The ZIMBABWE Situation | Our
thoughts and prayers are with Zimbabwe - may peace, truth and justice prevail. |
Dear Editor
The following article was published in your
media recently. I thought that a rebuttle was required and I hope that this will
be given some consideration by yourselves. A long article like this is difficult
to deal with in a response, but it contains so many errors of fact and
assumption that it simply cannot be allowed to run unchallenged. This is why so
many of us who live in Africa, find the Afro-American lobby iconoclastic and
sycophantic in its views on the continent and just what is going on there. They
clearly come to the continent, as Ron Wilkins did, with preconcieved ideas and
left with enough "facts" to confirm their prejudice.
Eddie Cross
Secretary for Economic Affairs, the
Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe.
15th September 2002
By Ron Wilkins
TBWT Guest Contributor
Article Dated 9/4/2002
I recently returned to L.A. from Zimbabwe
as part of an official fact-finding team. As our mission neared an end, Elombe
Brath, chairman of Patrice Lumumba Coalition and the leader of our 14 member
delegation said to a newspaper reporter "our conclusion is that the land reform
program is justifiable and long overdue". Elombe further echoed the sentiment of
our team when he stated that "although we knew that the Western media was
subjective in its interpretation of events in Zimbabwe, we were shocked by the
level of bias and unprofessionalism in stories about this country".
I
want it known that my very positive impressions of Zimbabwe, its people and the
veracity of statements made by its leaders, have been expressed in nearly
identical terms by the independent pan-African magazine, New African. I strongly
encourage Africans in the U.S. to read New African magazine, for it has
consistently provided comprehensive coverage on Zimbabwe and the African
continent as a whole. New African's exclusive 16 page interview with President
Mugabe in its May issue is required reading for anyone seriously interested in
understanding the challenges facing Zimbabwe.
Our team included
journalists, activists, lawyers and educators. We were Africans from Canada,
Trinidad, Puerto Rico, Uganda and the United States. Among our group of 4 women
and 10 men was Adelaide Sanford, Vice Chancellor-New York State Board of
Regents; Dr. Tony Martin, Black Studies Department-Wellesley College-Mass -
author of "Race First - The Ideological and Organizational Struggles of Marcus
Garvey and the UNIA" ; Dr. Georgina Falu, San Juan, Puerto Rico - translator of
key contemporary African historical works from English to Spanish and Betty
Dopson, Queens, New York - Co-Chair Committee to Eliminate Media Offensive to
African People (CEMOTEP), which is a leading organization which challenges
erroneous reporting on Black leadership.
Our mission was to assess the
land reform program, brief our respective constituencies and encourage them/us
(Africans in the diaspora) to weigh in on what needs to be a public debate on
U.S. government policy toward Zimbabwe. Presently, Western governments led by
Britain and the United States, and mainstream print and elecronic media, are
unanimous in their condemnations of Zimbabwe's land reform program. The U.S.
State Department has labelled Zimbabwe's land redistribution initiatives as
"reckless". CNN, BBC and a host of mainstream tabloids have portrayed Zimbabwe's
white farmers as victims and its president Robert Mugabe as the villain. "A
farmer as she packed to go", said "I can't cry anymore. I just don't have any
tears left", wrote Time Magazine on August 19. Conspicuously absent from media
images of distraught and teary-eyed white farmers, are the faces of destitute
African peasants whose lands were expropriated during colonial rule, or
optimistic new farmers who have achieved success.
The carefully
orchestrated disinformation campaign to undermine and ultimately take down
Zimbabwe's progressive government, is standard fare for U.S. rulers, who have
never supported a single liberation movement on the African continent. Late last
year, the U.S. government adopted the Zimbabwe Democracy Act, which has imposed
stiff sanctions on Zimbabwe. With the noteworthy exception of the courageous
former congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, every member of the Congressional Black
Caucus supported Bush's signing of the bill. Our delegation found itself, on a
number of occasions, in the awkward and embarrassing position of being asked to
explain the anti-Africa voting patterns of Black politicians. Our African
brothers and sisters point to Jewish and Irish lobby groups, which act as links
between their homelands and the U.S. political establishment, and wonder why so
many of us are conspicuously silent on issues affecting the motherland.
Since independence Zimbabwe's government has constructed hundreds of
needed hospitals, nearly doubled the number of primary schools to 4,500,
increased secondary schools from 177 to 1,548, teacher training colleges from 4
to 15, universities from 1 to 8 (Zimbabwe now has the highest literacy rate in
Africa at 85%), piped water schemes from 26 to 520 and dams from 121 to 2,438.
Actually, a considerable amount of information which places Zimbabwe in a much
more favorable light, is not being disseminated by Western news sources.
Following our discussions with a wide range of Zimbabweans, which
included landless peasants, white and black farmers, government officials, media
representatives, war veterans and President Mugabe himself, we determined that;
1) the primary two reasons for Western hostility, unfair reporting and
sanctions against Zimbabwe are President Mugabe's determination to return land
to Indigenous African peasants, who are its rightful owners; and Zimbabwe's
intervention in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), at the request of its
legitimate government, to repel Western-sponsored aggressors. Zimbabwe's timely
dispatching of troops to the DRC, whose numbers rose to 12,000 during the peak
of the conflict, helped to prevent the recolonization of the richest country in
Africa.
Comment: Land Ownership. Although Ron
Wilkins has a name of european origin, I assume form this article that he is
black and has links with Africa from his past. I also assume that he owns a home
in the US and is a voting citizen. He probably also owns a car and perhaps
other permanent assets in the US. White Zimbabweans owned and farmed 8,3
million hectares of land (2,4 acres = 1 hectare) before the present land
aquisition exercise was launched in February 2000. This is just over 20 per cent
of the total land surface in Zimbabwe. The land is spread across the 5
agroecological zones which determine agricultural potential - the highest
potential being Region 1. and the lowest Region 5. 83 per cent of all these
properties had been purchased by their present owners after 1980 when Zimbabwe
gained its independence. The great majority hold certificates of "no interest"
issued by the Zimbabwe government under Robert Mugabe which enabled them to buy
the land and then invest in productive activity.
The land is held
freehold - and these rights which are entrenched in our constitution and which
are protected throughout the world as the primary foundation of economic
investmemt and growth, are now being violated in an illegal, violent and
criminal programme. If Ron Wilkins was dispossesed of his home, his car and all
other fixed and moveable assets, except the clothes he owned and perhaps some
furniture, he would be as mad as a hornet on a hot day. Yet he dismisses the
rights of these land owners as if they were of no account. It is not Ron
Wilkins fault that he is an American, neither is it my fault that I am an
African. We both had no choice in the matter. We chose to live in the countries
of our birth and I hope we share the same desire to prosper and invest so that
our families can live. I think we also expect our respective governments - even
if we did not vote them in - to protect our interests.
The Congo: In 1994 Hutu rebels masacred 800
000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu people in a short period of national genocide. The
action was supported by Mabuto who was in power in the Congo. Not only did he
enflame passions using a radio station in the Kivu Province but he trained and
armed the people who did the killing. When it was over, the Tutsi took power in
Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda and swore that they would never allow that to happen
again. To achieve this they decided to take a security corridor along the Congo
border with their countries and to prevent any further action by the Hutu rebels
who had sought refuge in the Congo. They needed a Congolese to head this limited
military action and chose Kabila who was running a nightclub in Tanzania and who
had been a personal friend of Mugabe in the 70's and even
earlier.
On entry to the country they found the
Mabuto regime totally rotten and Kabila found himself in Kinshasha as head of
state. He turned on his partners after a short while and kiled many of the Tutsi
soldiers who had got him into the seat of power by overthrowing Mabuto. The
Rwandese and the Ugandans, frightened of a resumption of support for the Huti
rebels in the Congo decided to overthrow Kabila. In August 1997, Mugabe threw a
third of his army (British trained and arguably the best army north of South
Africa) into the fray at a cost of over US$1 million a day. They saved Kabila
and in return gained control of the huge diamond mines in the east of the Congo
where they have been ever since. The UN has condemned the Zimbabwean
intervention as being self serving and exploiting the assets of the Congo for
personal gain.
While in the Congo, the Zimbabwean army has
trained and armed the Hutu rebels and this more than any other single factor has
perpetuated the war in Central Africa - threatening the stability of half the
continent. More than 2,5 million Congolese have lost their lives in the conflict
since it started. There is evidence to suggest that Zimbabwe and Angola were
complicent in the death of Kabila senior, making way for Kabila junior, who was
expected to be more pliable. No forces or interests external to Africa were
involved in this conflict.
2) land reform has been ongoing for the
past four years and 360,000 families, which include the opposition, have
received land. Many white farms are unusually large and range between 3000 and
20,000 hectares, while an average family-owned farm in the U.S. is between 200
and 250 hectares. Three members of Britain's House of Lords own land in
Zimbabwe. Some white farms are not even listed in Zimbabwe's national records
and the Opppenheimer Ranch is 300,000 hectares. However, the vast majority of
black peasants must eke out an existence in "rural areas" on land that is rocky,
poor and arid. Seventy-five percent of Zimbabwe's food is produced by black
farmers, including sixty percent of its maize or corn, which is the country's
staple crop.
Comment: Land reform has been a basic
government programme since independence in 1980. At that time white farmers
numbered about 6000 and held about 12 million hectares under freehold title.
Since then about 4 million hectares has been acquired on a willing seller
willing buyer basis and settled. Of the 2000 farms purchased from their former
owners, 800 were allocated to Zanu PF leaders and others before the present land
grab was started.
The Oppenheimer property is well within
Region 3/4 and suitable only for extensive ranching and wild life. It is in fact
only 300 000 acres and the Openheimer family have offerred a substantial portion
to the state free plus a grant of Z$10 million to provide infrastructure and
development for settlement purposes. This was rejected by the
state.
The 12 million hectares of land occupied by
commercial farmers are held by some 23 000 farmers. 4200 are white. The average
farm size for the white farmers is 1976 hectares. Of Region 1 land - 80 per
cent is in the hands of either small scale black peasant farmers or the State.
Only 20 per cent of this intensive farming zone is in the hands of large scale
commercial farms. In Region 2. large scale commercial farms controlled 60 per
cent of all land with Region 3, 4 and 5 all standing at about 15 per cent. The
largest properties in the country are owned either by corporations or by the
State - Mwenzi Ranch is just less than 1 million acres - owned by the State, the
CSC and ADA properties combined are over 1,2 million acres and are all state
owned. None of these are subject to land settlement.
3) the coming food shortages and "famine",
which Zimbabwe's detractors have connected to the land reform program, have no
relationship to each other at all. The anticipated food shortage is being
produced by a regional drought that is undermining crop production in a number
of countries. In truth, droughts, which are cyclical in the region and occur
every ten years, are a fact of life. While death from starvation has occurred in
the neighboring countries of Zambia and Malawi, no Zimbabweans have died.
Despite very limited resources, Zimbabwe has gotten itself through food crises
quite admirably.
Comment: In 1992 Zimbabwe had a severe
drought with near total crop failure. All cities were on water rationing and
wildlife thoughout the country had to be fed for survival. This year no cities
are on water rationing and crops such as cotton, tobacco and soybeans all
yielded 70 to 80 per cent of normal yields. In 1992 the country was able to feed
itself without external assistance and no Zimbabwean died of hunger. Today, the
country faces a 75 per cent deficit in all basic foods and is unable to supply
more than a third of the shortfall. At least 500 000 Zimbabweans will die in the
next 6 months from malnutrition and hunger. There is no comparison and all
commentators acknowledge that bad policy and the violent land aquisition
programme are mainly responsible for the food crisis.
4) white farmers in Zimbabwe are
being permitted to keep one farm and are being compensated for all capital
improvements on land reclaimed by the government. Exceptions to this rule are
farms which are in excess of permissable acreage, idle or under-utilized farms
and farms next to communal lands. Some farmers own as many as 7 and 8 farms.
African laborers on white farms are treated poorly and receive inadequate pay.
Ian Smith, who lead white resistance to the black independence struggle, pays
black laborers on his farm $4,300 Zim dollars ($72 US) per month and crowds them
into one room hovels which lack electricity and other necessities. During the
current phase of land reform, defiant white farmers have been arrested, but
there has been no violence and no farmer has been forced out.
Comment: Ron must have visited another
country - he could not be talking about Zimbabwe. Out of the 4200 white
commercial farmers - all of them holding freehold title rights with investments
of over US$6 billion in their businesses, 4000 are the subject of compulsory
eviction orders that will leave them penniless and dipossesed. No farmers are
being exempted and over half of the farmers concerned have only one property.
There is no compensation and all evictions are violent. 11 white farmers have
been killed and thousands of farmers and their workers beaten, raped and burnt
out of their homes. They are being traumatised and already we have over 800 000
people who are officially classified by the UNDP as being evicted and internally
displaced.
Living standards for farm workers and their
families (2 million people in all), were 3 times the average of the living
standard in the communal areas. They also enjoyed free housing, water and light
and energy for cooking. They also often were given food to suplement their
diets. These people are now homeless, displaced, hungry and without
employment.
5) some white farmers, resentful after
receiving section 8 notices to surrender their farms to the government, are
poisoning the soil with herbicides, poisoning livestock, destroying maize crop,
blocking boreholes (wells), setting wildfires and commiting other forms of
sabotage.
Comment: It is astonishing that not a
single shot has been fired by over 10 000 white men on these 4200 farms in
defence of their rights as property owners. All are armed and many have had
military training. This example of restraint is extraordinary in any ones
language. Remember these people are being forced off their farms, often at gun
point, often with violence directed at themselves and their staff and their
families. This is their property - not the states, they bought the farms, they
invested in irrigation and equipment, dams and infrastructure. Its their
property that is being taken from them by force.
If a similar situation was to develope in
the US and I was allowed to force Ron out of his house and other property so
that I could take occupation - without compensation or any other rights, I am
sure I would be faced with violent resistence. The difference in the US is that
Ron would have the protection pf the law and the assistance of the Police. Here
the farmers have no support or protection of any kind.
I as an African can say OK lets drive these
people out of Africa - I can assure you the majority of the farmers and their
families will not suffer for long. They will quickly find themselves valued in
the countries to which they go as hard working and intelligent men and women.
Good law abiding citizens who pay their taxes. The people who are left behind
will however suffer for decades from the loss of investment and confidence, the
loss of skills, the damage to the economy. Our exports have fallen by half since
this chaos started, emplyment by a third, the economy by a quarter. Our currency
has collapsed from 12 to 1 against the US dollar to 700 to 1. Capital flight is
now endemic.
6) Zimbabwe's
presidential elections in March, which saw President Mugabe returned to office,
were declared "free and fair" by monitors from several African countries and the
African Union. Since independence more than 20 political parties have operated
in the country, including the MDC which is openly supported by white farmers,
Britain and others opposed to the present government. Zimbabwe's election
outcome stands in sharp contrast to the U.S. presidential election where
thousands of black votes in Florida, which favored Bush's opponent, were thrown
out.
Comment: All serious observer missions
were unanimous, the Zimbabwe elections were not free or fair. Nigeria and South
Africa agree and suported the subsequent suspension of Zimbabwe from the
Commonwealth until this is corrected. The MDC has 2 million members - the total
white population is less than 50 000 today. The great majority of the membership
of the MDC is black, low income and Zimbabwean. Even amongst the white farmers,
only a minority supported the MDC in any way - and are now paying for their
courage as the state attacks their homes and assets. We have taken the election
to the Courts and expect the Courts to rule in our favour as the legal case is
overwhelming.
For Zimbabwe's
Indigenous population the land redistribution struggle represents the "Third
Chimurenga". The first was the courageous yet unsuccessful 1890's resistance
against white colonizers, and the second was the liberation struggle, won at a
cost of more than 50,000 lives, which led to independence in 1980. In his book
titled "British Betrayal of the Africans - Land, Cattle and Human Rights",
Zimbabwean historian Aeneas Chigwedere writes, "thousands of Africans were
killed, maimed and tortured in 1893, 1896-97, 1900-1904 and between 1970 and
1980; the Africans were impoverished and starved by the seizures of their
cattle, goats, sheep and crops by an illegal regime; Africans were denied the
necessary health facilities and continued to be decimated by the common tropical
diseases; the Africans were denied education facilities and toiled as hewers of
wood and drawers of water for the white man... I have a fair picture of the
histories of all the former European colonies in Africa. I cannot find a single
colony that was treated as mercilessly and as ruthlessly as Southern Rhodesia
(Zimbabwe)". And then there is this observation by Mr. Chigwedere," Judging from
their performance in Africa, the British are undoubtedly the worst racists that
have existed on the face of the earth".
Comment: Aneas Chigwedere is the Minister
of Education in Mr Mugabes government. He is an outspoken appologist for Mugabe
otherwise he would not be a part of the administration. I once spoke to Samora
Machel about the colonial histories of the region and he remarked to me "Mr
Cross, if you were to choose your colonisers you would never choose the
Portuguese". Ron Wilkins is a victim of his own past, just as I am a victim of
mine. My family have been here since 1867 and we are all still here and intend
to stay, come what may. The difference between Ron and myself is that I choose
to fight for a better life for Africa, in Africa. All I own is right here. If
Africa fails, I loose everything. Bush may have won the vote in Florida on an
unsatisfactory basis, but that did not in any way threaten Ron's way of life.
When Mugabe stole the past election, he then set about destroying everything
that we had built up over the past 100 years - including all the good things he
did in the eary years of independence.
Perhaps our delegation's most memorable
meeting was with President Robert Mugabe. The meeting lasted nearly two hours as
the president outlined the land issue and responded to our questions. Yet
another meeting with Dr. Olivia Muchena, Minister of State with responsibility
for monitoring the land reform program, provided us with additional insights
into the land question. Dr. Muchena described how Western education contradicts
traditional African values by making it clear that " when white people took the
land, they disqualified themselves from being human, because they had done an
inhuman act. They (the white people) took what belonged to God -- a form of
sacrilege if you like".
Dr. Muchena then said, "the land is not a
commodity. It cannot be bought and sold. The land is the sum total of who we are
as human beings. This fundamental belief is at the core of our tenacity and the
courage that you see in our president".
Comment: For Olivier Muchena, a Doctor of
Science and a active Christian to say that whites are not human - is absolutely
disgraceful. If any member of the Bush administration was to say something like
this about black Americans there would be an uproar. Ron accepts this racist
propoganda as if it was true and justified. Land rights and security of tenure
are universal rights. In this country they are entrenched rights in the
Constitution. No one has the right to take that away without fair market based
compensation. Certainly not with violence and worse in the
process.
This same man that Ron speaks of in such
glowing terms has taken away our right to freedon of expression and association,
he has abandoned the rule of law, subverted our judicial system and the whole
electoral system. He has unleashed on his people a campaign of violence and
intimidation which is aimed at destroying the MDC and all it stands for. The
state controlled media run a hate campaign which is so virulent that the
majority of all Zimbabweans no longer tune into the radio or TV. Mugabe is
tyrant on the same level at Bokassa in the CAR and Mabuto in the Congo or Amin
in Uganda. This is a man who is pursuing a Pol Pot agenda in his own country and
against his own people. Black Americans need to do more than act as praise
singers for tyranny if they want our respect and support in their own struggles
for a more just society. They must not use the black white/thing as an
excuse.
The government of Namibia, which
firmly supports Zimbabwe, recently announced plans to expropriate 192 farms in
its territory. Namibia's congress noted in a resolution"that it was concerned at
the slow pace of land redistribution, which has the potential to cause civil
strife". Namibia and its sprawling next door neighbor South Africa, each have
land hungry populations whose patience has worn thin. Namibia's President Sam
Nujoma, responding on one occasion to white claims of land ownership
asked " so how much land did the white man
bring to Africa?".
Comment: How much land did Ron's family
bring to America, how much land did immigrants to Australia bring to that
continent. There are 400 000 Zimbabweans in the UK - they own houses and
busisnesses - do they have rights? This is irresponsible
nonsense.
In
an editorial appropriately captioned "The end of Rhode's dream", a European
newspaper opposed to Zimbabwe's land reform program, sadly recalled how "Cecil
Rhodes imperial dream to move north from the Cape into the uncharted interior of
Africa, exploiting its mineral wealth and introducing settlement", had come to
an end. Rhode's dream to have whites dominate and exploit Africans "from the
Cape to Cairo" has been Africa's long nightmare. Africa belongs to its people,
and not to others, whose home is elsewhere! Zimbabwe is on the threshold of
restoring stolen land to its rightful Indigenous owners. We must have no
illusions about what is at stake here. The principled, defiant and resolute
stand taken by President Mugabe and the Zimbabwean nation has shaken the
imperialist world at its foundations. Restoring the land to the people is what
Kenya's Land Freedom Army, disparagingly referred to as the Mau Mau, sought to
achieve. Retaking the land has been the cornerstone of the fight for
independence in every part of the African continent, if not the world. There are
many who can recall how one of our greatest revolutionaries, Malcolm X, during
his speech titled "Message to the Grassroots" said "revolution is based on
land... the landless against the landlord ...land is the basis of independence".
Allow me to end this article with words spoken by President Robert
Mugabe, words which drew sustained applause, during his historic August 12
Heroes Day Commemoration speech at National Heroes Acre. National Heroes Acre is
a shrine and the final resting place for Zimbabwe's martyrs. "We are a child
that imperialism would never have wanted to see born, one it would have rather
scotched and quashed in the belly than see born. We emerge from circumstances of
a resolute liberation struggle and thus carry a stamp of stolid, defiant
protest. We do not kowtow to erstwhile imperialist forces with avid appetites
for the control and manipulation of our lives and destiny and the continued
exploitation of our wealth and resources". President Mugabe went on to point out
that the process of retaking Indigenous land settles "the grievance of all
grievances" that Zimbabweans would "not be deterred on this one question" and
that "the land is ours"!
Ron Wilkins currently teaches the history of
Africans in Latin America & the Carribbean and African American history at
several Los Angeles area colleges and is Deputy Chairman of the Harlem based
Patrice Lumumba Coalition. Mr. Wilkins, who has travelled extensively throughout
the African continent, is a veteran sixties Black power activist and was a
member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. e-mail: politicart@excite.com (contact
address-not for public distribution)