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While this issue seems to have attracted maximum media attention, this writer felt there still remain some critical actualities that need to be questioned and scrutinised.
It is public knowledge that indeed the West, and to be more specific, Britain, are well known for their baseless and equally shameful denial of the existence of the no doubt spectacular form of racist abuse of human rights through the imposition of the economic sanctions, this time two questions must be answered.
First, in their endeavour to justify the extension of the very tool that weakened the functionality of Zimbabwe’s economy, the EU said it will revise the sanctions after a peaceful and credible constitutional referendum has been held. In this respect, the writer would want to question the sincerity of these nations, and of course the whole idea of making sure that the nation undergoes such a fundamental democratic process while the whole populace is suffering. So in order for a peaceful and democratic referendum to be held, the West considers it orthodox that the citizens must go hungry first? What is the logic here?
Secondly, for so many times they have argued that sanctions are non-existent in the nation, and unfortunately, there are also some sections of people in Zimbabwe who seem to be singing the same chorus. But what the whole nation would be asking right now is if the sanctions are indeed non-existent, what is it that they are extending?
It is disturbing to note that in the quest to sanitise a rotten and undemocratic law by the name the US’ Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act (S. 494), anti-Zimbabwean people have gone an extra mile to hide the cruel document that has caused intensive suffering to the Zimbabwean people, awarding it colourful names like travel bans, restrictive measures or targeted sanctions. But the myth has since been cleared, all and sundry is knowledgeable and fully aware that sanctions are real and they have done no good to the Zimbabwean economy and its citizens.
But of the two questions raised, this writer would argue that it is the former concern that is of more significance in the contemporary political dispensation. By categorically stating that the West will only consider removing the sanctions after completion of the referendum, it is clear that the much despised interference into the democratic processes of independent nations is once again manifesting itself with the whole world’s eyes wide open.
It is disreputable that the US, and the entire colonialists bloc would deny the outcome of the referendum for patriotic Zimbabweans are not likely to vote for a constitution that reverses the gains made so far in terms of, for instance, land redistribution process and the recent indigenisation process. Just as a reminder, ZDERA was enacted by the US as a sign of its frustration over the land redistribution process that saw a greater percentage of the disempowered citizens testing the good of owning the means of production for the first time in history as colonial imbalances never allowed indigenous blacks to rise from the dust.
The West, in all their conscience, could be mistaken, raising false hopes that one day their dreams will be fulfilled, expecting some kind of a blind legislation to be passed in the daylight, a law that will overturn the gains of the justified land reform and other economic wrongs that the nation has so far corrected but, speaking in the words of one great thinker by the name John Fiske, such dreams can be equated to that of a child dreaming of owning a railway line!
Why would the West want to see the outcome of the referendum first, setting it as a prerequisite to the upheaval of the economic cancer that they infected the Zimbabwean fiscus through the imposition of the racist sanctions? It seems now, more than ever before, the regime change agenda which the West has always failed to admit as its immediate objective in their aggressive foreign policy, is now clearly visible and open than ever before.
With such kind of news coming, further questions and suspicion would also be raised as to whether the great powers are not going to interfere in the forthcoming democratic process to take place. At this moment, the words uttered by former US President George W Bush on the 21 December 2001 when ZIDERA was signed into law are becoming even more sarcastic yet revealing the inner corrupted bias that they represent. He said… “This Act symbolises the clear bipartisan resolve in the United States to promotion of human rights, good governance, and economic development in Africa…”
This statement is equally sarcastic in as much as it is a testimony that the sweet sounding name awarded to the punitive document only served to give a façade of a nation in pursuit of serving Africa yet in reality, as it is now being witnessed in current developments, was actually a law that has nothing in it that strived to do good to the Zimbabwean people but to serve the selfish interests of the colonisers. If the embargo was introduced to, among others, enable promotion of human rights, why then would they consider it worthwhile to extent the sanctions when the nation is undergoing a constitution making process? The open truth is that if the West were honest in their claims, this was actually the best time to repeal any form of restrictions to the nation to allow for the free democratic transformation and reforms.
Even from an economic point of view, the law, according to them was also an initiative to strive for economic revival in Africa, the displayed actuality on the ground is that the measures crippled Zimbabwe’s state as the bread basket of Southern Africa. So in fact, sanctions did not only affect the Zimbabwean economy, but also affected trade within Sadc and beyond Sadc borders.
The economy, peace, and security are intertwined to the extent that a slight shake of one of these critical pillars, affects the other two. Constitution-making bears with it new and restoration of economic principalities and laws that in the end, affect the entire viability of national processes. Thus for the West to extend the sanctions at a time when the nation is preparing for elections, and the referendum is tantamount to killing the economic revival as much as it is a measure to frustrate the nation’s always peaceful elections.
As the denial of the existence of punitive sanctions in the country continues, it remains a mystery as to why the West are failing to come to terms with their own natural objective conscience and stop the kind of madness that is taking course without a break in their foreign policy.
Perhaps, the argument that was given by one congress woman on the House of Representatives passed the Bill in December 2001, Cynthia McKinney would best sum up the whole argument and clearly explain why this writer feels there was no justification for the extension of sanctions at this critical time. She said, “Can someone explain how the people in question who now have the land in question got title to the land . . . I have not heard anyone proposing a United States Democracy Act following last year’s presidential election and if a foreign country was to pass legislation calling for a United States Democracy Act which provided funding for United States opposition under the fig leaf of voter education, this body and congress would not stand for it.
“There are many dejure and defacto one party states in the world which are the recipients of support from the US government. They are not subject to congressional legislative sanctions.”
If the Bill was at first rejected by some concerned Americans themselves, where is the justification for the continuation of sanctions at this critical time when the nation is heading towards elections?
*Jephiter Tsamwi can be contacted at [email protected] or 0733854681
Online Reporter