Robert Mugabe – From hero to zero

Kamna Arora

He fought hard to liberate his land, but now his countrymen are yearning for freedom from his grip. Thirty years ago, Robert Mugabe was the apple of Zimbabweans’ eyes, but now he is no less than a desperate oppressor bent on holding on to power by any means. Over the bend of time, Mugabe’s stardom waxed and waned, pushing Zimbabwe towards the abyss. He brought all the misfortune to the country that was once the breadbasket of southern Africa. It seems to be a gloomy tale, and certainly it is. Once upon a time, many developed nations were jealous of Zimbabwe’s strong economy, which was strengthened by sectors such as mining, manufacturing and tourism. But now, those developed nations have no option but to express sympathy towards the country pillaged by its own saviour. Born in 1924, Mugabe has striking similarities with Africa`s most prominent leader, Nelson Mandela. However, their legacies are strikingly different. Both studied at South Africa`s Fort Hare University. Both the leaders participated in the struggle against White minority rule – Mugabe in Rhodesia, now called Zimbabwe, and Mandela in South Africa. Both the leaders aimed at dethroning White-run regimes and both were imprisoned for a long time. But, there comes the difference. While Mandela used his time in prison to commence a dialogue with South Africa`s White rulers to dismantle the apartheid regime, Mugabe came out of prison with determination to bring down White society by force. Mandela gave up power after his five-year term as President in 1999, while Mugabe continues to cling to power 28 years after. In fact, it seems that he will only continue to throw his hat in his ‘own’ ring. Today, Mandela is praised as the model of reconciliation and forgiveness, while Mugabe represents modern-day tyrants. Mugabe won the 1980 election unopposed. Vowing to work for reconciliation and racial harmony, he was being looked at as a model of restraint. But within weeks of acquiring power, Mugabe set out to suppress political opposition in Matabeleland and establish a one-party state. On his orders North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade of the Zimbabwean Army massacred upto 20,000 civilians – whom Mugabe called ‘political rivals’ – in 1983-87. The true face of Mugabe was unveiled. He wanted total control and proved that he could employ any method to retain it. Today, victims of Mugabe’s despotism are baying for his blood. Meanwhile, Mugabe`s aides juggled for farms, businesses, property, and government contracts. Instead of stopping protégés from doing so, Mugabe started amassing such people around him in a bid to stay in power. His sycophantic ministers and loyal aides got richer and richer, while common Zimbabwean was pushed into utter despair. After ruling Parliament without any opposition, the President started controlling state media, the police, the civil service and courts. And the hero turned villain, the freedom fighter turned oppressor. Attacking opponents, rigging elections, controlling independent press and breaching the courts are acceptable to Mugabe because they help him satisfy his hunger for power. Five years ago, Mugabe had vowed to use whatever violent methods he could to tackle the opposition. "If that is Hitler, then let me be a Hitler tenfold. That is what we stand for," he had said. Today, Mugabism has made Zimbabwe’s situation gruesome. People are dying of hunger, and Mugabe is busy arranging arms rather than food. Once the breadbasket of Africa, Zimbabwe is now a net importer of food. In a report, the UN’s World Food Programme has underlined the need to supply food for 5.5 million Zimbabweans in 2009. The African country is facing severe shortages of most essentials such as medical drugs, fuel and electricity. More and more people are dying of cholera, while doctors and nurses are on going on strikes. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Zimbabwe, death toll from cholera outbreak has reached 1,937. There are over 20,000 suspected cases of the water-borne disease in Zimbabwe. Adding to the misery is the UN’s fear that cholera cases will rise by three-fold by the time the rainy season ends in April. Unemployment in Zimbabwe is about 90 percent, and the country’s inflation rate is the highest in the world. Officially, Zimbabwe’s inflation is 231 million percent, though unofficial estimates suggest it is even higher. The country’s central bank recently introduced a 10 billion dollar note worth less than USD 20. In 1980, the Zimbabwean dollar was worth more than USD 1. The World Bank has described Zimbabwe’s economy as the world`s fastest shrinking one for a country that is not at war. By 2005, around 83 percent of the population was living on below USD 2 a day and the situation has only worsened since then. According to the UN, average life expectancy in Zimbabwe dropped from 63 years in 1990 to 40.9 years in 2005. Reports suggest that Zimbabwe’s population has shrunk from approximately 12 million to may be less than nine million due to disease and mass departure. More than three million Zimbabweans are believed to have left the country in search of work and food. The tyrannical attitude of the leadership is actually indicating that not only people, but Zimbabwe as a country is dying. One of my Zimbabwean friends told me that she goes to Botswana to purchase flour and sugar. Wait a second! If the country has nothing to sustain on, how are Mugabe and his aides managing? Well, the reports suggest that Mugabe pays that hard currency to his cronies which comes from mining gold and platinum. The President also sells farmland to Libyan and Chinese entrepreneurs. Zimbabwe has had no Cabinet since the March Presidential Election. The power-sharing deal between Mugabe and the leader of the opposition, Morgan Tsvangirai, is almost dead. The deal had to be cobbled in the first place after Tsvangirai won handsomely but Mugabe refused to accede defeat. The African National Congress, the Southern African Development Community, and the United Nations have failed to bring Zimbabwe back on track. The calls by Botswana’s President Ian Khama and Kenya’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga for Mugabe’s demise, and UN’s sanctions threat against the country have failed to move the President even an inch from his earlier position. He will not step down and that is it. Mugabe wants no compromise. Recently, he did not even let former US President Jimmy Carter and UN’s former chief Kofi Annan enter the African country, indicating that he is the King of his land, who does not want any ‘outsider’ to interfere in his country’s affairs. Who will revolt? If not outsiders, then can insiders bring change in Zimbabwe? Will recent riots by unpaid junior soldiers shake the security structure of the country? It’s quite hard to foresee! And it is equally hard to foretell any solution to the ongoing crisis till the presence of Mugabe in the country. Power made him corrupt. The anti-colonial hero is actually a shady, brutal incompetent man. Mugabe’s Mugabism proved to be quite extortionate for those who believed in him.