Boycott EU – AU meeting: Zimbabwe Vigil Diary

The Vigil is writing to Prime Minister David Cameron urging him to boycott the EU / AU Summit in Brussels on 2 / 3 April if Mugabe attends. We think he should follow the example of his predecessor Gordon Brown who refused to attend an EU / AU Summit in Lisbon in 2007. 

A large group from the Vigil stood in for Mr Brown in Lisbon, drawing attention to the human rights abuses perpetrated by Mugabe, who was reduced to hiring prostitutes from a local brothel to bulk up a counter demonstration led by the UK-based Zimbabwean ‘academic’ George Shiri (see our diaries of December 2007: http://www.zimvigil.co.uk/vigil-news/diary-archive/115-vigil-diary-archive-dec-2007).

Another Zanu PF apologist, Blessing-Miles Tendi of Oxford University, now says in an article in (predictably) the UK Guardian newspaper that boycotting would be ‘both hypocritical and silly’. The Vigil believes that, on the contrary, a boycott would be both principled and sensible.

Mr Tendi thinks that Britain needs to mend fences with Mugabe: perhaps grovel a bit, apologise, invite him to Buckingham Palace again, restore his Harrods card, or better still rename Jermyn Street after him . . . The Vigil thinks it is the other way round. Mugabe needs to mend fences with the UK.

But Mugabe is not the sprightly nonagenarian portrayed by Mr Tendi. He may perhaps be able to stay awake long enough in Brussels to spew vitriol at the West for keeping Zimbabweans alive but his regime is simply beyond redemption. It has shown that it is incapable of changing course. All it can do is engorge itself until it bursts – like a broiler chicken.

Mr Tendi seems to think that because other African leaders invited to the Summit are murderers and thieves Mugabe must be acceptable. The Vigil does not buy this. The so-called sanctions were imposed on Mugabe and his cronies because of human rights abuses. There is overwhelming evidence that last July’s elections were stolen so his regime is illegitimate. Why then should sanctions be lifted?

The UK remains the biggest donor of humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe. it has made it clear it would do more to help our country but Mugabe’s destructive policies and the rampant corruption of the Zanu PF regime make this impossible – not sanctions.

To embrace Mugabe now would be to condone his odious rule which has reduced Zimbabwe from being one of the most prosperous countries in Africa to one of the poorest. For all their faults, you can’t say this about Angola’s Dos Santos, Swaziland’s Mswati III etc.

As for monsters like Dos Santos and Mswati masquerading as African leaders at the Brussels summit: we wish they would be treated in the same way as we would wish the EU to treat Mugabe. That’s not hypocrisy, it’s principle; it’s not silly, it’s sensible – if Africa is ever to more forward to real democracy.

Here’s our letter to Mr Cameron:

Seven years’ ago your predecessor Gordon Brown judged it unacceptable to sit at a table with Robert Mugabe at an EU / AU Summit in Lisbon. We understand Mugabe has been invited to a similar summit in Brussels in April. Exiled Zimbabweans believe you should follow Mr Brown’s example. 

We ask: what has changed since Mr Brown took his stand? We believe the situation has got even worse, with stolen elections in 2008 and stolen elections last year. Recent revelations in the official media in Zimbabwe confirm how totally corrupt the Mugabe regime is. Our view is that no dialogue is possible with Mugabe’s Zanu PF and EU countries are deluded if they think they can do deals with a corrupt regime.