Maravi

West’s hidden hand exposed

West’s hidden hand exposed

THIS is the last part of a series in which STEVEN GOWANS looks at the West’s attempts to effect illegal regime change in Zimbabwe by sponsoring rightwing political groups and terrorist activities. IT’S not President Mugabe per se that Washington and London and white commercial farmers in Zimbabwe want to overthrow. It’s his policies they want to be rid of, and they want to replace his policies with their own, very different, policies. There are at least five reasons why Washington and London want to oust President Mugabe, none of which have anything to do with human rights.

The first reason to "chase" President Mugabe from power is that in the late 1990’s his Government abandoned International Monetary Fund-mandated structural adjustment programmes — programmes of bleeding people dry to pay interest on international debt.

These are policies of currency devaluation, severe social programme cuts — anything to free up money to pay down debt, no matter what the human consequences are.

The second is that President Mugabe sent troops to the Democratic Republic of Congo to bolster the Kabila government. This interfered with Western designs in the region.

The third is that many of President Mugabe’s economic policies are not congenial to the current neo-liberal orthodoxy.

For example, President Mugabe recently announced the nationalisation of a diamond mine, which seems to be, in the current climate, an anachronism.

If you nationalise anything these days, you are called radical and out of date. The MDC — which promotes the neo-liberal tyranny — wants to privatise everything. It is for this reason that President Mugabe talks about the opposition wanting to sell off Zimbabwe’s resources.

The State continues to operate State-owned enterprises. And the Government imposes performance requirements on foreign investors. For example, you may be required to invest part of your profits in Government bonds. Or you may be required to take on a local partner. Foreign investors or governments that represent them bristle at these conditions.

The fourth is that British companies dominate the Zimbabwean economy and the British government would like to protect the investments of British banks, investors and corporations.

If you read the British Press, you will find a fixation on Zimbabwe, one you won’t find elsewhere.

Why does Britain take such a keen interest in the internal affairs of Zimbabwe? The usual answer is that Britain has a special interest in Zimbabwe because it is the country’s former colonial master, but why should Britain’s former colonial domination of Zimbabwe heighten its interest in the country?

The answer is that colonisation paved the way for economic domination of the country by British corporations, investors and banks — and the domination carries on as a legacy of Britain’s former colonial rule.

If you are part of the British ruling class or one of its representatives, what you want in a country in which you have enormous investments is a trustworthy local ruler who will look after them.

Arthur Mutambara, who was educated in Britain and lived there, and has absorbed the imperialist point of view, is, from the perspective of the British ruling class, far more attractive than President Mugabe as a steward of its interests.

Finally, Western powers would like to see President Mugabe replaced by a trustworthy steward who will abandon the fast-track land reform programme, which, apart from violating sacrosanct principles of the capitalist church, if allowed to thrive, becomes a model to inspire the indigenous rural populations of neighbouring countries.

Governments in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand also look askance at President Mugabe’s land reform policy, and wish to see it overturned, for fear it will inspire their own aboriginal populations.

President Mugabe’s Government accelerated its land redistribution programme in the late 1990s, breaking with the completely unworkable, willing-buyer/willing-seller policy that only allowed the Government to redistribute the country’s arable land after the descendants of the former colonial settlers, absentee landlords and some members of the British House of Lords were done using it, and, therefore, willing to sell.

Britain, which had pledged financial assistance to its former colony to help buy the land, reneged, leaving Harare without the means to expropriate with compensation the vast farms dominated by the tiny minority of white descendants of British colonists.

Zimbabwe finally abandoned the willing-buyer/willing-seller formula in 1997. The formula was crippled from the start by parsimonious British funding, and it was clear that the programme’s modest goals were more than Great Britain was willing to countenance.

In a letter to the Zimbabwean Minister of Agriculture in November of that year, British Secretary of State for International Development Clare Short wrote: "I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe." Referring to earlier British assistance funding, Short curtly stated: "I am told that there were discussions in 1989 and 1996 to explore the possibility of further assistance. However, that is all in the past."

Short complained of "unresolved" issues, such as "the way in which land would be acquired and compensation paid — clearly it would not help the poor of Zimbabwe if it was done in a way which undermined investor confidence".

Short was concerned about the interests of corporate investors, then. In closing, Short wrote that "a programme of rapid land acquisition as you now seem to envisage would be impossible for us to support", as it would damage the "prospects for attracting investment"

It was only after President Mugabe embarked on this accelerated land reform programme that Washington and London initiated their campaign of regime change, pressuring President Mugabe’s Government with sanctions, expulsion from the Commonwealth, assistance to the opposition, and the usual Manichean demonisation of the target government and angelisation of the Western-backed opposition.

The MDC, by comparison, favours a return to the unworkable willing-seller/willing-buyer regimen. The policy is unworkable because Harare hasn’t the money to buy the farms, Britain is no longer willing to finance the programme, and even if the money were available, the owners have to agree to sell their farms before the land can be redistributed.

Land reform under this programme will necessarily proceed at a snail’s pace.

One thing opponents and supporters of President Mugabe’s Government agree on is that the opposition is trying to oust the President (illegally and unconstitutionally if you acknowledge the plan is not limited to victory at the polls).

So which came first? Attempts to overthrow Zimbabwe’s Zanu-PF Government, or the Government’s crackdown on the opposition?

According to the Western media spin, the answer is the Government’s "harsh crackdown" on the opposition.

President Mugabe’s Government is accused of being inherently authoritarian, greedy for power for power’s sake, and willing do anything — from stealing elections to cracking skulls — to hang on to its privileged position.

This is the typical slander levelled at the heads of governments the US and UK have trouble with, from Milosevic in his day, to Kim Jong Il, to Castro. Another view is that the Government’s authoritarianism is an inevitable reaction to circumstances that are unfavourable to the attainment of its political (not its leaders’ personal) goals.

President Mugabe’s Government came to power at the head of a movement that not only sought political independence, but aspired to reverse the historical theft of land by white settlers.

That the opposition would be fierce and merciless — has been so — was inevitable.

Reaction to the opposition, if the Government and its anti-colonial agenda were to survive, would need to be equally fierce and merciless.

At the core of the conflict is a clash of right against right: the right of white settlers to enjoy whatever benefits stolen land yields in profits and rent against the right of the original owners to reclaim their land.

Allied to this is a broader struggle for economic independence, which sets the rights of investors and corporations abroad to profit from untrammelled access to Zimbabwe’s labour, land and resources and the right of Zimbabweans to restrict access on their own terms to facilitate their own economic development.

The dichotomy of personal versus political motivation as the basis for the actions of maligned governments recurs in debates over whether this or that leader or movement ought to be supported or reviled.

The personal view says that all leaders are corrupt, chase after personal glory, power and wealth, and dishonestly manipulate the people they profess to champion.

The political view doesn’t deny the personal view as a possibility, but holds that the behaviour of leaders is constrained by political goals.

"Even George Bush who rigs elections and manipulates news in order to stay in office and who clearly enjoys being ‘the War President’, wants the presidency in order to carry out a particular programme with messianic fervour," points out Richard Levins.

"He would never protect the environment, provide healthcare, guarantee universal free education, or separate church and state, just to stay in office." .

l Steven Gowans is a writer and political activist based in Ottawa, Canada.

Labels: NEOCONSERVATISM, NEOLIBERALISM, ZIMBABWE

posted by MrK @ 11:23 AM