Saturday, February 06, 2010

(STICKY) British High Commissioner responds

COMMENT - First of all, ms. Carolyn Davidson, I do not accept lies from elected or government officials. When you talk about 'restrictive measures', you are lying. You are using language that obfuscates the economic sanctions that are in place against Zimbabwe, and I don't care if that is your government's cowardly official stance or not. The economic sanctions against Zimbabwe have destroyed that country's currency, and were intended to destroy their economy to the point that the people would riot against their government. Secondly, the destruction of the Zimbabwean currency was intended to make the government's agricultural reforms fail, so your kith and kin could keep their stranglehold on Africa's land. Just as they are maintaining their stranglehold on Africa's mines, to where they rip off Zambia to the tune of $2,400 million a year or more. Your collective $600 million in donor aid does not come even close to compensate for that.

Your insistence that economic sanctions 'do not hurt ordinary Zimbabweans' is only more evidence of your complete cowardice and lack of character. Of course economic sanctions hurt ordinary Zimbabweans - that is the idea. How else could they be moved to overthrow their own government? Economic sanctions killed upto 500,000 Iraqi women and children because of lack of access to basic medication. Why would economic sanctions somehow exempt the ordinary Zimbabwean citizen when it comes to Zimbabwe? We all know the extent of the cholera outbreak - well most of those deaths would have been prevented if the local councils had access to imported chemicals for water purification. Those deaths are directly on your head. And you dare come onto a public forum and state that economic sanctions that have destroyed the national currency 'do not hurt ordinary Zimbabweans'.

You are a coward, a hypocrite and a liar.

British High Commissioner responds
By British High Commission,Lusaka
Sat 06 Feb. 2010, 04:00 CAT

Your editorial on Sunday January 31, 2010 focused on Zimbabwe and the UK and EU "sanctions."

As the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, made clear in Parliament on January 19, the most important factor influencing the United Kingdom's views on lifting EU restrictive measures will be evidence of actual change and reform on the ground in Zimbabwe. These are not MDC-T measures. These are not ZANU(PF) measures. They are the EU’s, and we will make our own judgements as to when they should be reinforced or eased.

But the key to having restrictive measures eased, or lifted, is for those in Zimbabwe who are currently resisting progress to implement the commitments to reform they agreed to in the Global Political Agreement (GPA).

The EU measures currently impose restrictions on 203 key figures involved in the violence and human rights abuses of the Mugabe regime and 40 companies associated with these individuals and their sources of finance. They do not hurt ordinary Zimbabweans. They do not affect the development of legitimate trade or business. They do not have any adverse effect on humanitarian assistance.

Indeed, levels of British aid - $100 million this year - to Zimbabwe and ordinary Zimbabweans have never been higher.

Yours sincerely,
Carolyn Davidson
British High Commission,Lusaka

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posted by MrK @ 3:25 PM

1 Comments:

At 7:44 PM , Blogger MrK said...

On the existence of economic sanctions, which are not 'targeted' at even 203 individuals, but at "the Government of Zimbabwe", read ZDERA. These are not by any means the only economic sanctions against the government of Zimbabwe, but they are a matter of record, annihilating any argument that there are only 'target sanctions' against individuals.

Text of S. 494 [107th]: Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act of 2001

SEC. 4. SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRATIC TRANSITION AND ECONOMIC RECOVERY.

(c) MULTILATERAL FINANCING RESTRICTION

... the Secretary of the Treasury shall instruct the United States executive director to each international financial institution to oppose and vote against--

(1) any extension by the respective institution of any loan, credit, or guarantee to the Government of Zimbabwe; or

(2) any cancellation or reduction of indebtedness owed by the Government of Zimbabwe to the United States or any international financial institution.

Source: Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act of 2001 (S.494, 107th US Congress)

IMPACT ON TRADE AND THE ECONOMY:

Trade Deficit in million USD ($)
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 exp
-295.6 -322.5 18.2 108.3 305.2 387.9 231.3 200b

Source: FAO/WFP Crop and Food Supply Assessment Mission to Zimbabwe, 5 June 2007
Table 1: Zimbabwe - Key economic indicators, 2000–2007

As you can see from the FAO data, the very year ZDERA froze the government's lines of credit, with nearly all international business being done on credit, the trade surplus ($322 million in 2001) collapsed into a trade deficit ($18 million).

Because the government was forced to operate on a cash only basis, they were forced to inflate the national currency, with destructive and highly disruptive effects on the general economy.

Like the liars and hypocrites they are, the MDC have been claiming that the effect of these economic sanctions were the effect of 'mismanagement by Mugabe'.

When ZDERA was introduced, Chester Crocker testified to the US Senate:

"To separate the Zimbabwean people from Zanu PF we are going to have to make their economy scream, and I hope you Senators have the stomach for what you have to do."

And that is exactly what they did. Zimbabwe was marked for an economic hit, in the form of a credit freeze, and an international propaganda campaign, with the purpose of eliminating nationalist leadership and installing neoliberal sellouts to privatise the economy, deregulate the country and open it up to exploitation by transnational capital.

That is what is going on. And now you can no longer claim you didn't know.

 

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