EDITORIAL COMMENT: United front crucial in fight against sanctions

The Movement for Democratic Change formation led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai has often been cited by the authors of Zimbabwe’s sanctions regime as being complicit in crafting the punitive measures and Minister Biti’s call therefore sends a strong message to the West that the sanctions need to go as they have wrought untold harm to the economy and caused the suffering of the Zimbabwean people.

Elsewhere on these pages, we carry a report from a Zimbabwean online news portal which quotes Minister Biti as calling on Canada to lift sanctions on Zimbabwe.

He reportedly told Canada and other Western countries to lift sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe because “they are not serving anyone”.

Minister Biti, who is also the secretary general of the MDC-T, told reporters after delivering a lecture at Carleton University in Ottawa on Tuesday night that the policy of trying to isolate President Mugabe was no longer useful — four years after a coalition government stabilised the economy and eased political tensions.

“Canada is such an important country, and has been an important country over the years, that it must be engaged in Africa and in the difficult places over the world,” Minister Biti is reported as telling the Globe and Mail newspaper.

He called on Canada and the international community to lift sanctions on the country and its officials, saying they are “not serving anyone”.

“The use of sanctions and isolation, I think they have outlived their usefulness,” he said.

Last year, Minister Biti wrote to the United States Treasury to protest the inclusion of two diamond firms — Mbada Diamonds and Marange Resources — to the list of companies sanctioned under its Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act (ZIDERA).

The companies were apparently punished for partnering the State-owned Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation  (ZMDC) which was already on the US sanctions list.

Minister Biti told Assistant US Treasury Secretary Charles Collyns that the US actions flew in the face of the Kimberley Process’ green light for Marange diamonds. He said: “It would be curious to find out the motive of your decision against the two companies. Your decision will not stop the mining that is a sovereign issue covered by international law. Most importantly, it will not stop the sale of diamonds. All it does is to encourage more opaqueness and underwriting of the diamond industry . . . this is a self-defeating and retrogressive position; one which I hope was not taken to placate powerful interests who were against the Kinshasa agreement.”

We welcome the Minister’s call and hope that the letter and spirit with which he made the remarks was sincere and honest. Zimbabwe needs to project a united front to the world and if the inclusive Government speaks with one voice, it is bound to succeed in its mission to take the country forward.

The Zanu-PF side of Government has always insisted that the illegal sanctions imposed on the country were hurting the economy and ordinary Zimbabweans and not targeted as claimed by their authors.

Now that the man in charge of the country’s Treasury has acknowledged that sanctions need to go, we hope the rest of his party will take the cue and join him in campaigning against them.

The West also needs to admit its folly, swallow its pride and engage Zimbabwe as a sovereign nation on an equal footing.

President Mugabe has been consistent in calling for the unconditional lifting of sanctions and we urge MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai to emulate his counterpart and fight against sanctions. It would send a strong bold message to the West that Zimbabwe brooks no interference in its affairs if the PM were to stand up and be counted.

We hope Minister Biti is not a lone voice in an MDC party which has in the past proved to be a willing bedfellow to forces of neo-colonialism and imperialism. To prove us wrong, Minister Biti, who today addresses investors in London, should reiterate that call for the lifting of sanctions to the British establishment which is the root of all that is wrong in Zimbabwe today.

Zimbabwe needs an opportunity to grow its economy without the added weight of sanctions on its back. Crucially, the European Union, which meets next month to review the sanctions regime on Zimbabwe, needs to be told by Minister              Biti that the country needs breathing space if it is to get out of the woods. Sanctions have to be lifted in their totality immediately.