Mugabe stole the Zimbabwean election with violence and intimidation. But Morgan Tsvangirai unwittingly helped him. How did this hitherto brave leader lose his bearings so badly, and what will the consequences be—both for Zimbabwe, whose warring factions are now in fragile talks, and for the MDC, which is also riven with deep faultlines? Stephen Chan, who reported from inside Zimbabwe between the first presidential poll and the run-offs, looks ahead.
Archive for the 'Africa' Category
What kind of man is Robert Mugabe? How did the internationally feted liberation hero of the 1970s turn into the blood-soaked tyrant of today? Heidi Holland, who knew Mugabe when they were both anti-Ian Smith activists in the 1970s, attempts to answer these questions in Dinner with Mugabe, her new “psychobiography” of the Zimbabwean president. Tom de Castella reviews the book for Prospect here. Meanwhile, Zimbabwe-watchers will not want to miss Stephen Chan’s dispatches from Harare for Prospect online, to my—entirely unbiased—mind the most in-depth and informed coverage of the Zimbabwe election crisis to be found in western media.
Also this week: Derek Brower explains how oil subsidies in the developing world are keeping the price of oil sky-high—and how they are playing havoc with the assumptions of market economists.
Prospect’s Zimbabwe correspondent is sending—anonymously, for obvious reasons—regular dispatches from Harare as the election drama continues to unfold, exclusively for Prospect online. We hope to provide readers with more-or-less daily updates over the next week or so.
Stephen Chan continues to document the unfolding drama in Zimbabwe for Prospect online—click here to read his updated article.
Stephen Chan—dean of the faculty of law and social sciences at Soas and regular Prospect contributor—has just left Zimbabwe having spent ten days in the country observing the recent presidential and parliamentary elections. You can read his take for us here.
If you want to visit Zimbabwe from the UK, it’s now Air Zimbabwe or nothing. As this report in today’s Times notes, less than ten years ago it was possible to fly to Harare with any of 18 foreign airlines. Yesterday, the last carrier maintaining long-haul flights into and out of the country—British Airways—brought these to a close, citing economic reasons.
It’s an astonishing example of globalization in reverse: the dismantling of the kind of access we tend to assume is hard-wired into the fabric of our world. Zimbabwe, of course, is an extreme and infamous example of economic collapse. But events there are an important reminder that the global freedoms of movement, trade and information many of us enjoy are underpinned by nothing more reliable than profits—and that, if these vanish, so do all the privileges of purchase that go with them.
Last year, Prospect broke the story that the Sudanese mobile phone entrepreneur Mo Ibrahim was to sponsor a prize for African leaders who improve the governance of their country. Every year, the winner will be awarded $500,000 for the subsequent ten years, followed by a lifetime pension worth $200,000 a year.
Yesterday, the first award went to Joaqium Chissano, former president of Mozambique. Chissano was a solid choice, and will have caused little surprise. Despite having been in power for 20 years—perhaps not quite the unambiguous signal to African leaders that commentators were expecting—the former president was an ideal candidate. During his time in office—1986 to 2005—he took his country from civil war to peace; instituted basic economic reforms; installed multiparty democracy; and merged the militias of the warring parties (RENAMO and FRELIMO) into a united armed forces.
Chissano’s trump card, though is that he handed over power, in February 2005, after a properly contested election, refusing to countenance the constitutional option of a third term. This is the “Mandela magic” that Dr Ibrahim is hoping will rapidly spread throughout the continent’s leaders.
Question marks remain over the prize. Yes, the winner can spend the money on whatever he likes. Yes, the cash could be stopped, should Chissano’s behaviour warrant it. No, the prize need not be awarded every year; if there were such a glut of candidates, it would never have been necessary. Yes, maybe the prize does paradoxically reinforce the “big man” archetype of African leadership. But it’s a start.
The prize will not cure all Africa’s ills, and nor is it trying to. But the founder of the prize is adamant that leadership is the place to start. In a ceremony marked by optimism, Ibrahim made sure to end on a high. Following the unveiling of the Mandela bronze in August, he warned Ken Livingstone, London had better watch out: we’re going to be needing a lot more grassy areas for statues of the next generation of African leaders.
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