The controversial Operation Murambatsvina and President Thabo Mbeki’s role in the Zimbabwean crisis has heightened divisions within Zimbabwe’s two major political parties, and has caused ructions within the diaspora.
Opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai is taking strain for ”betraying” the party by meeting Mbeki in Pretoria on the eve of the African Union summit. A senior MDC official told the Mail & Guardian: ”That’s why we are angry with Tsvangirai. He did not have the courage to tell or remind Mbeki of our national executive resolution not to engage him as a mediator.”
On Wednesday Tsvangirai told journalists that Mbeki had conceded that quiet diplomacy had not worked and was now seeking to ”engage [President Robert] Mugabe with new strategies”. Party sources say Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo had mooted former Mozambican President Joachim Chissano as a new mediator, but that ”Mbeki rejected that because he thought Chissano wasn’t going to have enough leverage. Mbeki felt that only he could sway Mugabe and Tsvangirai agreed with him.”
This faction within the MDC is also disillusioned with the party’s ”tame response” of merely condemning the demolition of shacks and market stalls and is advocating a more militant approach. The evictions have also opened up Mugabe to uncharacteristic criticism from heavyweights within the ruling Zanu-PF. The M&G has learnt that the dissent cuts across the party’s traditional factions, with both the old guard and young turks expressing their displeasure with the ”implementation” of operation Murambatsvina.
Among those who have railed against it are Vice-President Joyce Mujuru, her rival in the party succession race, Emmerson Mnangagwa, party chair John Nkomo and Zanu-PF information chief Nathan Shamuyarira. ”Unlike before, it’s no longer the case that Mugabe barks instructions,” a Zanu-PF insider said. The source said that the party is also split on dialogue with the opposition. Some young turks were keen that the party return to the negotiating table, but the old guard believes ”that the ideological chasm is so huge that there is no way of finding a workable solution”.
Mbeki’s role in Zimbabwe also came under fire at a protest outside London’s Guild Hall last week. The Zimbabwean newspaper, run by exiled journalists based in London, reports that demonstrators trashed South African fruit and wine. ”We are not anti-South African, simply determined to make our point that President Mbeki can make all the difference if he recognises publicly what is going on next door,” the organisers said. ”Does Mbeki condone what Mugabe is doing? If he does, and this certainly seems to be the case, then perhaps we are doing our friends in South Africa a favour — maybe Mbeki is thinking along the same lines as Mugabe,” protester Sean Robinson is quoted as saying.
The trampling of wine, fruit and vegetables was accompanied by a call to boycott South African produce. But members of the recently formed Zimbabwean Diaspora Coalition in the United Kingdom admonished their compatriots for ”a naïve action … which, in the context of chronic food insecurity at home, is stunningly insensitive and misdirected”.
The group acknowledges that Mbeki and others who ”prop up” the government are ”legitimate targets”, they said it was a ”spiteful slap in the face for the workers” who harvested and packaged the goods for export and the Congress of South African Trade Unions who ”have offered soli-darity with ordinary Zimbabweans and consistent condemnation of Mugabe’s despotism”.
The recent ANC National General Council resolved that there should be more urgency in addressing the Zimbabwean situation. On Tuesday Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and Deputy Minister of Finance Jabu Moleketi met Mugabe and his deputy, Joyce Mujuru, in Harare. The M&G has learnt that paying for Zimbabwe’s fuel supplies and assisting the country with much-needed foreign currency was discussed on the day-long trip. The government talks came on the same day that a group of South African clergy returned with a damning account of the demolitions. ”Young people who could be agents for change may be catalysts for conflict as they are exposed to the hopelessness of their parents,” said the church leaders in their report. ”This deliberate destruction … is unparalleled in modern-day Africa.”
Their observations came a few days after United Nations special envoy Anna Tibaijuka concluded her fact-finding mission. Her report is expected in two weeks’ time.
Sugar cane could solve Zim’s fuel shortage
Zimbabwe has approached multi-national giant Anglo-American to revive an ethanol plant in the country’s lowveld region to try to fix a crippling fuel crisis that has worsened because of rising world oil prices.
ZimOnline reports that the government was offering to return some of the land it had forcibly seized from Anglo in the last five years as a sweetener for the deal.
Anglo built the ethanol processing plant at the height of international sanctions against the government of Ian Smith. The plant produced ethanol from sugar cane grown on vast estates owned by Anglo and other firms.
The process of distilling sugar into ethanol that has a high alcohol content, before it is mixed with petrol, is a low-cost way of producing fuel. Zimbabwe’s fuel stations have run dry as the country battles to generate foreign currency to pay for supplies.
Minister of Energy and Power Development Mike Nyambuya would not confirm the government’s move but said Harare was doing everything possible to secure fuel ”given the difficult” circumstances. Anglo officials would not be drawn on the matter.
”Let me say we have approached Anglo on how we can work together to find a lasting solution to the fuel problems, and we have identified the ethanol plant as one of the critical areas we should start with,” said a senior government official who refused to be identified. The official said Anglo had concerns about the economic viability of the project. — ZimOnline,/i>