Following the 'Panama Papers' scandal, I observed the disproportionate
backlash against Lewis Hamilton and noted that generally speaking, the
financial affairs of British F1 drivers, only became a topical issue when the
driver was not Caucasian. It was not a
piece I wanted to write. Defending the
behaviour of someone who utilises tax havens is not an easy one for me to
swallow. It goes against so much of what
I believe in. Similarly defending Mugabe,
in any capacity, has always felt like a moral dilemma to wrestle with.
Robert Mugabe came to power three weeks before I was born
and has ruled Zimbabwe ever since. Last week he was placed under house arrest
and at the time of writing, his tumultuous reign is drawing to an end. He engaged in some of the most abhorrent conduct
ever administered by a world Statesman in my lifetime. However, the uncomfortable truth for much of
the world’s media outside of Africa is that land redistribution had been a huge
issue in the country and desperately needed addressing. My regrets over Mugabe and the ‘Fast-track
land reform programme’ (FTLRP) surround not its implementation, but that he
took so long to do it and that when he did, it became a political issue of his
creation. It has and always firmly will
be a social justice one. It is about correcting
the crimes of colonialism, as painful as they may be. The consequential cries of agony serve as a sharp
reminder that for all the nostalgic love of Empire, it created a cruel legacy
that became so complicated to untangle.
Between 2000 and 2013 some 4,500
Caucasian-owned farms were seized and redistributed among black citizens, often
during violent confrontations. They generated images which horrified the
world. In many ways, the decision taken
in 2000 to pursue FTLRP was a defining moment in the career of Mugabe and
ensured his permanent caricature as a 21st century African bogeyman. Visitors to my blog will feel like they have
read this piece before, because if you change
some of the details, the rise and fall of Mugabe as a “friend of The West”, loosely
follows a similar tale to other dubious individuals around the world who later
fell out of favour, such as Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden to name but two.
To understand the context of FTLRP, one first needs to go
back to some of the origins of how the Zimbabwean State was established in
1980. This followed the Rhodesian War of Independence which had raged for the
proceeding decade and a half and resulted in the Lancaster House Agreement. This created a deal to end minority rule in Zimbabwe, albeit with conditions. It is
those conditions which were to later form the basis for the appetite of the
implementation of FTLRP twenty years later, when Mugabe believed that an
agreement with Britain was no longer being honoured.
Without turning this piece into a history lesson drawing in
everything from Ian Smith and the use of chemical weapons, the Nyadzonya raid, the
Gukurahundi massacres and everything else in between, the key sticking point at
the end of the talks
surrounded land reform. The picture in
1979 was stark
with 97% of Zimbabwean land owned by a minority Caucasian population. Joshua Nkomo and Mugabe’s perspective that
Zimbabwe should be able to determine its own future was resisted by Britain who
maintained that land redistribution would be restricted on a “willing seller,
willing buyer” principle
for the first ten years following independence.
Up until 1997, Britain continued
compensating the Zimbabwean Government for the purchasing of farmland from
Caucasian landowners in accordance with the principle set out in 1979. However when Tony Blair swept to power in May
of that year, a new British
foreign policy towards Zimbabwe was brewing and a desire to deploy funding
elsewhere emerged. Of course it is at
this point that one can easily slip into the mistake of finding an explanation
for all of Zimbabwe’s 21st century economic difficulties stemming
from a decision made at the British ballot box. For example, it would be
churlish to dismiss the devastating impact that Mugabe’s disastrous ‘Economic Structural
Adjustment Programme’ (ESAP) which commenced in 1990 (four years before Blair became
Labour leader) or the hyperinflation it triggered.
This is the reason why Mugabe’s motives should be
scrutinised and rightly bring into disrepute his status as a Pan-African icon championing
social justice. However, leaving that
aside, they do set the scene for a country facing economic hardship while tasked
with the duty of juggling a promise to a minority population from an era of
colonialism. Coupled with two severe droughts
in four years, Zimbabwe was a nation in crisis and the last thing it needed had
been London pulling the rug out from underneath them.
So set in motion a chain of events, Mugabe using the
breakdown in talks with Blair as a pretext for a fight
to uphold Zimbabwean Sovereignty. “It’s your money, keep it. It’s our land, we
will take it”. The popular headline
almost collectively orchestrated by every media outlet outside Africa has steadfastly
maintained that the decision to implement FTLRP in 2000 is an obvious answer to
the economic output which plummeted in the following years. Yet predictably they failed to take into
account the crippling
sanctions which were applied by Britain, the EU
and the USA who were under pressure to retaliate.
They also fail to reflect a reality of success stories as a
result of FTLRP. You would be hard-pushed to find many who would justify the
violence or methods of intimidation that were enlisted, but the contrasts do
make for interesting reading. Even with
the principle set out in 1979, by 2000 some 4,400
Caucasian landowners still controlled 32% of agricultural land, compared to 1 million
black families who occupied 38%.
Fast forward to 2013
when the FTLRP programme was completed, and no Caucasian owned farms remained. In the same year a book
entitled ‘Zimbabwe Takes Back Its Land’, showed
that agricultural production had reached the same level of the 1990s, with more
land now under cultivation than had been worked previously by Caucasian farmers.
6,000 Caucasian farmers had been replaced
by 245,000 black farmers as a result of the programme.
It followed a trend, confirming encouraging signs seen from
a study in 2010
which showed
that over half of new agricultural landowning households were accumulating and
investing. The study had been able to debunk five myths
including the widely held viewpoint that FTLRP had been a total failure or that
the rural economy had collapsed.
Mugabe can be criticised for so many poor judgements made on
his watch as the President of Zimbabwe and the purpose of this piece is not to excuse any of them. Where land was
appropriated by party associates or friends, this is indefensible and cannot be
explained away so I make no attempt to do so.
Where human rights were violated, where democratic principles ignored,
none of these can ever be justified.
FTLRP should serve as a warning to other countries in the region, indeed
I did predict as much to a Zimbabwean friend back in 2000 when the policy had
been pursued. Neighbours like South
Africa are still very much distracted by the novelty of being able to vote and
have yet to question the enormous social inequalities which still exist in
their country, nor indeed the disproportionate land redistribution which
eventually must be addressed. That will
not last forever. Zimbabwe has provided
a glimpse of what may yet unravel next door, unless progress is made to remedy
the hangover of minority rule. This must
go far beyond the “willing buyer, willing seller” principles which remain in practice there. It is a solution so poorly devised under that Lancaster House Agreement and only
offers sluggish progression.
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