South Africa cannot make the meltdown in neighbouring Zimbabwe its ”own property”, South African Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota said on Wednesday.
Asked at a media briefing on the international relations cluster of ministers at Parliament whether the Zimbabwean economic meltdown and general crisis does not rate at all for South Africa — given that it had not been mentioned in President Thabo Mbeki’s speech at the opening of Parliament last week and had not been mentioned in briefing notes — Lekota argued at some length that a multilateral approach has to be taken on Zimbabwe.
This involves forging a position that is supported by all the Southern African states. South Africa is no worse affected by the problems of its neighbour than Zimbabwe’s other neighbours are, he argued.
He acknowledged that sometimes progress in resolving the Zimbabwe problems is slower — sometimes ”painfully slow” — within the context of this approach but that South Africa, nevertheless, has regular contact with Zimbabwe.
These regular discussions include the issue of the ”economic problems in that country”. The issue of ”the management of the opposition” has also been discussed.
Asked if the special relationship between Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF and the African National Congress makes the interactions between the countries better or worse, he said that the approach is ”the autonomy of sister formations”.
This implied that Zimbabwe’s government has the right to determine its own domestic policies.
SA deports Zimbabweans
Meanwhile, the South African Department of Home Affairs this week deported 1 600 Zimbabweans for breaching the country’s immigration laws, Harare’s Herald Online reported on Wednesday.
The locals were repatriated in 16 luxury buses through the Beitbridge border post.
Young men were the majority among the deportees, with a few women also in the group.
The deportees were kept at Lindela Detention Centre in Johannesburg for several weeks. Some did not have passports and visas while some had overstayed.
Business at the border post was disrupted as customs officials and travellers jostled to have a glimpse of the long chain of buses.
The deportees were later handed over to Zimbabwean police and the International Organisation Migration repatriates support centre, where they were counselled on safe migration before being provided with food and transport to their respective homes.
No comment could be obtained from the South African immigration officials.
Record inflation
Earlier this week, it was reported that Zimbabwe’s annual inflation leapt to a new record 1 593,6% in January, showing no respite in a crisis marked by chronic shortages of foreign exchange, food and fuel and unemployment of more than 80%.
Inflation, which the government has dubbed its number one enemy, is the highest in the world.
Critics blame President Robert Mugabe’s politically driven policies, including the seizure of land from white commercial farmers to resettle landless black people. The veteran leader says Zimbabwe is being sabotaged by his opponents.
The United States ambassador to Harare said in remarks published last Thursday that Zimbabwe is using Western sanctions imposed on Mugabe and his coterie as a convenient excuse to explain its economic meltdown.
”Neither the US nor any other country has imposed general sanctions on the Southern African nation,” Christopher Dell wrote in the independent Financial Gazette.
”Instead, what the US and others did was to target financial and travel sanctions at the roughly 100 individuals most responsible for undermining Zimbabwe’s prosperity and democracy.”
Mugabe and his ministers routinely blame an economic meltdown on targeted sanctions imposed on them by Washington and the European Union following the 2002 presidential polls, which the opposition says were rigged. — I-Net Bridge, Reuters, Sapa, AFP