Premature call on LIFTING OF sanctions
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...By MOSES CHAMBOKO
Published: March 3, 2010
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For the avoidance of doubt, this article represents my very personal opinion. Let no media get too excited and misrepresent this as discord, disgruntlement or disobedience within any entity, real or imagined.
Lately, there has been a flury of talk, views and pronouncements on the so-called illegal sanctions or restrictive measures. Unfortunately or interestingly, some of the views have transcended the entire spectrum of the political hierarchy.
However, what I find amusing and paradoxical is the fact that the real cause of the imposition of sanctions seems to have been relegated to the backburner. Factors that attracted sanctions include state-sponsored violence, lawlessness, selective application of the rule of law, illegal and violent farm invasions, corruption and general state-orchestrated brutality. Can somebody please tell me what has changed?
The GNU was not formed ostensibly for window-dressing but to deliver on certain milestones. To what extent has it achieved people’s expectation?
As I write, Getrude Hambira, an elderly mother and probably grandmother too has been hounded out of the country by the same forces of repression that invited sanctions. She is reportedly hiding in South. Her crime; she speaks her mind. So what has changed? Journalists are also being persecuted on a diuly basis.
Just a few days ago, hired hoodlums brutalised innocent citizens in Epworth for attending an MDC rally. Up to now, there is no evidence that the perpetrators have been brought to book. As if this was not enough, the trio of village-boy Kudakwashe Bhasikiti, heavily recycled Dzikamai Mavhaire and reportedly ailing Stan Mudenge, all of them my homeboys, displayed gross insensitivity and political immaturity as they took turns to denigrate the Prime Minister at a gathering in Triangle. I hope none of my former students of 22 years ago was there to listen to such inflammatory and preposterous language such as “Pasi naTsvangirai, pasi neMDC”. Are these slogans still acceptable given the route our nation has travelled over the past year or so? Again, what has changed?
While independent commissions have been appointed, the reality is that there hasn’t been anything beyond the announcement. On the other hand, the constitutional process is literally limping along and could collapse any time. This is all due to machinations of one party known to all of us because The Kariba Draft is to be protected or imposed at all costs, so what has changed?
Listening to the learned and often honest though unpredictable Welsh Ncube, one could tell that the perpetual talks are literally deadlocked or even dead. Will allowing certain individuals the liberty to globetrot revive these talks? When we were young, we used to argue about the “myth” of the chicken and the egg. Is this argument going to continue well into our adult or political lives? Must it be sanctions or GPA implementation first?
Under the guise of prosecution, Bennet is being persecuted more than a year after he was nominated deputy minister. Will this entice anyone to lift sanctions?
It would be a very sad day if progressive Zimbabweans were to wake up one day to find that MDC policy is now directed by sentiments coming out of the politburo at Shake-Shake House. “We won’t budge until sanctions are lifted” is what the politburo has declared. This must not necessarily translate into MDC policy.
Yes, sanctions must go but only after what attracted them in the first place has been adequately dealt with. Full and unconditional implementation of the GPA is the easiest and fastest way out. Why is it so difficult to implement the GPA in full and then get all three parties to focus on one issue only, being sanctions? Wouldn’t the international community listen when they see that indeed there is movement on the ground? Simply making pronouncements and posting ambassadors is just not enough. This is a message that must sink!
What is happening with the toxic issues? Aren’t’ these the really devastating self-imposed sanctions? Doctors who spend their entire lives treating symptoms and not causes of the disease will condemn their unsuspecting patients to the morgue.
Let us not forget that in South Africa, sanctions were not lifted the day Madiba walked out of Robin Island. The world waited until there was real and tangible freedom and democracy before lifting those sanctions, almost four years down the line.
To quote then Prime Minster of Zimbabwe, R.G Mugabe in his 1987 article titled “The Struggle for Southern Africa”; he said, “If sanctions will play a part in terminating the suffering, they must be imposed”. He went on to say “If additional suffering is necessary, we are also ready to pay the price”. This was in reference to apartheid South Africa.
What’s good for the goose…
chambokom@gmail.com