COMMENT - So the EU demands compensation be paid by the Zimbabwean government for improvements made to the land by the colonial landowners. However, the same agreement stipulated that the British government would pay these same colonial landowners compensation for the value of the land itself which they have steadfastly refused to do, since Clare Short's 1997 letter to them minister Kumbirai Kangai. This was
the Blair government's attitude towards compensation:
I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe. We are a new Government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests.
In the words of
President Mugabe, at Harlem Mount Olivet Baptist Church:
President Mugabe: And here you still had the democrats in power under president carter. Then they undid the promise that America had also made, that they would alongside Britain would also fund the land reform. Carter was defeated, and in came President Reagan. President Reagan reneged on the undertaking by President carter, and said no, he was not going to continue the aid program which the Democrats had started. Then in Britain they also reneged and said they no longer had any money. And this at the time of Thatcher, but later we negotiated with the conservative government. A new deal in 1996. But before that new deal saw the light of day, the Conservative Party was defeated. And in came Blair, and his lot. And these said to us, very clearly, very blatantly, they were not in a position to inherit colonial responsibility. What the Conservatives had promised was a matter for the Conservatives, we are a Labour party with it's own policies. We said to them, we tried to reason with them. And said but at international law, surely, if you are a successor to a legitimate government of Britain, you don't only succeed to assets, you also succeed to liabilities. That is international law. And what were the promises and undertakings to us by the conservative party and conservative government, should certainly be respected by you. In broad daylight they said that they would not do that. They would therefore not fund the land reform program and pay compensation, or help us to pay compensation for land to be acquired by our government, for purposes of resettling our people.
They said to us, we were deadlocked on this matter at Lancaster House for ten days. The negotiations altogether took three months, from October to December 1979. If the principle we stood by and we affirmed in 1979 that when your ancestors seized our land, they did not pay compensation, and so, we did not have any duty or moral principle on the strength of which we could pay you compensation.
On to the sanctimonious attitude of the EU:
(NEWZIMBABWE) Zim debt clearance talks, EU adds land compensation to agenda
03/10/2015 00:00:00
by Staff Reporter
Land compensation on the agenda ... EU ambassador to Zimbabwe, Philippe Van Damme
THE European Union has put Zimbabwe's controversial land issue on the agenda of the 2015 annual meeting of the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) taking place in Lima, Peru, next week.
The development creates a new headache for finance minister Patrick Chinamasa who is already under attack from hawks in government and the ruling Zanu PF party over his pro-IMF policies.
Zimbabwe owes foreign creditors about $7 billion and is in desperate need for new funding to revive its faltering economy.
Creditors have told the country to clear first clear $1.8 billion in arrears to the IMF, World Bank and African Development Bank before financiers can resume lending to the country.
Chinamasa will present a strategy for clearing the arrears at the Lima meetings.
Although details of his plans have not been made public, the IMF’s Zimbabwe representative described what the minister would present was a “sensible strategy”.
But EU ambassador to Zimbabwe, Philippe Van Damme, has said Zimbabwe should go to Lima with a comprehensive plan to compensate white farmers ousted under the government’s often violent and chaotic land reforms in the past 15 years.
The envoy said this in a speech read on his behalf last Friday Thomas Opperer, Head of the Agriculture and Food Security Section at the EU Delegation in Harare. He was speaking at the unveiling of an agriculture support fund by the EU.
“The Constitution is also very clear, stipulating in its section 72(3)(a) that all improvements effected have to be compensated, as also detailed as per the Land Acquisition Act and acknowledged in the ‘Strategies for Clearing External Debt Arrears and the Supportive Economic Reform Agenda’ that the government will present to the international community in Lima on 8 October ,”said the EU ambassador.
“In this regard, it is important to achieve a consensus based compensation mechanism that is workable and acceptable to all concerned, in line with the existing guidelines and procedures.
“Again, the EU does strongly emphasize the importance of carrying out this exercise in an inclusive manner, where all parties concerned (including the various farmers unions) are not only consulted but can contribute to reach a consensus about the key criteria and mechanism established.”
Chinamasa recently told the international community that Harare is committed to compensating the dispossessed farmers but “we have no money”.
Labels: EU, IMF, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM
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Dr J Nkomo’s speech at Lancaster House 1979
This article was written by Our reporter on 14 February, at 18 : 47 PM
IN 1979, leaders of the Patriotic Front (of Zanu and Zapu) participated in a Constitutional Conference at Lancaster House, London. The purpose of the Conference was to discuss and reach agreement on the terms of an Independence Constitution for Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia). The Conference opened on 10 September under the chairmanship of Lord Carrington, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. The Conference concluded on 15 December, after 47 plenary sessions. Below is a statement made by Dr Joshua Nkomo on behalf of his and Mr Robert Mugabe’s delegation.
Full Text of Speech
Mr Nkomo: Mr Chairman, first I would like to apologise to the Conference, through you, that we in the first place requested that we had some time, as given in our letter, and secondly that we still were late. We apologise for that to the Conference.
Mr Chairman, the Patriotic Front is going to give a statement that represents the Front. Mr Mugabe and myself are presenting this statement on behalf of our group.
The Patriotic Front, deeply conscious of the need to bring an end to racism and colonialism which continue to plague the people of Zimbabwe, welcomes the British Government’s stated aim to assist in this task of decolonisation. We have come to London to attend this Conference in response to the invitation recently extended to us by you, Mr Chairman, on behalf of the British Government. For us our presence here is by itself an act of immense sacrifice. The scarce material resources we have had to divert and the manpower we must of necessity tie down in London for the duration of this Conference should be enough evidence of our seriousness and good faith. We have always said that we will leave no stone unturned in our struggle for the total liquidation of colonialism in Zimbabwe.
In particular we welcome the fact that the British Government now states that it is prepared to help bring genuine majority rule to our country, Zimbabwe. We are anxious to discover whether that is in fact the intention. Equally we wish to make our position absolutely clear and understood in order to facilitate frank and meaningful discussions.
The unique reality of the situation is that for many years now a major war of national liberation has been raging in our country. This arose from the single tragic fact that Britain failed to meet her decolonisation responsibilities even in the face of the continuing of flagrant illegal acts of the secular minority which challenges the people of Zimbabwe to take up arms and decolonise themselves. Thus we are faced with the task of a peace Conference.
British secular colonisation in Zimbabwe presented special problems which did not disappear by being ignored for decades. The war is an additional special problem and cannot be ignored if it is to end.
To achieve decolonisation comparable to that in other Commonwealth states we must first achieve the basic conditions for the movement to independence which existed in those countries. That was peace, safety and security for all, in the context of which an independent state would be governed according to the agreed constitution by a government elected by a people who were essentitally free and secure when they chose their government. That essential preliminary situation does not yet prevail in Zimbabwe and even an accepted and agreed constitution will not create it. It is our basic task here to create those conditions.
Mr Chairman, the extent and character of the war of national liberation must be made perfectly clear. Ninety per cent of the country is covered by this war: the towns and cities are surrounded by and often penetrated by the armed struggle. Parts of the country the regime has written off and abandoned: these we term the liberated areas. In other areas the regime can only achieve a temporary daily presence with punitive raids on the villages: these we term the semi-liberated areas. The remaining contested areas include the towns and the citadels of the regime which we are poised to conquer. Thus the Patriotic Front has now responsibilities not only to fight but also to ensure peace, order and good government – the ‘problem of success’ – inside Zimbabwe.
Clearly it is not our purpose in coming to London to betray or abandon any of these victories of the people of Zimbabwe who have partly liberated themselves and are continuing the task precisely because Britain failed to carry out her responsibilities.
This Conference is not only unique in British colonial history because it must achieve peace as well as a future constitution: it is unique because this is the first time that two decolonising forces have to co-operate in this task. The Patriotic Front representing the people of Zimbabwe are here as the effective decolonising factor, while Britain is here asserting her diminished legal authority. In this connection it must be pointed out that Britain, despite its claimed experience in decolonisation has had no success in Zimbabwe or did not give any determined effort. The task has had to be undertaken by the people themselves. Through their sweat and blood the process is well on its way. The most positive proof of this is the admission of Britain’s agent in the form of the declaration of martial law in over nearly 90 per cent of the total area of the country.
Yet we are more aware than any of the destruction and tragic toll of our struggle, of the regime’s continued ability and increasing determination to wreak havoc and mass destruction. It is thus our vital responsibility to achieve genuine independence, thereby bringing about peace and putting an end to the prevailing anarchy and chaos. This is no longer a solely British responsibility; we must – and our presence here demonstrates our will to do so – work together with Britain.
We have stated before and we repeat the fact that the Patriotic Front and the achievements of the Zimbabwean people are essential factors in the decolonising process. We have to do this together. This is vital.
The task of this peace Conference is to ensure through an indivisible comprehensive agreement the irreversible transfer of power to the people of Zimbabwe. This is one continuous interdependent process. It is complex but does not lend itself to piecemeal treatment. The critical period leading to independence is as vital as the independence constitution itself. In practice the task of creating a suitable constitution for the crucial transitional period will serve the ultimate task of agreeing a constitutional model for independence for our country and assist us in that undertaking in understanding one another’s constitutional preferences. There must be no doubt about the freedom and fairness of the context of pre- independence elections. As the recent history of our land so eloquently demonstrates, treachery, tribalism and mass murder is all that can result from a false solution. To accept such a Zimbabwe would be a betrayal of our people, of our principles and quite simply (since dead and detained men can neither canvass nor cast votes) a betrayal of ourselves. We must remember here that it has always been, and it remains, the basic objective of the Patriotic Front to ensure that government of a genuine free Zimbabwe is based upon free and fair elections. We have said this, Mr Chairman, several times. We were the initiators of the principle of universal adult suffrage in Zimbabwe, in the face of its constant rejection by Britain herself and the minority regime in that country.
Zimbabwe must be a sovereign republic in which the sovereign nation pursues its own destiny, totally unshackled by any fetters or constraints.
The sovereign Zimbabwean people must, acting through their own freely chosen representatives in parliament, be free and fully vested with the power to exercise complete dominion over resources from time to time as need arises. They must be free to reorganise the social, political and economic institutions and structures and be free to shape their own destiny as a nation without having to pander to any racial, ethnic, tribal, religious, social or other interests or differences.
The safety and survival of the republic must be the sacred trust of the Zimbabwean nation, not the pawn in the hands of mercenaries and other alien adventurers and agents. We are irrevocably committed to the position that the Zimbabwean people, by whose blood and sacrifice colonialism was exorcised from the land, must themselves be the perpetual guarantors of sovereignty in the face of all challenges, domestic or foreign. Liberation and the process leading thereto must, once agreed, be irrevocable and irreversible. We know no other way of ensuring this than strict adherence to the principle that the people and their forces who have toppled minority rule must be entrusted with the task of ensuring that colonialism, under whatever guise, will not return to plague the nation once again.
Justice will not occur by accident in a sovereign Zimbabwe, nor will its administration and dispensation remain in the hands of privileged minority. It must conform to the social and cultural values of the Zimbabwe people themselves.
The socio-economic system must conform to the people’s sense of justice, democracy and fair play.
These and similar goals, cherished vigorously by our people, and for which thousands now lie in mass graves throughout Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Botswana and Angola must not be betrayed or compromised. In the past many people present here in Lancaster House, but who are now our antagonists cherished them too. It is personal ambition and greed that propelled them into betrayal and treason. We are sworn not to follow their example.
At this stage, Mr Chairman, having seen both the British proposals and yesterday’s statement by Lord Carrington, we find the British proposals are too vague for us to judge whether they are adequate to our comprehensive task. The British Government must now be prepared to take us into their confidence and show us what their real proposals are. This is very essential if we are to discuss with clarity of mind. The present outline states no more than some of the elements of any constitution but contains also certain aspects which are very different from the normal British pattern and are also seriously retrogressive as compared with earlier British proposals such as the Anglo- American proposals.
It avoids the real issues which should be brought before this Conference and solved. Only by dealing with them can we hope to leave here and return to freedom and the prospect of peace and tranquillity in our country, Zimbabwe.
The essential questions we have posed constantly to ourselves and which we insist must be understood by all seriously concerned with a solution include the following:-
1. Will the people of Zimbabwe be really sovereign and be able to exercise their sovereign authority?
2. Whose army shall defend Zimbabwe and its people? It must be noted here that 60% of the present white army are mercenaries.
3. Whose police force shall protect the people of Zimbabwe?
4. What type of administration and judiciary shall serve the people of our country, Zimbabwe?
5. Will any ethnic, religious, tribal or other group be able to hold the rest of the people of Zimbabwe
hostage?
6. How do we create the situation for the holding of free and fair elections?
7. Whose laws will govern such elections?
8. In particular, apart from the British supervisors and the Commonwealth observers, who will administer the elections and ensure the safety of the voters and candidates?
9. What will be the future of the people’s land?
These and similar issues are those which should be placed on the agenda of this Conference and before the world if real peace is to return to our beloved Zimbabwe. The time for evasion is long past and we insist that the final phase of decolonisation be seriously pursued now by the British and by ourselves.
We have won that position by our own sacrifice, our own struggle, our own blood. We are not requesting anybody to bestow this right on us. We have done it ourselves. We continue to do it.
Thank you, Mr Chairman.
Labels: JOSHUA NKOMO, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, ZANU-PF
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Mugabe, Tsvangirai, Ncube set for UK land talks
16/06/2011 00:00:00
by Staff Reporter
PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and Industry Minister Welshman Ncube are set to launch a high-level engagement with Britain to discuss compensation for white farmers who lost their land. The planned discussions will be the first time that Mugabe would be openly engaging Britain on the land issue since his government embarked on the controversial land reforms in 2000 aimed at resettling landless blacks.
Hundreds of white farmers were driven off their land after the then Zanu PF government passed legislation empowering the compulsory acquisition of farms without compensation. Ministers insisted at the time that Britain had refused to compensate the farmers, breaking its commitments made at 1979 Lancaster House talks which opened the way for majority rule in Zimbabwe.
A review document of Zimbabwe’s power sharing government by the country’s three main political parties, which was presented to the SADC summit in Johannesburg last weekend, says the three leaders will “write to the United Kingdom” urging the former colonial power to “accept the primary responsibility to pay compensation for land acquired”.
The engagement could start within weeks.
Britain broke off land talks with Zimbabwe in 1997 after the then International Development Secretary Claire Short (Labour) said that the UK did not accept that it had a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe.
Short stated that her government was only prepared to support a programme of land reform that was part of a poverty eradication strategy, stating in a letter to the Zimbabwe government:
“I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe.
"We are a new government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and, as you know, we were colonised, not colonisers.”
The tone of the letter infuriated Mugabe whose government offered no protection to white farmers when war veterans and landless peasants marched on farms, forcibly driving out white land owners.
Britain responded to the land seizures by ostracising Mugabe’s government, before lobbying the European Union to impose sanctions on Zimbabwe in 2002, officially presented as a response to human rights abuses by Zanu PF shock troops.
It is unknown how the UK will respond to overtures by the Zimbabwean leaders, but last month, former Labour leader and Prime Minister Tony Blair – who presided over the breakdown in relations between London and Harare – insisted that his government had set aside money for land reform.
"One of the myths that Mugabe used was this thing that we wouldn't provide money for land reform," Blair said.
"I set aside the amount of money they needed for land reform, but one important thing was that the money had to go through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and not through his government machine, because if it went through his government machine it wasn't going to be used for the purposes for which it was directed.
[Tony Blair lied a country into war. Without references to back up what he is saying, only a fool would take his word for anything. - MrK]
“Therefore, that was the issue; not that we wouldn't fund the land reform, we were happy to do that. And still are, by the way!"
[Then why haven't you paid compensation directly to the white farmers? It has been 10 years now. Tony, you're such a liar. - MrK]
Mugabe has recently expressed hope that Zimbabwe can re-engage with Britain, saying of Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron: “He seems to be quiet for now. I have been listening to what he says. They may talk about Zimbabwe in general terms, but I haven't heard him making really critical remarks about me.”
And Zanu PF strategist Jonathan Moyo told UK media last week that Cameron's "circumspect and careful" attitude had reduced the levels of "noise and tension" between the two sides, suggesting that Mugabe would welcome "constructive" dialogue with him.
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM, MORGAN TSVANGIRAI, ROBERT MUGABE
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Secret documents show Blair's admiration for President Mugabe
By: Philip Murombedzi
Posted: Monday, August 30, 2010 9:41 pm
SECRET documents released recently by the United Kingdom government under the Freedom of Information Act are likely to embarass the New Labour party of Tony Blair as they clearly show that President Mugabe sought to have good relations with Britain all along.
The documents also reveal that Mr Blair had an admiration for President Robert Mugabe and saw him as a unifier on the African continent, but changed his stance after the Fast Track Land Reform Programme started in
2000.
Mr Blair changed his stance when Zimbabwe asked the New Labour government to honour commitments made at Lancaster House in 1979 -- to fund the land reform exercise in Zimbabwe.
The documents, released to The Independent newspaper, show that the relationship between New Labour and President Mugabe blossomed soon after Mr Blair took office in Downing Street.
"Just weeks after the Government unveiled its ethical foreign policy in May 1997, the British PM wrote a personal letter to Mr Mugabe congratulating him on his role in unifying Africa and helping to improve relations between the continent and Britain," wrote The Independent.
"The signed message, which welcomed President Mugabe's appointment as leader of the Organisation of African Unity, paved the way for an attempt to bring the two leaders together in a face-to-face meeting in Downing Street during the first weeks of the New Labour administration."
The two leaders finally met at the Commonwealth summit in in October 1997 in Edinburgh.
At that meeting President Mugabe told Mr Blair that he wanted Britain to honour Lancaster House commitments in which half a million hectares of white-owned farmland were to be redistributed among landless black farmers.
In a letter dated 11 June the UK's Foreign Office urged the Mr Blair to agree to President Mugabe's request for an official visit to Downing Street.
The memo reads: "This may be a useful opportunity for an exchange of views in advance of CHOGM [the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting].
"After South Africa, Zimbabwe is the most important country in southern Africa to us both commercially and politically."
"President Mugabe remains a senior African and Commonwealth figure with whom there would be advantage in establishing early close relations. We recommend that the Prime Minister sees him if his programme permits."
No 10 wrote back to the Foreign Office saying that Mr Blair could not make the date suggested by President Mugabe.
A second Foreign Office letter later urges Mr Blair to hold the meeting in September. But this time Mr Blair's commitments prevented the two leaders meeting.
In the run-up to the Commonwealth conference, President Mugabe was optimistic about forging closer ties with Britain. "I have great hopes of Tony Blair," he said. "Mrs Thatcher described me as a terrorist but Tony Blair is different."
The populist government of Mr Blair later changed its tune on Zimbabwe as it sought money to fund policies it had promised to British people.
The government cut aid to former colonies in an attempt to save money; and Zimbabwe was not spared.
Then UK Secretary for International Development, Claire Short, wrote to the Minister of Agriculture and Land at the time, Kumbirai Kangai, saying: "I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe."
She added: "We are a new Government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and as you know we were colonised not colonisers.
"I am told Britain provided a package of assistance for resettlement in the period immediately following independence. This was, I gather, carefully planned and implemented, and met most of its targets.
"Again, I am told there were discussions in 1989 and 1996 to explore the possibility of further assistance. However that is all in the past."
After Britain reneged on their obligation, Zimbabwe's land reform programme started.
The British government will be embarassed by this report as it proved that they have been hoodwinking the public on what exactly transpired at the time.
The overtures made by the Zimbabwean government were scoffed at and the Zanu-PF was left with no option but to go it alone.
Labels: CLAIRE SHORT, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, NEOCOLONIALISM, ROBERT MUGABE, TONY BLAIR
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Understandable Fury
By: Dr Kenneth Kaunda
Posted: Thursday, March 25, 2010 5:06 pm
Founding Zambian president Dr Kenneth Kaunda
IN light of a recent claim by the House of Commons Africa All Party Parliamentary Group claim that no agreement was reached on land in 1979 at the Lancaster House constitutional talks on Rhodesia, we reproduce a piece that was written by former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda in the July - September 2007 edition of BBC Focus on Africa magazine.
We believe that piece will shed some light on what transpired and refutes some of claims made in the report: 'Land in Zimbabwe: Past Mistakes, Future Prospects'.
Full transcript
____________
LEADERS in the West say Robert Mugabe is a demon, that he has destroyed Zimbabwe, and he must be gotten rid of.
This demonising is made by people who may not understand what Robert Gabriel Mugabe and his fellow freedom fighters have gone through.
In 1960, Harold Macmillan, then British prime minister, made an interesting statement in Cape Town, referring to what was taking place in southern Africa as "The wind of change".
He had correctly read the feelings of the black masses.
Eventually, the British government abolished the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.
Smith's Rhodesia
Northern Rhodesia in 1964 became Zambia and Nyasaland became Malawi. But white people in Rhodesia rejected that wind of change and, in November 1965, Ian Smith, by force, took over in a "Unilateral Declaration of Independence".
It was treason against the British monarchy, the colonial ruler.
Soon, Smith arrested African leaders, including Robert Gabriel Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo.
Harold Wilson, then British prime minister, showed signs of hopelessness.
He called some meetings aboard the Tiger navy ship, and yet another one on another British warship called the Fearless.
Both meetings showed no tiger claws, and were fearful of the rebels in Rhodesia.
I spoke with Wilson, but there was no progress. And, sadly, Smith's rebel regime went on.
Meanwhile, the Zimbabwe freedom struggle was continuing, but handicapped because its key leaders were locked up.
Even talks with another British prime minister, Edward Heath, did not help.
I could see clearly that no matter who became prime minister of Britain, they would do nothing about the Rhodesia situation.
South Africa's buffer
It was South Africa that was in charge. I concluded that the settlers were interested in keeping Southern Rhodesia under white rule so that they could have a buffer against advancing African independent states.
In 1974, I decided to meet John Vorster, South Africa's then-prime minister.
We met in his white train at the bridge between Zambia and then Southern Rhodesia, as a follow-up to our discussions, he freed our colleagues in Zimbabwe's liberation movements.
There was, of course, not a single dull moment in the struggle for independence in our region.
In August 1979, Commonwealth countries from all over the world met in Lusaka to consider many issues – but the most serious one was the Zimbabwe situation.
In the end, then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher agreed Britain would hold a conference on the future of Zimbabwe in London.
She asked me to be around at what became known as the Lancaster House talks, in case difficulties arose in the negotiations.
At the talks, the people of Zimbabwe were assured that they were going to be independent the following year, 1980.
But that wonderful news was conditional.
The new government of Zimbabwe was not to deal with land issues but was to "leave that in the hands of the British government".
Nationalists from Zimbabwe accepted this rather harsh and complicated condition.
Blair government inaction
I understand that the Thatcher government had begun to deal with the land issue, as did her successor, John Major.
But when in 1997 Tony Blair took over, I understand that some young lady in charge of colonial issues within that government simply dropped doing anything about it.
I ask you, my reader, to consider the implications of the long struggle.
The nationalists, who had the regaining of land as a key objective of their struggle, were now being told the British government, which promised to look after that issue themselves, was not going to go ahead with it.
The Zimbabwean government waited patiently for more than ten years, but the British government defaulted.
We must remember the occupation by Cecil Rhodes.
Rhodes removed African people from fertile lands to hilly and unfertile lands in favour of settlers.
And remember that, later, while neighbours became independent, Southern Rhodesia was grabbed by white settlers, led by Smith.
In the struggle, many people were killed.
There have been allegations of corruption in relation to land allocation.
Well, the corruption should have been dealt with by all. Stopping the land programme, and doing nothing, was not the solution.
Prayer for Mugabe
I do not believe it is right to demonise Robert Gabriel Mugabe.
It is notable that he and his colleagues have not expelled from Zimbabwe people who did terrible things to them.
Of course, there are some things which President Mugabe and his colleagues have done which I totally disagree with – for example, the police beating of Morgan Tsvangirai.
It is not that I think Tsvangirai can make a good leader.
I see him as the Frederick Chiluba of Zimbabwe, but beating him or even sending him to prison will not be the right thing.
On the other hand, given their experience, I can understand the fury that goes through President Mugabe and his colleagues.
Now, let me reveal that when Blair was elected British prime minister, I wrote a poem in his favour, called A star is born to us.
Indeed, his feelings for Africa have been very good.
But then came the two Bs, Blair and George Bush, and their terrifying act of March 2003 – the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
I condemned the two Bs publicly, denouncing the criminal invasion.
Now my prayer is that the Zimbabwe issue will be treated differently by Blair's successor, Gordon Brown.
It is also my humble prayer that South African President Thabo Mbeki and his regional colleagues will meet Robert Gabriel Mugabe, who will be ready in his soul, mind, and body to respond to the advice they give him and the people of Zimbabwe.
Labels: KENNETH KAUNDA, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM, UK
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COMMENT - I think the message learned by the Native Americans centuries ago is that if you make a verbal agreement with the British, it is worth the paper it isn't written on.
Lancaster House was clear on Zimbabwe land reform
By: COMMENT
Posted: Thursday, March 25, 2010 4:41 pm
Independence was conditional on leaving the land issue to the British
ZIMBABWEAN online media today is awash with news that the Lancaster House Agreement of 1979 was never explicit on compensating white farmers for land reform. A House of Commons Africa All Party Parliamentary Group published a report
'Land in Zimbabwe: Past Mistakes, Future Prospects'.
In an opinion piece, the chair of that body and Labour MP for City of York, Hugh Bayley, claims that "the narrative that Britain 'betrayed' the promises it made at Lancaster House, though widely held throughout the region, has no foundation because no agreement was reached on land in 1979."
He further writes: "The Africa APPG received no evidence from any source – including the Zimbabwean Embassy in London – indicating that a secret deal was made on land.
"Despite this, the belief that justice on land was denied at Lancaster House is felt strongly today, both in Zimbabwe and throughout southern Africa. It is clear that Britain must do all it can to address this misconception and restore our reputation in the region."
Those who have read the Constitution that came out of that conference will know that the UK and US made an explicit pledge to fund the reform.
APPG can make all necessary action to "restore Britain's reputation", but facts remain intact. The Patriotic Front (PF) of Zanu and Zapu would have walked without an agreement on land.
Talks almost failed on the single issue of land; as the PF led by Robert Mugabe and Dr Joshua Nkomo would not budge.
Denial of Britain and US's pledge at Lancaster House is a cynical attempt at justifying inequity and a crude attempt at re-writing the history of Zimbabwe.
In any case, Britain has a moral obligation to fund that process, according to Labour MP Tony Benn. The victim, surely, cannot be expected to fund the very process that enslaved them. Land is the sole purpose why the Liberation War was fought.
It is inconceivable to think that anyone, including the media, would support the fact that Whites - 5% of the population - were justified to own 80% of the arable land.
Millions of black people scratched a living on the rest of the infertile land. This was a crucial debating point for Mugabe and Dr Nkomo.
Those who care to read the Lancaster House proceedings, will have found out that when UK government negotiator, Lord Carrington presented the draft constitution on Rhodesia it contained no reference to land, the sole purpose of the liberations struggle.
Both Mugabe and Nkomo blew up and talks almost failed.
Then Commonwealth secretary general, Shridath Ramphal, saved the talks. Ramphal secretly contacted the US ambassador in London, Kingman Brewster, and asked him to get the then US President, Jimmy Carter, to promise money to pay white farmers for their land, and he (Carter) did.
Lord Carrington in 2007 told the BBC: "Brewster was totally supportive. We were at a stage where Mugabe and Nkomo were packing their bags.
"He (Brewster) came back to me within 24 hours. They had got hold of Jimmy Carter and Carter authorised Brewster to say to me that the United States would contribute a substantial amount for a process of land redistribution and they would undertake to encourage the British government to give similar assurances.
"That of course saved the conference."
The issue is that there was an agreement on compensation; and that agreement led to a ceasefire, otherwise the war would have continued.
As part of that deal, the UK paid white farmers around $35m for their land in the first years of independence. That land was then redistributed.
If there was no such agreement, why did they make that payment?
The British also assisted in setting up the Zimbabwe Conference on Reconstruction and Development in 1981. At that conference, more than £630 million of aid was pledged, as part of the Lancaster House Agreement.
The first phase of land reform in the 1980s, which was also partially funded by the United Kingdom, successfully resettled around 70,000 landless people on more than 20,000 km² of land.
It is important to note that, at Lancaster House, both the British and American governments offered to buy land from willing white settlers who could not accept reconciliation (the "Willing buyer, Willing seller" principle) and a fund was established for that purpose.
Lord Carrington, Sir Ian Gilmour, Robert Karigamombe Mugabe and Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo, Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Dr. S C Mundawarara signed the report which included that pledge.
Everything took a turn when the Labour government came into power in 1997.
Claire Short, then secretary of state for international development wrote on 5 November 1997 to Kumbirai Kangai, then Minister of Agriculture and Land saying:
"I am told Britain provided a package of assistance for resettlement ... This was, I gather, carefully planned and implemented, and met most of its targets."
Was that provision not part of the Lancaster House Agreement?
Claire Short, however, added: "Again, I am told there were discussions in 1989 and 1996 to explore the possibility of further assistance. However that is all in the past.
"I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe.
"We are a new Government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and as you know we were colonised not colonisers."
This is the crux of the matter and Claire Short's letter killed off every agreement that had been made at Lancaster House and relations between Britain and Zimbabwe soured.
Any other arguments fielded in the media are baseless, including the fact that Zimbabwe was involved in the Second Congo War. That war, the deadliest conflict worldwide since World War II, only started in August 1998, after Claire Short's letter. Zimbabwean forces only entered DRC in September 1998.
Zimbabwe's involvement in that war couldn't have influenced the British decision to stop land compensation before it had happened.
No amount of propaganda will re-write the history of Zimbabwe, or of Britain for that matter.
_____________
Comments and suggestions to itayig *** hotmail.com
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM
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COMMENT - Interesting parliamentary report on the Lancaster House Agreement/Constitution. What a bunch of cheapskates though. It isn't the Zimbabwean government that should be outraged by this, but the white commercial farmers. They're the ones Britain screwed over when it refuses to pay compensation. I really like the fact that in this information age there is immediate pushback. The Zimbabwe Guardian has
an immediate response, and an earlier article from Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, former President of Zambia, titled
Understandable Fury.
UK made no promise to fund Zimbabwe land reform: report
by
25/03/2010 00:00:00
BRITAIN made no firm undertaking to fund Zimbabwe’s land reform programme as oft-claimed by Zimbabwe government officials, a new report by MPs from the former colonial power says.
The Africa All Party Parliamentary Group says the December 21, 1979, Lancaster House Agreement was signed “without the Patriotic Front leaders acquiring the powers they wanted to address the chronic land ownership inequality they would inherit”.
The report concludes: “What they (Patriotic Front leaders) had received was assurances from the British and American governments that funds would be committed to assist with land reform ...
“Given this, the Africa All Party Parliamentary Group concludes that no figure was mentioned, much less agreed upon, and that commitments made by either the British or the American government were assurances of support with no price tag attached.”
The report published this week will incense the Zimbabwe government which says Britain and America reneged on promises to fund land reform during the talks that ended an armed insurrection against white colonial rulers, and re-established majority rule in 1980.
In a famous speech delivered in Harlem, United States in 2000, President Robert Mugabe said: “The land we had hoped would come to us easily after the understanding we had reached in 1979 as we negotiated for independence with the British at Lancaster House, and they had agreed to fund the process of land acquisition and resettlement ... still hasn’t come.
“Those who had made the promise then were the government of [Margaret] Thatcher, and here you still had the Democrats under President [Jimmy] Carter. Under the promise that America had also made, they would fund alongside Britain the land reform.”
Mugabe said after Carter was defeated, and President Ronald Reagan took charge, the latter “reneged on the undertaking by President Carter and said ‘no, he was not going to continue the aid programme which the Democrats had started'.”
Mugabe added: “Then in Britain, they also reneged and said that they no longer had any money, and this at the time of Thatcher. But later, we negotiated with the Conservative government a new deal in 1996, but before that new deal saw the light of day, the Conservative party was defeated and in came Blair and his lot.
“Blair said to us very clearly, very blatantly, that they were not in a position to inherit colonial responsibility, what the Conservatives had promised was a matter for the Conservatives, ‘we are a Labour party with its own policies’.
“We tried to reason with them and said, ‘but at international law, surely if you are successor to a legitimate government of Britain you don’t only succeed to assets, you also succeed to liabilities’.”
The British MPs, in their report entitled ‘Land in Zimbabwe: Past Mistakes and Future Prospects’, say they set out to probe a “growing belief among Zimbabweans and others that during the Lancaster House talks that led to Zimbabwe’s independence Britain and the United States made promises concerning land transfer which were later betrayed.”
The MPs add: “These promises, it is claimed, included specific amounts to buy out white Zimbabwean land-owners and set up black Zimbabweans as farmers, thereby righting a colonial wrong.
“British and American versions of events maintain that no promises were made other than to provide substantial funding for agricultural development and land reform. These, they say, were fulfilled until President Mugabe’s government began to pursue what they regarded as unworkable economic policies and allowed land to be seized without compensation. In response, Western donors cut off aid for land reform.”
[They can say what they want, but until 1997, only UKPND 44 million had been made available. The British or Americans were not interested in compensating white farmers for the market value of the land, and they have been trying to put all the blame on the ZANU-PF instead. What they are really afraid of, is that they have to compensate white farmers not only in Zimbabwe, but in Namibia, South Africa, Kenya, and many other African countries. Such is the price of colonialism, that even the world's leading economies cannot pay compensation without going bankrupt. - MrK]
The report says Britain must be a “positive force in the rebuilding of Zimbabwe”, but adds that “if we are to contribute towards a solution, then we must first scrutinise our past and work out what went wrong, where it went wrong and how to ensure that history does not repeat itself.”
In an interesting finding, the MPs say Britain and the international community “failed to recognise how vulnerable President Mugabe was to pressure from the war veterans” in the lead up to the 2000 farm invasions by independence war veterans.
“By 1997, pressure in Zimbabwe began to build against President Mugabe. The hitherto benign War Veteran Association first demanded larger pensions and then, in 2000, land,” says the report.
“President Mugabe, unable to extract provisions from Britain or the international community and desperate to remain in power agreed, allowed and even encouraged farm seizures with no compensation.”
Mugabe has accused Britain of sabotaging Zimbabwe’s economy in response to the farm seizures which he defends as a necessary programme to correct immoral land ownership patterns.
As Mugabe, along with Patriotic Front comrade Joshua Nkomo, negotiated the Lancaster House deal in 1979, white Rhodesian settlers made up less than 1% of the population but owned 70% of the land – 6,000 large scale white farmers controlled roughly 40% of the country’s territory while approximately seven million black Zimbabweans were crowded into communal areas.
A major point of frustration with the Lancaster House Agreement for the Zimbabwe leaders was that the constitution could not be altered for 10 years – thereby guaranteeing the property rights of the commercial farmers for a decade after Zimbabwe won its independence.
Land resettlement during that period could only occur through the willing buyer-willing seller scheme, which Britain had pledged to support. Between 1980-1985 the Land Resettlement Programme was moderately successful, but stalled after 1985 when Britain refused to release any more funds. A total of 71,000 families had been resettled.
[And a total of over 320,000 families have been resettled to date - well over a million people. - MrK]
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM, UK
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Land — A cornerstone of Lancaster House settlement
By David Martin
This is the fifth in a series of eight articles on the events of late 1979 and early 1980, the last stages leading to independence of Zimbabwe.
"You do not understand history. The right in power, not the left, solve major world problems: De Gaulle and Algiers, Macmillan and the ‘wind of change’, Nixon and China . . . I think we will have a settlement in Southern Rhodesia under this woman [Mrs Thatcher] within 12 months."
On May 4 1979, President Samora Moises Machel had arrived eight minutes late for a cabinet meeting that had been scheduled to begin at 9am in Maputo, the Indian Ocean capital of Mozambique.
He apologised to his assembled ministers and told them to be seated. Then he asked why they were so gloomy; had he not heard that Margaret Thatcher had won the British election the previous day, they asked?
Yes, he replied. That was why he was late for the meeting; he and his wife had stayed up the previous evening drinking champagne to celebrate Mrs Thatcher’s victory. The assembled ministers looked at Machel as if he had taken leave of his senses.
Their reaction was predictable. The British shadow foreign secretary, Francis Pym, had said that if the Conservatives were elected they would recognise the "internal settlement" signed by Ian Smith, Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Reverend Ndabaningi Sithole and James Chikerema.
Such a move threatened to place British forces on the side of the white settlers against the liberation movements.
As the leader of a neighbouring country which had become the main rear base for Zanu-PF during the war of liberation, Machel had shared a keen interest in the Southern Rhodesian outcome, and particularly in the land issue.
He pre-empted the first interview he gave after Mozambique’s independence in June 1975 by demanding of this writer: "Tell me about white Rhodesians."
We talked for two-and-a-half hours about the farmers and the land and Ian Smith (whom he called a "tobacco seller"), resulting in the formal interview for The Observer being postponed until the following day.
In August 1979, Commonwealth leaders assembled in Lusaka across the River Zambezi for their biannual summit. It was the first Commonwealth meeting attended by representatives of Mozambique, now a Commonwealth member.
The Lancaster House talks in London followed and by Christmas 1979 the ongoing Southern Rhodesian crisis had been resolved, at least on paper — three months ahead of Machel’s predicted deadline.
But it was not an easy meeting. The former US Secretary of State, Dr Henry Kissinger, had laid out the principles for a settlement during his shuttle diplomacy in 1976. Kissinger, despite the pessimism at the time, had set in motion the diplomatic process that would lead eventually to the settlement of the Rhodesian impasse.
In the third volume of his memoirs of those years, Kissinger writes: "Our allies expressed their goodwill and avowed their readiness to make a financial contribution to reconstruction and transition costs for the European minorities should a breakthrough to majority rule actually be achieved."
It was upon this promised financial support (which by then had been increased) that a settlement became possible at Lancaster House. But, as is often the case when establishing principles, the details were glossed over by those who were not directly affected by the land and other issues.
Land became the sticking points at Lancaster House and the then Commonwealth Secretary-General, Sonny Ramphal, spoke privately to the US ambassador in London, Kingman Brewster, about the issue.
Brewster was a former president of Yale University and a close friend of the then US president, Jimmy Carter, and his Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance. Both men were extensively consulted by Brewster on the basis of the breakthrough Kissinger had achieved in getting Smith to accept majority rule.
There followed a secret meeting at in November 1979 at the Ramphal’s official residence at Garden House, 40B Hill Street, London W1.
Initially, only three people were present: Ramphal, Robert Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo, as the political leaders of the Patriotic Front. Brewster was later invited to join the meeting.
They discussed "the fundamental rights guarantee proposed by the British for prompt and adequate compensation to the white farmers", Ramphal recalled.
"This took no account of the reality of land distribution in Zimbabwe and how future leaders would redress that reality without having to pay vast sums of money promptly and adequately.
"The meeting concluded that the constitutional provisions proposed by the British would have to be accepted, but these would only be accepted alongside the resources necessary to pay for the land.
"It was decided that the US would make a gesture by starting such a fund and Brewster immediately received approval from Carter and Vance. One American stipulation was that it be referred to as an ‘Agricultural Development Fund’ and not as money to buy out the white farmers. We thought this would encourage the British. But this never happened."
Ramphal blames Thatcher for not instituting the fund.
"In those first 10 years, all of this should have been worked out in London. But it was not," he said, adding that" "Robert was interested in the details as well as the principle regarding land at Lancaster House."
In Harare, the interpretation is different. Thatcher, they believe, partially accepted the agreement that had been worked out during the first 10 years of Zimbabwe’s independence when an entrenched clause prevented land acquisition except on a "willing seller, willing buyer" basis.
Depending upon whether you choose to believe the British or Zimbabwean sums, the British government gave Zimbabwe GBP 44 million or GBP 30 million during those first 10 years.
This sum, however, pales into insignificance when measured against the amount that was actually promised. The British Foreign Secretary of the time, David Owen, wrote subsequently: "The last labour government in 1977 under Jim Callaghan promised substantial sums: GBP 75 million from Britain and US$520 million from the States."
That they did not deliver these sums is perhaps less important than the fact that they accepted the principle, which was the basis of the Lancaster Agreement.
Thatcher refused to renew the British support to buy out the white farmers once the 10-year clause had expired in 1990. Her successor, John Major, held discussions with the Zimbabwean Government and in 1996 sent an Overseas Development Assistance mission to Zimbabwe to evaluate the first phase.
This mission found that the first 10 years had been largely positive and recommended ways forward. However, before the recommendations could be implemented, John Major lost the 1997 elections to the Labour party and Tony Blair.
Blair flatly refused to accept Britain’s colonial responsibility and the undertaking made by his predecessors in the Conservative government and on November 5 1997, the British Minister of Overseas Development, Clare Short, wrote the now infamous letter the then Zimbabwean Minister of Agriculture, Kumbirai Kangai, as follows:
"I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe. We are a new government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and as you know we were colonised not colonisers."
With the stroke of a pen, Short sided with the racial land division which dated back to the days of white supremacy and terminated the agreement that Kissinger, the Lancaster talks, Thatcher and Major had so carefully nurtured.
It is scarcely surprising that the Zimbabwean government regarded the new British position as a "repudiation of a cornerstone of the Lancaster House Agreement".
l David Martin was former Africa correspondent of The Observer, London, and a chronicler of the liberation struggle in Southern Africa, who passed away in August 2007.
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LAND REFORM, ZAMORA MACHEL
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Lancaster House - The US perspective
By Jeffrey Davidow - Lancaster House: The US Perspective
Mon, 21 Dec 2009 23:05:00 +0000
This is the second in a series of eight articles on the events of late 1979 and early 1980, the last stages leading to independence of Zimbabwe. Davidow is a retired US diplomat.
FOR more than three months in late 1979, British Foreign Secretary Peter Carrington chaired a conference at Lancaster House in London that the British government had convened to find, once and for all, a solution to "the Rhodesian problem".
At the outset and through most of its course, few observers or participants gave the conference much chance of success.
Most doubted that a settlement acceptable to all of the parties gathered there could be devised, that would bring an end to the war in Rhodesia and guide the country from minority white domination to majority African rule.
The pessimism was understandable.
For 15 years, successive British governments had failed in efforts to convince Ian Smith, the then Prime Minister of Rhodesia, to relinquish the control that he and approximately 200 000 white settlers maintained over Rhodesia’s government and its black population, which by 1979 numbered approximately seven million . . .
Nevertheless, the conference did succeed. On December 21, the head of the Salisbury delegation, Bishop Abel Muzorewa, the leaders of the Patriotic Front, Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe, and Lord Carrington signed an agreement that contained a constitution for the independent state of Zimbabwe, ceasefire provisions to end the war, and transitional arrangements to guide the country through a brief period of British interim administration . . .
The Lancaster House Conference was a three-act play, or, better put, a one-act play performed three times, but with enough variety and tension so as not to rob each performance of its drama.
Each dealt with a distinct area of the settlement — the constitution, the transitional arrangements, and the ceasefire — and lasted about one month.
Most of the performance was enacted outside of the conference hall.
At each stage the British were able to obtain early Muzorewa approval of their proposals and couple that with Lord Carrington’s perceived willingness to pursue a second-class solution, to obtain the Patriotic Front’s acquiescence.
In retrospect, the three acts take on an almost formalised predictability, but at the time few could be sanguine of success . . .
On 7 June 1979, US President Jimmy Carter had issued a congressionally mandated report in which he stated that the conditions were not yet appropriate for the United States to lift sanctions against Rhodesia, which was technically still a colony in rebellion against Britain.
The US president’s decision was not a popular one among many on Capitol Hill, where support for the Rhodesian regime of Bishop Abel Muzorewa, who had six weeks earlier replaced Ian Smith as Prime Minister, was increasing . . .
Perhaps the most significant involvement of a supporting actor was that of US Ambassador Kingman Brewster. Responding to separate requests from [Commonwealth Secretary-General Sonny] Ramphal and Carrington, President Carter authorised Brewster to convey to the British, the Front Line States, and the Patriotic Front a pledge of US assistance should Lancaster House result in a success.
The wording of the US commitment was convoluted and cautious, reflecting the Carter administration’s concern that it might face congressional criticism for participating in a "buyout" of white landlords or for opening the US.treasury to land-hungry peasants . . .
In a statement to a plenary of October 18, Nkomo noted that the British and US assurances on land issues "go a long way in allaying the great concern we have over the whole land question".
Another factor that may have played a role in acceptance was the knowledge, leaked to the Press and discussed in general terms with Nkomo and Mugabe, of British intentions to take an active role in the transitional period, thus limiting, to some degree, their continued concern about Rhodesian regime control during the interim period.
Carrington’s negotiating position was markedly strengthened by the situational factors surrounding the conference: its London venue and the wide panoply of tools — intelligence gathering, Press manipulation, tactic bargaining played out in Parliament — that he put to use.
The keystone of the British conference tactics, the step-by-step approach, generated momentum as intended, kept the parties engaged, and conveyed the impression of conference progress necessary for Carrington to maintain the support of Mrs Thatcher and interested onlookers such as the Front Line States and the US government.
A principle function of the supporting players was to reinforce Britain’s credibility . . . "One of our most important contributions throughout the Lancaster House Conference," writes [then US Secretary of State] Cyrus Vance, "was to vouch for British sincerity and impartiality with the suspicious Africans."
The categorical difficulty lies not entirely in the multiplicity of Carrington’s roles [as negotiator, mediator, arbitrator]. It is also prompted by the blurring of distinctions that were once thought to neatly exist . . . Certain subjects seem quite clear as long as we leave them alone.
The ideal mediator was once thought to be an impartial third party, with no particular stake in the outcome, able to elucidate the conflictive issues, promote co-operation among the parties, and generate compromise agreements.
Most mediators still perform these functions. In international relations, however . . . many mediators represent entities that are not disinterested and have the capability of influencing participants by the use of threats and promises.
"Dominant third-party" mediation, in all its variations, will be a recurring feature of the diplomacy of the United States as well as other countries. It might help to know a bit more about it.
______________
* The author was US Diplomatic Observer in Rhodesia from July 1979 and stayed for three years until 1982. He was the senior US diplomat in Zimbabwe after independence in April 1980 and opened the US embassy. This article is from his book, A Peace in Southern Africa: The Lancaster House Conference on Rhodesia, 1979 published by Westview in 1984.
Labels: JEFFREY DAVIDOW, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT
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The British Governor. Will he have plumes and a horse?
Lord Peter Carrington - The British Governor: Will he have plumes and a horse?
Wed, 23 Dec 2009 01:57:00 +0000
This is the third in a series of eight articles on the events of late 1979 and early 1980, the last stages leading to independence of Zimbabwe. Lord Carrington was the British Foreign Secretary.
IN April 1979 an election had been held under the auspices of the Salisbury government in an effort to break the deadlock and win general international respectability.
Nkomo and Mugabe (who had each spent 10 years in prison under the Smith regime) had, although released, been allowed no part in the election and had denounced it as a sham.
The only black contender, who thereafter nominally led a Rhodesian government, was Bishop Abel Muzorewa.
This was described as the “internal settlement” (Muzorewa was governing, with Ian Smith firmly behind his right shoulder) and we were urged, particularly by the right wing of the Conservative Party, to acknowledge its validity and to recognise an independent Rhodesia.
It would have been highly convenient if we had been able to do so . . .
I was certainly keen to emphasise how far the Smith government had come towards us and towards settlement.
“There had been a fundamental change inside Rhodesia,” I said to the Lords in my first speech as Foreign Secretary.
“There has been an election in which every adult man and woman has been enabled to cast a vote . . . there is now an African majority in Parliament.”
And I took every opportunity to speak encouraging words about Muzorewa and to remind that these developments under Smith, who had not long before spoken of white rule lasting a thousand years, could hardly be shrugged off as insignificant or not marking progress.
The trouble was that, although the election had been as full and fair as conditions permitted, Nkomo and Mugabe had not taken part; so that conditions had only permitted a vote for Muzorewa, as a black — and he collected what I am afraid was a great many more votes than he could have possibly scored in an open contest (ultimately he received a derisory share of the vote when weighed against Nkomo and Mugabe).
I was already, sadly, convinced that the “internal settlement” was probably a fudge, in terms of the domestic support it really commanded.
It was widely seen as a device to perpetuate the white man’s rule behind an amenable and unrepresentative black front, and although this was by no means completely fair there was something in it.
Above all — which for me was decisive — it could not possibly be sold to the international community.
It has to be recalled that Smith’s declaration of independence had been an unconstitutional act and his regime in consequence illegal — and thus difficult for the British Crown to recognise, even if sanitised, so to speak, by an appearance of democracy. The international community perceived the difficulty very clearly. I asked Lord Harlech to pay a series of visits, to form a view on who would be prepared to recognise the Rhodesian “internal settlement”, if we ourselves did.
He reported that it would not be recognised by any black African states — Nigeria, very hostile to Rhodesia and carrying a lot of weight, was orchestrating this opposition.
It would not be recognised by a single member of the European Community. There would almost certainly be an adverse vote in the United Nations. There would also be a likely break-up of the Commonwealth.
The “‘internal settlement” did not look as if it had a chance of achieving my main object — international acceptance of Rhodesia, as well as a cessation of fighting; and I reiterate what this main object was because nothing less could possibly be in the long-term interest of Rhodesians themselves. Black and white . . .
I was not optimistic about the Lancaster House out-turn.
I was confident we had been right not to recognise the “internal settlement”, to go for another conference, to get preliminary Commonwealth — and, on the whole, international — endorsement of the idea. But I thought it likely that the invited parties would come, and then create trouble at the moment they decided most favourable, break off proceedings, walk out, go away . . .
I decided to give separate dinner parties at the start, one for the supporters of the “internal settlement”, for Smith, Muzorewa and their followers; and another for the Patriotic Front . . .
I think, in retrospect, that I at the time underestimated the difficulties of each of these sections and individuals had with the principle as well as the practice of sitting down with the others in conference.
There had been bad things done in Rhodesia and much bitterness both among whites and those blacks loyal to the Salisbury government; while, on the other side and at the second of my dinner parties, I was struck by the normality and poise of both Nkomo and Mugabe after their very long periods in gaol . . .
I remember, too, Ian Smith at one of the private rather than plenary meetings. He said to me: “I think its disgraceful the way you’re handling this conference . . . [while] hundreds of people in Rhodesia are being killed.”
I think I kept my temper during some pretty provoking moments at that conference, but on this particular occasion it was touch and go. I said to Smith: “Perhaps you might recollect that but for you nobody in Rhodesia would be being killed.”
I think it was a fair reply. Ian Smith went home shortly afterwards. It was not he but David Smith and Peter Walls who had been convinced that the white Rhodesians should keep at the conference, keep going . . .
The conference dragged on, looking like ending in failure more often than success . . .
The eventual agreement set out a simple sequence — simple in concept, likely to be troubled in execution. There was to be a ceasefire: the guerrilla forces were to stand down, move to assembly points, accept disarmament.
There was to be a reversion to the constitutional situation before the Unilateral Declaration of Independence by Smith; and then there was to be elections in Rhodesia, based on universal suffrage, with all parties permitted to take part and with independence and recognition of a balanced constitution granted by the British Crown thereafter.
I was dreading the moment when I would have to announce that the first step would be the return of a British Governor, for although it was an inevitable consequence of our proposals for return to legality, I knew nobody expected it and nobody would like it . . . I made the announcement at a plenary session.
There was dead silence. It lasted a long time. It was broken by Joshua Nkomo. He looked at me enquiringly. “Really? Will he have plumes and a horse?” The whole conference dissolved in laughter. The day was saved.
_________________________
*Reflections on Things Past: The Memoirs of Lord Carrington, Collins, 1988
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, LORD CARRIGTON
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Lancaster House revisited
Phyllis Johnson - Lancaster House Revisited
Mon, 21 Dec 2009 00:11:00 +0000
THIS is the first in a series of eight articles on the events of late 1979 and early 1980. Thirty years ago, on December 21 1979, an agreement was signed in London that set in motion a series of events that put Zimbabwe on the course to where it is today.
The signatures appended reluctantly to that agreement beneath the chandeliers and subterfuge of Lancaster House ended the war in a place that some called Rhodesia and signalled a different route to independence for a country that the majority called Zimbabwe.
The 103 days of pressure and posturing conducted by the adroit Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom, Lord Carrington, from September 10 until December 21 1979, were notable by the avoidance of the main issue in a 90-year-old dispute.
The parties simply agreed to disagree on the core issue of land and went on to reach agreement on all surrounding matters, including the sensitive question of a ceasefire and a brief return to British rule before elections and independence.
Land was discussed instead at strategic meetings on the sidelines and concluded at one such meeting convened at the Hill Street residence of the Commonwealth Secretary-General, Sonny Ramphal.
His deputy (and successor as Secretary-General), Chief Emeka Anyaoku, said in his memoirs (The Inside Story of the Modern Commonwealth, Evans 2004) that: "The two leaders of the nationalist movements (Mugabe and Nkomo) strongly objected to the proposal that the future government of the country should commit itself to paying full compensation to the white farm owners on a ‘willing seller/willing buyer’ basis.
"For them, this amounted to mortgaging the future resources of Zimbabwe to buy back land that had been forcibly taken away from their people in the first instance.
"They argued that the land ownership structure was unacceptable to them, and that their people had taken up arms to fight the liberation war in order to regain the land.
"They certainly were not prepared to pay to recover what has been ‘stolen’ from them, as the land had not been paid for when their people were forced off it.
"I took the point and reported these conversations and my impressions to Sonny Ramphal, while updating him on how far I was able to persuade them to go along with certain elements of the proposals," Anyaoku said.
"Sonny Ramphal then made approaches to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and President Jimmy Carter of the United States, both of whom indicated that they would be willing to provide assistance to independent Zimbabwe that would enable the new government to buy back land from white farmers on a ‘willing seller/willing buyer’ basis.
"The British and American offer was conveyed to the nationalist leaders and, on the basis of this, it became possible to move the negotiating process forward."
Anyaoku also says that President Samora Machel of Mozambique played an important role "and swung his influence behind the Lancaster process".
Neighbouring countries in the person of the chairman of the Front Line States, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, President of the United Republic of Tanzania, urged the Patriotic Front leaders to settle, advising them that they could deal with the land issue after they formed the government of an independent Zimbabwe. Tanzania operates a successful system of long leases for land use, with bankable leases.
Carrington was clear on where British interests lay and that the nationalist forces fighting for independence had the upper hand.
"The war had strained Rhodesia’s economy and society to the limits, and inspite of a good many local successes for government forces and some skilful military operations, it was not being won.
"It was exhausting Rhodesia, and in this context that meant it was particularly exhausting the white Rhodesians."
Although "Margaret Thatcher had not particularly bent her mind to Africa", Carrington said, "we were sure that the British interest demanded settlement of the Rhodesian issue and needed such a conference if it could possibly be attained."
Thatcher’s education was advanced by Carrington and also by Machel who anticipated her election as British prime minister and had a ready strategy to engage her on Rhodesia.
On hearing confirmation of her election in early May 1979, Machel told his astonished cabinet that "this woman will bring us settlement in Rhodesia".
Among the rumbling of discontent from his colleagues, Machel dispatched a history lesson about the Right in power, giving examples of French president Charles de Gaulle granting independence to Algeria, US president Richard Nixon opening up to China, and British prime minister Harold Macmillan announcing the "wind of change" towards independence from colonial rule in Africa.
Carrington also commended the role of President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia at the Commonwealth Summit held in July 1979 in Lusaka, where the plans firmed for a conference.
He described "how the prime minister’s fears of personal animosity proved largely groundless and how she at once blossomed in the warmth of Kenneth Kaunda’s friendly personality, dancing with him enthusiastically as she did at the first party".
In his memoirs (Reflections on Things Past: The Memoirs of Lord Carrington, Collins, 1998), Carrington described the many weeks at Lancaster House as a "tempestuous and testing time" and said he was not optimistic at the outset. But he added that he "was struck by the normality and poise of both Nkomo and Mugabe after their very long periods in gaol (jail)".
"The agreement set out a simple sequence — simple in concept, likely to be troubled in execution. There was to be a ceasefire: the guerilla forces were to stand down, move to assembly points, accept disarmament.
"There was to be a reversion to the constitutional situation before the Unilateral Declaration of Independence by Smith; and then there were to be elections in Rhodesia, based on universal suffrage, with all parties permitted to take part and with independence and recognition of a balanced constitution granted by the British Crown thereafter."
Senior British officials later admitted that a secret of their successful closure to the negotiations was placing electronic listening devices in the rooms of all of the principal players. — sardc.net
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT
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Zim farmers to receive $109m donor funding
Written by Kingsley Kaswende in Harare, Zimbabwe
Saturday, October 03, 2009 5:38:23 PM
ZIMBABWEAN farmers have won a collective US$109 million from donors in efforts aimed at helping the country reap over two million metric tonnes of cereal during the 2009/10 season.
The funding comprises US $74 million announced by the World Bank, US $20 million by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the US $15 million extended by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) last week.
USAID and Standard Chartered Bank of Zimbabwe on Wednesday signed an agreement that would enable the bank to expand its lending by US $20 million over five years.
The programme, made possible under USAID’s Development Credit Authority, is targeted at the agricultural sector and will allow the bank to increase the number of loans directly to farmers and enterprises that can provide inputs and technical assistance to small holder farmers with the ultimate objective of increasing productivity and production.
“The credit authority is being established as one of several assistance programmes, above and beyond US humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe, which have come about because of President Obama’s commitment to provide agricultural and other assistance to the people of Zimbabwe. President Obama made this commitment to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai during the prime minister’s June 2009 visit to Washington DC. The assistance demonstrates the will of the American people to assist Zimbabwe to restore its once vibrant agricultural sector,” said US Embassy chargé d’affaires Donald Petterson at the signing ceremony.
USAID director Karen Freeman also announced that her organization, through the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, would provide approximately 13,000 vulnerable households with seeds and fertiliser for the coming agricultural season through US $1.7 million in funding to FAO and NGOs.
The World Bank on Wednesday also announced a donation of US $74 million to help poor farmers in Zimbabwe.
World Bank senior agricultural economist David Rohrbach said the money would benefit 700,000 families, helping to buy seeds, fertilisers and other agricultural equipment for the coming harvest.
The money will be channelled through non-governmental organisations involved in the agricultural and humanitarian sectors.
Last week, FAO said it would give about 176,000 vulnerable Zimbabwean farmers seeds and fertilisers for the coming farming season.
FAO's Emergency Coordinator in Zimbabwe Jean-Claude Urvoy said the US $15 million scheme, which is being done in conjunction with the European Union, could possibly double food production this season compared to the previous season when the country reaped 1.2 million metric tonnes.
A decade of economic crisis coupled with intermittent droughts, lack of fuel, tools, seeds and fertilizers has over the years diminished agricultural production.
Others however, blame poor production on seizure of farms from commercial white farmers for distribution to inexperienced indigenous farmers who neither have interest nor agricultural knowhow.
The country, once the breadbasket of the region, has been struggling to feed itself over the years.
The announcements for funding come at a time when the inclusive government was holding a stakeholders agricultural conference that was aimed at finding ways of reviving the shattered agricultural sector in Zimbabwe.
Agriculture minister Joseph Made, senior government officials, bankers, and farming groups were among the participants at the conference, funded by a multi-donor trust fund.
At the conference on Wednesday, stakeholders said a return of the rule of law and respect for property rights were essential to bring back investor confidence and for the restoration of agriculture.
They were referring to the land reform programme in which over 4,000 white farmers have so far had their farms redistributed, mostly without compensation.
A recent report by government stated that since the so-called land reform programme started in 2000, 203 farms out of the gazetted 6,571 farms have been compensated.
The government argues that the rest of the compensation is expected to come from the British government as agreed at the Lancaster discussions.
Labels: FAO, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, USAID, WHITE FARMERS
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New Zim constitution on track: Sadc
Reuters/TZG reporters
Fri, 02 Oct 2009 17:12:00 +0000
ZIMBABWE is on track to draw up a new constitution, the head of regional body Sadc's parliamentary forum said on Friday, but he did not say when the charter is expected to be adopted. The new charter will replace the Lancaster House Constitution drawn up in 1979 before independence from Britain.
"I am very confident that Zimbabwe will come out with an answer to the problems of Zimbabwe, including the constitutional dispensation," Prince Guduza Dlamini, president of the Southern African Development Community's (Sadc) parliamentary forum, told Reuters.
Dlamini was speaking on the sidelines of the opening session of the two-day conference of the Association of European Parliamentarians for Africa (AWEPA), taking place about 40 km (25 miles) north of Cape Town.
Dlamini did not say when the Sadc, which helped broker the formation of Zimbabwe's inclusive Government, wanted a new constitution to be completed.
The convention in July was part of a process which should lead to the adoption of a new constitution and to elections in about two years.
Dlamini said the charter could have a positive impact on Zimbabwe's neighbours.
"We are all interdependent, so if country X is having problems, those problems are going to filter through to some of the member countries.
"If we are able to live up to the expectations of the community (Sadc), we believe we will develop together," said Dlamini, also the Speaker of Swaziland's parliament.
Dlamini said an Sadc delegation visited Zimbabwe last month on a fact-finding mission and the Sadc parliamentary forum would hold its next plenary meeting in Zimbabwe sometime in October.
Reuters/TZG
Labels: CONSTITUTION, LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, SADC
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COMMENT - I cannot follow Keith Harmon Snow in this, although I agree with 99% of what he writes. I think his labeling of the Gukurahandi affair 20 years ago as 'genocide' is overly harsh (the high estimates of death are 20,000 people, the low estimates 3,000), and the
context of disarmament while apartheid was still going on in South Africa is not put forward. For the sake of completeness, I post this article by him. To quote from the Catholic
Commission for Justice and Peace in Zimbabwe,
March 1997 report, which is actually based on research in the field, not merely estimates or political gain:
FINAL ESTIMATE: The figure for the dead and missing is not less than 3000. This statement is now beyond reasonable doubt. Adding up the conservative suggestions made above, the figure is reasonably certainly 3750 dead. More than that it is still not possible to say, except to allow that the real figure for the dead could be possibly double 3000, or even higher. Only further research will resolve the issue. Somehow, this became '20,000'. It is for the makers of this claim to present their evidence. Note that this report was published before the fast track land reform programme was introduced later in 1997, and that no research mentions '20,000' before that date.
THE GREAT BETRAYAL:
MugabeÕs Gang and Genocide in Zimbabwe
keith harmon snow
My friend, a former Ambassador, has been listed for assassination. Naming him, or the country he served in, would hasten his execution. He was listed by ZANU (PF) agents in his hometown. ZANU (PF) is the Zimbabwe African National Union (Patriotic Front) government ruling party. His cousin was recently tortured, another relative killed, accused of supporting the rising opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).
On his 8000 hectare farm in rural Matabeleland, Emily (18) and Constance (19) shuck peanuts for about US two dollars a day. They count themselves lucky. Like others who have poached much of the wild game here, they come from the abutting Tribal Trust Lands, where people were forcibly resettled, evicted under colonialism or the Rhodesian regime or the Mugabe government. ÔMDCÕ has been painted in red on the AmbassadorÕs gate. He lives with fear and uncertainty.
He is land poor. The farm failed circa 1993 when the Zim dollar crashed, Structural Adjustment triumphed, drought set in and all but a dozen cattle of his cattle perished. He kills one of his six chickens for dinner, which we eat in darkness by a stone hearth fire in his shell of a farmhouse – looted in the waves of violence which for decades have permeated life in Matabeleland.
Posted in a major foreign mission throughout the 1980Õs, the Ambassador at first dismissed the testaments to terror forwarded to his offices by foreign NGOs whose expatriate staff in Zimbabwe was directly confronted by it. Independence was newly won. People had killed and died for equality, justice, peace, development and land. To the Ambassador, then a loyal ZANU (PF) functionary, reports of government sponsored terror were untenable. Still his host government petitioned for the official ZANU (PF) position: The reports were forwarded to Harare, to Comrade Robert Mugabe.
ÒThere was never any answer,Ó the Ambassador mumbled. ÒI finally confirmed it for myself. I couldnÕt believe it. I eventually resigned. It has taken me years to comprehend.Ó
As early as October 1980, plans were lain by Robert Mugabe and ZANU (PF) to consolidate power absolutely. By 1981, Mugabe had imported 108 North Korean experts to ÔtrainÕ an elite force – the Fifth Brigade – which soon operated with impunity outside the newly consolidated army. Commanded by now Air Marshall Perence Shiri – also coordinator of the paramilitary Central Intelligence Organization (CIO) and the armed forces -- the Fifth Brigade answered only to Comrade Mugabe. Licensed to search and destroy, the FB was unleashed on the Midlands and Matabeleland provinces. Publicly ordered to Ôplow and reconstruct,Õ the FB instituted a reign of terror which to this day dictates fear and silence in hundreds of thousands of survivors. The government called it Gukurahundi – the rain that washes away the chaff – the peopleÕs storm.
Manufacturing Zimbabwe
The media has only recently discovered the terrorism of the ZANU (PF) government. It is never ÔterrorismÕ however, and Mr. Mugabe is never a ÔdictatorÕ per the mediaÕs sympathies with client ÔleadersÕ who have dutifully served the media corporations and their directors. Comrade Mugabe, the Ôblue-eyed boy,Õ is no longer Ôthe darling of western multinational capitalÕ however and, therefore, recent coverage of the 2000 parliamentary elections in June has portrayed him in a mildly unfriendly light. The press has never explored the manufacture of Òa nation where elections have been characterized by voter apathyÓ which, in any case, is only Òin recent years,Ó and two decades of state-orchestrated terror is expediently cloaked in the mediaÕs ostensible attention to Òtwo months of intimidation and gerrymandering.Ó [International Herald Tribune, 6/28/00]
Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe provides a telling case study on the propensity of multinational capital to support the postcolonial rise and entrenchment of black dictatorships. It was critical to co-opt the global rise in black nationalism and expropriate liberation movements. Thus, while ever bemoaning the supposed losses they were simultaneously consolidating new gains. It was another capital coup, sold to the world by their media vanguard under the polished veneers of deceit. Hence the likes of Mobutu (1963-1997); Rawlings (1979-2000); Banda (?-?); Moi ( ?- 2000); Kuanda (1964-1991); Babangida (1987-1993); Eyadema (1967-2000); Biya (?-2000); Bongo (?-2000). Note the latter three – Togo, Cameroon and Gabon – remain in near total media whiteout. Note that Zimbabwe in 1998 and 1999 has returned record international banking profits.
Typical of disingenuous and diversionary media portraits of Africa, one of the biggest articles on Zimbabwe in 2000 elections coverage focused not on the criminal opportunism of an entrenched client government gone sour, but on elephants tearing down an electrified fence to access crops. [International Herald Tribune, 6/22/00] Only the most privileged and their corporations have electrified fences here. This just four days before the polls, after yet another week of government orchestrated terror.
ÒWhat is happening is not chaos, it is carefully orchestrated,Ó wrote human rights advocates in a 27-page chronology of violence from 14 February to 4 July. ÒIt is state-organized violence. The issue also has little to do with land, legitimate issue though this is. The violence is about the first real threat to ZANU (PF) power in 20 years, the MDC.Ó
The War of the Dogs
Since the first British South Africa Company invasions of the late 1800Õs, land has always been the issue for the disenfranchised masses of the Ndebele and Shona super-tribes. In 1893 a Ndebele defense force slaughtered the Alan Wilson patrol – an arrogant white squad dispatched by Cecil Rhodes – after the invaders pillaged Ndebele villages. By 1894 white settlers had taken over 100,000 head of Ndebele cattle. Chiefs were swindled. Mining, ranching and plantations spread like plague. Europeans destroyed crops and grain stores. Starvation and disease brought Ndebele survivors to eat the hides of slip aprons and sandals.
Social institutions were expropriated, chiefs coerced, replaced, rewarded for state loyalty and native repression. Christian missionaries found fertile ground in destitute peoples divorced from everything safe and familiar. The colonists waged a propaganda campaign extolling the virtues of hostile lands on which natives were forcibly resettled. All the best land went to the whites.
The Land Apportionment Act (1930) and Native Land Husbandry Act (1951) further institutionalized possessionary segregation and the division of Rhodesia into zones of exclusive white and black occupation. In 1974 the Rhodesian government executed ÔOperation OverloadÕ where, in three months and without warning, 46,960 members of 187 native homesteads were forcibly resettled into 21 ÔProtected Villages.Õ People were repeatedly uprooted, forced to rebuild, promised the world but dumped on unknown land where nature, crowding, colonial de-stocking of cattle, disease, famine and coercive agrarian state policy prevailed. Taxes were collected at gunpoint.
By 1961 rising African Nationalism had swept the country into increasing non-cooperation and sabotage. To the arrogant whites, ÔAfro-NatÕ resistance was all quite improper, an affront to protocol, audacious native hooliganism. [Peter Godwin and Ian Hancock, Rhodesians ever Die: The Impact of War and Political Change on White Rhodesia, circa 1985]. Demonstrations were banned, movement restricted. Arrests, floggings, torture, forced confessions, extrajudicial executions, spotter aircraft and riot squads were justified to enforce whites-only hunting restrictions, land-grab policies, and the prosecution of white supremacy.
ÒThe communists had already started their propaganda,Ó wrote Ian Smith, in The Great Betrayal. ÒBut our average black was not interested. Traditionally he was conservative and satisfied with the manner in which things were progressing.Ó Smith could not have been further out of step with Ôhis average black.Õ
The Zimbabwe African PeopleÕs Union (ZAPU) emerged in 1961 under Joshua Nkomo; ZANU in 1963 under Robert Mugabe. [There were many other early leaders in both parties, many of whom were eventually assassinated.] From Zambia ZAPU and ZANU – both banned 1964 – orchestrated armed incursions against the Ian Smith regime and the emergent Rhodesian Front (RF). The first major armed rebel action (1962) provoked a RF police search and destroy operation, which netted some 97 rebels. Huge dogs were used. It is remembered as Ôthe war of the dogs.Õ
Guerrilla War
Early guerrilla incursions led to arrests and imprisonments, which crippled the nationalist struggle and drove it underground. The RFÕs Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) against Britain in 1965 increasingly brought the abrogation of basic human rights. African Nationalism in turn found support in an unholy alliance with international capital.
ÒThe farmers, small local manufacturers and skilled workers had developed a common interest in exploiting and segregating the Africans. This coalition certainly formed the support basis of the RF in 1962. It came together to fight multinational capital, represented by the mining companies, finance houses and major secondary industries, and which opposed rigid segregationist and supremacist policies in favor of the greater incorporation of blacks as wage earners, consumers and middle managers.Ó [G. Arrighi, in Essays on the Political Economy of Africa, New York, 1973].
To Ian Smith, this was Ôthe great betrayal.Õ ÒWhy were the internal affairs of black African one-party dictatorships off the agenda at Commonwealth [UK] Ministerial Conferences,Ó he bemoans, revealingly, Òand RhodesiaÕs internal affairs on the agenda?Ó
It was a lost cause. As nationalism turned to guerrilla war the increasingly intransigent RF resorted to new heights of dispossession, secret hangings and grotesque forms of torture. The RF infiltrated and bombed guerrilla bases in Zambia and Mozambique. The elite RF Selous Scouts staged horrific killings of civilians to alienate civilian support for ZIPRA and ZANLA -- the armed wings of ZAPU and ZANU -- guerrillas, who retaliated in turn against collaborators real and imagined.
The civilians of Matabeleland suffered particularly harshly. The Selous Scouts successfully infiltrated supply networks, impregnated clothing and spiked food and drinks with lethal chemical poisons, causing guerrillas to turn on civilians. The late 1970Õs saw napalm and anthrax used, campaigns of biological warfare now well documented. Livestock and people died en masse: In one district in Matabeleland alone an estimated 10,000 cattle died and 1200 people were treated for anthrax poisoning. Infected victims continued to seek treatment into the 1980Õs [See Violence and Memory, notes to p. 145].
ÒThe number of cases was wholly unprecedented and the epizootic persisted for an unusually long period; the pattern of distribution was abnormal as disease was confined to national borders and within these only affected Africans. People testified to having seen planes dropping a white powder on fields and pastures; others saw soldiers sprinkling Ôsmall pillsÕ into water sources which killed fish and poisoned cattle [Alexander et al: Violence and Memory].Ó
By 1979 some 800-900 people were dying monthly in an increasingly unpopular and unsuccessful war costing the RF some US$ 1.1 million per day. There were over 9000 prisoners in Rhodesian jails. Defeat was imminent. Still the legacy of colonialism, the inequities of white supremacy and its authoritarian legal structures, the preferential access to loans and massive government subsidies gave whites a monopoly on land. In 1978 some 6000 white farmers produced agricultural sales worth $R 332 million; 680,000 African farmers produced only $R 24.6 million. Corporations like Liebigs and Lonrho owned estates of over 1 million acres.
Under UDI and the international sanctions placed on Rhodesia to 1980, the state prospered like never before. Transnational corporations masqueraded as domestic firms to evade sanctions. Military expenditures benefited external players: In 1979 a squadron of U.S. Augusta Bell 205 ÔHueyÕ helicopters were acquired in an illicit deal through the U.S.-Israeli partnership. Royal Dutch Shell busted sanctions to fuel the RF war. Twenty Cessna ST337B reconnaissance planes manufactured in France under US license were delivered. U.S., UK and other companies sold heaps of landmines to all parties; they endure to maim and kill innocent civilians today [Human Rights Watch publication on landmines in Southern Africa, 1999]. Sanction busting was untransparent however: Many more interests participated.
While guerrilla war won widespread public support, ZIPRA and ZANLA guerrillas faced each other as enemies. ZANLAs and their backers targeted ZIPRAs; battles erupted at guerrilla camps in Zambia and Mozambique. Antagonism persisted under the cease-fire agreement with the RF (12/21/79) and into the post-Independence violence, the Gukurahundi.
Tribalizing the Polity
The Lancaster House Agreement, which brokered the transition to majority rule, contained clauses which entrenched the rights of white Rhodesians and corporations. Both black and white Rhodesian officials hostile to nationalism retained government posts, to the angst of locals who expected their replacement -- if not punishment. Draconian decrees proscribing basic freedoms prevailed against citizens for years to come.
ÒAdoption of the Lancaster Constitution meant that Rhodesian businessmen and those African elites aspiring to become capitalists had ten long years to discover and influence each other before the new state could legally take any steps which might by chance lay the foundation for socialism.Ó [Dr. T. Mahoso, ÒZimbabwe Reconciled to Rhodesia,Ó MOTO, April 1992: 6]
Big players like Roland ÔTinyÕ Rowland, John Brodencamp, Billy Rautenbach (a guns runner who today owns some 150 companies in 11 African countries, British Virgin Islands and the US), Lonrho, the Oppenheimers and deBeers threw their weight behind ZANU (PF) as Robert Mugabe distilled victory out of the 1980 elections. The overwhelming ZANU (PF) win was seen as remarkable, given the huge rural power base of ZAPUs Joshua Nkomo: The elections were felt to be grossly rigged. Intimidation and violence orchestrated by ZANU (PF) in rural areas -- which characterized the 2000 elections – had its genesis in 1980. Hundreds of prominent ZAPU supporters were rounded up after the 1985 elections and disappeared. Matabeleland was hardest hit.
Repression against ZAPU/ZIPRA continued after the cease-fire agreement. Demobilization from the war saw RF forces at the helm, where like ZANLAs, most retained their arms and freedom of movement. ZIPRA guerrillas were treated like a defeated army: They were disarmed and confined; busloads of demobilizing guerrillas were attacked by air, fired upon by police. ZANLAs retained their heavy artillery, subsequently used against ZIPRAs, who did not.
Facing significant persecution, still most ZIPRAs complied with demobilization and by June 1980 ZIPRA regulars following ZAPU leadership rounded up hundreds of uncooperative ZIPRA guerrillas, who were subsequently imprisoned and held for years. Comrade Mugabe and his cadres soon set out to manufacture a ÔdissidentÕ and/or ÔZAPUÕ and/or ÔNdebeleÕ conspiracy, as justification for repression. As with the history and importance of ZAPU/ZIPRA during the liberation struggle, ZANU (PF) set to work to expropriate the history of ZAPU/ZIPRA in the postcolonial era. The Gukurahundi would be similarly denied.
ÒThe nation was imagined after 1980,Ó wrote the authors of the newly released Violence and Memory, which retells the history of Matabeleland, Òso as to exclude the western third of the country. In this way men and women in Matabeleland who were committed nationalists found themselves in conflict with the nation state. Zim nationalism turned out to be authoritarian rather than emancipatory, and we are under no illusions that had ZAPU rather than ZANU won the 1980 elections, things would have been very different. At the level of its leadership, Zim nationalism in 1980 was commandist; both parties were equally committed to the one-party state and the executive presidency.Ó [Jocelyn Alexander, JoAnn McGregor and Terrence Ranger, Violence and Memory: One Hundred Years in the ÔDark ForestsÕ of Matabeleland, James Currey, 2000: p. 84]
The newly independent Zimbabwe clearly faced hostile internal and external forces. South African commandos sympathetic with the RF continued to penetrate and attack military targets. Former RF soldiers, aberrant ZIPRAs and ZANLAs, criminals and opportunists all contributed to instability. However, most all insecurity lumped under the category ÔdissidentsÕ by the ZANUP(PF) government was subsequently attributed to ZAPU, ZIPRA and to the Ndebele people.
As persecution against ZIPRAs intensified, hundreds of ex-ZIPRAs in the newly incorporated Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) deserted. Thousands of ZIPRAs fled to Dukwe refugee camp in Botswana where they faced deportation and conscription into a secret South African backed ÔSuper-ZAPUÕ commando force. Super-ZAPU targeted white farmers and ZIPRAs and operated briefly only in Matabeleland. Regular ZIPRAs were confused and deceived by Super-ZAPU: They recognized ZIPRA leadership, but in the field Super-ZAPUs no longer behaved with the strict professionalism or ethics of ZIPRA. ZIPRAs eventually awoke to the Super-ZAPU game and ruthlessly drove them out.
However most people targeted as ÔdissidentsÕ were merely ex-ZIPRAs facing a systematic campaign of extermination who were driven back into the bush. It was not the ZANU (PF) government which they fought, but the imperative of life or death. Unlike the liberation struggle, the citizenry did not support them, since the government used ÔdissidentÕ activities to justify a campaign of terror and the public blamed this on the Ôdissidents.Õ
From early independence, ZANU (PF) increasingly politicized tribe, polarizing the Shonas and the Ndebeles. While ZIPRAs in the 1970Õs had enjoyed much support in Shona areas, in the 1980s they found hostility. If Shonas reported ÔdissidentÕ activity in Shona areas they were rewarded; Ndebeles who did the same in Matabeleland were shot. Speeches by Mugabe and ZANU (PF) officials, and propaganda by their monopoly on the press, exaggerated the scale and frequency of ÔdissidentÕ violence, which, often enough, was manufactured by ZANU (PF).
Known arms caches were suddenly Ôdiscovered,Õ coincidentally timed to support ZANU (PF) claims of a rising conspiracy. ZAPU/ZIPRA properties were confiscated, ZAPU leadership purged from office, jailed, exiled. Prime Minister Mugabe sowed suspicion and tribal animosities at every turn. Detention camps were set up in Matabeleland prior to 1983. ZIPRAs and ZAPUs were increasingly tortured and Ôdisappeared.Õ True ZANLA dissidents sowing insecurity in Shona areas – a much more significant threat – were disproportionately attended. Matabeleland had suffered unbearable violence, decades of discrimination and war. The worst was yet to come.
Gukurahundi
Dominated by former ZANLA guerrillas, the Fifth Brigade was given unlimited powers and total license to exterminate ÔdissidentsÕ without question or explanation. Uniquely uniformed, marked by red berets, they predominantly targeted innocent civilians. No one was too young or too old. While civilians in just two districts of Matabeleland attributed 45 murders from 1981 to 1987 to Ôdissidents,Õ the Gukurahundi killed in the tens of thousands. In January 1982, Matabeleland North was invaded, cordoned off, curfewed, and punished.
According to Patson Sibanda, they came to his village at dawn. They abducted all males, door-to-door, and loaded them on buses at gunpoint: They were never seen again. Patson was tipped off; he fled to Botswana. Patson points to the borehole where they beat his mother when she went for water.
They targeted ZAPUs, government officials, even ZNA regulars on leave. Clinics and schools were attacked, teachers brutalized, medical staff beaten and warned not to treat rising local casualties. They set up permanent and mobile bases, occupied water boreholes, shops – anyplace people had to go – and they carried lists naming people for assassination. Violence was intentional, systematic, and premeditated. It was also random, indiscriminate and meaningless.
Women and children and the elderly were beaten for pursing their daily lives. People were herded – frog-marched under constant abuse – to all night indoctrination rallies, sometimes lasting for days, forced to sing and dance, and were beaten or killed for the most trivial Ôoffenses.Õ They were pulled from buses, forced to dig their own graves in front of loved ones, humiliated and shot. An old man summoned from across a field was beaten for not moving fast enough. Villages were torched, families burned alive in huts. Bodies were dumped in mine shafts as often as they were left to rot in public. People were killed if they sought to recover their dead, funerals were forbidden. Mass graves proliferated and these remain testaments to the horrible and perverse incidents f violence and torture, geographical apparitions scarring the landscape and haunting the peopleÕs psyches, all too real and current.
Government trucks sometimes returned to massacre sites to collect the skeletons and the propensity – if not policy -- to tamper with, suppress or destroy evidence persists to the present. While some police and officials worked to shield the populace, most turned a blind eye or participated. Some were targets themselves. Civilians recognized Fifth Brigade soldiers as the same ÔdissidentsÕ that had abused them, demanding food, the night before; people followed ÔdissidentsÕ into the bush where they watched them change into government uniforms.
In testimony taken from thousands over the past fifteen years, victims and witnesses repeatedly stressed the soldiersÕ own words: Their orders were to Ôwipe out the people in the areaÕ and Ôkill anything that is human.Õ [Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, Breaking the Silence, Building True Peace: A Report on the Disturbances in Matabeleland and the Midlands, 1980-1988, Legal Resources Foundation, 1997.]
Rape was policy, it was both public and private and it often preceded killings. Pregnant women were publicly bayoneted and gutted, families forced to watch, as soldiers talked about killing the Ndebele unborn. At schools girls were raped sometimes 20 to 30 at a time and then forced to have sex with the boys as soldiers watched. Widespread rape was interpreted as a systematic attempt to create a generation of Shona children.
As early as March 1983 government officials were petitioned to stop the carnage. Representatives from the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace personally delivered evidence of atrocities to Prime Minister Mugabe. Official policy then vacillated between encouragement of atrocities and denial. Patterns of violence clearly changed however, though repression remained equally lethal. In January 1984 the Fifth Brigade was deployed in Matabeleland South where, under suffocating curfew and restrictions of movement, and the telltale repression, starvation was further adopted as a strategy. With less than 200 true dissidents in the region, some 400,000 civilians suffered horrendously.
Fifth Brigade atrocities proliferated most from 1983 to 1985. Paramilitary forces – the elite CIO, Police Internal Security Intelligence (PISI) -- ZANU (PF) youth and ZNA forces complemented the Fifth Brigade operations with notorious terrorism of their own. While the Fifth Brigade was withdrawn in 1986, these ZANU (PF) agents continued to arrest, torture, interrogate and ÔdisappearÕ into and throughout the 1990Õs, to the present. Rather than changing the allegiance of the public, repression hardened them against the ZANU (PF) government. Former ZAPA leaders like Joshua Nkomo incorporated into the ZANU (PF) government after 1988 reverted to policies of silence or of Ônot opening old wounds,Õ preaching the rhetoric of unity in public, feathering their own nests backstage.
While there were an estimated 400 dissidents at the height of 1980Õs Ôinsecurity,Õ most were captured, killed or exiled, and only 122 dissidents turned themselves in after the Unity Accord -- between ZANU (PF) and ZAPU leadership -- and the government Amnesty of 1988. With not less than 10,000 killed (many people count over 30,000), thousands more were disappeared, tens of thousands were severely tortured, hundreds of thousands were subjected to some kind of physical or psychological abuse.
The impact of ZANU (PF) violence cannot be overstated: ÒMerely to threaten to make people,Ó wrote Human Rights advocates in 2000, Òis a powerful weapon against defenseless people who have personal memories of witnessing executions and being tortured by this government in the recent past.Ó
The New Face of Socialism
The rhetoric of liberation and independence translated early into new schools and clinics, but ÔprogressÕ proliferated most significantly on paper, and this subsumed any popular land redistribution. Neocolonial policies partnered with the self-interest and cronyism of ruling elites to further usher the interests of western capital and the white minority into the 1990Õs. Enter Structural Adjustment: Unemployment bloomed; real wages fell; the Zim $ was devalued; expenditures for education, food and health care – once promised free for all – dried up as MugabeÕs gang of thieves followed their marching orders in shiny new Mercedes Benz sedans. Foreign-controlled mining, banking and big tobacco (US) reaped unprecedented profits. Meanwhile the goods and services grew ever more inaccessible to the ever poorer black masses.
Note that there is a direct and significant link between poverty, mass rape, and bloodletting against women, and the lack of basic health care to the spread of the AIDS pandemic in Africa. In the major ongoing ÔAIDS in AfricaÕ propaganda front of the world media, AIDS is almost entirely dissociated from these factors and attributed almost universally to heterosexual intercourse. The emergent front was launched with a six-part series in the New York Times which began with a huge article of August 6, 1998. Focused on AIDs and Zimbabwe, this huge feature totally diverted attention from root causes: terrorism, underdevelopment, mysogyny and dictatorship.
Top-down international conservation and development programs were Ôoverwhelmingly endorsedÕ in rural Matabeleland – by people who were terrified into a consensual silence by ZANU (PF) cadres, informants and police around them. Many programs only further dispossessed them of their land. Government propaganda and backslapping foreign donors delineated wildlife protection areas even as Mugabe plead that there was no land available for redistribution. Coercion and arrests followed resistance to programs dictating that infrastructure be relocated to accommodate wildlife – this where such basic resources were mostly absent. Further evictions persisted in efforts to ÔconserveÕ forests.
Neglect, discrimination and conflict in Matabeleland combined to leave health care mostly inaccessible. A massive malaria epidemic struck in 1996, killing hundreds (at least): Some 52,932 people treated for malaria strained already meager health services. Meanwhile, from 1992-1997 a massive Z$ 1.7 billion was paid out from the War VeteranÕs Compensation Fund, a scandal where, for example, many supposed ÔWar VetsÕ were born after Independence and MugabeÕs brother-in-law Reward Marufu won a settlement for a fraudulent claim of a 90 % disability.
In 1997 some 62 poor families were evicted as the Gokwe North Rural District Council officials razed their homes: These were people who had already been forcibly evicted under the Kariba Dam project (1950s): By 1997, their rebuilt lives were blocking a proposed Safari project by a white Zimbabwean. Huge farms previously acquired for land redistribution have gone to government ministers and ZANU (PF) leaders.
ÒHistorical inequities and colonial legislation, government looting, favoritism and skewed resettlement policies remain the major stumbling blocks in the poorÕs struggle for land in Zimbabwe,Ó wrote ZimRights, commenting on the ongoing Mugabe ploy to manipulate and influence the 2002 presidential elections through the waves of recent farm invasions.
Back to the Futureless
Costing Zimbabwe some US$ one million per day, MugabeÕs gang in August of 1998 dealt themselves into the gold, diamonds and cobalt free-for-all in the former Zaire -- itÕs a perverse farce to call it the Democratic Republic of Congo -- in exchange for supporting KabilaÕs ouster of Mobutu. Under the veil of the international media and with the support of the dubious Organization of African States (OAU), he has been assisted in bluffing 13 million people in a country where education is so lacking that some do not yet associate malaria with mosquitoes.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has been silent on the Zim crises: Son Kojo Annan is director of Air Harbor Technologies, partnered with Leo Mugabe, for the controversial multimillion dollar development of HarareÕs New International Airport. [FYI: Kojo Annan is also linked to Sutton Investments, a Nigerian firm which in 1999 won the six million pound contract to monitor the UN oil-for-food program in Iraq: ÒUN Chief Under Fire,Ó Financial Gazette, 5/4/00].
When a reporter for the London Guardian [or Observer: I will email the proper citation ASAP] tried to break the story of the Gukurahundi in 1983 it was crushed by Tiny Rowland and Lonrho corporation. Suppression and the story itself became hot topics in England: Even Prince Charles was aware of it. It has otherwise remained off the media agenda. The Reagan, Bush and Clinton administrations certainly knew about it. UNHCR, UNIFEM, CIDA (Canada) and Lutheran World Federation all ran the Dukwe refugee camps in Botswana (1980-1988). Reagan and Ian Smith people had a history, and they remain(ed) close. David Coltart, 2000 elections winner of an MDC parliamentary seat, in 1992 traveled to Europe and Washington and petitioned government and UN officials and US Senators (Nancy Kassebaum and others) to withhold IMF and World Bank loans pending accountability for the Gukurahundi and ongoing violence. He was ignored.
Government soldiers disguised as landless squatters and ÔWar VetsÕ continue to prosecute farm invasions as this article goes to press. Much of what should be the peopleÕs land is not controlled by Ôwhite farmersÕ but also by huge corporations. Roadblocks, curfews, beatings and intimidation in rural areas and high-density suburbs of Harare persist. Soldiers wearing the uniforms of the Fifth Brigade, and others in the telltale red berets, have been seen in rural areas. New lists for assassinations have been drawn up. The message is clear. The tactics are all too familiar.
MugabeÕs fall from grace may be an issue of his gangÕs infringing on other international criminals operating in the DRC (like Barrick Gold: a George Bush, Brian Mulroney, Senator Howard Baker enterprise). It may be an issue of the expedience of greater Ôdemocracy,Õ the imperatives of market or raw material access and ZimbabweÕs transition to a new stage of predatory capitalism. The MDC will most likely support this process.
MugabeÕs days are numbered. Many people are calling for recognition of the Gukurahundi and prosecution of MugabeÕs Gang for crimes against humanity. Mugabe continues to play his part in the great betrayal of the African masses and the US media continues to provide cover. In any case, Emily and Constance will keep on shucking peanuts for peanuts in Matabeleland. ~ end
Labels: LANCASTER HOUSE AGREEMENT, ZIMBABWE
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