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Bottom of the abyss

Dec 05 2008 06:00

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'No worse there is none," was the anguished cry of poet Gerard Manley Hopkins -- and it is an apt description of the crisis in Zimbabwe. Time and again since the early 2000s, that tortured country seemed to have reached the bottom of the abyss, only to fall still further.

This week's riots by soldiers have been widely read as marking the beginning of the end. The security forces are Robert Mugabe's only remaining source of power. If he can't keep them on his side, surely his days must be numbered?

Alas, not necessarily. A fraction of Zimbabwe's 30 000-strong army, mainly junior officers, rampaged through the streets of Harare this week, and there was no evidence of an organised mutiny.

The top echelons of the military remain loyal to Mugabe, as do the dreaded military police. The disturbances seem to have been contained for now; significantly, soldiers did not join a protest against currency restrictions by citizens. Observers believe their intention was to try to influence the Zanu-PF congress next week.

As a provider of basic services and a framework for economic activity, the Zimbabwean state has collapsed. The cholera epidemic highlights its inability to furnish the most elementary health services; water supplies have broken down; roads are disintegrating; schools cannot teach; hyperinflation has destroyed the currency.

But those are problems only for the suffering masses. The ruling kleptocracy, with its access to fuel and foreign exchange through the state, its private boreholes and its ability to source food and health services from South Africa, can hang on for many months yet.

This is why Mugabe has refused to concede real power to the Movement for Democratic Change, despite losing an election. It is pointless for Thabo Mbeki to try to strong-arm Morgan Tsvangirai into signing an agreement that leaves the same criminals in charge and has no hope of inducing the West to release the rescue funds essential for economic recovery.

Forget about negotiations -- they will solve nothing. The time has come for radical measures by the region, spearheaded by South Africa. The bottom line must be the imposition of "smart' sanctions against the ruling clique, of the kind already applied by the EU and the US, to sever their lifeline to South Africa.

Zimbabwe must be suspended from the SADC and excluded from its consultations. And as Botswana's foreign minister has proposed, the final response to continued intransigence must be comprehensive regional sanctions, which would block Zimbabwe's exports and cut off fuel and electricity supplies.

CONTINUES BELOW

For the citizenry the pain would be acute, but hopefully brief. Their plight could hardly be worse than it is at present, and the harsh fact is that there is no possibility of it improving until the octogenarian dictator and his key lieutenants step off the political stage. It is time for South Africa to abandon Mbeki's failed policies of appeasement and to provide real leadership.

Battle of the spin
The art of political communication is lost. In the past months activists and politicians have eschewed all notion of the cerebral and have gone animal. They have called each other snake, baboon and cockroach as ANC members, past and present, have failed to cope with the momentous political changes in their ranks. It's sad.

The ANC and its allied mass democratic movement was always a party of deep and often exhaustive debate where the descent into the simian was not tolerated. Now, it's all changed. When ideas failed and loyalties split, the ANC president first resorted to name-calling.

He referred to former president Thabo Mbeki as a snake and then called his party's splintered members "snakes". It's gone down the evolutionary chain since then and arguably taken political life to sewer level.

Good then that the Congress of the People (Cope) has invested in two dynamic spin doctors who can raise the tone of South African debate. JJ Tabane and Sipho Ngwema are former award-winning government spokesmen.

Tabane worked at the environment and tourism department where he was a wily communicator and, of course, Ngwema made the Scorpions as popular as Marvel comic super-heroes when he was tasked with showing South Africa what they were about. He did a zealous job, inviting the media along on raids and allowing us into the sting factory.

Of course, the jury's out on whether that was a good thing for the crime-fighters, as they have now been hung out to dry by politicians, but there is little doubt that Ngwema knows how to promote new organisations.

Over at Luthuli House, political communication is stuck in a Nineties rut. Neither spokesperson Jessie Duarte nor her second in command Carl Niehaus seems to know how to sell the post-Polokwane ANC and both get stuck in fighting a rear-guard battle with the new kid on the block.

By focusing on the name of the new party and using every platform to lambaste the splinter group, the ANC's spokespeople show they are worried about the impact in next year's election.

So while the two may complain that the media are fixated with Cope, that's not quite true. By choosing a communication campaign that is defensive and not lateral-minded, they have turned Cope into the David facing a lumbering old Goliath. And that was before Tabane and Ngwema were hired. If the two are to succeed, they should focus not on what's wrong with the ANC, but with what's right about the newcomers.

Many South Africans are happy to stick with the ANC because it has delivered on grants, houses, electricity and water to many poor communities. But there is also a large cohort of South Africans seeking a new political home. Political communication was never at a greater premium and on this score at least, the ruling party is simply not coping.

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Comments

Zimbabwe and South Africa! In both countries, the 'liberation movements' that have proved themselves as ruling parties to be corrupt, callous, incompetent and self-interested have long passed their 'use-by' date. And the SADC is no better, as it's just a cronies' club, with Botswana the exception.

The days are numbered for Zanu-PF and the ANC. We shall hope that their implosion and removal from power will lead to a new order of political responsibility and honesty, not only in these two countries but in the Southern African region. Then at last the ordinary African citizen may start to be served by government instead of being exploited, duped, robbed, threatened and oppressed.

Citizen Mntu on December 5, 2008, 4:26 pm

To tabo mbeki ("t" and "m" in small caps)

Am a proud Zimbabwean and won't hesitate to call a spade a spade, a shovel a shovel regarding the problems bedeviling our beautiful country. in as much as pple blame Robert Mugabe for whats happening in ZIm, alas its not but some South African called thabo mbeki. Consider this, Thabo was rejected by his own people as incompetent and i still don't know why he thinks he is mandated to Oversea whats happening in Zimbabwe. many a times he has refused to tell the truth to the international community about the evils taking place in my country all perpetrated by Mugabe and Zanu. SAD SAD SAD SAD and SAD indeed. u are a shame to Africa thabo and when they say Africa is not in a position to solve its own problems they will be referring to ppl;e like u. Zimbabweans are by and large a smart lot (most of them are smarter than thabo especially those who attempted and passed ZJC) and they always angry to hear you, thabo, blatantly about the situation in our country. u have dismally failed to groom black south africans into a educated and proud people......al u were worried about was Zimbabwe as if u are a Zimbabwean. Shame shame shame on you thabo!

i recall vividly when SA won the rugby world cup when some English players and some white south africans refused to shake your hand. at first i sympathised with you but gees they were bloody right. u are disgrace to South Africa and Africa as a whole. LASTLY.....u need to go and take up more english lessons.....pathetic grammar and oral skills u have mate.

Loveless Doit on December 5, 2008, 11:02 pm

Ah the wonder and magic of one-man-one-vote.

Dennis Hoines on December 6, 2008, 10:50 am

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