Zimbabwe - A letter from the diaspora

Friday 18th May 2007

Dear Friends.
It's no secret I think that I am related to the Litany Bird so it's not surprising that the Bird's thoughts sometimes chime with my own even though we are thousands of miles apart. Last week it was the attack on the lawyers that got us both warbling the same tune, more of a sad lament really, at the death of democracy in Zimbabwe as exemplified in the brutal attack on the legal profession.

Here in the British diaspora, the shock at the arrest this week of the lawyer defending Simon Mann received some coverage in the British press but I didn't find any serious analysis of the underlying issues represented by this ferocious attack on one of the fundamental principles of a democratic state - which Zimbabwe claims to be.
The wife of one of the lawyers who had been beaten up by the police in Harare, the so-called guardians of law and order, turned up at last Saturday's Vigil outside the Zimbabwe Embassy to tell the assembled Zimbabweans and sympathisers about her husband's ordeal. After the lawyers' protest at the nation-wide crackdown on their legitimate activities, they were taken in trucks to a piece of waste land and ordered to lie down on the ground to be beaten. Her husband had refused, he was not going to prostrate himself on the ground like an animal in order to be humiliated. 'Beat me if you want to', he said ' but you'll have to do it while I'm standing'.
That's the spirit, I thought as I read the account. We could do with more of that defiance in the face of the criminal assault on the legal fraternity - and anyone who dares to disagree with the regime - by ignorant thugs calling themselves police officers. When their turn comes - as it surely will - to stand in a court of law facing prosecution those same policemen and soldiers will need lawyers to defend them. For their sake, they can only hope for honest lawyers and judges who will respect their rights to a fair trial without victimization.
And speaking of judges, am I the only one who finds it utterly shocking that Zimbabwe's esteemed judiciary have remained silent in the face of the attacks on their legal colleagues? What does it take I wonder to silence a judge's conscience so completely that he will not even raise his voice when officers of the court are brutalised in full public view? A farm or two, perhaps, is the price of silence?

There was at least one piece of good news this week with the announcement that Roy Bennett had been granted asylum by the South African government. That joyful tiding came at almost the same time as the parliamentary legal affairs committee in Harare found Obert Mpofu, a minister in Mugabe's government, guilty of contempt of parliament. That was precisely the same offence for which Roy Bennett had served a prison sentence. Bennett's 'contempt' was daring to push/punch the Minister of Justice who had goaded him beyond endurance with insulting racist remarks about his ancestors. With their usual presence of mind the ZBC cameras were there to film the occasion; their slogan remember is 'We'll be there when it happens' and a transfixed audience of whom I was one watched as Roy charged across the chamber like an angry bull! A slight push, that's what I saw and the tall Minister crumpled like a pack of cards. It was pure theatre and where I lived it was the talk of the bottle stores for days. ' Brave Pachedu has shown us the way it should be done' the people said. And for that 'contempt of parliament' Roy Bennett was sentenced to one year in prison; he served nine months in a stinking Zimbabwean gaol. No prison sentence for Obert Mpofu though. His offence was nothing less than lying to the parliamentary committee, now that surely is contempt of parliament. Obert Mpofu, by the way, is the Honourable Member who has declared that no white farmer shall be allowed to farm in his constituency. It does make you wonder who are the real racists in today's Zimbabwe.

For me, it's the fishy story that takes the biscuit this week! All Zimbabweans know about Bob and the Wailers. When the motorcade goes past with its wailing sirens motorists and pedestrians are supposed to stop whatever they're doing and get out of the way. Very nasty consequences may follow the failure to obey what may be deemed as disrespect for the office of the president. The law states that ' a person shall not make any gesture or statement within the view or hearing of the state motorcade with the intention of insulting any person travelling with an escort or member of that escort.' With such an ambiguously worded law any poor unfortunate, even an unthinking fish, may be viewed by an over-eager police officer as 'disrespectful'- especially if its smell offends the presidential nostrils.
Picture the scene; it is the weekend and Robert Mugabe is making his stately way to his rural home in Zvimba. The motorcade goes past one of the poorest suburbs in Harare, Kuwadzana, along the Bulawayo road. The vendors are all standing along the roadside; the same vendors who were made homeless and jobless by Murambatsvina, two years ago. Now they are desperately trying to sell their fish and earn a few dollars to feed their families. It's not quite clear whether the vendors pushed towards the motorcade or whether they just held up their 'smelling fish' as one soldier described it but twenty minutes after the motorcade had passed, those same soldiers returned armed with truncheons and rifles and started beating and arresting the hapless vendors. The President was very angry with them, reported the soldiers, because the vendors were turning the roadside into another Mbare Musika. And we can't have that can we? We can't allow desperately poor and jobless Zimbabweans to attempt to earn an honest dollar; they and their 'smelling fish' make the place look untidy and that's very disrespectful of them!
But it was the soldiers' own comment as reported by one of the vendors that gave the story its final ironic twist. They said we were embarrassing the government by openly showing off our poverty to the President! You have to admit, that does take the biscuit!
The Brits, of course are crazy about cricket. So the news of John Howard's decision to cancel the cricket tour was big news here. Pity Tony Blair didn't have the guts to do it last year, some papers commented. But it was Bright Matonga's comment at home in Zim that Australia's decision was nothing more than a 'racist ploy' that puzzled me. I'm still trying to work that one out particularly in the light of Harare's subsequent, rather grovelling appeal to the Aussies to let their players come after all. The logic seems a little twisted somehow - but that's Zanu PF for you!
Ndini shamwari yenu. PH.

Friday 11th May 2007

Dear Friends.
Perhaps because I was once married to a lawyer and still feel a certain respect for the law and lawyers, I don't think that anything that has happened in Zimbabwe over the last week has shocked me more than the arrest and imprisonment of the two human rights lawyers acting for detained opposition members. Showing their complete contempt for the law, the police ignored two High Court orders calling for the lawyers' immediate release and the two men were held for four days in stinking prison cells but fortunately for them, they were not beaten. No such luck for the fifty or so other lawyers who on Tuesday gathered to protest their colleagues' arrest and imprisonment. Dressed in their black legal gowns and white collars the lawyers assembled in front of the High Court of Zimbabwe only to be met by truckloads of armed policemen who proceeded to beat and manhandle them. They were then separated into two groups and bundled into the backs of trucks. Passing motorists stopped their cars to watch, apparently. It's a pity none of them had the presence of mind to use a camera but I didn't need a picture to visualize the scene. It was there at the High Court that my family and I had watched as their father was called to the Bar. We were so proud of his achievement; after years of studying and hard work he had finally made it; he was an Advocate of the High Court. He went on to become a member of the side bar as it was called in those far off days and as an attorney was involved in defending university students demonstrating against the Smith regime and other men who are now senior members of Mugabe's government. So much for 'liberation credentials'; back then those men were fighting against the injustices of the Smith regime; now they are fighting against their own people in a desperate attempt to stay in power.
I don't recall any one of the lawyers being physically harmed in any way during the campaign to bring about the end of the Smith regime or indeed any of the brave South African lawyers who defended people like Mandela and Govan Mbeki, the South African President's father. With this brutal assault on the legal fraternity in Zimbabwe Mugabe and his compliant police force have plumbed new depths of depravity.

The British media here have barely covered that particular story but that has not prevented the continuing bad press Zimbabwe receives. The name Zimbabwe crops up all over the place and it's always accompanied by comments about the collapse of this beautiful and once prosperous country; highest inflation in the world, lowest life expectancy, 80% unemployment and the near starvation of the population, the list is endless. I only have to mention that I come from Zimbabwe and even ordinary non-political British people look at me pityingly, 'Oh it's terrible what's happening there. That Mugabe!' they say.

This month the BBC is broadcsting the prestigious Reith Lectures. It's the eminent economist Geoffrey Sachs who is delivering this year's lectures and last week he dealt with the developing world's economies and Africa in particular. I was amazed to hear Sachs say that he was deliberately excluding Zimbabwe from his survey because under Mugabe's flagrant misrule the economy had virtually collapsed and could in no way be said to represent the improving African economic scenario. To all intents and purposes Zimbabwe has become a 'non-country' though it seems that Francis Nhema will still head the Sustainable Development committee at the UN thanks to the African vote which apparently sees no contradiction in the appointment of a man whose country is decidedly not following any known model of 'sustainable development'. It's a crazy world.
Another example of Zimbabwe's rock-bottom reputation came during the local elections here. In Scotland, the Electoral Commission reporting on the conduct of the elections compared the mismanagement to 'an election in Zimbabwe.' The problem you see was that Scottish voters were provided with two ballot papers, one for parliamentary elections and the other for local councils. The first page for Scottish parliamentary elections was divided into two columns and required the usual cross to indicate preference, the so-called First Past the Post system. The second column contained the names of constituency members and again nothing more than a cross was required to indicate the voter's choice. As I understand it, it was the second sheet, to elect local councillors that caused the problem. Here a numerical system was used where the voter numbered the candidates in order of preference, Proportional Representation in other words. And that's where some at least of the muddle arose. If you're feeling confused by all this, it's nothing to what the Scots felt. 100.000 votes were invalidated because of spoilt papers; voters simply did not read and follow the instructions. The comparison with a Zimbabwean election couldn't be more apt bearing in mind that the intellectually challenged Zanu PF regime is telling us that there will be council and national elections on the same day. The Senate we are told will be selected by proportional representation. Can't you just picture the chaos when Zimbabwean voters are confronted with both the usual First Past the Post system and Proportional Representation! No doubt Mugabe's friends the South African observers will still be able to declare the election free and fair and Zimbabwe will emerge with its reputation untarnished – at least in its own eyes!
So, it was with considerable amusement that I read in last week's Zimbabwean that President Mugabe is planning a massive PR campaign to reinstate his tattered reputation. It is rumoured that officials at the Zim Embassy in London have enlisted the help of a public relations company to mount a clean-up operation so that Mugabe and co will come up squeaky clean. Needless to say it could be tricky finding any company willing to undertake the job. Even the profits involved in the estimated cost of £150.000 pale into insignificance compared to the irreparable damage any firm would do itself if they agreed to handle such a task. Rather like trying to change the image of Hitler and the holocaust.
Perhaps the absolutely lowest point of the week for me - and everyone in the Diaspora I imagine - was to read Didymus Mutasa's announcement that Ba Chatunga will be the only Zanu PF candiate for president for the next six years. Dear God, the man will be 89 years old if that happens. After the initial heart-sinking realisation that we'd never be able to go home, I pulled myself together. We've heard it all before I told myself. It's never going to happen… 'In your dreams, Mr Minister!'
Ndini shamwari yenyu.PH

Friday 4th May 2007

Dear Friends.

It is sometimes useful to stand back from the horror and chaos that characterises this last stage of Mugabe's rule and try to look at the situation objectively. Easier to do that I suppose if you're not there in the country suffering the total collapse with starvation and poverty all around you but I admit to bouts of fair-mindedness when I think I ought to try and be objective!
You all know how Mugabe constantly harps on about the west - and the UK in particular - and how they 'demonize' him and his party. 'You never tell them the good things that are happening under Mugabe's rule' the media is told and my response to that is 'What good things are there to talk about?' In my quieter moments I do wonder if perhaps we critics of the regime do not sometimes over-state the case but then I hear about babies being beaten, women being kept naked in the cells and just yesterday I read in The Zimbabwean details of the number of political prisoners being held and I go back to my angry question, 'What good things are there to talk about?'
An interesting article in the UK Guardian recently caught my eye. It was entitled 'How To Turn an Open Society Into A Dictatorship in Ten Easy Steps' and although it was not about Africa or even Zimbabwe the article exactly pinpointed what has happened in our country.
The article by a certain Naomi Wolf argues that there are ten steps that need to be taken by anyone taking over power. She gives the examples of Hitler and Pinochet but in Africa we have our own examples. The process is not a random one. All those seeking power have to do is follow a sort of historical blueprint to close down an open society and turn it into a fascist state - with varying degrees of bloodshed along the way. Wolf goes on to argue that creating and sustaining a democratic society is a long and arduous process but closing it down is much easier. Just follow the blueprint.
If you are a Zimbabwean reading this you will be able to decide quite quickly whether the country passes the Dictatorship Test. I leave it to you to decide!
Step One: Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy. For Nazi Germany it was the Jews. In the west today it's Islamic terrorism. Step Two: Create a gulag - a place where all dissenters are sent for long periods. In America that's Guantanamo Bay. Step Three: Develop a 'thug' caste eg. the Nazi Blackshirts whose job was to go round brutalizing the population. Step Four: Set up an internal surveillance system. Step Five: Harass citizen groups and civic society. Step Six: Institute arbitrary arrest and detention. Step Seven: Target key individuals. Step Eight: Control the Press. Step Nine: Equate all forms of dissent with treason. Step Ten: Suspend the rule of law, subvert the judiciary and police.
There's one other point Naomi Wolf makes; once you put all the powers, legislative, executive and judiciary in the same hands you have all the makings of a tyranny. Externally, on the surface everything looks normal. That's what the dictator wants you to see; look behind the external picture and you will see the full horror of torture, brutality and the infringing of basic human rights.
And there you have it. By my reckoning Zimbabwe scores nine out of ten on this Richter scale of dictatorship. We don't yet have a gulag as far as I know but then you could argue that the whole country is nothing more than a gulag - for dissenters anyway.
So, in answer to the question, 'Why don't you tell us the good news coming out of Zimbabwe?' I repeat, 'What good news is there?' What good news can there be when the price of the staple food goes up by 700% condemning millions to near-starvation?
Ndini shamwari yenyu. PH