via We won’t kneel to West — President | The Herald March 16, 2015
JAPAN is warming up to Zimbabwe after slightly over a decade of frosty relations, President Mugabe said yesterday. The President, who is attending the United Nations 3rd World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction here, said Japan had shown a regrettable tendency to “listen to the West” over its foreign policy on Zimbabwe, in the process poisoning relations between the two countries.
“We’ve a Look East Policy that means deal with Japan, India, Malaysia, and Indonesia and co-operate together. We’ve some Japanese level of co-operation, but it could be better and I think Japan also tended to listen to the West as it criticised us and naturally tended to withdraw, but it’s only now that it’s warming up again towards us,” President Mugabe told a Japanese TV station following a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe.
“We’ve been dealing with China openly, India quite openly, so why not other people?”
President Mugabe granted an interview to the TV station on the sidelines of the conference.
Even as he spoke about Zimbabwe-Japan relations, the President said Western countries that had demonised Zimbabwe over the last 15 years after the country began a programme of land reclamation from descendants of white colonial settlers were now back-pedalling furiously.
“Western countries didn’t want to deal with us. It’s only now that they are coming forward, but we won’t go down and kneel,” he insisted.
He said Zimbabwe has natural resources like gold, diamonds, platinum and coal among other minerals that needed capital to convert into wealth. But Zimbabwe, he emphasised, would rather deal only with allies who share the same vision.
“We don’t want a system that reduces us to labourers, no, we want to be participants in our economy; to be owners of our economy, to assert that the natural resources are ours, they’re our worth and they should be developed with assistance yes, but assistance that does not reduce us into semi-slavery,” he said.
The African Union and Sadc chairperson, who is set to leave Japan today, said Africa was in talks with the West to fight terrorism in Africa – but Africa feels it is better off fighting its own battles without Europe and the United States seeking a domineering role.
“Of course there are talks (on fighting terrorism), but those (EU and US) want to dominate us and that’s why we say we’re better off,” the President said.
He added: “They want things done their own way. They’re the cause of many of our political troubles, and they want regime change in several African countries. They want regime change in Zimbabwe, they want me to go, them and not my people.
“We’ve got to build resistance against them; they use the NGOs to subvert our systems, they use some people they buy amongst us who become disloyal. But we’ve to be organised politically and in terms of the security.”
Turning to the on-going conference, President Mugabe said disasters visit all continents hence it is important for countries to exchange views on how to reduce the risk.
The local television was particularly interested in the President explaining what he meant when he said violent conflict in some parts of Africa and Asia needed to be included as an agenda in the conference.
“Terrorism, which affects Africa now, beginning with the eastern side where we have Al Shabaab operating in Somalia,” he explained. “Even there we have groups of pirates, piracy has become the order of the day for some organisations in Somalia. When you come up north, then you have, I don’t know whether this is born of Al Qaeda, but they say no they are not born out of Al Qaeda, Boko Haram, it says it’s the child of Isis, both quite dangerous.
“When it strikes, it’s either the whole village, school and children swept away and that has not got a counter yet, although some African countries are putting themselves together – Chad, Cameroon etc. joining forces with Nigeria, we welcome that,” said President Mugabe.
He said regional bodies and the AU have also discussed about threats to security and passed resolutions on terrorism.
“We urge regions to strengthen their security. In Sadc, which I think is the best organised regional organisation in Africa, we’ve an organ on Politics, Defence and Security which runs as part of Sadc to ensure that our defence forces are in order and they defend our territories and ensure that our security is not threatened,” said President Mugabe.
COMMENTS
Japan is not stupid and willpay no attention to Mugabe’s rants. Old fool
“But we are now kneeling to China….” as China moves away from an Agriculture based economy and employment , while Zim is doing the opposite as she moves into primitive small scale tribal farming under the disguise “land is the economy”.
It is sad that Africa again is becoming a source of raw materials to industrialise China at the as it did for the Europeans during colonisation.
By the way Japan, South Korea and India are in bed with the West. China is now a success because they did away with their business models and copied the West. Outwardly note the change in their buildings and dressing.
“They want regime change in Zimbabwe, they want me to go, them and not my people.” Which people?….Mugabe stop clamouring like Sadaam or Gadhafi who used to claim my people like me.
To prove the people of Zimbabwe love you call for a general election supervised by the UN just as happened when you were ushered into power and let every Zimbabwean above 18 vote, including those who have run away from you.
Please do not hide behind a finger.
The West will talk when they see injustice. When a government is not treating its citizens right. And that is what many of these african leaders cannot accept. They want to be like Kings, and not like accountable elected officials.
Mugabe can scream and shout all he wants. He has little credibility left, and could now be considered the most hated person in Zimbabwe.
Kneeling is of absolutely no relevance to the problems facing the nation. The abiding concern is poor performance by those claiming to be serving the nation’s best interests. The Japanese will surely not be impressed by these references to their strategic and political competitors. It is far wiser and much better to be modest given ones complete lack of global clout. The real problem in Zimbabwe is that the hard work to become a relevant global player is not being done by those who would seek to give advice to developed nation’s on whose aid and goodwill they depend on.
You have the whole country on its knees already Bob. Wake up