Today is a momentous day for Zimbabwe, a country all but destroyed by
29 years of increasingly grotesque misrule by Robert Mugabe and his
Zanu (PF) party.
Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, will
be sworn in as Prime Minister, paving the way for a unity Government
in which MDC ministers will serve alongside the very people who have
spent the past decade abducting, beating, torturing and killing their
fellow activists. Mr Mugabe remains President.
The word unity is utterly inappropriate. The war will continue, in
another form. It will now be hand-to-hand combat, one MDC insider
says, and only one party will survive. The problem is, according to
Western officials, it is likely to be Zanu (PF). If so, there is no
hope for this beautiful, once bountiful country.
Sceptics argue, correctly, that Mr Tsvangirai was forced to join this
Government by overwhelming pressure from southern Africa, which lacked
the stomach to remove one of the continent’s last surviving liberation
leaders, despite his clear defeat in elections last year.
They say that Mr Tsvangirai has walked into a trap; that Mr Mugabe has
no intention of sharing power; that the wily octogenarian will easily
outwit him and that the Old Crocodile will corrupt and co-opt MDC
politicians with money, Mercedes and mansions. They expect the MDC to
be swallowed up by Zanu (PF) as surely as Joshua Nkomo’s Zapu party was
when it was forced into a merger in 1987 after the Matabeleland
massacres.
Mr Tsvangirai will have achieved nothing, they say, except to give the
faltering tyrant a lifeline and his regime a veneer of legitimacy that
Mr Mugabe will use to erode international sanctions. It’s sad. What
have the last ten years of struggle been for? one asked.
There are plenty of reasons for such scepticism. Mr Mugabe regards
Zimbabwe as his personal property and has never been known to
compromise in his life. Zimbabwe is mine, he declared in December.
The so-called Global Political Agreement (GPA) is vague, toothless and
riddled with ambiguities that offer Zanu (PF) ample opportunity to
thwart MDC initiatives.
There is no clear division of power between Mr Tsvangirai and Mr
Mugabe. Zanu (PF) retains a large measure of control over the security
services, Zimbabwe’s final functioning institutions, and the two
parties are locked in a bizarre compromise whereby they will jointly
run the hotly disputed Home Affairs Ministry, which controls the
police. Other contentious issues such as the future of Gideon Gono, the
Reserve Bank governor responsible for Zimbabwe’s
5,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (five hextillion) per cent inflation, are
left unresolved.
Nor has the regime shown the slightest intention of mending its corrupt
and violent ways since the GPA was signed last September. Its leaders
have continued to imprison MDC activists, harass white farmers,
restrict Mr Tsvangirai’s movements and enrich themselves at the
people’s expense. It is far from certain that the country’s generals
will deign to salute their new Prime Minister after today’s ceremony.
Curiously some of the MDC’s most ardent proponents of unity government
agree with much of this. They know that the GPA is deeply flawed, and
is far more than Mr Mugabe deserves after using violence to subvert the
election, and far less than they deserve. But they argue that they have
no option and can no longer stand on the sidelines while Zimbabwe
implodes, and that if they are smart, determined and ruthless enough
they can destroy the regime. We can fight and deliver at the same
time, which we’ve never been able to do before, a senior official said.
They argue that the international community can start funnelling aid to
some of the 13 ministries – including finance, health, energy and water
– that it will control; that control of so many ministries will
severely curtail Mr Mugabe’s powers of patronage, exacerbating rifts
within Zanu (PF); and that the MDC can open the books to expose
Zanu(PF)’s past misdeeds.
MDC insiders also believe that they can use their parliamentary
majority to great effect. They will seek to repeal repressive
legislation, including that which crippled Zimbabwe’s independent
media. They can hold officials accountable, including the editors of
newspapers which incite hatred and division.
The MDC also controls every city council in Zimbabwe, and believes that
with Western assistance these can quickly begin restoring water
supplies, mending roads and providing other basic services that have
largely collapsed. Finally the MDC has in Mr Tsvangirai by far the most
popular politician in Zimbabwe, who should now be able to travel
freely, attending meetings, addressing rallies and winning airtime as
he has never been able to before.
MDC officials talk of a virtuous cycle whereby its support rises as it
delivers real improvements, securocrats and civil servants see which
way the tide is flowing and cast in their lot with the MDC, and the
population becomes increasingly emboldened as Zanu (PF) crumbles. A
dictator needs fear to stay in power, an official close to Mr
Tsvangirai said. What will happen if we can remove that element of
fear?
There is just one problem with the MDC’s scenario. It depends crucially
on Western aid beginning to flow. Britain, the US and the EU say that
this will not happen unless the new Government demonstrates a genuine
commitment to reform – a development they find almost inconceivable as
long as Mr Mugabe remains President.
It is, in short, a classic Catch-22. If the MDC fails to deliver, Zanu
(PF) will be quick to shift the blame from its own lamentable
performance