The Zimbabwe government on Tuesday greeted with triumph news that a Commonwealth troika had decided to spare it from further sanctions, calling the decision a victory over colonialism.
The official Herald newspaper said the two African members of the troika, Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and Thabo Mbeki of South Africa ”did Africa proud” by out-voting Australia’s Prime Minister John Howard.
The troika met in Abuja, Nigeria on Monday, six months after it partially suspended Zimbabwe from the Commonwealth over flawed elections that returned President Robert Mugabe to power.
Howard backed full and immediate suspension of Zimbabwe, while Obasanjo and Mbeki wanted to continue to monitor the southern African country for another six months.
The three agreed that nothing had been done yet to address Commonwealth concerns that Mugabe had been re-elected
undemocratically. But Commonwealth secretary general Don McKinnon, along with Howard and Prime Minister Tony Blair of Zimbabwe’s former colonial power Britain, said the 54-member body intends to keep the pressure on.
Speaking on BBC radio, McKinnon said the Commonwealth had given Mugabe a 12-month period that expires on March 19 next year, to come into line before full suspension from the organization is considered.
”We are still remaining engaged,” he said. ”The Commonwealth is not just walking away from this. We are doing our best to remain engaged and try to influence.”
Blair and Howard agreed on Tuesday after meeting in London to keep up pressure, with the British leader reiterating his concern at the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe, a Foreign Office representative said.
Meanwhile, the Herald, which closely reflects government thinking, claimed Howard’s agenda was ”not to discuss the situation in Zimbabwe but to prescribe punishment to a country that had dared challenge colonial hegemony.”
Zimbabwe has accused white Commonwealth countries of trying to undermine a controversial land reform programme.
The government-backed scheme is aimed at redressing colonial imbalances in land ownership by the compulsory acquisition of white-owned farms, which are redistributed to landless blacks.
Aid agencies warn that the programme, which has resettled some 300 000 black families and aims to resettle many more, will aggravate a famine that threatens over half the country’s 12-million people, because the new landowners are not trained commercial farmers.
Zimbabwe’s main political opposition criticised the troika for being too lenient on Mugabe.
Welshman Ncube, the Secretary General of the Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) said the Commonwealth had missed ”an opportunity to take firm action.”
He said Obasanjo and Mbeki had given their assent to an ”unrepentant and unreforming” Mugabe and given him ”another six months to destroy the country.”
”Right now it (the government) is doing everything to subvert democratic processes in Zimbabwe,” he charged.
The Commonwealth suspended Zimbabwe from its political councils after its observer mission to the March presidential polls produced a report saying the election did not reflect the will of voters.
The Zimbabwe government rejected that report, which it described as flawed and one-sided, and accused the troika of acting unilaterally when it partially suspended Zimbabwe.
Masipula Sithole, a political science lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe, said the reprieve had not totally let Zimbabwe off the hook.
If there was no improvement in the next six months, the country could expect the ultimate censure — sanctions and full suspension from the body — he warned.
”I believe we have been given a long rope,” Sithole said. He described as ”premature” the glee in government circles over being spared further sanctions.
”We know what is coming,” he said. ”If we don’t improve within the next six months, we’re doomed.”
On Monday Zimbabwe’s Foreign Affairs Minister Stan Mudenge welcomed the panel’s decision, and invited the troika to come and assess the situation in Zimbabwe for themselves.
”Particularly we want Prime Minister Howard to come to Harare,” Mudenge said. ”He can come and see what he wants to see, he can discuss what he wants to discuss.” – Sapa-AFP