Who Is Tony Blair to Lecture Zimbabwe?

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Britain, the Commonwealth and Zimbabwe:
Who Is Tony Blair to Lecture Zimbabwe?

We Will Resist the Upside-Down View of Africa

Our Quest to Redeem a Just and Natural Right Has Been Criminalised

On Tuesday, December 9, the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, made a statement in the House of Commons regarding the recent Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Nigeria. Although the theme of the CHOGM was "Development and Democracy: Partnerships for Peace and Prosperity", it was dominated by continuing government efforts to bully and interfere in the affairs of Britain’s former colony Zimbabwe.

The people of Zimbabwe rose up and gave their lives to end rule by Britain and the illegal racist regime of Ian Smith in what was then the colony of Rhodesia during the 1960s. After many years of armed struggle they finally achieved formal independence only in 1980. Since that time they have attempted to deal with legacy of nearly a century of colonial rule and in particular to address the issue of the redistribution of land, which even after independence has remained in the hands of a minority of settlers of mainly British origin. However, successive British governments have refused to honour their obligations under the Lancaster House agreement of 1980 to financially assist the government of Zimbabwe’s land redistribution programme. The present Labour government in particular has pursued an arrogant colonialist approach to Zimbabwe, interfered in its internal economic and political affairs, assisted and financed opposition to the existing government, organised a campaign of vilification against its leaders and tried to isolate Zimbabwe internationally, all in an attempt to destroy the country’s sovereignty and create a situation where the diktat of Britain has to be obeyed.

In this shameful endeavour the Labour government has declared that it is only the Eurocentric values of Britain and the other big powers that can hold sway in the world and has sought the support of the governments of the US and the EU countries, as well as the IMF, who have also attempted to bully Zimbabwe into submission. Tony Blair’s government have also employed the reactionary Commonwealth, an anachronistic organisation of 54 countries, most of which are former British colonies.

Zimbabwe was suspended from the Commonwealth in 2002, following strenuous efforts by the British government to establish the view that its elections were not "free and fair" and a struggle by many other Commonwealth members who opposed this view and refused to be dictated to by Britain and a handful of other countries.

At this year’s CHOGM the struggle broke out again over whether Zimbabwe should remain suspended. The British government again attempted to impose its will and Zimbabwe’s suspension was not lifted. In response the government of Zimbabwe declared that it was resigning its membership and described its withdrawal as "an escape from hell".

In his statement Tony Blair attempted to present the issue of Zimbabwe as concerned with "democracy, respect for human rights and the rule of law – the very principles on which the Commonwealth was founded". But these "core Commonwealth values" have been those imposed by British imperialism and interpreted to suit its interests. How can Tony Blair pose as the defender of any democratic values when the Labour government has flagrantly violated international law in Iraq and elsewhere and violates the elementary rights of its own citizens in so many ways, for example under the guise of "fighting terrorism".

Although Tony Blair announced that the CHOGM’s decision was democratically agreed by all its members, it is evident that such democracy does not exist in the Commonwealth and Southern African countries immediately condemned the decision. Mozambique’s President, Joaquim Chissano, openly accused the CHOGM of using "undemocratic procedures", while Levy Mwanawasa, president of Zambia, declared "the western countries bulldozed the suspension of Zimbabwe partly because of their economic muscle". Thabo Mbeki, president of South Africa, in a lengthy statement made it clear that the original decision to suspend Zimbabwe was strongly opposed by many countries and based on dubious grounds. He reiterated the fact that the land question is the key issue in Zimbabwe and pointed out that the problems facing the country are a consequence both of British colonial rule and the machinations of successive British governments since 1965.

The CHOGM has once again exposed the reactionary colonialist character of the present Labour government, as well as previous British governments. But it has also exposes the reactionary nature of the Commonwealth, which far from being a partnership between equals, continues to be the means whereby the British government attempts to continues to exercise neo-colonial domination over nearly one third of the world’s countries and nearly a quarter of the world’s population.

Letter from President Thabo Mbeki to ANC Today, the Online Voice of the African National Congress, December 12-18, 2003

The 2003 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) opened in Abuja, Nigeria at the close of this past week. Its substantial agenda included the controversial issue of Zimbabwe. Contrary to false reports peddled by some, CHOGM dealt with all matters on its agenda, including Zimbabwe.

Its longest session considered a Report entitled "Making Democracy work for Pro-poor Development", prepared by a Commonwealth High-Level Expert Group on Development and Democracy. This Report was commissioned pursuant to the Fancourt Declaration adopted by CHOGM when it met in our country in 1999.

By the time the Abuja CHOGM concluded, it had continued the suspension of Zimbabwe from the councils of the Commonwealth. Zimbabwe had left the Commonwealth, rendering this decision meaningless. The SADC countries, supported by Uganda, had decided to express their strong disagreement with the CHOGM decision. Time will tell what impact all of this will have on the Commonwealth. But it is necessary to recall some of the history that has led us to this situation.

When it met in Coolum, Australia in 2002, CHOGM charged a Troika made up of the Chair of the Commonwealth, the Prime Minister of Australia, and the Presidents of Nigeria and South Africa, to take action on Zimbabwe, in the event that the Commonwealth Elections Observer Team made a negative finding about the 2002 Zimbabwe Presidential elections. This was the full extent of the mandate given to the Troika.

This Observer Team concluded that "the conditions in Zimbabwe did not adequately allow for a free expression of will by the electors." On this basis, the Troika decided to suspend Zimbabwe from the councils of the Commonwealth for one year, which should have meant the conclusion of its mandated mission.

However, the Troika also decided that it would meet again in a year's time to consider the evolution of the situation in Zimbabwe, in the context of various policy decisions taken earlier by the Commonwealth. Nevertheless, later, the then Chair of the Commonwealth, Australian Prime Minister Howard, insisted that the Troika should meet six months earlier than it had decided, which it did out of respect for his position as Chair of the Commonwealth.

The reason he insisted on this otherwise unscheduled meeting was that he wanted the Troika to impose additional sanctions on Zimbabwe, for which it had no mandate. The two other members of the Troika told him as much and argued that the Troika should meet at the end of the one-year, as originally agreed. Nevertheless, the Chair was determined to have his way.

Accordingly, contrary to all normal practice, he decided to announce to the world at a press conference, that he disagreed with his colleagues in the Troika and wanted more Commonwealth sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe. At one stroke, this both destroyed the Troika and put in question the democratic principle of decisions by majority.

The majority on the Troika then advised the Chair that if he wanted additional sanctions, he, and not the Troika, would have to get a mandate from all the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth. They also indicated their opposition to the continuation of the suspension beyond the one-year that had been agreed earlier. Nevertheless, the Chair requested the Secretary General to consult these Heads.

In his report, after this process of consultation, the Secretary General said: "Some member governments take the view that it is time to lift Zimbabwe's suspension from the councils of the Commonwealth when the one-year period expires on March 19 2003. Some others feel that there is no justification for such a step and that there is in fact reason to impose stronger measures. However, the broadly held view is that Heads of Government wish to review matters at CHOGM in Nigeria in December 2003 and that the suspension of Zimbabwe.should remain in place pending discussions on the matter at CHOGM.The members of the Troika have now concluded that the most appropriate approach in the circumstances is for Zimbabwe's suspension.to remain in place until.CHOGM in December 2003."

Unfortunately, the Secretary General has never explained what he meant by "the broadly held view", especially in the light of the fact that some Heads of Government were not consulted, and others were wrongly led to believe that we supported the continuation of the suspension. The statement that we had expressed ourselves in favour of the continuation of the suspension was false.

We must also make the point that the Zimbabwe government has never been given the possibility to respond to the report of the Commonwealth Observers, contrary both to the principles of natural justice and the rules of the Commonwealth itself.

This is especially important in the light of the fact that other Election Observer Groups, such as our own, made determinations about the Zimbabwe Presidential elections that differ from the finding of the Commonwealth Observers. For instance, the largest of our Observer Teams, made up essentially of representatives of civil society found as follows:

"It appears that the will of the people was demonstrated to a degree reflected by the number of people who came out to vote and who did get an opportunity to vote. The turnout at the polls and the number of people who voted was second only to the first election following the liberation of Zimbabwe. This view must be seen in the context of the obstacles and problems that characterised the pre-election period that is described boldly and frankly in the body of this report. The (Observer) Mission is, therefore, of the view that the outcome of the elections represents the legitimate voice of the people of Zimbabwe."

We accepted this determination and have no reason to conclude that the eminent South Africans who came to this conclusion were wrong, whereas the Commonwealth Observers were correct. This is particularly so given the fact that they spent a longer period of time in Zimbabwe than the Commonwealth Observers, and did more than any other group to help ensure that the elections were free and fair.

In addition, to ensure the continuous coverage of all parts of Zimbabwe, it worked together with the other South African Observer Teams, as well as the Cabinet Ministers we sent to Harare to ensure the effective access of our Observer Teams to the Zimbabwe government to deal quickly with any problems that could arise.

We have also studied and taken seriously the observations and recommendations contained in the 42-page Report of our Observer Mission. These observations include issues of political violence, legislation and state institutions relevant to the elections, the role of the media, and the general political situation. Those who present themselves to the public as experts would do well to study this Report.

When we met in London as the Commonwealth Troika, we were restricted solely and exclusively to the findings of the Commonwealth Observer Report. We also had no mandate to consider the substance of this Report and never did. Neither did the Abuja CHOGM, though it decided to continue the suspension of Zimbabwe, on the untested assumption that the Commonwealth Observer Report was correct in its conclusion.

At its March 19, 2002 meeting in London, at which it suspended Zimbabwe for a year, the Troika reiterated a critically important statement made by the Coolum CHOGM. It said that the land question was at the core of the crisis in Zimbabwe and could not be separated from other issues of concern.

At the Abuja CHOGM, the land question in Zimbabwe was not discussed. Indeed, the land question has disappeared from the global discourse about Zimbabwe, except when it is mentioned to highlight the plight of the former white landowners, and to attribute food shortages in Zimbabwe to the land redistribution programme.

The current Zimbabwe crisis started in 1965 when the then British Labour Government, under Prime Minister Harold Wilson, refused to suppress the rebellion against the British Crown led by Ian Smith. This was because the British Government felt that it could not act against its white "kith and kin", in favour of the African majority.

At the constitutional negotiations in 1979, the British Conservative Government insisted that the property and other rights and privileges of this "kith and kin" had to be protected. It therefore ensured that Zimbabwe' s independence constitution had entrenched clauses, valid for ten years, which, among other things, protected the property rights of the white settler colonial "kith and kin", including the landowners.

The large sums of money promised by both the British and US governments to enable the new government to buy land for African settlement never materialised. The land dispossession carried out by the settler colonial "kith and kin" through the barrel of the gun had to be sustained, despite the fact that even in 1979, the British government recognised the fact that land was at the core of the conflict in Zimbabwe, as did the 2002 Coolum CHOGM.

In 1998 we intervened to help mediate the growing tension between Zimbabwe and the UK on the land question. This, and other factors, led to the international conference on the land question held in Zimbabwe that year.

At that conference, the international community, including the UK, the UN, the EU and others agreed to help finance the programme of land redistribution that had been an essential part of the negotiated settlement of 1979, which, in return for introducing majority rule, guaranteed the privileges of the white settler colonial "kith and kin". Nothing came of these commitments.

Later, the British government could not find a mere £9 million to buy 118 farms, which purchase had been agreed at the international conference. These would have been used to resettle the war veterans who had begun to occupy farms owned by the white "kith and kin", continuing a struggle for the return of the land to the indigenous majority, which had started at the end of the 19th century.

Again we intervened to help solve the Zimbabwe land question. We managed to get pledges from various countries, other than the UK, to provide this £9 million. Having handed this matter over to the UN, it collapsed in the intricacies of the UN bureaucracy. Though there were willing sellers and willing buyers, and the necessary funds, the 118 farms were not bought.

With everything having failed to restore the land to its original owners in a peaceful manner, a forcible process of land redistribution perhaps became inevitable. Though we were conscious of the frustration that had built up in Zimbabwe, we urged the government of Zimbabwe both privately and publicly to act against the forcible seizure of white farms and other violence in the country. On one of these occasions, at Victoria Falls and in the presence of President Mugabe, I told the world press that, together with Presidents Nujoma and Chissano, we had raised this matter with President Mugabe.

For the record, we must mention that our national broadcaster did not record my comments on this matter. The SABC television team that covered this press conference later explained that at that point it did not have the necessary cassette to record these comments. Soon after this press conference, the BBC interviewed me to confirm the remarks I had made. And yet afterwards, many worked hard to propagate the blatant untruth that we had said nothing about any of the contentious issues in Zimbabwe.

In his book, "Decolonising the Mind", the Kenyan writer, Ngugi wa Thiongo, writes about the consternation among some Europeans that he had started writing in his native language, Gikuyu. He says:

"It was almost as if, in choosing to write in Gikuyu, I was doing something abnormal.The very fact that what common sense dictates in the literary practice of other cultures is questioned in an African writer is a measure of how far imperialism has distorted the view of African realities. It has turned reality upside down: the abnormal is viewed as normal and the normal is viewed as abnormal. Africa actually enriches Europe: but Africa is made to believe that it needs Europe to rescue it from poverty. Africa's natural and human resources continue to develop Europe and America: but Africa is made to feel grateful for aid from the same quarters that still sit on the back of the continent. Africa even produces intellectuals who now rationalise this upside-down way of looking at Africa."

For example, those who fought for a democratic Zimbabwe, with thousands paying the supreme price during the struggle, and forgave their oppressors and torturers in a spirit of national reconciliation, have been turned into repugnant enemies of democracy. Those who, in the interest of their "kith and kin", did what they could to deny the people of Zimbabwe their liberty, for as long as they could, have become the eminent defenders of the democratic rights of the people of Zimbabwe.

During the Abuja CHOGM, those accustomed to the practice of disinformation, described as "spin", did everything to communicate false reports to the media. They campaigned and lobbied to ensure the continued suspension of Zimbabwe. We deliberately avoided engaging in any of these activities. We fed no stories to the media. We did not campaign. We lobbied nobody. Yet the story is put out that we lobbied, blocked agreements, and dismally failed to achieve our objectives.

We are not, and should not be surprised at this kind of behaviour and the turning of reality upside down on the part of those that Ngugi wa Thiongo described as those "that still sit on the back of the continent." The tragedy is that there are some among us, those that have the possibility to occupy the media spaces, who claim that they are Africans, among them intellectuals, "who now rationalise this upside-down way of looking at Africa", according to which "the abnormal is viewed as normal and the normal is viewed as abnormal".

In his book "Diplomacy", Dr Henry Kissinger discusses the place of the issue of human rights in the East-West struggle during the Cold War. He writes that:

"Reagan and his advisers invoked (human rights) to try to undermine the Soviet system. To be sure, his immediate predecessors had also affirmed the importance of human rights.Reagan and his advisers went a step further by treating human rights as a tool for overthrowing communism and democratising the Soviet Union.At Westminster in 1982, Reagan, hailing the tide of democracy around the world, called on free nations 'to foster the infrastructure of democracy, the system of a free press, unions, political parties, universities, which allows a people to choose their own way, to develop their own culture, to reconcile their own differences through peaceful means'.America would not wait passively for free institutions to evolve."

In time, and in the interest of "kith and kin", the core of the challenge facing the people of Zimbabwe, as identified by the Coolum CHOGM, has disappeared from public view. Its place has been taken by the issue of human rights. Those who have achieved this miracle are not waiting passively for free institutions to evolve.

It is clear that some within Zimbabwe and elsewhere in the world, including our country, are following the example set by "Reagan and his advisers", to "treat human rights as a tool" for overthrowing the government of Zimbabwe and rebuilding Zimbabwe as they wish. In modern parlance, this is called regime change.

In its statement after the Abuja CHOGM, SADC and Uganda said: "We also wish to express our displeasure and deep concern with the dismissive, intolerant and rigid attitude displayed by some members of the Commonwealth during the deliberations. The Commonwealth has always operated on the basis of consensus. We fear that this attitude is destined to undermine the spirit that makes the Commonwealth a unique family of nations. This development does not augur well for the future of the Commonwealth."

But, once more, some Africans have turned things upside down. They argue that, internationally, we face some trouble or other because we confirmed positions at the Abuja CHOGM that we have explained before, publicly. They will not say that the Commonwealth is faced with an impending crisis because of the positions it took, which have very little to do with the urgent task to encourage the entire political leadership of Zimbabwe to act together to resolve the political, economic and social problems facing the people of this sister country.

In its Report, having made its determination about the 2002 Zimbabwe Presidential elections, the Commonwealth Observer Team said: "We call on all Zimbabweans to put aside their differences and to work together for the future of their country. We believe national reconciliation is a priority and that the Commonwealth should assist in this process."

Our own Observer Mission said: "The Mission recommends an urgent programme of political reconciliation and economic restructuring and transformation that places the people and country of Zimbabwe first and transcends the differences that were demonstrated in the election process."

This is also what the Heads of Government from Uganda and the SADC countries said to their colleagues at the Abuja CHOGM, arguing that the continued isolation of Zimbabwe would not facilitate the achievement of this goal. Unfortunately, others had already made public statements that one of the principal outcomes of this meeting would be, not a Commonwealth commitment to this goal, but the continuing suspension of Zimbabwe from the councils of the Commonwealth. For them, it was important that this objective should be achieved, to maintain their credibility especially with the media, whatever else was decided that might actually relate to the future of the people of Zimbabwe.

Many things have gone wrong in Zimbabwe leading, among other things, to a high degree of polarisation in the country and a serious economic crisis. Together with the rest of the SADC countries, we have discussed these negative developments with the government and people of Zimbabwe, and will continue to do so. At the same time, we have made a commitment to work with the people of Zimbabwe, represented by both the ruling party and the opposition, to arrive at the situation in which "all Zimbabweans put aside their differences and work together for the future of their country".

Whatever happened at the Abuja CHOGM, and perhaps because of what happened at the Abuja CHOGM, the outcome visualised by the Commonwealth and South African Election Observers will be realised, regardless of the negative speculations made by some that so-called quiet diplomacy has failed. This outcome demands of us that, regardless of the fact that we are poor and need the support of others richer than ourselves to overcome our problems, we should always refuse to "rationalise the upside-down way of looking at Africa."

Our poverty and underdevelopment will never serve as reason for us to abandon our dignity as human beings, turning ourselves into grateful and subservient recipients of alms, happy to submit to a dismissive, intolerant and rigid attitude of some in our country and the rest of the world, towards what we believe and know is right, who are richer and more powerful than we are.

Speech by Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on the Occasion of the World Summit on the Information Society, Geneva, Switzerland, December 10, 2003

Mr. President of the Summit,
Your Excellency Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations,
Excellencies Heads of State and Government, Distinguished Delegates,
Invited Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen.

I wish, on behalf of the people and Government of Zimbabwe, to thank and pay tribute to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the people and Government of Switzerland for organising and hosting this landmark Summit on the hope for and challenges of a global information society. I remain cognisant of the fact that this Summit is a culmination of a series of efforts that seek to bring into sharp focus an integral dynamic in human development, namely information, as well as the infrastructural means of its delivery, or what we have come to collectively term information and communication technologies (ICTs).

Mr. President, the new millennium boasts of dramatic technological improvements which have given rise to what is an information revolution. Time, space and distance have collapsed to create what for some is "a brave, new world", with instantaneous and simultaneous dimensions. It is a world of enormous technological leaps, a world where means have improved well beyond measure.

Yet in this new age, we continue to face basic paradoxes. The duality of development and under-development remain implacably in place as the basic and core dialectic to which there is no apparent synthesis. The rich, imperious and digital North remains on the one end of the development divide; the poor, disempowered, underdeveloped South remains on the other end of the divide.

Yes, for us post-colonials, we still have an aloof immigrant settler landed gentry – all-white, all-royal, all untouchable, all-western supported – pitted against a bitter, disinherited, landless, poverty-begrimed, right-less communal black majority we have vowed to empower, and in the cause of whom Zimbabwe continues to be vilified, in a country that is ours and very African and sovereign. Hence, in spite of the present global milieu of technological sophistication, we remain a modern world divided by old dichotomies and old asymmetries that make genuine calls for digital solidarity sound hollow. It is a sad, sad story of improved technological means for unimproved human ends.

Mr. President, long after we have talked about the need for information and communication technologies as tools with which to contrive the information society, we are soon to discover that receivers and computers are powered by electricity which is unavailable in a typical Third World village. Long after we have talked about connectivity, we are soon to discover that most platforms for electronic communication need basic telecommunication infrastructure which does not exist in a typical African village.

What is worse, we will discover, much to our dismay, that the poor villager we wish to turn into a fitting citizen for our information society, is in many instances unable to read and write. Where we are lucky to find the villager literate and numerate, we soon discover that he or she is not looking for a computer terminal but for a morsel of food; an antibiotic to save his dying child; a piece of land on which to eke out an existence, in short, looking for a humane society that guarantees him food, health, shelter and education.

For us, E-commerce implies growing economies trading fairly in barrier-free markets. E-education implies economies run for the people, not for the sake of enriching one or two multinational corporations. E-health implies affordable drugs for affordable health delivery systems that can only be guaranteed by policies that are genuinely national. Yes, E-government implies a sovereign national Government that manages "Top Level Domains" within its borders and whose preoccupation are its people first and foremost. Yes, for us E-Zimbabwe means a Zimbabwe with a sovereign people, Zimbabweans, and run by them and not by the British, Australians or Americans. This is a fundamental principle of our UN Charter enunciated as the right of self-determination.

Mr. President, the key to, and foundation of an information society lies in the resolution of the dilemma of development. The way to an information society is through even, fair and just development. There is no shortcut.

Today Mr. President, we seek an information society in a world shaped and divisively structured by global hierarchies of power – undiminished, hegemonic power made most arbitrary by the politics of unipolarity that have led to circumstances of a disempowered UN system. We seek equal access to information, itself duplicitously presented as a basic human right when in fact it was commercialised and commoditised by a few rich countries a long time ago; and when it is daily managed and deployed in defence of the selfish interests of those countries.

Yes, we seek equal access to information and the control of communication technologies whose genesis in fact lies in the quest for global hegemony and dominance on the part of rich and powerful nations of the North. The ICTs that we seek to control and manage collectively are spin-offs from the same industries that gave us the awesome weapons that are now being used for the conquest, destruction and occupation of our nations. The ICTs by which we hope to build information societies are the same platforms for high-tech espionage, the same platforms and technologies through which virulent propaganda and misinformation are peddled to de-legitimise our just struggles against vestigial colonialism, indeed to weaken national cohesion and efforts at forging a broad Third World front against what patently is a dangerous imperial world order led by warrior states and kingdoms.

The deadly, televised spectacle of an unjust war of occupation in Iraq, based on blatant lies peddled shamelessly on monopolised media, was a dramatic example of a false and failed global information society founded on the twin aggressive impulses of shock and awe. These last two years have shown us how information and ICTs are often deployed as preludes and accompaniments to aggressing the sovereignties of poor and small nations. I say this because my country Zimbabwe continues to be a victim of such aggression, with both the United Kingdom and United States using their ICT superiority to challenge our sovereignty through hostile and malicious broadcasts calculated to foment instability and destroy the state through divisions.

Our voice has been strangled and our quest to redeem a just and natural right has, been criminalised. Today we are now very clear. Beneath the rhetoric of free press and transparency is the iniquity of hegemony. The quest for an information society should not be at the expense of our efforts towards building sovereign national societies. Our national society does not exist to serve ICTs or information. Both must be instruments that serve our society as it seeks fullness through balanced development and self-determination. Both must express themselves within the parameters of our inviolate sovereignty represented by our democratic national will which expresses itself through our national laws, our national policies and our national institutions. On this we are firm and unbending.

Instead, we should seek to use ICTs as tools that can be adopted and adapted to the construction of sovereign national societies, with clear national identities, themselves real and only durable building blocs to vibrant, diverse, just and sustainable global information society.

I thank you.