IT is now three weeks since the Mail & Guardian disclosed the horrific details of the report compiled by Zimbabwe’s Truth and Justice Commission on the atrocities in Matabeleland. The only response has come from Robert Mugabe, who denounced those responsible for the report as “mischief- makers” and declared: “If we dig up history then we wreck the nation.”
For the president of a country to describe as “mischief-makers” those who disclose the murders of his citizens boggles the mind. As for his views on history we would commend to him the words of the Spanish philosopher, Jos Ortega y Gasset: “We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.”
Zimbabwe’s Catholic bishops have, to date, failed to release the report although its contents are widely known. Their failure can only be ascribed to fear of the president. We hesitate to accuse others of lack of courage, but their pusillanimity sits uneasily with the church of martyrs.
But it is with regard to South Africa’s response, or lack of it, that we nurse a feeling of betrayal. Nelson Mandela made a state visit to Zimbabwe this week. He failed to visit Matabeleland, or its capital Bulawayo. In all the speeches he made we have not been able to discover so much as a veiled reference to the atrocities.
How can we claim leadership of an African renaissance if we fail the moral imperative to make a stand on our neighbour’s infamy ?