No one can be quite sure what's going on in Zimbabwe but if it results in the removal of Robert Mugabe from power, it can't be bad.
Once upon a time, Southern Rhodesia was a prosperous nation. Run by the descendants of the original white European settlers, it wasn't perfect but it was far from the mess it has since become. From the time of its independence in 1980 and the transfer of power from the government of Ian Smith to the tyranny and dictatorship of Mugabe, it has descended into utter chaos. In common with so many African countries, independence really meant the passing of power to tribal leaders whose ambitions were self-serving. Tribal animosity lead to murder and mayhem, with the winners then systematically enriching themselves at the expense of the common people.
In the newly named Zimbabwe, Mugabe won the struggle against Joshua Nkomo and established such a control that he has remained in power for 37 years; Prime Minister initially, then President once his opponents had been eliminated. Under his watch, white farmers have been driven from their lands, some being murdered while the government looked away. Inflation has reached levels never seen before anywhere in the world and the people have lived in abject poverty. Anyone who has spoken out against Mugabe has found themselves in deep trouble; the common people have lived in fear, terrorised by Mugabe's thugs.
Mugabe has undoubtedly robbed his nation of billions of pounds that will never be recovered. He has reduced his country to a state of such poverty and chaos that his going can only be a good thing, so long as whoever replaces him is not from his own circle of monstrous allies. Even then, it is unlikely that much will improve as tribal conflicts and loyalties plus self enrichment will continue to be at the forefront of any new regime.
When Harold MacMillan's "Winds of Change" swept through Africa from the late 1950s to 1980, little thought was given to what that really meant. Stable western style government was replaced with home grown administrations in countries riven by tribal and religious conflict. Tyrannical dictatorships arose everywhere, civil wars broke out, economies collapsed and the common people suffered. Despite this, the western world largely sat on its hands and did nothing to try to help a situation which it had created, other than to pour billions of pounds, dollars, franks and marks into the continent, to little effect. Much of the money was stolen by the brutal regimes which had taken control and, year after year, the same round of famine and disease occurred.
That this still continues is almost unbelievable. We are still annually asked for donations to help starving children in some part of Africa, these days most often in places such as Ethiopia, Somalia or Sudan, but with the same basic lack of success. The conflicts in these countries, and others, originates entirely from a misguided attempt by the Western World to hand power to local people, when the local people were simply not able to exercise it democratically. While they may have access to Sky television and the internet, play with mobile 'phones and X-Boxes, far too many of these people are basically medieval in social development.
Worst of all, South Africa is now heading rapidly down the same path as its corrupt leadership repeats everything that the likes of Mugabe have done before. Apartheid may not have been right but at least South Africa was a prosperous nation under the leadership of successive white governments. As with Southern Rhodesia, government by Europeans has been replaced with government by tribal leaders and the result is increasingly one of corruption and tribal in-fighting. Current President, Jacob Zuma, has faced so many charges of illegal activities that it is astonishing that he remains in office, but that's the way it is in Africa today. High officials exercise their tyrannical rule with an iron grip, and make money while the nations fall apart.
If anything proves how useless and toothless the United Nations is, it's the state of the continent of Africa. Idi Amin, Muammar Gaddafi, Jean-Bedal Bokassa, Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, Robert Mugabe and many, many others have destroyed their countries while enriching themselves, and the UN has stood by, powerless to intervene.
Will we never learn ?
No comments:
Post a Comment