[DEBATE] : Re: Zim sanctions?

Wed Jun 7 07:37:50 BST 2006

Last pragraph in Patrick's article: 

  "Indeed, following the lead of the Archbishop of Bulawayo, Pius Ncube,
Zimbabwean civil society may need to more publicly advocate serious
sanctions, given the lack of pressure from opportunistic politicians 
and businesses". 

  Tinashe 

Russell <grinker at mweb.co.za> wrote:
  Patrick - so what exactly are you advocating with regard to sanctions 
against Zim? I think you need to spell it out more explicitly. Your article 
merely seems to complain that other countries/multi-lateral agencies aren't 
doing it properly and are in fact secretly doing business with Zim (what a 
surprise).

So what do you want them to do?

We surely need to remember the role played by the old left in doing the 
spade work for subsequent humanitarian imperialist interventions all over 
the place, including Iraq.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Patrick Bond" 

To: "debate at mailhost15.mweb.co.za:SA discussion list" 

Sent: Wednesday, June 07, 2006 6:52 AM
Subject: [DEBATE] : Zim sanctions?

The Mercury

Time to advocate serious sanctions
By pressuring Mugabe, can activists replace collusive states and
business that are benefiting from the status quo? asks Patrick Bond

June 07, 2006 Edition 1

Patrick Bond

The unwillingness of governments, multilateral bodies and big business
to promote rudimentary democracy and social justice in Zimbabwe is now
glaringly obvious. Renewed solidarity initiatives can be taken with more
confidence by grass-roots activists on both sides of the Limpopo River
and beyond.

Item: UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appears to have been intimidated
into not taking a trip to Harare, after President Thabo Mbeki raised
expectations that he would achieve a breakthrough.

Mbeki last week passed the buck to Annan and Zimbabwe President Robert
Mugabe: "It's best left to them, to the UN and the Zimbabwean government
and, hopefully, that will produce its outcome so that we remove this
particular matter from the international agenda." Mugabe simply refused
to give Annan an audience.

Item: Last Friday, the head of the European Commission's Harare mission
and the Austrian ambassador to Zimbabwe wrote a letter to the Herald
newspaper firmly stating: "There are no economic EU sanctions against
Zimbabwe. There have never been economic EU sanctions against Zimbabwe."

The bureaucrats were right, and they pointed out that for the latest
year data available, 2004, "Zimbabwe had a trade surplus of E261 million
(R2.23 billion) with EU states."

Item: A few days earlier, South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana
Dlamini-Zuma told parliament that Pretoria would not wield targeted
"smart" sanctions against Zimbabwe's rulers: "It may not be a very
useful tool to use right now because it doesn't seem to be yielding
results, even in the hands of the most powerful block in the world."

Of course not, but for a simple reason: Pretoria is a smart-sanctions
"buster" by permitting the Zimbabwe elite's shopping visits, real estate
speculation and illicit financial holdings. If Pretoria joined in
imposing smart sanctions, the results would be immediate and formidable.

Investors

Item: Big business is again hopping into bed with Mugabe, according to
Dianna Games of the SA Institute of International Affairs writing last
week in Business Day: "Many South African companies believe that
Zimbabwe is still a better and easier place in which to do business than
many other African countries because of its strong business culture,
diversified industrial base and relatively good infrastructure. And many
companies are still making good, albeit often declining, profits."

Pointing out that more than two dozen large South African corporations
employ about 20 000 Zimbabweans in mining, retail, franchising,
commercial agriculture and banking, she said: "There may be no better
time for investors to take a long, hard look at the opportunities that
Zimbabwe presents right now."

That was also a point made last year by Tony Hawkins, Professor of
Business Studies at the University of Zimbabwe and well known to
Financial Times readers: "South Africa has gained market share in
exports, tourism and services. South Africa's share of investment in
Zimbabwe has also risen as there has been an element of bargain-basement
buying by some mining and industrial groups."

Hawkins added: "South Africa is also taking significant skills from the
country, especially scarce black skills in health, education, banking,
engineering and IT. It would be too much to say that South Africa has
benefited in net terms, but there is a good deal of evidence to suggest
that it is securing some gains from the crisis."

Reflecting business confidence in Mugabe's ability to hold on, two large
multinational firms - South Africa's Implats and the French bank BNP
Paribas - last week announced, respectively, a R1.7 billion platinum
investment (36% of which represents a gift to the government for crony
"empowerment") and a R332 million credit secured by future nickel export
revenues.

Another new Mugabe ally is the brutal dictator of Equatorial Guinea,
Teodoro Obiang Nguema, who visited Zimbabwe in March and whose country's
oil began flowing to Zimbabwe last week. Nguema wants the British
mercenary Simon Mann extradited from Harare, where Mugabe's forces are
holding him after he transited Harare in a 2004 attempted coup bid.

Is pressure being applied by the West, as Mugabe often claims? Aside
from an arms embargo on the government, the EU's smart sanctions apply
to just 100 key Zanu-PF leaders, and take the form of travel bans and a
threat to freeze any assets they place in European banks. There are
similar provisions in the US, but these countries together provide in
excess of R1 billion in aid to Zimbabwe, largely for food and
humanitarian relief

Threat

No one calls for that aid to be turned off because it feeds millions of
people for whom Zimbabwe's own farms - especially the small-scale and
peasant sectors - generated maize surpluses, prior to the more general
meltdown of the country's agricultural infrastructure. The starvation
threat has less to do with the takeover of white farms and more to do
with the general lack of access to rural transport, fuel, pesticides,
fertilisers, farm implements, electricity and the like.

What about a renewed diplomatic initiative from the West? A good
reflection of the US imperial agenda in Zimbabwe may be last week's
report in a Harvard University journal authored by Todd Moss and Stewart
Patrick of Washington's Centre for Global Development.

Moss and Patrick argue against existing sanctions: "The US and EU may
need to review their sanctions legislation to ensure that it does not
create a legal problem or disincentive for re-engagement or private
investment."

They also argue that a post-Mugabe Zimbabwe government will "have to
deal with an inherited external debt of some $5 billion (about R30
billion). Clearing arrears will be the first step, but the arrears
accrued within the past few years account for nearly half the current
debt stock, suggesting that some special dispensation may need to be
found with the multilateral institutions and the Paris Club of creditors."

In contrast, the position advocated by civil society campaigners, such
as the Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development and Zimbabwe Social
Forum, is that the vast but useless 1990s loans advanced by the
International Monetary Fund and World Bank should be completely cancelled.

Indeed, following the lead of the Archbishop of Bulawayo, Pius Ncube,
Zimbabwean civil society may need to more publicly advocate serious
sanctions, given the lack of pressure from opportunistic politicians and
businesses.

Patrick Bond is Director of the UKZN Centre for Civil Society and
coauthor of Zimbabwe's Plunge, available from the University of KZN Press.
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