Zimbabwe Information Center in North America
A project of the North American Coalition for a Free Zimbabwe (NACFREEZ)
By Stanford G. Mukasa
Letter from America
July 2, 2007
MDC
Writing Mugabe’s political epitaph begins
There has been an upsurge in predictions about when Mugabe is likely to step down. They range from August next month to late next year.
The writing of Mugabe’s political epitaph is being motivated by an extraordinary deterioration, spearheaded by a free-falling economy, of the situation in Zimbabwe.
But there is a broader context within which Mugabe’s stepping down should be addressed. There is a lot more to resolving the Zimbabwean crisis than Mugabe’s exit.
The danger with solely focusing on Mugabe’s retirement from politics is the assumption that this will be the end of the repressive rule under ZANUPF.
Many people are likely to feel a post -Mugabe Zimbabwe will be a breeze of fresh air of democracy, freedom of speech and economic progress. Hence, any news of Mugabe’s retirement is greeted with a great deal of anticipation and euphoria. Such feelings could create in the minds of many people a sense that protests and demonstrations are no longer necessary.
Mugabe’s possible exit must always be analyzed in the context of the hydra headed monster called ZANUPF. Mugabe is only one head which can be easily replaced by another, and yet another. The repression of Zimbabweans does not come solely from Mugabe but the totality of the ZANUPF monster.
A classic example to understanding this is Kenya’s experience.
When Kenya’s president, Jomo Kenyatta, died in 1978 many Kenyans looked forward to a new post-Kenyatta era that would ease the repressive atmosphere, especially among the students and radical politicians.
But, alas, Kenyans soon realized that Kenyatta’s successor, Daniel arap Moi, was in many ways a reincarnation of his predecessor. Under the nyayo (footsteps) political stratagem, that legacy of Kenyatta and KANU was extended for the next three decades, ending only in 2003. This end of the Kenyatta legacy did not come about with the reform of the ruling party, Kenya African National Union, or KANU. What, in fact, happened was the massive defeat of KANU at the elections. In other words, real freedom and democracy for Kenyans came in 2003. That was about 40 years after Kenya gained her independence!
In the case of Zimbabwe, popular hatred for Mugabe has bitterly skyrocketed, creating a somewhat welcoming attitude towards people like Emerson Munangagwa, Joyce or Solomon Mujuru, Simba Makoni, Gideon Gono and other presidential aspirants in the ZANUPF camp.
But they all represent the same old ZANUPF hydra. They have all been socialized by the ZANUPF ideology of violence, repression and dictatorship. Any change of leadership within ZANUPF and from Mugabe and any of his cronies without defeating ZANUPF at the elections will most likely entail more decades of repression.
However, Mugabe’s successor, quite cognizant of the depressing social economic conditions in the country, will initially appear to distance himself or herself from the legacy of Mugabe. The successor may even abolish some of the repressive laws and appear to be offering a hand of friendship and cooperation to the opposition movement. But without the complete defeat of ZANUPF such gestures will, at best, be token and marginal efforts to help lure international aid and investments to jump- start the economy that now clearly lies in tatters.
Two forces are significantly forcing Mugabe’s hand toward retirement.
One is the economy against which Mugabe is fighting a losing battle. All efforts, including the so-called Look East policy, that the Mugabe regime has tried to improve the economy have been a complete failure. The economy has remained steadfastly out of control from Mugabe.
Yet it is the economy Mugabe relies on to prop up his increasingly unpopular regime. Mugabe is seeking to manipulate the economy as a matter of political expediency rather than anything else. His latest outrage is the attempt to wrestle the economic control of businesses by giving the majority shares to his restless and schizophrenic ZANUPF cronies.
Involving ZANUPF in any business enterprise is a kiss of death for that business. ZANUPF has failed dismally to manage its own businesses. ZANUPF and Mugabe have become the opposite of King Midas – anything ZANUPF and Mugabe touch does not turn into gold but rots immediately.
The explanation is very simple – ZANUPF, despite some of their members boasting degrees in economics and business, have no capacity to create wealth. They have historically been acculturated to using violence to grab whatever they want.
If you give a busfull of passengers to a 27-year old who has never driven a vehicle in his life, the inevitable is the bus will crash. This is how the economy has essentially crumbled under ZANUPF control. But sensing the elections, possibly next year, Mugabe hopes this will help solidify political support from his diminishing ragtag band of cronies.
The other is the growing dissension within ZANUPF. Mugabe is increasingly paranoiac. He does not know whom to trust among his cronies. He is aware that all the state resources he has been doling out to his supporters are shrinking. There are not enough farms left to give out. There are not enough tractors to parcel out to all supporters.
Some supporters who were given resources a few years back are returning for some more. Father Christmas Robert Mugabe’s bag is running empty on gifts and rewards.
Out of sheer desperation, Mugabe is reported to have ordered Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono to print over four billion dollars in money in order to pay the restless and insatiable cronies, especially the war veterans and youth militia thugs. Mugabe has been pouring money and gifts into the bottomless pit of these thugs and veterans. But they spend whatever they get like there was no tomorrow.
A few years ago the war veterans got incredibly large amounts of the so called ‘thank you’ money. Very few, if any, ever bothered to invest. They went on some of the most ridiculous spending sprees as if gripped by demons. One war veteran was reported to have hired a taxi to drive him from Harare to Bulawayo and back just for the pleasure of sitting in the back and being driven around. Another, who had apparently never driven in his life, bought a car and crashed it the same day.
Since Mugabe’s security and power are based on the mercenary support from these thugs, cronies, the army and police, the dire economic situation is driving him against the wall as the cronies advance towards him to demand more. His response? Print more money!
But printing more money is creating a vicious circle of an escalating inflation, now at hyper level, which, in turn, erodes the purchasing power of the same money he is parceling out to the cronies and, thus, impoverishing them with worthless dollars or bearer’s checks. Mugabe knows that if he cannot give them what they want the thugs will feed him to the crocodiles.
Mugabe has now reached a point where he can no longer satisfy his cronies. Put simply, he can no longer pay money for his own protection. He is left with one option – and that is to step down.
Mugabe is also at his weakest point in his political life. He is now caught in a whirlwind of events he cannot completely control. His threats to force retail shops to reduce consumer prices backfired on him when shortages started looming. Mugabe thought he could eat his cake and have it. He was abysmally wrong.
The only problem with these two forces of the economy and dissent within ZANUPF is, while they can effectively remove Mugabe from power, they have the potential to reform ZANUPF. A reformed ZANUPF will seek to maintain the status quo and grant blanket amnesty to Mugabe and the ZANUPF cronies who have committed crimes against humanity and stolen state assets.
This kind of amnesty will never be popular among Zimbabweans. So the new post -Mugabe reformed ZANUPF will be inclined to use force against the masses in order to maintain itself.
However, there is a third force that could also knock Mugabe off the pedestal of political power. It is the people’s mass protest and civil disobedience. The advantage of this third force is it will go well beyond removing Mugabe by also replacing ZANUPF from the center of power.
But as long as people’s attention is focused solely on removing Mugabe, and as long as the economy and dissent within party ranks begin to chip away the citadels of Mugabe’s political power, the incentive for popular mass action or civic disobedience will apparently remain low among Zimbabweans.
This would be tragic. A reformed ZANUPF will, in order to stay in power indefinitely, always come up with strategies for rigging future elections. And Zimbabweans, like Kenyans in the post-Kenyatta era, may find that, long after Mugabe is gone, they are facing basically the same problems they had before.