By Alex Magaisa
THREE weeks ago, Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai left on a tour of Europe and North America, much of which is collectively referred to as the West.
As the tour unfolded two major objectives were apparent. First, the trip sought to promote re-engagement between Zimbabwe and the West whose relationship over the past 10 years has been severely estranged.
Second, the mission sought to facilitate ways of funding the new Inclusive Government which is basically operating on less than a shoe-string budget, a circumstance that was largely authored by gross mismanagement of national resources.
By and large Tsvangirai was warmly received by the leaders of the many countries that he visited. However, his trip to London was overshadowed by the ugly scenes of protests by sections of the Zimbabwean Diaspora more of which will be said later in this article.
It was evident from the various receptions he got that Tsvangirai is now acknowledged as a national leader. Before this trip, Tsvangirai had visited these countries as an opposition leader but on this occasion he was a man transformed; a metamorphosis that also took many of his hosts and observers by surprise.
His new capacity has brought new objectives and also a different language of politics, some of which his hosts and observers found hard to comprehend, let alone accept. Tsvangirai could have taken the easier option and spoke the language of condemnation that sits easily in the pages of the media in these parts.
Instead, he chose to speak positively of his relationship with President Mugabe. Some have accused him of not being faithful to the truth on certain issues such as the situation on the farms and the human rights issues.
It did not help that at a time when he was trying to sell a positive image an influential human rights body, Amnesty International also issued a damning review of Zimbabwe’s precarious human rights situation.
To be sure, this was a difficult voyage. Tsvangirai has been a recipient of generous Western support in leading the fight for democracy in Zimbabwe. For that he has been accused by his erstwhile opponents of being a Western puppet.
Yet, the decision to join the government headed by Mugabe was not popular among some Zimbabweans and in the West. It is possible that some of his old friends in the West now doubt his credibility. But as a leader in the new government it is in his interests to ensure that it succeeds in its mission. Yet to do so, the bankrupt country needs resource-injection from somewhere.
In this respect, Tsvangirai has the unenviable task of persuading the Western world to provide some funding to kick-start the economy. Yet to do so he needs to persuade the West that Mugabe is now a reformed character or at least that he has enough power to ensure the resources are used fairly and effectively. He cannot possibly do this whilst at the same time appearing to condemn his new partners.
Thus it has appeared that he has tried too hard perhaps to paint a picture that the government is on the right path and has good prospects.
Yet in so doing he has drawn the wrath of his constituency, who feel that in fact there is not enough progress at all; those who consider that the forces of continuity still hold sway in Zimbabwe. With the problems on the farms being highlighted and the issue of arrest and mistreatment of those accused of political offences still brewing, the confusion over the application of media regulations, and the clear violations of court orders still continuing, Zimbabwe’s positive image has proved to be a hard sell. Clearly, Tsvangirai has had his work cut out.
It is hardly surprising that although he has been warmly embraced by the West, the begging pot has received very little. Yet it would have been naïve to expect that Tsvangirai would return with bags of cash.
This trip has to be seen for what it truly was — a tentative step toward re-engagement with the Western bloc. It had been years since Zimbabwe and Western countries had shared the same table on a bilateral basis. The hostility caused deterioration in trust and confidence, key tenets of any sound relationship.
These elements of a relationship cannot be restored overnight. Therefore, I see this as being only the beginning in a long process of relationship repair and much of this lies in our court.
Some of the key things that ought to be done require no investment at all from the state. Liberating the media, enabling a free environment where civil rights are protected does not cost money. If anything, it facilitates creativity and enterprise which can help to ease the unemployment situation.
The government ought to play its role in rebuilding Zimbabwe’s image and that requires the cessation of all the retrogressive things that continue to hold us down. We can use so many words but it all comes down to just two words of a simple type: common sense. The leadership must quite simply be guided by common sense but sadly this always seems to be a scarce resource, even though it’s free.
As indicated earlier, the biggest blemish on Tsvangirai’s trip was the ugly reception that he got during his speech to Zimbabweans at London’s Southwark’s Cathedral. A section of the crowd was not pleased with Tsvangirai’s general call for people to return home.
This reaction must have come as a shock to the visitors. The last time a national leader was booed and heckled by his supporters he panicked.
This was when in 1997, at the Heroes Acre in Harare, liberation war veterans broke with tradition and heckled President Mugabe during a graveside speech. President Mugabe panicked. This humiliation had never happened to him before.
The result was that he paid out $50 000 to each person who claimed to be a war veteran. This was the Zimbabwe dollar when it was still a proper dollar. A few weeks later this and combination of other factors contributed to the collapse of the Zimbabwe dollar on 14 November 1997, a date often associated with the start of the real show of the cataclysmic fall of Zimbabwean economy.
One hopes Tsvangirai does not panic from the scenes in London. It could be very easy for him and others to dismiss the Diaspora as a useless constituency that deserves little if any attention.
I think it’s important to take seriously the concerns raised by those who expressed their resentment however disrespectful it might have been carried. Perhaps there is concern that the prime minister is trying too hard to sell a product that passed its sell-by date centuries ago.
But it is also important for the PM to know that the heckles do not necessarily represent the homogenous views of all Zimbabweans in the Diaspora. Indeed, contrary to general thought, the Diaspora is not a homogenous entity — there are many faces and characters of the Zimbabwean Diaspora — their concerns, fears and interests may meet at times but they are not necessarily uniform across the board.
There may in fact, be many who acknowledged his call and understood it, not as an order from the emperor but simply as a call for re-engagement.
I do think though that the Prime Minister’s advisory team could have done better and that they have learnt a lot from this episode. Every leader has researchers, advisors and speechwriters. A leader is as good as those around him.
We often marvel at how effective President Obama is in delivering the right speeches to different audiences but what we do not realise is that he has a great team around him; a team that works its socks off to prepare their man for every occasion.
He relies on them for so many things, including research on the issue to be presented, the make-up, attitude and mood of the targeted audience, create the best script for that audience.
Basically, very often it is not the content of the message that matters most but the manner in which it is packaged and delivered. That also includes a clear appreciation of the audience to whom it is delivered. Many people I have spoken to agree that the Prime Minister was not adequately prepared to face the kind of audience that he met at Southwark Cathedral last Saturday. At the risk of sounding elitist, with all due respect, the call of the PM is very relevant to certain segments of the Diaspora — the skilled and professionals — but not all and it would have been well-received and discussed sufficiently by that type of audience.
That call could therefore have been packaged and sold to an audience of that type and to be sure, it would have been warmly received and considered. I know that because I work with many Zimbabweans who have shown a critical interest in playing a role in rebuilding the country. They appreciate that when the Prime Minister calls for people to return home, it is not a literal call for people to pack their bags to return home instantly. They appreciate that this is language for re-engagement and that decisions are made as a matter of individual choice.
What the government needs to do is to respond to the interest of these people and collectively devise ways of facilitating skills utilisation which can be done in so many ways beyond physically returning home.
We know that there are so many ways because we are not the first country to produce a Diaspora. We do not have to re-invent the wheel; rather, we can learn from those who have been there before us —what they are doing to fully utilise the Diaspora resource.
Finally, contrary to some characterisation of the trip, I do not think it was a failure. I think it was the first tentative step toward re-engagement with the West, which is crucial. Mistakes were made, as in all things new and some things could have been said differently but perhaps one can appreciate that these perhaps overly positive words were made more in hope of achieving the right thing.
●Alex Magaisa is based at, Kent Law School, the University of Kent and can be contacted at [email protected] e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or [email protected]
