Africa

On the whole I’ve been pretty supportive of condemnation of Robert Mugabe coming from London and especially from Prime Minister Gordon Brown. It is thus disquieting to discover that perhaps Brown’s words represent bluster and palaver. When the rubber meets the road, Zimbabweans looking to England to escape Mugabe’s noxious kleptocracy are having a tough go of it.  According to a report from IRIN:

The British government’s loud condemnation of human rights abuses in Zimbabwe led many Zimbabweans to assume they could find easy refuge in the United Kingdom: the reality for asylum seekers has been far less straightforward.

According to Home Office figures, around 20,000 Zimbabweans sought asylum in Britain between 2000 and 2007; of those, 4,807 applications were successful - 944 of that total making it on appeal.

In 2000 - a year of state-sponsored election violence and land seizures in Zimbabwe - 95 percent of 1,010 asylum applications were refused. In 2002, after European governments condemned the conduct of presidential elections held in March, 62 percent of 7,655 applications were rejected. 

The number of asylum applications by Zimbabweans fell sharply from 2002, but in 2006 began to rise, reaching 1,650 requests; the trend continued in 2007, according to the Home Office. Successful applications, in terms of initial asylum decisions made before appeals are heard, were stuck at just 8 percent between 2004 and 2006, but rose to 19 percent in the last quarter of 2007.

A Home Office spokesperson, speaking to IRIN on condition of anonymity, denied that the immigration department was setting the bar unfairly high for Zimbabweans. “We know that the human rights situation is bad in Zimbabwe, but not everyone is at risk,” she said. “Every case is treated on its own merits and those who need protection will get it; the remainder would be encouraged to go back voluntarily, failing which they will be removed forcibly.”

It’s awfully easy to condemn, to tsk tsk from afar, or even to refuse to attend meetings with African nations if someone like Mugabe is going to be present. Those are acts of shallow statesmanship. Symbolically powerful, perhaps, and more than what the leaders of other nations have bothered to do, but still fairly low-hanging fruit. But the hard part is to take the action that will improve the lives of those suffering under the regime you have castgayed, rightly, as abhorrent. If Mugabe has turned his country into a hellishly brutal realm, London of all places owes the Zimbabwean people some form of succor. Granting asylum is only one means of providing redress, but it is also one easily available to Brown, Parliament, and the Home Office. Talk is cheap, Mr. Prime Minister.

The EU-Africa summit kicks off tonight in grand style. The central figure in the drama that plays out will still be Robert Mugabe whose very inclusion in the meeting has been the source of much debate in the past few months. Still a hero to a few but a pariah to most, the wily despot, who recently announced that only “friendly nations” will be allowed to observe next year’s elections, will almost assuredly be the center of attention for much of the meeting.

Gordon Brown has every right to boycott the summit, and quite a lot of justification, but an even better approach might be for those leaders who do attend the summit to confront Mugabe frontally. This would give Mugabe the platform that many will dread him having, and will inevitably give him a chance to denounce his critics as imperialists and puppets, but he’s likely to do that anyway. What would be most reassuring would be if some African heads of state, even those who believed Mugabe has every right to attend the meeting, broke their silence to condemn Mugabe’s brutal regime.

It looks like British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has failed in his campaign to prevent Robert Mugabe from being invited to December’s summit of European and African leaders in Portugal. Further, Brown is meeting with resistance to his proposal that the European union send an envoy to deal with the Zimbabwe crisis. Those African leaders who continue to stand by Zimbabwe at least can hide behind the (very) thin reed of Pan-Africanism and loyalty to someone they still accord status as a former liberation hero. But what excuse do the Europeans have?

Although Brown effectively put the organizers of the summit in a him-or-me situation that some might see as blackmail, the reality remains that given a choice between having the legitimate Prime Minister of England and the ferocious dictator of Zimbabwe attend the summit, many, including the European leadership, pathetically went with Mugabe. Let us at least hope that this decision proves to be the catalyst for other leaders turning their back on the summit. A Europe-Africa meeting is vital. Mugabe’s presence at such a gathering is anything but.

Gordon Brown remains steadfast in his refusal to attend any Europe-Africa summit in which Robert Mugabe is allowed to participate. At least a few African leaders are rallying around Mugabe, who is on his way to New York where he will attend the meeting of the General Assembly. Prepare for rhetorical brickbats to come from Zim’s wily tyrant. Already his sycophants in the press have gone after Brown, with political columnist Nathaniel Manheru writing in Harare’s government mouthpiece The Herald: “Mugabe stands very tall and black. Brown stands white and colonial.”

But keep in mind as the verbs and adjectives fly that not only is Brown on the right side in this debate, but that his view reflects that of masses in Zimbabwe who have been victims of Mugabe’s betrayal of his people for the sake of his own power and aggrandizement. Mugabe will use his bully pulpit. We know this to be true. But the words he speaks will be bitter but empty, sound and fury signifying nothing except his scorn for human rights, democratic processes, and his own people.

Yesterday I asserted the following:

As long as there is progress, however tentative and cosmetic, an outside world that has been loath even to think about intervening in Zimbabwe is going to continue to stand pat. This is Thabo Mbeki’s roll of the dice. If these reforms prove effective, he will deserve a large proportion of the credit. But if they fail, and it is easy to succumb to pessimism and argue that they will, it all lands in Mbeki’s lap.

Well, not surprisingly, South Africa appears quite pleased with the progress in Zimbabwe. Even a man whistling past a graveyard sounds happy with himself. But perhaps South Africa really is helping to clear the logjam to its north. As the most powerful nation in the region, South Africa ought to have tremendous influence.

But what is more surprising is that I appear to have been wrong, at least to some extent, about the effect that recent developments might have on the western powers, and especially the US and UK. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has vowed to boycott December’s summit of African and European leaders if Robert Mugabe is invited. Even more significantly, he requested his fellow heads of state to follow suit. Now Brown’s threats and blandishments largely represent commitments of omission — promises not to do things — as opposed to commitments of commission, which would require actual action, but they strike me as at minimum symbolically significant, and might lead to more tangible accomplishment.

And of course we can already anticipate president Mugabe’s apoplectic response: The accusations of neocolonialism! The colorful insults! The stubborn refusal to yield an inch! And did I mention the accusations and the name calling? But hopefully Mugabe’s act will begin wearing thin not only among western leaders, but more crucially among African leaders who are far better able to dismiss Mugabe’s vitriolic fulminations and whose absence from the upcoming meeting would speak volumes. If only a few African heads of state take the lead, a deluge might just follow.