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We welcome Belgium’s call for the lifting of the West’s illegal sanctions regime and the increasing realisation in the British media that the sanctions serve no other purpose than assuage the egos of petty Western politicians.Belgium’s Damascene moment, coming as it does at a time Western media are acknowledging the futility of the continued estrangement, is tacit admission that the regime change drive has aborted, and only Zimbabweans can choose their leadership.
As we report elsewhere in this issue, the British government has been urged to drop its destructive engagement for re-engagement.
We should applaud ourselves for this feat, for refusing to go under despite the arsenal the Westerners ranged against our country and its people since the turn of the millennium.
Once again we reiterate President Mugabe’s constant refrain that we have no quarrel with the Western alliance, but just a bilateral dispute with London that the new Labour government of ex-premier Tony Blair tried to internationalise, and which the EU and US needlessly bought into.
We have always insisted on the justness of our cause and been open to building bridges. The sanctions were not only imposed illegally, outside the purview of the United Nations system and in violation of the Cotonou
Agreement that governs relations between African Caribbean and Pacific countries, but were a blatant attempt to mask wilful violation of international law.
This is because by refusing to honour obligations entered into by the Tory administration of Margaret Thatcher which pledged to meet the costs of land reforms in Zimbabwe in 1979, the Labour regime violated customary international law that bid it to uphold all treaties and contracts of the Tory government, the same way the Tories today are bound by obligations of the Labour regime.
Be that as it may, the traditionally all-white Commercial Farmers Union on whose behalf the sanctions were imposed has since indicated that land reforms are a fait accompli, and no longer wishes to continue swimming against the tide.
They have expressed a wish to work with Government and also be considered for resettlement like other Zimbabweans.
To this end we hope the Westerners move to scrap their sanctions regime in the wake of the harmonised elections.
The Westerners must also stop their covert and overt interference in our domestic affairs by cutting all funding of political parties and quasi-political groups masquerading as civil society.
Our people suffered a lot over the past decade as the sanctions regime decimated our currency, wiped out pensions and savings and destroyed livelihoods.
The gains Government made in the social-services sector since independence were stymied with thousands of innocent people succumbing to preventable diseases like cholera.
Reparations for the damage wrought by the economic warfare are worth pursuing. As always Zimbabwe’s hand is extended, the same way it was extended to Rhodesians who decimated our people during the Second Chimurenga.
We seek only co-existence, mutual recognition and the respect due to us as an equal member of the community of nations.
Online Reporter