Last year I joined the chorus of political commentators all over the world in hailing the coalition government between President Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party and Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party as the best hope for democracy in Zimbabwe. And we did so knowing full well that this coalition was forged only because Mugabe refused to cede power after losing at the polls.
But here’s the business-as-usual note I sounded:
Now Mugabe can afford to be magnanimous. Indeed, I suspect he would be happy to confer the title of prime minister upon his politically cuckolded foe, Tsvangirai; provided, however, that that title is conferred with all of the political power wielded by a Nubian Eunuch.
(“Zimbabwe forms (improbable) coalition government,” The iPINIONS Journal, February 12, 2009)
This is why it came as no surprise to me when Mugabe immediately sought to wield dictatorial control over this coalition by rejecting the MDC’s nominee for deputy agriculture minister, Roy Bennett. And it only reinforced Mugabe’s intent to brook no opposition that he did this by having Bennett arrested on clearly trumped up charges of treason; namely, plotting a coup d’état.
What is surprising, however, is that a Zimbabwean court acquitted Bennett on all charges yesterday. Because, given that the judiciary routinely did his bidding, this acquittal represents a transformative challenge to Mugabe’s 30-year dictatorship. It also marks an ironic triumph for a white Zimbabwean at a time when Mugabe is attempting to rid the country of the few who remain: a silver lining indeed.
Recall, after all, the economic disaster Mugabe created six years ago when he executed his national land reforms. These reforms amounted to nothing more than seizing farms from the white farmers who made Zimbabwe the bread basked of Sub-Saharan Africa and redistributing them among his black cronies. Unfortunately, this new landed gentry knew nothing, and cared even less, about farming, which soon turned the country into the agricultural basket case it has become.
Now Mugabe has vowed to execute an indigenization and empowerment program. This will require all foreign companies to transfer at least 51% of their shares to black Zimbabweans. And nobody doubts that this program will do for business in Zimbabwe what Mugabe’s land reforms did for agriculture, which is why the neutered MDC raised such existential opposition to it.
In the meantime, that Bennett is happy to have been acquitted is clearly understandable. What is not, however, is his resolve to continue the good fight against Mugabe’s confiscatory oppression. (Bennett’s farm was among the first seized in 2004 under Mugabe’s land reforms.)
Good has triumphed over evil. I’ve been standing resolute with the people of Zimbabwe who’ve been undergoing the same persecution. But it’s made me more resolute and fortified me more in my fight towards real change in Zimbabwe.
(Bennett, BBC, May 10, 2010)
Perhaps he should have ended this statement by quoting American Revolutionary War hero Nathan Hale who lamented that “I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.” More importantly, though, the irony should not be lost on Zimbabweans that the person with the most moral authority to lead their downtrodden country is this white man.
Related commentaries:
Zimbabwe forms (improbable) coalition government
Mugabe swears himself in as president for life
Zimbabwe land reforms
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