South Africa

Two interesting developments in the Zimbabwe election campaign. The first is that it appears that many of Simba Makoni’s supporters are hedging their bets, quietly supporting the upstart candidate while avowing their loyalty to Zanu-PF and thus implicitly, it would seem, to Robert Mugabe. One can sympathize with the inclination — crossing Mugabe almost always comes at a cost — and yet during a time when Makoni and his supporters are taking a great deal of risk and revealing tremendous courage, it would be nice if some of Zimbabwe’s most prominent members of the political class could do the same. It is this sort of fecklessness that will help Mugabe secure the presidency again by hook or by crook, violence or theft.

The second story is equally telling. Zimbabwe’s economy has gone to hell over the last few years with nary a helping hand from Mugabe and Zanu-PF for any but the smallest, most well-connected cadre of loyalists.  But suddenly Mugabe is demanding faster food imports, particularly of maize, in light of the country’s food emergency, which the president seems a bit late in discovering. It was not all that long ago that Zimbabwe was the region’s breadbasket. Nonetheless, Mugabe’s nakedly self-interested reaction does bring about one question: If the old man wins re-election, which only a fool or an optimist would bet against, could Makoni’s challenge have awakened in him a realization that he is not bulletproof? Or are these merely the temporal machinations of a despot interested only in consolidating power? I would bet on the latter, but assuming that Mugabe is going to find a way to win, we all had better hope against hope for the former.

(Zapiro — The Mail & Guardian)

The political contest in Zimbabwe continues to mystify observers. Simba Makoni’s candidacy has legs, which in and of itself is a cause for surprise, and possibly excitement.

A British economist, Professor Gwyn Prins of the London School of Economics, has called for South Africa to threaten to cut off Zimbabwe’s electricity supplies, much of which comes from south of the Limpopo, if President Robert Mugabe’s government continues to intimidate the electorate or otherwise sabotages Makoni’s campaign. This sort of thing (as I predicted yesterday) is all that it takes for Mugabe to accuse any critics, or in this case, Makoni’s candidacy itself, of being inspired by Great Britain. Mugabe’s cynicism is nothing if not consistent, and thus easy to anticipate.

Makoni, meanwhile, has been reaching something of an olive branch out to Mugabe, promising that a Makoni administration will not seek to punish Mugabe for his myriad gross violations of human rights. Presumably Makoni can say little else, lest Mugabe simply crush the opposition candidacy right now (I still fear that this step is coming), but it is still disquieting to realize that Mugabe will likely not be brought to account for his many crimes.

Accusations of Mugabe vote buying continues apace. Meanwhile analysts argue that high-profile Zanu-PF defections sting Mugabe, but should not ultimately destroy Mugabe’s electoral hopes unless the trickle becomes a flood. But the biggest X-factor continues to be both the possibility of violence, especially on the part of Mugabe’s supporters, as well as what role the police will play in either allowing violence to go forward or, worse yet, in fomenting chaos. Police officials insist that the election will be peaceful, but then again, what else can we expect them to say?  

Simba Makoni’s comments last week that “South Africa has not offered any support, and I didn’t ask for it” probably reaffirmed in the minds of many people Thabo Mbeki and the rest of the South African government’s unwillingness to stand up to Robert Mugabe. And yet it seems from where I sit that Mbeki must be aware that he is in a no-win situation. Any word from him of even tepid support for Makoni and  Mbeki runs the risk of opening the floodgates of Mugabe’s considerable and well-rehearsed rhetorical flourishes about Zimbabwean sovereignty and imperialistic outside interference.  And in  giving Mugabe, who is already tightening his grip on power in advance of this month’s elections,  an outside bogeyman  Mbeki almost assuredly would be playing into the hands of Mugabe who would love nothing better than to play the role of beleaguered defended of Zimbabwean autonomy in the face of an outside onslaught. Best for Mbeki to remain silent and hope for change to come than inadvertently to fuel Mugabe’s victory by giving him an outside influence against whom to rally.

(Simba Makoni — UK Telegraph)

Worse news than Mbeki’s possibly welcome silence has hit Makoni’s camp in any case. Joyce Mujuru, Mugabe’s deputy president (long-rumored to be Mugabe’s likely successor), has announced that she is backing Mugabe for another term. This scuttles many of the hopes that Makoni’s supporters had developed in which Mujuru would throw her support behind Makoni as other prominent Zanu-PF members have done in recent days.

Here is a quick roundup of some Africa-related news stories that have caught my eye in recent days:

Despite the fact that the media lives by the age-old credo “if it bleeds it leads” with regard to crime stories, which serves to warp people’s perspectives on the nature and frequency of crime, violent crime rates are actually dropping in Gauteng.

Does the recent peace agreement in Kenya signal better days ahead? Roger Cohen of The New York Times thinks as much.

Robert Mugabe might be starting what he believes to be his “march to victory,” but increasingly members of Zanu-PF are throwing their support behind Mugabe’s intrepid challenger, Simba Makoni. I still do not see Mugabe allowing Makoni to wrest his crown away, but if somehow it happens, I envision many of even Mugabe’s most ardent supporters responding to Mugabe’s defeat in the same way that the Wicked Witch’s praetorian guard responded after Dorothy liquidated their boss: “Hail Simba!”

One trend that I have noticed in American sports is the increasing presence of African athletes making their mark on the playing fields. Many of these athletes came to the United States when they were young children, many others were born in the United States to African parents, and still others found themselves face-to-face with American college coaches whose recruiting tentacles extend wider and deeper with each pasisng year. The usual push-pull factors are at play in these immigrant cases: On the run from war or privation or political chaos, drawn to the idea of America as the land of opportunity. The New York Times has the story of one such athlete, Hasheem Thabeet, a 7′ 3″ center for the University of Connecticut’s men’s basketball team who has become something of a folk hero in his native Tanzania.

Finally, what does it mean to be a citizen of a country? Is it sufficient to be born there? must one’s parents also be citizens of the country? Ireland is one of many nations dealing with these questions, and African immigrants represent the political football being kicked around.

This is not the run-up to glory that Robert Mugabe anticipated when he surprised everyone by announcing that Zimbabwe would hold elections at the end of March. Mugabe expected a coronation. He expected that the short timetable for the polling and the fact that he had cowed or crushed most all viable opposition would surely mean that he would cruise to another victory, and since there is no such thing as a tainted election win in the political world of Robert Mugabe, he would be able to claim that the people had spoken, their will enforced. This victory would allow him the pretense to crush his opposition under the pretense that they were subversive agents of the imperialists. It must have made the old tyrant smile to think of how cleverly he had gamed the system.

But perhaps Mugabe was too clever by half. He did not anticipate the challenge posed by the rise of Simba Makoni. He probably did not anticipate that Bulawayo would run out of money or that numerous civic organizations in South Africa would engage in nearly daily protests at the Zimbabwean Consulate in Johannesburg.

This is not to say that Mugabe is especially worried. And why would he be? He still controls the armed forces and the police. And in controlling the men with guns he can control not only large numbers of votes, but also can terrorize the dissenting factions in his country. After all, the state media announced that Zimbabwe’s police forces are ready to use force to crush any disruptions that might occur through election day. It does not take a lot of foresight to imagine that the police will not be especially nonpartisan when they mete out their particular brand of justice.

Nonetheless, Mugabe has experienced a February that he never could have imagined. He will almost certainly win the election, or at least “win” the election, because that is is will, and the fruits of his will tend to come to pass in the state he so controls. But he had to think that it would all be so much less difficult. It is not always easy being a dictator in a state that puts on the pretenses of being a democracy.

Robert Mugabe turned 84 on Saturday, and the wily old tyrant was in a typically feisty mood, announcing in the face of his increasingly emboldened opposition that “There will never be regime change here … Never.”

Simba Makoni, Mugabe’s challenger in the March 31 election, is unbowed by Mugabe’s intransigence and continues to forge ahead with a candidacy that at times seems Quixotic, at other times mad, and always brave. He continues to be optimistic about his chances of unseating Mugabe, speaking of “renewal” and healing the wounds that Mugabe has opened.

One wild card in this election might be the support Makoni is beginning to draw from members of the military, police, and security forces, a development that I have for some time argued might change the political calculus in Zimbabwe. Mugabe owes his status to the loyalty that he still inspires from the men with guns who surround them. If those people suddenly refuse blindly to follow him, if they choose to pursue democratic change, or simply opt for a new dispensation, democratic or not, Mugabe will find that “never” is not as long a time as he imagines. Security forces can easily wreak chaos. Perhaps they also can help bring about peaceful change in Zimbabwe. Now that would be a change that most of thought would happen, well, Never.

My initial response to this article asserting that Simba Makoni has quite a challenge ahead of him was to wonder what sort of moron might argue anything to the contrary. Fortunately, though, the reporter goes deeper than the “no tea party” argument:

Makoni’s real challenge is to show he has the clout to attract enough grassroots support to fend off an already dirty campaign against his candidacy, and to prove he can forge the difficult alliances with senior Zanu-PF officials and elements from the opposition that he needs to weaken Mugabe.

There are two factors involved, of course: One is whether or not Makoni can drum up the necessary support. I believe that he can. Between dissident Zanu-PF members and the existing opposition groups, most notably the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), makoni should be able to draw a great deal of potential voters. This all assumes that someone in the MDC, such as Morgan Tsvangirai, does not choose to run as well, which will split the vote. (It would also tell us anything we need to know about any MDC member who pursued the presidency during this period of cautious optimism for Makoni.)

The second factor is probably more important: Even assuming Makoni poses a serious challenge to Mugabe, will he really be allowed to run a campaign without the threat of violence, without facing trumped-up charges, and without general interference from Mugabe and his henchmen? Furthermore, even if Makoni is able to pursue the presidency, will his supporters be allowed to vote, will those votes count, and will all votes be tabulated fairly? The odds, I fear, are not good on this front.

Robert Mugabe is going to face a surprise challenge in the upcoming election that he called recently (to great outcry from the opposition and observers of the country’s politics). Simba Makoni, a former finance minister whom Mugabe forced out of office in 2002, appears to have the support of many dissidents within ZANU-PF as well as from both factions within the weakened opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Makoni might provide Mugabe with his most formidable challenge yet. From to a story in South Africa’s Daily News:

Simba Makoni, plus dissidents in Zanu-PF, plus support from both factions of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change seem set to give President Robert Mugabe the challenge of his long life.

The “lucky coward”, as Mugabe is dubbed by some of his critics in Zimbabwe, is facing his Waterloo for the first time in a political career in which he has used every trick in the book, but particularly financial patronage, to ensure his survival.

Now Zimbabwe is broke and one of his own, who is respected by the urban middle classes, the international community, Africa and the opposition, wants his job.

It will not be as easy for Mugabe, 84, to use security forces to harass and beat up Simba Makoni as it was in 2002 when presidential challenger Morgan Tsvangirai was accused of being a white man’s stooge and a puppet of the West.

It will be even harder for Mugabe when other heavyweights in Zanu-PF make their support for Makoni known.

Naturally the knives have come out. Mugabe’s henchmen have already begun to try to taint the new challenger to Mugabe’s crown. ZANU-PF has expelled Makoni. The state-controlled media dismissed him as”a loud fart.” Liberation movement veterans, many of whom still blindly support Mugabe, have branded Makoni a traitor. Ominously, Joseph Chinotimba, deputy leader of the war veterans, told Zimbabwe’s Herald newspaper, “We are now going to campaign vigorously for President Mugabe. I feel sorry for Makoni, he has lost the political plot. From today to the nomination date we will have finished with them. Traitors should know that Zanu-PF has a history of dealing harshly with their kind.”

This last assertion is undoubtedly true. Mugabe, his underlings, and his seemingly blindly loyal supporters, of which there are still undoubtedly (and inexplicably) many, have shown time and again that it will take more than democratic processes, which they know are easily manipulable, to oust their man from power. Makoni may be able to win a free and fair election in Zimbabwe. But it is certain that the election he faces will not be free or fair. Nor will it be peaceful. Makoni is brave. Courage will not, I fear, be enough.