It will make the work of 
healing ten times more difficult.

* Horace Campbell is a Professor of African American Studies and 
Political Science at Syracuse University. He is the author of the 
well-known book, Rasta and Resistance: From Marcus Garvey to Walter 
Rodney. He is also the author of Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of 
the Patriarchal Model of Liberation.

* Eusi Kwayana is the veteran Pan African activist of Guyana and the 
Caribbean. His most recent book, the Morning After is a call for an end 
to the manipulation of racial insecurity in Guyana by those who promote 
inter ethnic violence in the name of liberation. His other books 
include, No Guilty Race and Scars of Bondage.

***

Death Spiral in Zimbabwe: Mediation, Violence and the GNU

Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?
[Bertolt Brecht.1953]

By
Grace Kwinjeh

18 June 2008

In March 2008 Zimbabweans voted in the most peaceful election since 
independence, resulting in an unambiguous victory for the opposition 
Movement for Democratic Change led by Morgan Tsvangirai. Three months 
later, the country is haemorrhaging from a massive and rising tide of 
political violence not seen since the state sponsored terror of the 
early 1980s. The ruling party and its supporters are responsible for the 
vast majority of the current attacks.1 As if to underscore his party’s 
public embrace of violence, President Mugabe now openly threatens to 
“wage war” beyond the June 27 Presidential run-off election, if his 
candidacy should be rejected by the people for a second time. Meanwhile 
the MDC government-elect, MDC party structures and much of the party’s 
leadership have been forced into hiding as they seek to convince voters 
of their right to select – and see installed in place – a president of 
their choice.

For SADC, the Zimbabwe conflagration has become the most comprehensive 
diplomatic failure in the region since the resumption of the Angolan war 
in the 1990s. But unlike Angola, the Zimbabwe crisis is one for which 
SADC, President Mbeki and the international community bear a central 
contributing responsibility. By pushing for secretly brokered 
power-sharing arrangements leading to a “government of national unity” 
(GNU), the international intervention in Zimbabwe has relegated hopes 
for a new democratic dispensation built on the foundations of the 
expressed popular will of Zimbabweans. By refusing to actively 
acknowledge the MDC’s electoral victory and insist on its recognition 
and acceptance by ZANU PF, regional leaders and the international 
community effectively ignored and silenced the democratic voice of the 
people. As a consequence, the MDC’s hard-won legitimate authority has 
been erased, and the way has been opened for ZANU PF to recover by the 
bullet the authority it had lost at the ballot box.

It is increasingly apparent that talk of a GNU has helped to accelerate 
the level of violence, not calm it; and has fostered political 
instability, rather than the smooth transition to a new governing order 
that Zimbabweans voted for in March.

This violent outcome of a proposed GNU strategy should not have been 
unexpected. ZANU PF’s violent riposte is reminiscent of the period 
immediately prior to Independence around the Lancaster House Conference, 
and even more so of the party’s violent campaign before the 1987 “Unity 
Accord” with the ZAPU opposition: indeed, it is a tried and tested 
tactic of ZANU PF to threaten and deploy intense violence as a strategic 
bargaining tool. Since independence the party has singularly 
distinguished itself among Zimbabwean political parties by demonstrating 
a capacity for – and indeed claiming the right to wage – mass violence 
in defense of its “national” interests. No longer heading the majority 
party, Robert Mugabe now cynically portrays violence as a means for 
defending the people from their mistaken choice.

This deeply cynical pathology is echoed more subtly in the GNU concept. 
Despite a clear rejection of ZANU PF under electoral conditions heavily 
tilted in that party’s favour, unity talks have been promoted as a means 
of bringing the former ruling party back into the centre of 
decision-making. Even though neither voters nor the MDC demanded this 
arrangement in March, the new government in waiting has come under 
enormous pressure to fall in line accordingly. Its leaders have 
repeatedly said that such an arrangement would deny the popular voice 
and reward anti-democratic, flagrantly illegal and often murderous 
behaviour – while only deferring, and certainly not solving, the problem 
of organising the transition to a new political order. It is indeed 
difficult to understand why those who previously promoted engagement 
with ZANU PF as a means of strengthening a deeply flawed electoral 
process, should now effectively reject that improved process and insist 
on power sharing terms with the author of electoral fraud and intimidation.

In contrast, it is clear that the promotion of a GNU is integral to the 
facilitation of an elite transfer of power which would vitiate the 
popular will of the electorate. This is why the idea of a GNU has been 
explicitly rejected by the leading membership-based civil society 
organisations in Zimbabwe, from the trade unions to human rights 
networks. These groups challenge the credibility and viability of a 
compromise that according to its proponents, would bring about some sort 
of “normalisation” of the political space without addressing the growing 
democratic deficit in Zimbabwe. For the Zimbabwean democratic movement, 
political normalisation requires before all else, recognition and 
acceptance of the expressed will of dominant social interests – not its 
circumvention through brokered elite pacting carried out under the 
threat of violence.

In Zimbabwe, there is abiding consternation over why ZANU PF and its 
militia were given the opportunity by SADC and the international 
community to ignore the electoral results in the first place. What would 
have happened if the election results – deemed legitimate by observers – 
had been recognised and enforced? And what would happen if a similarly 
free and fair process were enforced in the current second round, by 
insisting on the disarming of ZANU PF and its militia, and the 
confinement of the security forces to base? Have those mediating and 
promoting mediation raised these issues – the clearest and most profound 
obstacles to democratic practice in Zimbabwe in the current moment?

It is widely acknowledged that demilitarisation is a central 
precondition needed to advance a democratic outcome and ensure its 
consolidation in the medium term. Yet, the perpetration of violence has 
been treated as a negotiable right – not as an act which invalidates 
claims to the process of a democratic transition. Remarkably, it took 10 
weeks of deteriorating conditions for SADC’s official mediator Thabo 
Mbeki to publicly raise his concerns about the spiralling violence. But 
even then he avoided commentary on responsibility, despite ample 
documented evidence heavily implicating ZANU PF and state security 
forces in commanding the terror. His spokesperson claims he is precluded 
from doing so by virtue of his position as mediator. However this is a 
hollow rationale in the face of open and mounting ZANU PF belligerence.

The absence of collective censure of violence and any pointed criticism 
by Mbeki has been seen by perpetrators of the violence as giving them a 
green light to continue employing these tactics to further their 
political ends. And for ZANU PF, with few political repercussions 
arising from the deployment of its violent supporters, there seems 
little incentive for abandoning this approach– and perhaps much to be 
gained from pursuing it. Robert Mugabe’s public declaration earlier this 
week that his party would go to war in the event of his defeat in the 
second round of voting was met with paralysing silence by Thabo Mbeki. 
The deployment of weapons and violence may be logistically difficult to 
confront: the deployment of words and threats is not.

The election fix: back to the future

By focusing on the GNU, rather than the actual election results, the 
SADC mediation has effectively allowed ZANU PF to return to the 
brokerage scenario it had anticipated in the post election period. This 
scenario, broadly shared by ZANU PF reformers, SA, some EU governments 
and others before the election, was premised on the belief that the 
MDC-Tsvangirai party’s support would be diminished by support for 
MDC-Mutambara and for Simba Makoni, the former Finance Minister and ZANU 
PF reformer who was a candidate for President. A split opposition vote 
would enable victory in the Presidential election and at least a 
plurality in Parliament. Moreover, the dispersion of opposition 
representation across three groupings would present options for 
developing a ‘Kenyan-style’ negotiation that could lead to a ZANU PF 
dominated GNU. Makoni – the “modernising” reform face of ZANU PF - could 
be parachuted in under Mugabe, to soon replace him as the consensus 
politician. And ZANU PF could argue that, if this kind of arrangement 
was acceptable for Kenya, why not in Zimbabwe? There was a lot of this 
kind of talk among MDC-M and Makoni supporters in advance of the election.

For ZANU PF this scenario both enabled the departure of Mugabe, a 
political liability whose presence would continue to block the party’s 
return to legitimacy and the resumption of desperately needed, 
stabilizing financial assistance for the world’s fastest-collapsing 
economy; and the retention and renewed consolidation of power by the 
ruling party. Confident of a mediated victory and needing a “legitimate” 
result to back its claims to rehabilitation, ZANU PF significantly 
loosened control over the electoral process in the first round of voting 
in March.

As it turned out, the party’s electoral assumptions were wildly naïve. 
At the election support for the MDC-M collapsed – and notably for its 
leadership, which was roundly defeated. Makoni was overwhelmingly 
rejected by voters, gaining perhaps just 10 percent of the vote. At the 
same time, ZANU PF’s traditional voters deserted the party by voting for 
the opposition or by boycotting the poll, as they had done in the 
benchmark defeat of the party in the 2000 Constitutional Referendum. In 
contrast, the MDC Tsvangirai party surged across the country, including 
in former rural strongholds of ZANU PF that for the first time ever had 
been rendered easily accessible to opposition campaigners – and to 
opposition polling agents and officials. This combination of factors 
meant there were too few votes to rig with, and that the conditions 
allowing the playing off of opposition forces within a prospective GNU 
did not materialise.2

The shock of the election result and the resulting conundrum for the 
ruling party were quite literally written on its face. The headline of 
The Sunday Mail, the most slavishly loyal of the state-controlled 
newspapers, screamed the day after the election, “Anxiety Grips Zim” . 
Many other state media, including the country’s only radio and 
television broadcaster, ZBC, effectively fell silent, bewildered about 
what to say. No party leader of note addressed the nation for several 
days. It was apparent that ZANU PF was reassessing its game plan. Over 
the next month it developed and then rolled this plan out, as SADC first 
patiently accommodated repeated inexplicable delays in the processing 
and announcement of results by ZEC, and then sat motionless as ZESN, the 
key civic election monitoring network, and MDC itself were raided by 
state officials in search of independently collected polling data that 
could be used to disprove manipulated official figures. Even after the 
long delay, only limited details of the presidential poll were 
eventually released.3

Meanwhile, reports surfaced of remobilised war veterans and youth 
militias, and of the first violent penetrations by state security forces 
of “turncoat” former ruling party strongholds. ZANU PF aimed to create 
conditions that would make the run-off so difficult and dreaded that 
prospects of averting violence through some form of GNU and power 
sharing arrangement would be welcomed: a replay of the ZANU-ZAPU Unity 
Pact of 1987. ZANU PF’s transparently obvious “spin” on the violence – 
which has often been taken up by SADC leaders, and swallowed whole by 
much of the regional media as well – has been doubly damaging for 
Zimbabwean democrats. One the one hand, substantial evidence that the 
violence is disproportionately organised against the MDC has drawn muted 
criticism from SA, SADC and the GNU advocates like Makoni; on the other, 
the small amount of retaliatory violence attributed to the MDC is deemed 
to suggest a “crisis” and raise possibilities of “civil war” – 
reinforcing the need to avoid a run-off and the urgency for a negotiated 
solution.4

African leaders have thus far studiously avoided apportioning 
responsibility for violence, in most instances couching reactions in 
terms of cautioning both sides and invoking dialogue. Widespread 
violations of SADC’s election ‘norms and standards’ have failed to 
elicit coherent responses from them. Neither has SADC cautioned or 
castigated the ZANU PF government for failing to ensure its 
constitutional responsibility for safety and security, despite 
overwhelming empirical evidence that the primary perpetrator is ZANU PF 
and its proxies.

Rather than address the issue of destabilizing violence and impose 
political censure for its deployment in this period of uncertainty, the 
SA government, SADC, some EU diplomats and the Makoni grouping actively 
talked up the need for a GNU – ostensibly as way to avert the threat of 
violence coming from ZANU PF. Indeed, as independent and MDC reports 
emerged demonstrated that increasing numbers from the MDC’s ranks were 
being beaten, tortured, abducted and murdered, the rationale for a GNU – 
and a political counter-attack to the wave of violence – was publicly 
reinforced by SA and SADC.

While mediation does not preclude processes of accountability, this 
approach appears to have been absent from the Mbeki initiative. As a 
result the SADC intervention has directly facilitated ZANU PF’s 
unfolding strategy for manipulating the conditions and issues that would 
have to be negotiated. SADC’s tentative response to the March vote 
allowed space and time for ZANU PF to regroup and ramp up the violence 
and threats of more of the same – both fuelling a defensive “demand for 
GNU”, and reasserting ZANU PF’s leading place in the setting of terms 
for any negotiations. The latter now focus on ending violence and 
averting civil war, rather than implementing the results of the peaceful 
election or ensuring that the next round of elections are conducted in a 
free and fair atmosphere – something that it appears can no longer be 
ensured.

The GNU problem

If the GNU is primarily being proposed as a means to avoid a violent 
tragedy, rather than as a basis for a establishing a new inclusive 
democratic politics, sceptics are right to question the idea’s aims, 
objectives and predictable outcomes. Just as importantly, we need to 
pose a question for those advocating a non-democratic negotiated 
resolution to Zimbabwe’s election crisis: by what principle can the 
rights of the popular democratic will as expressed by voters be equated 
with, or rendered secondary to, the rights of discredited elites and 
perpetrators of violence? For this is precisely what the idea of a GNU 
proposes, in the name of an elusive, highly unstable and temporary peace.

Even if the MDC were able to extract considerable concessions from ZANU 
PF, it is highly unlikely that Robert Mugabe’s party would cede its 
effective control over its levers in the bureaucracy and particularly, 
in the security forces. Why would it: these are the instruments of war 
and obstruction that have enabled ZANU PF to climb out of the hole of 
electoral defeat on more than one occasion, to protect its networks of 
power. To suggest that these determinants of power would be given up 
willingly is to accept the notion that ZANU PF would be willing to 
abdicate. The last two months have exposed this view as profoundly 
delusional. Those who have put stock in the GNU have failed to assess 
their model of peace-making in light of ZANU PF’s strategic 
understanding that violence is a political asset and an effective 
substitute for popular legitimacy, which will not be negotiated away.

Rather than deflect and defeat the likelihood of political violence, the 
construct of a GNU would formally integrate it into the lifeblood of the 
Zimbabwean democratic dispensation. This is a remarkable solution to put 
before a political party that has just won an election based on its 
abiding commitment to non-violent democratic participation – and to the 
voting majority who supported it. For South Africans, this situation 
recalls the kind of power sharing arrangements that former South African 
President F W De Klerk had in mind at the start of the 1990s negotiation 
process, where the share of actual voter support would not determine 
power arrangements.5 This proposal was not acceptable in the new South 
Africa then, and it is not acceptable in the new Zimbabwe now.

If there were no question of who were to lead and form a GNU, there 
would be little space for the kind of unanswered violence that is now 
seen. In effect, SADC’s weak response to the March election has 
facilitated a strong and violent response by ZANU PF.

For the time being, it seems increasingly likely that the GNU route will 
be not followed. This is not due to any lack of effort by the likes of 
Mbeki and many in SADC, or the distasteful posturing of the rejected 
Makoni, who cites rising violence as the need for inclusive negotiations 
without naming and condemning those – his erstwhile colleagues – who 
have created the unstable terrain on which he hopes to relaunch his 
ambitions. Rather, both the MDC and its supporters are wary of 
legitimizing the political role of those holding the gun to their heads 
and the torch to their homes. War is not something to be prevented: it 
is here already. And the only non-violent way to confront and defeat it 
is the ballot box, even if that option too is flawed.

If the current pressures for a GNU do indeed fail, all is not lost for 
ZANU PF: Makoni or another ZANU PF senior reformer could return to the 
forefront if Mugabe were to win the run-off, further destabilize the MDC 
and civil society, and then retire on his own terms – handing over power 
to a reformer to negotiate a new GNU from a position of regained 
legitimacy and strength. But this first requires another successfully 
manipulated election result, and a frontal assault on MDC and civil 
society resistance. The arrest on treason charges this past week of MDC 
Secretary General Tendai Biti does not bode well; neither does the 
relative weakness of the SADC response to this latest development. And 
is there any reason to think that additional ZANU PF manipulations 
during and after the second round of voting will not take place, given 
the success of such interventions in the first?

Accepting responsibility, acting responsibly

The options chosen by SADC and the international community for dealing 
with the March 2008 election have directly contributed to the options 
chosen by ZANU PF. It was a choice not to recognise the MDC victory and 
to allow the illegal charade over the recount to occur.6 It is enough 
here to point out that the MDC won the Parliamentary elections, that 
Morgan Tsvangirai won the Presidential election, that nearly 3 million 
Zimbabweans did not vote, and consequently it is very clear that Robert 
Mugabe and ZANU PF do not enjoy the support of the vast majority of the 
population.

This set of circumstances allowed for an alternative political response; 
a recognition of and call for an MDC government to be accepted by ZANU 
PF. However, the failure to support this option has contributed directly 
to the current confusion between promoting conditions for a free and 
fair re-run and negotiations for a GNU. Despite a widespread acceptance 
that conditions cannot be free and fair for the June 27 poll, and calls 
for a GNU, the MDC is sticking to the electoral path and holding out 
prospects for an inclusive government of national healing in which it 
would play a lead role after the elections. This position is not openly 
supported by SADC, who seem stuck to a moribund engagement that is 
destined to undermine the democratic will of Zimbabweans, and that will 
promote an elitist management of transitional arrangements under the 
auspices of a power sharing arrangement that will effectively insulate 
and protect those responsible for perpetrating violence and gross human 
rights abuses – as happened with previous election amnesties for party 
violence, and most seriously with the Unity Accord in 1987.

As regards the re-run, the keys to re-establishing a recognisably fair 
playing field are not adequately being pursued by SADC and South Africa, 
which plays directly into the agenda of those who wish to ensure it does 
not proceed. Although it is no longer possible to create the conditions 
for a free and fair poll, with less than 10 days before the poll, there 
could and should be certain steps taken to remedy the most egregious 
violations and potential for destabilisation. This should include: 
deploying adequate numbers of election monitors, especially in areas 
where violence and intimidation has been reported, and playing a more 
active role in monitoring the activities and decision-making processes 
of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission; promoting an agenda of disarming 
ZANU PF and its militia / war veteran proxies hands; censuring the role 
of the security forces, censuring hate speech and talk of war by any 
political parties; commenting on access of candidates to state media; 
question and establishing a strategy with rewards and penalties for 
compliance/non-compliance with SADC election guidelines.

Thabo Mbeki did state ahead of the 2005 elections that there would be 
consequences if the SADC Principles and Guidelines were seriously 
violated, but this was said against the background of woefully 
inadequate provisions for monitoring on the ground.7 Meanwhile, in June 
2008, the corpses of MDC officials and suspected opposition supporters 
are accumulating, thousands have been displaced by the political 
violence, likely thousands more continue to be beaten and brutalised, 
hate speech fills the airwaves, and a discredited President threatens 
the majority with war – and still, there is no sign of serious electoral 
censure in the air from regional leaders.

It is time for fresh thinking and fresh action. In advance of the second 
round of presidential voting, problems need to be anticipated and 
prevented before the arise. Several critical questions emerge.

What would have happened if SA, SADC and the international community 
rejected the delays by ZEC and ZANU PF, demanded the transparent 
compilation and immediate release of results - and ensured that all 
parties abided by them?

What would have happened if all civil society organisations and 
democratic parties and politicians had stood firmly behind the MDC 
government-elect, rather than soliciting for all-inclusive 
extra-electoral GNU? If more support for the winning party MDC had been 
expressed, what options then would have remained for elite transitions?

Who, then, really enabled ZANU PF’s violent election strategy, sending 
the defeated party, its leaders and violent supporters inside and 
outside the state all of the wrong signals in the immediate 
post-election period?

And consequently, whose responsibility now is it to end the violence by 
terminating discussions about an all-inclusive GNU, and insisting on a 
government of transition and renewal headed unambiguously by the party 
elected by the people: the MDC Tsvangirai.

NOTES

1 There is no credible evidence which suggests a conclusion other than 
ZANU PF’s direct culpability for the current wave of organised violence, 
as there is a large and growing body of documented evidence that 
substantiates this view; there is no comparable evidence suggesting that 
the MDC has either launched a parallel wave of attacks; that the MDC is 
capable of doing so; and that MDC leaders or party structures have 
called for such a strategy. As such, violence is an integral factor in – 
and not a product of – the current crisis.

2 See the following for more detailed analyses of what happened in the 
March elections; SITO (2008), ZIMBABWE ELECTIONS 2008. Examining The 
Popular and Presidential Choice - Hiding or Run Off? IDASA: PRETORIA; 
SITO (2008), The Inconvenient Truth. A complete guide to the delay in 
releasing the results of Zimbabwe’s presidential poll. Prepared by Derek 
Matyszak of the Research and Advocacy Unit, Zimbabwe. IDASA: PRETORIA; 
SITO (2008), THE INCONVENIENT TRUTH (PART II). A complete guide to the 
recount of votes in Zimbabwe’s “harmonised” elections. Derek Matyszak, 
Research and Advocacy Unit, Zimbabwe. IDASA: PRETORIA; SITO (2008), What 
happened in the Presidential election? Research & Advocacy Unit, 
Zimbabwe. IDASA: PRETORIA.

3 In the end, ZEC merely announced the result of the Presidential poll, 
which bore a suspicious resemblance to the ZESN “sample based 
observation” result. No detailed results were given for the Presidential 
poll, in complete contrast to the other three elections in these 
“harmonised” elections. See again SITO (2008), What happened in the 
Presidential election? Research & Advocacy Unit, Zimbabwe. IDASA: PRETORIA

4 The depiction of violence as equitable and the deliberate avoidance to 
engage with available empirical information that clearly demonstrates 
who are the primary perpetrators is chillingly reminiscent of the way in 
which violence in South Africa during the negotiations of the early 
1990s was depicted as ‘black-on-black’, ‘tribal’, Zulu vs Xhosa, etc. 
These crude representations, adopted by significant sections of the 
media, analysts and so on fundamentally undermined efforts to secure 
accountability and remains to this day a major part of South Africa’s 
‘unfinished business’ in terms of the dealing with its past.

5 De Klerk has envisaged a ‘troika’ arrangement involving the NP, ANC 
and IFP, as a way of avoiding a democratic outcome to the negotiations.

6 That the recount was illegal has been covered in great detail. Here 
see again SITO (2008), The Inconvenient Truth. A complete guide to the 
delay in releasing the results of Zimbabwe’s presidential poll. Prepared 
by Derek Matyszak of the Research and Advocacy Unit, Zimbabwe. IDASA: 
PRETORIA; SITO (2008), THE INCONVENIENT TRUTH (PART II). A complete 
guide to the recount of votes in Zimbabwe’s “harmonised” elections. 
Derek Matyszak, Research and Advocacy Unit, Zimbabwe. IDASA: PRETORIA.

7 The 2005 elections were, in fact, seriously flawed, but nonetheless 
given a passing grade by South African and SADC. For an analysis of this 
election, see Reeler, A.P., & Chitsike, K.C (2005), Trick or Treat? The 
effects of the pre-election climate on the poll in the 2005 Zimbabwe 
Parliamentary Elections. June 2005. PRETORIA: IDASA.

***

Times (UK), 19 June



President Mugabe's mobs target opposition families



Jan Raath in Harare



The families of Zimbabwe's opposition leaders are being targeted for 
brutal execution in the latest twist to the brutal electoral violence 
gripping the country. With Robert Mugabe seeking to stifle the challenge 
to his power before a presidential run-off vote on June 27 the most 
recent victim of the his supporters was the wife of the unofficial mayor 
of Harare. Abigail Chitoro was so badly beaten by the mob that dragged 
her and her four-year-old son from their home that even her 
brother-in-law struggled to identify the body. The clothes she was 
wearing, her distinctive haircut and the blindfold that Zanu PF 
supporters forced her to wear as they firebombed her home gave the only 
clue to her identity. In the past week the wives of at least three 
opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) officials have been 
murdered. The tactic, as President Mugabe and his generals try to avert 
electoral defeat, has had the desired effect: the husbands have been 
rendered useless with terror and grief. The latest case came a day after 
Emmanuel Chitoro, 46, was chosen by colleagues from the MDC as the new 
Mayor of Harare. The party, which won 45 out of 46 of seats on the 
Harare city council in elections on March 29, was banned from taking 
office but decided to form its own council on Sunday.



On Tuesday the body of his 27-year-old wife was finally identified in 
the mortuary of the Parirenyatwa hospital, Harare's largest state health 
institution, with her head battered beyond recognition. Two pick-up 
trucks drove up to the Chitoro home in Hatcliffe Extension, a squatter 
camp on Harare's eastern outskirts on Monday night, and took away 
Abigail and Ashley, her son. Mr Chitoro rushed back when neighbours 
called him to find the house in flames. Neighbours said that they heard 
three explosions, thought to be petrol bombs. Mr Chitoro had brought 
with him Thanke Mothae, the director of the observer mission of the 
Southern African Development Community, to witness the attack. He found 
Ashley at a police station on Tuesday. Later that day he was told that 
the body of a woman had been found on a farm adjoining Hatcliffe. "I 
knew then that she had been murdered," he said. He sent his brother, 
Kumbulani, to collect her but he could not identify it. "He had 
difficulty identifying her. He wanted to know what clothes she was 
putting on, and what hairstyle she had," Mr Chitoro said. "The body was 
butchered. They had used heavy objects to crush the head. She still had 
the blindfold that my kid said they put on her head when they took them 
away." Mr Chitoro described what she had been wearing, and Kumbulani 
positively identified her. "I cannot go and see her. I cannot come out 
in the open. As we speak, Hatcliffe is covered in smoke. They are 
burning houses of people perceived to be MDC supporters. I don't know 
who will protect us."



In the last week there have been three reports of local MDC officials 
who fled their homes from marauding Zanu PF mobs and who had their homes 
burnt down. In each case their wives were put to death, two burnt alive, 
the other battered to death. In Epworth, a squatter area east of Harare, 
rampaging Zanu PF mobs burnt down the home of a third MDC councillor in 
as many nights. It was the same in Chitungwiza, the sprawling township 
south of the capital. Zanu PF struck again in Jerera, a small 
administrative town in southeastern Zimbabwe, not two weeks after it 
opened fire on six MDC supporters in the local party office, poured 
petrol on to them and set fire to them, killing two instantly. On 
Tuesday night, said a Catholic nun who asked not to be named, they burnt 
down the home of the Catholic priest at St Anthony's mission there. At 
another Catholic mission farther north, she said, nuns had been ordered 
to purchase T-shirts bearing Mr Mugabe's face, and wear them over their 
habits. They were forced to buy Zanu PF party cards for Z$20 billion 
each, worth about 50p in Zimbabwe's worthless currency. In Harare in the 
past three days mobs of hundreds of Zanu PF supporters have been raiding 
township markets, smashing vendors' stalls, stealing their goods and 
forcing them to buy Zanu PF party cards as licences. Police have 
occasionally ventured out to restore order, but arrested none of the 
perpetrators, said residents. In the well-off suburb of Chisipite, Zanu 
PF youths abducted the private security guard of the home of a senior 
British diplomat and assaulted him because he "works for the British", 
officials said.



> From AFP, 19 June



Four Zimbabwe opposition activists killed near capital: MDC



Harare - Four Zimbabwe opposition activists were found dead near Harare 
on Thursday ahead of next week's presidential election, the opposition 
Movement for Democratic Change said, blaming the deaths on the ruling 
party. The four MDC youth members were abducted on Tuesday and their 
bodies were discovered in various locations southeast of Harare, said 
party spokesman Nelson Chamisa. Chamisa said the MDC suspected they had 
been beaten to death by Zanu PF youth supporters. "Now it's about 70 
we've lost," Chamisa said, referring to the number of opposition 
supporters killed since the first round of the election on March 29. 
Zimbabwe police have also arrested one newly elected opposition lawmaker 
and placed six others on a wanted list, state media said Thursday, amid 
signs of a crackdown ahead of next week's presidential election. Shuwa 
Mudiwa, who won his seat for the Movement for Democratic Change IN March 
elections, was arrested on Wednesday for the alleged kidnapping of a 
13-year-old girl earlier this month, the Herald newspaper reported. "He 
was arrested this afternoon in Harare and is still in custody. He will 
appear in court soon," police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena told the 
government mouthpiece.



The six other newly-elected MPs are wanted on accusations of murder, 
public violence and malicious damage to property. Meanwhile, 11 
suspected MDC activists, aged between 22 and 43 years, were arrested in 
the northern town of Chinhoyi on Wednesday for allegedly removing and 
defacing President Robert Mugabe's campaign posters, the paper said. The 
MDC has warned of a crackdown ahead of the vote, with its number two 
leader Tendai Biti facing a treason charge and being held in prison. 
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, who faces Mugabe in the June 27 
run-off, has been detained five times as he has sought to campaign. 
Mugabe blames the opposition for mounting violence before the election 
and has threatened to arrest the MDC leadership. The UN has said that 
the president's supporters were to blame for the bulk of the violence. 
Tsvangirai has said 66 MDC supporters have been killed in the lead up to 
the vote in a campaign of intimidation. Mugabe's ruling party lost its 
parliamentary majority for the first time since independence in 1980 in 
the March 29 first round poll.



> From Associated Press, 19 June



Zimbabwe opposition reports deaths of 4 more activists



Harare - Zimbabwe's opposition party says four more of its activists 
have been killed in a firebombing near the capital, Harare. Zimbabwe 
holds a presidential election runoff in just over a week. President 
Robert Mugabe has been accused of unleashing widespread violence to 
insure a victory at the polls over opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai 
who won the first round. There's concern the runoff will be neither free 
nor fair.



> From BBC News, 19 June



Zimbabwe TV drops opposition ads



Zimbabwe's public broadcaster ZBC has said it will no longer carry 
campaign adverts from the opposition party ahead of next week's 
presidential election. The Movement for Democratic Change said it would 
appeal against the decision. Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa defended 
the move saying international coverage favoured the MDC and never 
reported the ruling Zanu PF's position. Earlier, UN Secretary General 
Ban Ki-moon expressed concern over the political violence in Zimbabwe. 
Adding his voice to growing international concern, he said the violence 
in Zimbabwe could undermine the outcome of the 27 June run-off vote. 
"Violence, intimidation and the arrest of opposition leaders are not 
conducive to credible elections," he told the UN General Assembly in New 
York. The MDC says 66 of its supporters have been killed and 25,000 
forced to flee their homes in a state-sponsored campaign of violence. 
Correspondents say the ban on adverts will not make a great deal of 
difference, as news bulletins at the state-run ZBC have always favoured 
Mr Mugabe, only mentioning the opposition in negative terms. There are 
no privately controlled radio or TV stations in Zimbabwe and only a few 
weekly newspapers, which most people cannot afford. US Secretary of 
State Condoleezza Rice is due to chair an informal UN Security Council 
meeting on Zimbabwe later on Thursday, in an attempt to maintain 
international political pressure.



On Wednesday, South African President Thabo Mbeki spent his 66th 
birthday continuing his efforts to mediate between President Robert 
Mugabe and the opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai. He held separate 
talks with both presidential candidates as pressure mounted on Mr Mugabe 
to curtail political violence ahead of the poll, but released no 
statement on the talks. The MDC has criticised Mr Mbeki's policy of 
"quiet diplomacy" for failing to hold Mr Mugabe to account. Official 
results show Mr Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change 
(MDC), gained the most votes in the first round of the presidential 
election in March but did not pass the 50% threshold for outright 
victory. A senior UN official, Haile Menkerios, earlier met President 
Mugabe to discuss the political stand-off and what the UN says is the 
increased suffering of an already vulnerable population. The UN is 
prepared to pay to fund election monitors to oversee the run-off vote. 
South Africa is opposed to the Security Council having too much 
involvement, the BBC's Laura Trevelyan reports from the UN. Pretoria 
argues that it is not for the council to resolve disputed elections.



Earlier, an African poll observer warned that he would not endorse the 
vote if current levels of violence continued. Marwick Khumalo, head of 
the Pan-African Parliamentary observers, told the BBC his team had 
received horrendous reports of attacks and that the political 
environment was not conducive to a free poll. But with the vote just 
days away, there is a growing sense of urgency with political violence 
beginning to spread from the countryside to the towns, says the BBC's 
Peter Biles in Johannesburg. Mr Mugabe has been waging a fierce campaign 
to extend his 28-year rule since Mr Tsvangirai failed to win enough 
votes to score an outright victory in March's disputed first round. 
Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has called for an international 
peacekeeping force to be deployed in Zimbabwe to ensure a free and fair 
vote. "It is time for the leaders of Africa to say to President Mugabe 
that the people of Zimbabwe deserve a free and fair election," he said. 
Rwanda's President Paul Kagame has also criticised Mr Mugabe, asking why 
he bothers holding an election, if he says he will not respect the 
outcome, reports the Reuters news agency. British Prime Minister Gordon 
Brown says he has spoken to the leader of South Africa's governing 
African National Congress, Jacob Zuma, about the possibility of 
deploying 1,000 election observers from the ANC. Western observers have 
been banned, as the government accuses them of being biased in favour of 
the opposition. The government has also said it wants to reduce the 
number of local election monitors, after 50,000 asked for accreditation.



> From The Times (UK), 19 June



South African president makes last-ditch appeal to Robert Mugabe



Jonathan Clayton



Thabo Mbeki, the South African President, flew unexpectedly to Zimbabwe 
yesterday in a renewed attempt to persuade Robert Mugabe to play by the 
rules or accept a compromise before next week’s presidential run-off. 
Government sources said that Mr Mbeki cancelled a scheduled trip to 
Sudan and instead arrived in Harare just before 1pm local time. He met 
Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, and 
later held talks with Mr Mugabe for 3½. In recent days African 
diplomats, normally much more reserved than their Western counterparts, 
have raised their voices over mounting levels of violence and said that 
a free and fair poll was not possible. Those sentiments were echoed by 
Ban Ki Moon, the United Nations Secretary-General, who voiced his 
"profound alarm" over developments in Zimbabwe. "Should these conditions 
continue to prevail, the legitimacy of the election outcomes would be in 
question," he said. Diplomatic sources told The Times that Mr Mbeki 
would urge Mr Mugabe to reconsider a government of national unity to 
prevent an election certain to lead to more violence.One senior African 
diplomatic source said: "A vote will solve nothing as the military have 
made it clear they will not give up power to Tsvangirai - the only way 
out is a deal."



> From The Guardian (UK), 18 June



Zimbabwe's voters told: choose Mugabe or you face a bullet



Chris McGreal reports from the centre of the country, where violence and 
intimidation are increasing ahead of the run-off elections



continued from yesterday



Zanu PF realised it had no prospect of reversing the economic decline. 
Since the first election, inflation has surged to 1.6m% and the Zimbabwe 
dollar has fallen from Z$50m to the pound to Z$8bn to the pound. A 
teacher typically earns Z$40bn a month. A litre of cooking oil costs 
Z$20bn. So the ruling party is quashing the opposition's ability to 
organise on the ground by driving out local MDC activists and then 
terrorising ordinary voters. The MDC fears that it may be working. The 
young woman clutching her child in Rusape certainly got the message. "We 
are scared. We are not going to vote. We just want to live. Some people 
are saying they will vote Zanu PF," she said. The MDC's national 
election director, Ian Makone, was forced into hiding more than a month 
ago. He will meet only after dark - "I work at night. I never go out 
during the day" - and at an empty house. Since Makone went underground 
his campaign manager, Ken Nyeve, and security guard, Godfrey Kauzani, 
have been abducted and murdered along with Better Chokururama, the 
driver for Makone's wife, Theresa, who is an opposition MP.



"Better's body was found first. They found the other two four days 
later. They were stabbed with knives and screwdrivers. Their eyes were 
gouged out and their faces burned ... There's a pattern. They torture 
you. They make you really, really feel the pain before you die," said 
Makone. "They were looking for me. We hadn't told anyone where I went in 
to hiding, not even our staff. Maybe if we had told them they could have 
survived after telling." Chokururama had already spent several weeks in 
hospital after a severe beating after the first election. "After the 
election it was clear their strategy was one of retribution. They made 
up their minds they were giving in to this violence and started to 
position themselves in key constituencies," said Makone. "Every day 
there are things that happen that I say, 'what the hell are we doing?' I 
meet people who say, 'people are dying, people are suffering, is it 
worth doing this?'"



In Manicaland, where the vote swung substantially away from Zanu PF to 
deliver an MDC victory, the strategy is overseen by the air force chief, 
Perence Shiri, who strikes terror into the population as the man who led 
the Fifth Brigade as it killed about 20,000 people during the 
Matabeleland massacres in the 1980s. Among those who have fled rural 
areas of the province to the main town of Mutare are five MDC members of 
parliament who dare not move around their constituencies or even sleep 
in their homes. They include Lynette Karenyi, the MP for Chimanimani 
West. "They have put Zanu PF bases in each and every ward of my 
constituencies where they are taking people and beating them," she said. 
Karenyi said the pro-Mugabe rallies in her constituency are being led by 
Shiri and the Matabeleland governor, Tinaye Chigudu. "Shiri and Chigudu 
held a meeting where they ordered people to beat MDC supporters. 
Afterwards the mob went to beat people and loot houses," she said. "They 
also told the voters to say they don't know how to read and write when 
they vote and they need help to vote for Robert Mugabe. People are now 
afraid that if they don't ask for help Zanu PF will know they voted for 
the opposition."



Another of the opposition MPs who fled to Mutare is Prosper Mutseyami. 
"They came to my rural home looking for me in the middle of the night 
three times," he said. "They're picking off all my party workers. 
There's 28 in police custody charged with inciting violence. They 
include the ward chairperson, three councillors, the organising 
secretary." He said they were targeting election agents so polling 
stations would not be monitored and to discourage political activity. 
"I'm being denied permission to hold rallies on the grounds that there's 
no police manpower. The funny part is Zanu PF are holding rallies daily 
in my constituency." Mutseyami says the forced Zanu PF meetings are 
often led by a Major General Bandama. "He threatens people. They say the 
last time you voted you voted wrongly. If you don't vote Robert Mugabe 
we will bring a war," he said.



An MDC district organiser in Makoni, who did not wish to be named, said 
that militiamen beat her children to force her to unlock her bedroom 
door during a late-night raid on her home. The activist, clearly still 
shocked by the ordeal, said she was forced into a vehicle, ordered to 
strip and repeatedly assaulted over the following hours. "They beat me 
and shouted: You are a bitch. They left me at a police station. They 
took a bullet and threw it at me. They said: kiss that bullet. They 
meant I was going to die," she said. The police threw the woman into a 
cell after charging her with public violence. Zanu PF has also targeted 
human rights lawyers, forcing them in to hiding or exile. Chris Ndlovu 
has defied the threats to represent opposition supporters hauled before 
the courts in Mutare. "The numbers are staggering. In some small places 
there are more than 100 people in prison. They are even arresting 
schoolchildren under 14. I have one case of a man of 94 years accused of 
public violence. In 16 years as a lawyer I have never witnessed this. 
It's unprecedented," he said.



"We have the military in rural areas and they target MDC supporters. 
They abduct them at night and take them to their bases where they claim 
to be 'reorienting' them but where they are just torturing people. When 
they are done they dump them at the police station where the police have 
no choice but to find an excuse to charge them. So the victim is accused 
of being the perpetrator of the violence." The militia has made a 
particular point of targeting teachers, who have traditionally acted as 
neutral election officials. Some schools have been left so denuded of 
staff they now barely function. Felistance Sithole lives in Rusape but 
dares not return to teach at a school in nearby Makoni South after she 
was threatened because she was a polling officer in the first election. 
"I won't do it again. I'm afraid. Most of us are afraid," she said.



That is what Zanu PF intended. In place of teachers and other unreliable 
elements, next week's election will be overseen by party functionaries, 
soldiers and civil servants who owe their jobs to Zanu PF. Makone says 
the violence will have an impact. "We're going to lose some of the rural 
votes. My estimate is we can afford to lose 200,000 votes in rural areas 
but we need to make it up in urban votes. We are going door to door in 
urban areas and begging for votes. We are holding secret meetings at 
night in people's houses, telling people this is their chance." Makone 
calculates that at least half a million potential MDC supporters did not 
vote in Zimbabwe's two main cities, Harare and Bulawayo, in the first 
round of elections and that they could tip the balance firmly in 
Tsvangirai's favour.Zanu PF seems to have recognised the same thing and 
is now targeting Harare's townships. In recent days, the ruling party's 
militia has hit Epworth, a township on Harare's eastern flank where Zanu 
PF has established five bases and what is euphemistically called an 
"information centre" where MDC supporters are persuaded to see the error 
of their ways. In Hatfield township, the militia burned down an MDC 
councillor's house. He wasn't at home. His wife and seven-year-old son 
died in the fire.