Transcript

Host: This is “On The Line,” and I'm Eric Felten. In Zimbabwe, the government of President Robert Mugabe has revoked the licenses of all nongovernmental organizations, or N-G-Os. These include major relief organizations trying to bring food to Zimbabwe's starving population.

The action against the N-G-Os is part of an intensifying campaign of repression and violence by the Mugabe government against independent voices. Dozens of opposition leaders and others have been beaten and arrested. Demonstrations are increasing over the country’s economic collapse and the government’s failed policies. According to human-rights groups, government security forces are now targeting members of the general public as well as opposition and civic leaders.

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is one of those who was beaten and detained. He spoke out against President Mugabe’s harsh rule:

Tsvangirai: "Mugabe’s crackdown on our people leaves a trail of broken limbs, rape victims, torture victims, and dead bodies. Such is the reality of Zimbabwe today. The unprovoked and the continuing attacks on all Zimbabweans advocating for peaceful change must stop forthwith."

Host: President Mugabe's government has also threatened members of the international media and foreign diplomats. The Herald newspaper, a Zimbabwean government mouthpiece, publicly threatened the life of a British diplomat for drawing attention to police abuse of detainees. U-S State Department spokesman Tom Casey commented on the Mugabe government's attacks on Zimbabwe's political opposition:

Casey: "No one should face harassment, intimidation, and, as it increasingly appears, beatings and physical abuse simply for trying to get together and meet and freely express their views and freely talk about political issues. I think what this incident shows clearly to the international community is, again, the repressive nature of the Mugabe government and the lengths to which it will go to try and keep people from being able to participate in the political process."

Host: U-S Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice included Zimbabwe in a list of countries suffering from serious human-rights abuses:

Rice: Too often in the past year, we received painful reminders that human rights, though self-evident, are not self-enforcing and that mankind's desire to live in freedom, though universally deserved, is still not universally respected."

Host: What is the U-S doing to try to influence Zimbabwe's government and help the people of that country, and what should other countries in the region be doing? I'll ask my guests, Walter Kansteiner, former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and George Ayittey, distinguished economist in residence at American University and president of the Free Africa Foundation. Welcome. Thanks for joining us.

Walter Kansteiner, N-G-Os being kicked out when the country is in a crisis of starvation -- what's happening?

Kansteiner: It's the sign that the pluralistic system that we once knew in Zimbabwe is totally fraying and crumbling, and the N-G-Os were one of the last few independent organizations that were actually still up and running and allowed, and now they, too, have been shut down.

Host: George Ayittey, how serious is this crackdown on N-G-Os as part of the larger issue in Zimbabwe?

Ayittey: I think it demonstrates increasing paranoia of a government which has become a disgrace to Africa. Today Zimbabwe's independent twenty-seven years, but to most Zimbabweans, this is totally meaningless. Back in the 1980s, many of us looked up towards Robert Mugabe as the national hero for bringing independence to his people, but now he's turned himself into a murderous despot. This is not a type of freedom we ask for in Africa, and shutting down N-G-Os is not going to solve the problem. It's just that this is a desperate measure of a desperate regime to try to hang on to power.

Host: Walter Kansteiner, how desperate is this regime at this point?

Kansteiner: Well, you look at their economic situation. It is in an untenable position. It is the highest inflation rate in the world, hyperinflation. The economy is literally collapsing -- something like eighty percent unemployment. The political situation has become completely authoritarian. As George said, it is one that is ruled by a dictator. And, so, the situation is dire. People are taking to the streets. We saw the beating of Morgan Tsvangirai, one of the leaders of the opposition movement, and I believe that the Mugabe regime is feeling the pinch and they are getting desperate.

Host: George Ayittey, what happened with the economy of Zimbabwe? How bad are things, and how did they get there?

Ayittey: Well, the economy has totally collapsed. You have inflation running at seventeen hundred percent, which is the highest in the world. Unemployment, as Walter said -- it's about eighty percent. The currency is totally worthless. In addition to that, Zimbabwe has the highest HIV-infection rate in the world. It's just -- the economy is badly mismanaged. It all started with this forcible redistribution of land. That's a legitimate issue for Zimbabweans to resolve.

Host: Now, this was taking farmland that was owned by white farmers who had been there for some time.

Ayittey: Yeah. It was from the colonial era, when land was seized from the black population and given to the white farmers. So at independence, for example, the white minority or the white farmers owned some ninety percent of the best lands in Zimbabwe. I mean, it's a legitimate issue which needs to be resolved, but President Mugabe has so badly mismanaged. As a matter of fact, the U-S and U.K. put up money to redistribute land on a buyer-willing, seller-willing basis. Britain, for example, contributed more than sixty-four million dollars towards this program.

Host: What happened to the money?

Ayittey: It was totally mismanaged. Some of the land was bought, and Robert Mugabe gave this land to his cronies. It never really got -- much of the land never really got to the real people. It's total mismanagement of this particular land program. So, a lot of us -- some of us were saying, "Look, this man has had more than twenty years to resolve this issue and he has failed the people of Zimbabwe and therefore it is time for somebody else to try his hand at it."

Host: Well, Walter Kansteiner, we see this issue of redistribution of land, and yet what's ended up happening is a huge increase of the number of homeless people, people living in shanties, and then the Mugabe government has had this operation to clear the cities of people who are in shantytowns who have nowhere to go, nowhere to live.

Kansteiner: That's exactly right, and we're seeing two major demographic phenomena going on right now. One is the actual fleeing of the country. It's somewhere between three and four and a half million Zimbabweans have left their own country, trying to get away from this desperate political and economic situation.

Host: And where have they been going?

Kansteiner: Primarily Botswana and South Africa -- to the neighbors. Some have gone over to Mozambique, but most of the flow is south. The other phenomenon that we're seeing is the clearing of townships outside of Harare, particularly, where informal settlements have sprung up over the years. The economy is in desperate shape. People are living in very makeshift-type shelters. But the government came in and literally bulldozed these people's homes in the course of a week, so we had something like seven hundred and fifty to eight hundred thousand people homeless simply because the government decided they wanted to clear out potential political opposition hot spots.

Host: George Ayittey, has the government succeeded in bulldozing the opposition?

Ayittey: Well, the government -- number one, it hasn't tried, and even if it tried to, it will never succeed. As Walter pointed out -- I mean, clearing the slums in the area in Harare, for example, resulted in more than eight hundred thousand people being left homeless, and this is very maddening, because it makes you ask, "What have these people got to do with colonial legacies?" for example. These are people who the government have failed, and they are trying to help themselves. But, you see, this clearing of the slums was all politically motivated, because Mugabe suspected that those slum dwellers were for the opposition, so he wanted to clear them out of the cities.

Host: And yet Robert Mugabe asserts over and over that the opposition is somehow, as you mentioned, trying to do the bidding of former colonial powers and reasserting some kind of imperialism.

Ayittey: Well, that is an old hat. It's a trick which has been played by African governments and leaders whenever they become -- whenever they've grown unpopular with their region. They have to find some kind of an excuse, and the excuse is generally that the opposition is portrayed as being supported by Western colonialists and imperialists. It's all hogwash. As a matter of fact, if you go to the rural areas, for example, if you ask the real people -- I mean, colonialism has nothing to do with Mugabe gunning the money supply to print and overprint and overprint the currency. The colonialists have nothing to do with inflation running at seventeen hundred percent. Colonialism has nothing to do with unemployment. Colonialism doesn't have anything do with Mugabe building palaces for himself and keeping one hundred million in Malaysian banks, for example. The leadership simply -- The government simply refuses to take responsibility for its own failures.

Host: Let's talk a little bit about what the U-S is doing and perhaps should be doing with regard to Zimbabwe, and let's start by hearing what Condoleezza Rice has to say:

Rice: "We are recommitting ourselves to help new democracies deliver on their people's aspirations for a better life. We are recommitting ourselves to stand with those courageous men and women who struggle for their freedom and their rights. And we are recommitting ourselves... "

Host: The Bush Administration has made an issue of supporting democracies, of trying to support democratic opposition in countries. How does that play out in Zimbabwe? Does this have any particular application for Zimbabwe?

Kansteiner: The short answer is "I'm not sure." The very sound support that Secretary Rice just gave to those seeking democracy and pluralism is terrific rhetoric, and we all support it. How that is actually happening in the Bush Administration, I'm not sure.

Host: George Ayittey, what do you think the U-S can do and should be doing with regard to Zimbabwe at this point?

Ayittey: Well, I think, first of all, it's good that the Secretary of State has expressed the U-S's concern for the lack of democracy. I think the whole international community needs to condemn the serious violations of human rights in Africa, but Robert Mugabe's a disgrace to black Africa. We need to take a strong stand. The reason why I'm saying this is because -- I mean, if you look at the postcolonial African script, for example, I mean, we want independence. Our leaders granted us independence, won independence from the white colonial rule, but in country after country after country, these leaders run their countries into an economic slump -- starting from Ghana, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Kenya. We want to change this particular record. Africa is a continent which is rich in mineral resources, and it needs to reverse this particular economic decline. Yes, the international community needs to condemn these violations. We fought for freedom, but true freedom never came to much of Africa. I mean, if you look at Zimbabwe, for example, there's no freedom there. But I personally believe that African countries need to do more, especially South Africa.

Host: Well, let's talk about that. Walter Kansteiner, in South Africa, you have the president, Mbeki, who has said that there's really not that much that regional players can do to pressure Zimbabwe, and he said, "We just don't have a big enough stick." Is he underestimating the influence that regional players can have on Zimbabwe? Kansteiner: He probably is, but he's underestimating it in public, and it's interesting to see that the SADC leaders met in Dar es Salaam.

Host: And SADC is?

Kansteiner: SADC is the Southern African neighbors of Zimbabwe. And they all met in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, just a couple weeks ago, including President Mugabe, and, clearly, there were some backroom negotiation, and there was some pressure that I think was probably applied to President Mugabe on political ways out of this mess. Now, everyone came out from the meeting and said, "We, of course, are all supportive of our neighbors, and we look for peaceful and proper political avenues to pursue this problem," all kind of nice-nice talk. But I hope behind the scenes there was some tough datelines laid down, some redlines, some markers articulated to Mugabe, and I'm hoping that we'll see, in the next few months, some of those true, hard targets that some of the leaders in the neighborhood have laid down come to fruition.

Host: Now, President Mbeki has said that the solution for Zimbabwe is to focus on elections coming up -- new elections. Here is what one of the opposition leaders, Morgan Tsvangirai, had to say about the prospect for elections in Zimbabwe:

Tsvangirai: "How do you go into an election when the opposition is being battered? How do you go in an election when there's no freedom of assembly, freedom of expression, the media is banned? How do you go in an election when the very same machine running the election is militarized?"

Host: What are the prospects for opening up any space for there to be an actually freely contested election in Zimbabwe?

Ayittey: Well, the possibility of that is zero, and I think President Mbeki is being disingenuous in the fact that, look, the mechanism which was used to dismantle apartheid in South Africa is exactly the same mechanism which needs to be used to dismantle the tyrannical rule that we have in Zimbabwe.

Host: And how would that work?

Ayittey: We in Africa have our own way of resolving our own crises. If you go back into the villages, the chief will convene a village meeting, put an issue before the people, the people will debate it and come to a consensus. This was modernized into a sovereign national conference. This was what Benin used to establish democratic rule. Sadly, the same mechanism that South Africa used was called -- in South Africa, it was called a convention for a democratic South Africa. Representatives of all political parties and all aspects of civil society all gathered and hammered out a sort of consensus of how to move the country forward. That's exactly the same mechanism that we need in Zimbabwe. South Africa -- In South Africa, Thabo Mbeki tried to sell that model to the Israelis and the Palestinians, and it's time he sold that model to his neighboring country -- to his neighbor Zimbabwe.

Host: Walter Kansteiner, what are the prospects for some kind of model like that?

Kansteiner: Well, I think, I'm afraid, that Morgan Tsvangirai has it right. How can you expect to have a free and fair election when you have none of the mechanisms of a pluralistic society? You have no freedom of expression. You have no political-party rights. As soon as a gathering, political or otherwise, is brought together, it is immediately hammered, physically hammered -- arrested, thrown in jail. So to assume that there is going to be a free and fair election under the current rules, under the current administration, is pretty far-fetched.

Host: George Ayittey, is there more that the U-S can be doing to put pressure on Zimbabwe?

Ayittey: Well, the U-S could -- not directly, but the U-S could work through, let's say, the African Union, for example. The U-S also could work through SADC, for example, because SADC draws part of its budget from Western sources, Western donors, for example. Some pressure could be exerted through there.

Host: What about the UN, Walter Kansteiner?

Kansteiner: I think the UN does have a role to play, and my hope is, in fact, that the Security Council will start addressing some of these Zimbabwe issues, and we'll see. The new Secretary General might just be able to do that.

Host: And what room, George Ayittey, is there for the opposition, civil society, in Zimbabwe to try to make some progress given the attacks they've been under from the government?

Ayittey: Well, this is where the prospects to make progress there is very bleak. It's bleak because, look, Mugabe controls all the levels of power. In order for civil society to operate, we need to have some kind of a free space, and for that, you need to have a free and independent media. That's number one. Number two, you also have to have some neutral and professional security forces so that people can go into the streets and sort of petition their government, protest if they want to, and not be clubbed. But, you see, you don't have these institutions in Zimbabwe. You don't have even basic respect for freedom of expression. Look, there wasn't any freedom of expression. Mr. Mugabe should look at African Union's own charter of people's human rights. Article Nine of that currently is freedom of expression. And Zimbabwe's a signatory to that particular charter for human and people's rights. Why is it violating those rights?

Host: Walter Kansteiner, what's your sense on what strategy or room there may be for the opposition in Zimbabwe to try to get their voices heard?

Kansteiner: Well, I think the opposition is relying on outside help, in particular, the neighborhood. I think that Morgan Tsvangirai went to South Africa. He's looking for some kind of assurances from the South Africans, from the SADC leaders, that space will be carved out for the political opposition in Zimbabwe, and the guarantors of that space are going to have to be the African leaders in the neighborhood. I think that's his strategy and that's his hope. I think that's probably as good a strategy as he can rely on right now, and our hope is that those neighborhood leaders take him up on it and, in fact, rise to the occasion and do provide that space.

Host: George Ayittey, we have about thirty seconds left. Where do you think things head now in Zimbabwe?

Ayittey: Well, you know, some of us are trying to mobilize Zimbabweans in the diaspora, you know. We're forming a Zimbabwe coalition for change, and I think that Zimbabweans in a diaspora could play a very important role in bringing about change in terms of supplying resources and advice to the opposition parties at home. We want to see a peaceful change in Zimbabwe. We don't want Zimbabwe to blow up like Rwanda or Somalia or Burundi or Liberia.

Host: I'm afraid that's going to have to be the last word for today. We're out of time. But I'd like to thank my guests, Walter Kansteiner, former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and George Ayittey of American University. I'd like to invite you to send us your questions or comments. You can reach us through our website at www.voanews.com/ontheline. For "On the Line," I'm Eric Felten.