Imperialists step up attacks on Zimbabwe
By Monica Moorehead
The Bush administration and its European
allies, especially Britain, have stepped up their political and
economic destabilization machinations against Robert Mugabe,
president of Zimbabwe.
Cybercast News Service announced on June 7 that the U.S.
government plans to condemn Zimbabwe's "flagrant and
devastating human rights abuses" at the United Nations Human
Rights Commission hearing scheduled for this week in Geneva,
Switzerland.
Patrick Chinamasa, Zimbabwe's justice minister, responded by
stating that lobbying efforts will begin to defeat this U.S.
campaign.
Last year Britain attempted to pass a similar resolution in
Geneva. But at the behest of Nigeria and a number of other
African, Asian and Middle Eastern representatives, the
resolution was defeated.
The U.S., through a presidential order, has just extended
economic sanctions against Mugabe and 76 other governmental
officials. The sanctions, imposed in early March by Bush,
freeze these officials' financial assets in U.S. banks. The
sanctions also prevent U.S. corporate interests from doing
business with these representatives. The U.S. and Britain are
demanding that Zimbabwe carry out "free and fair elections"
before the next scheduled elections in 2007.
Furthermore, the U.S. State Depart ment has released a study
entitled, "Zimbabwe's Manmade Crisis." This "study" supposedly
documents how Mugabe single-handedly transformed Zimbabwe from
being a self-sufficient country that could feed itself into an
indebted nation.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has also suspended
Zimbabwe's membership rights. The reason given by the IMF is
"failure to deal with its serious economic problems."
(CNSNews.com, June 7)
Zimbabwe's debt to the IMF is estimated at $233
million--much lower than other African countries that cannot
pay the interest payments on their debts, let alone the
principal. The IMF also reported that for the past four years,
Zimbabwe's inflation rate has risen 207 percent and its
production output has fallen by one third.
The unemployment rate is 70 percent.
Anti-government protests are being carried out by the
Movement for Democratic Change, a Zimbabwean opposition group
backed by the U.S. and Britain. The main goal is to create
political and economic unrest to bring down the Mugabe
government.
What's really behind these attacks?
Why are Bush, Blair and their European imperialist allies so
hell bent on ousting Mugabe? Mugabe is not targeted for being a
socialist, like Cuba's President Fidel Castro.
Mugabe is a former leader of a national liberation movement
that helped to bring an end to a racist, apartheid-like regime
led by Ian Smith in 1980. In fact, Mugabe is a bourgeois
nationalist, similar to other African leaders.
But what distinguishes Mugabe from others is his willingness
to stand up against U.S. and British imperialists. Mugabe has
let the world know that he will not bow down to imperialist
threats and schemes without a struggle. When the U.S. demanded
that new elections take place in Zimbabwe sooner than later,
Zimbabwean officials stated that it is the U.S. that should
have new elections, since Bush stole the presidency in 2000. It
is this kind of heroic defiance that has generated great ire
and scorn at imperialist bullies like Bush and Blair.
There is no doubt that the Zimbabwean people face tremendous
hardships daily, as do millions of people throughout the rest
of southern Africa. Years of drought have created a famine that
has affected at least 6 million Zimbabwean people alone.
Who believes that one person can cause a drought?
How can a governmental policy cause such a catastrophic
inflation rate when 96 percent of the economy is still in the
private hands of the former colonial oppressor of
Zimbabwe--Britain?
The greatest "crime" that Mugabe has carried out in the eyes
of the U.S. and Britain is his support for the confiscation of
land from the white commercial farmers, initiated by its
rightful owners--landless African farmers.
The State Department claims that Mugabe has "displaced" 2
million farmers, meaning white farmers. These privileged
farmers are part of a racist legacy of colonialism that began
when the first British occupiers carried out a bloody conquest
of Zimbabwe in the late 1880s. This included a campaign of
massive forced removals of the indigenous population from the
most arable lands. To this very day the relationship between
the white farmers and the indigenous population in Zimbabwe is
comparable to U.S. slavery a few centuries ago.
A large sector of those who fought for the liberation of
Zimbabwe were landless indigenous farmers, now commonly
referred to as war veterans. They are the ones who pressured
the Mugabe government to remove the commercial farmers, by
force if necessary, once the British government reneged on its
1980 Lancaster House agreement. This agreement held the British
government accountable for financially compensating these white
farmers so that Black farmers could reclaim their lands.
The U.S. and Britain want to give the impression that only
the white farmers can save the Zimbabwean people from
starvation. This falsehood is meant to justify the
reintroduction of colonization. These white farmers are tied to
the worldwide capitalist market. This means that they grow and
cultivate crops, like tobacco, to be bought and sold for a
profit, not to alleviate the hunger and suffering of the
Zimbabwean people.
These schemes should be viewed within the overall context of
Bush's quest for endless war and imperialist empire building.
Progressives and revolutionaries here and worldwide must
understand that defending the Mugabe government from
imperialist attacks is synonymous with supporting Zimbabwe's
ongoing struggle for sovereignty and complete independence.
Reprinted from the June 19, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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