Zimbabwe withers in Mugabe's mailed fist

The increasingly bloody political repression in Zimbabwe is proof of the growing desperation of its ageing authoritarian ruler - President Robert Mugabe.

Contemporary Zimbabwe provides clinching evidence that strong arm rule and a growing panic over losing power among those capriciously wielding it, are just two sides of the same coin. Mugabe is right now a living example of this pervasive political tendency.

There is a growing wave of popular opposition to Mugabe's rule but the reaction of the out-of-favour authoritarian Head of State is to unleash all the repression at his command on the dissenters. Thus has the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Morgan Tsvangirai been subjected to severe physical harassment and demoralizing restrictions. Tsvangirai himself has been a victim of the state's strong arm tactics.

The severity of the repression that has been thus exercised is strongly reflective of the state's determination to thwart the gathering movement for political liberalization in Zimbabwe.

Substantial democratic change in the country continues to be an elusive goal. However, rather than take the zest out of the opposition campaign, the mounting repression only seems to be making it grow.

With the Catholic Church in Zimbabwe coming out strongly in favour of the movement for democratic change, the opposition to the state seems to be acquiring unprecedented depth and vibrancy.

In a letter titled "God Hears the Cries of the Oppressed", the Catholic Bishops Conference of Zimbabwe said, among other things, that, "Many people in Zimbabwe are angry and their anger is now erupting into open revolt in one township after another ..... In order to avoid further bloodshed and avert a mass uprising, the nation needs a new people-driven constitution that will guide a democratic leadership chosen in free and fair elections".

With the Catholic Church taking on a pivotal role in the opposition to Mugabe's rule, the confrontation between the sides could be expected to be both prolonged and absorbing, with the opposition receiving increasing strength and staying power.

In a Catholic-majority country, the Church is bound to make much headway as an awareness-raising agent.While a weakening of the government could not be expected in the short and medium terms, it is bound to suffer impairment in the long term as the opposition campaign gains strength and Zimbabwe faces international isolation as a result of the West taking strong exception to the Zimbabwean state's repressive conduct.

Moreover, the deteriorating economic situation in Zimbabwe too is bound to further spike opposition to the state. Today, agricultural productivity in the country has hit rock bottom and the inflation rate is rising astronomically. Even if political disaffection does not have the desired effect of weakening the state, economic disaffection would.

With the majority of the population living off state handouts, economic discontent is likely to take a heavy toll on the country's internal stability. Although initially described by the Western press in the early eighties as "Marxist leaning", Mugabe is no communist.

His initial policy platform was black nationalism and this did serve the vital purpose of delivering Zimbabwe from white minority rule.

However, unlike in the case of South Africa, Mugabe has failed to take his country along even a broadly social-democratic path. Zimbabwe has had no guiding vision of this kind and has today degenerated into an authoritarian, one-party state where the state class or the ruling elite is enjoying an obscenely parasitic existence, while the people wither and die in a state of chronic economic want.

The fate that awaits such states is a prolonged, agonising, slow death. The often noted Third World political irony of the one-time oppressed degenerating into the oppressor, is thus haunting Zimbabwe too.

The Zanu-PF under Mugabe and their allies did well to dislodge the white minority regime under Ian Smith in 1980 but have failed to take Zimbabwe along a progressive path. Instead the erstwhile liberators have today turned oppressor. That is, the new, black state class is entrenching itself in power at the expense of the people.

One could only hope that the movement for democracy would have long life and resourcefulness because it is an important corrective to the oppressive structure forced on Zimbabwe by its one-time liberators.

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