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Mugabe in the dock

Nelson Mandela’s verdict on the situation in Zimbabwe offers guidance to an international community that is trying to hold back the Robert Mugabe regime from unleashing further violence and chaos on its own people. The great man recently declared that there has been “a tragic failure of leadership in our neighbouring Zimbabwe.” Mr. Mugabe’s regime has lost all legitimacy after his minions unleashed a violent campaign to intimidate voters ahead of a presidential election run-off scheduled for June 27. To go by the total of the vote counts posted at each polling station after the first round in March 2008, Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, had come out ahead. But the election commission, which is controlled by the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front, decided after a long delay that Mr. Tsvangirai must face a run-off since he did not win 50 per cent of the vote. In the weeks leading up to June 27, ZANU-PF thugs have systematically targeted for beatings and torture MDC activists; government officials who conducted the March elections fairly; and even people who happened to live in districts that had voted heavily for the opposition. Given the possibility that his supporters and party activists could be killed if they turned up at the voting booths, Mr. Tsvangirai decided not to contest the run-off.

Mr. Mugabe is bent upon proceeding with the farcical exercise. Some of the countries in Zimbabwe’s neighbourhood, with the notable exception of South Africa, have urged him to refrain from doing so. Angola, Tanzania, and Swaziland are trying to set up a new mechanism for mediation between the ZANU-PF and the MDC. Mr. Tsvangirai has agreed to take part in negotiations provided the run-off is postponed; armed international peace-keepers are posted to curb the violence; MDC prisoners are released; humanitarian organisations are allowed to operate freely; and the parliament elected in March is sworn in. But there is no indication that Mr. Mugabe — who has insisted that negotiations, if they need to be held at all, can start only after the run-off — will accept any of these conditions. Once upon a time, Mr. Mugabe was a genuine hero of his nation’s liberation struggle, which triumphed in 1979. He became a hero to all Africans when he swept to power on a popular wave in 1980. His radical land reform promised a great deal. Today his regime has become a byword for authoritarianism, human rights abuse, vote-rigging, and misrule — which has landed Zimbabwe’s economy in a mess and driven its people to breaking point. Mr. Mandela speaks for Zimbabwe’s neighbours, for Africa as a whole, and for the democratic international community when he calls attention to this tragedy of failed leadership.

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