The British Broadcast Company Zimbabwe, formerly known as Rhodesia, has struggled since 1980 to achieve political and economic stability.On April 18, 1980, thousands of young men, women, and children streamed down the rural paths and the tarred roads to vote for the war hero and presidential aspirant, Robert G. Mugabe. Mugabe’s presidency promised the future Zimbabwe had been waiting for— a land free of the oppression of racism and overflowing with prosperity. Citizens of Zimbabwe also saw in Mugabe a chance for liberties, such as the freedom of speech and religion, as well as equal education, previously denied to citizens of Zimbabwe by Rhodesians. After a campaign of flying and driving around the country, Mugabe managed to obtain the vote of an estimated 12 million citizens, largely from the peasantry.

Well, many thought that the magic had come to reality with Mugabe’s election. “We finally have it all” said newly-weds who kissed each expressing hope for the bright future. “Pasi roverera uchi nemukaka” (honey and milk are now flowing in the land (we are all set))” two friends could have joked waiting impatiently for the Independent Zimbabwe. Little did they know that they had elected a villain with a smiling cheek.

After elections in the new independent state of Zimbabwe in 1980, Robert Mugabe became Prime Minister of a coalition government and Reverend Canaan Banana, a member Mugabe’s party, received the largely ceremonial role of president. Factional differences in Mugabe’s party in the mid-1980s tore apart Zimbabwe until in 1988 Mugabe and his rival Joshua Nkomoa signed a unity agreement, ending the strife. In 1990, and again in 1996, Zimbabweans elected Robert Mugabe as their first ever executive (official, non-ceremonial) president.

Mugabe’s ineptitude as a leader, however, has stalled any hopes for Zimbabweans to gain greater liberties and freedoms. Mugabe’s questionable economic policies, especially in the past two years, have damaged Zimbabwe’s growth potential. In 1998, Zimbabwe’s stock exchange lost more than 60% of its value, mostly in foreign investments. Zimbabwe’ currency has devalued 100% to the U.S. dollar, suffered 60% inflation and a 50% interest rate. Zimbabwe’s economy also currently suffers from a 50% unemployment rate while experiencing less than a 3% growth in it Gross Domestic Product index.

Mugabe’s administration has also mismanaged agricultural policies. Despite the inflation and devaluation of Zimbabwean currency, the government re-imposed price controls on products such as maize meal in February 1999. In October 1998, Mugabe confiscated without compensation 841 farms (approximately 2.4 million acres), displacing 42,000 predominately white farmers, risking economic and racial turmoil. According to Robert Rotbers, an economist for the Christian Science Monitor, “the only positive result of Mugabe’s [mis]management is that Zimbabwe is so broke that it cannot afford the $1.9 billion cost of land reform,” which Zimbabwe peasants badly need and are consequently still hoping Mugabe will provide.

Many critics link Zimbabwe’s economic troubles not only on Mugabe’s inept rule but also on Mugabe’s military aide to President Laurent Kabila of Congo, costing Zimbabwe millions of dollars each week. By some counts, Mugabe has already provided Kabila with 8,000 Zimbabwean troops, resulting in many casualties and the rising disapproval of his people.

While the economy of his country sputters, Mugabe lives a life of lavish luxury, frequently traveling outside the country, especially to Europe where he has purchased choice pieces of real estate. A perception of heavy corruption, especially in the form of graft, clouds Mugabe and his entire self-appointed cabinet.

Mugabe has also reduced individual liberties in the attempts to reassert his own power and legitimacy as ruler. After a coup failed to remove Mugabe in December 1998, Mugabe had Mark Chaumduka and Ray Choto, editors of The Standard, a Zimbabwe journal, who reported on the incident, arrested, detained and tortured. In February 1999, Mugabe repudiated Zimbabwe’s Supreme Court for ordering him to release the prisoners. Despite substantial pressure from his courts, his people, and foreign countries such as the United States, the European Union, Britain, and South Africa, to release the prisoners, Mugabe has refused to do so.Mugabe has also recently stifled other Zimbabwe press, forcing them under government supervision. Mugabe has even commissioned an almost comical (if it were not so serious) propaganda commission charged with the tasks of “polishing the government’s battered image” and establishing “the credibility of the nation abroad.”

Where is freedom of speech when the press and airwaves are government lip-tied? Where is that freedom and independence our fathers fought for? Where is the land that our forefathers possessed? How much can the poor produce to feed themselves? It is about time for the people of Zimbabwe to realize the dream they had twenty years ago has failed because of the present pseudo-democracy, championed by the heartless Robert Mugabe and his regime!

Pedzi Makumbe '02 is a staffwriter who is majoring in Economics and minoring in Computer Science.

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