Desperately Seeking Sanity: What Prospects for a New Beginning in Zimbabwe?
Title:
Desperately Seeking Sanity: What Prospects for a New Beginning in Zimbabwe?
Author:
Raftopoulos, Brian Eppel, Shari
Appeared in:
Journal of eastern African studies
Paging:
Volume 2 (2008) nr. 3 pages 369-400
Year:
2008-11
Contents:
In Zimbabwe's Harmonised Elections on 29 March 2008 the ruling party ZANU-PF suffered defeat in the parliamentary elections for the first time since 1980. Robert Mugabe also lost the first round of the presidential elections, indicating that both he and his party were facing the prospect of losing state power. The lack of an outright presidential winner in the first round of the elections necessitated a runoff election at the end of June 2008. Whereas the period preceding the March elections was relatively peaceful, the horrendous violence that marred the period leading up to the June runoff completely undermined the conditions for a free and fair runoff. With little pretence at creating the political climate for a democratic election, Mugabe's ZANU-PF rolled out a campaign of violence, the levels of which have not been witnessed in the country since the Gukurahundi massacres in Matabeleland and the Midlands in the mid-1980s. Through a combination of extra-judicial executions, systematic use of torture, widespread population displacements, and a general campaign of terror, the Zimbabwean state targeted the structures and supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). As the electoral crisis deepened, the broader regional and international complexity of the Zimbabwean impasse imposed its imperatives on the unfolding crisis. Even as the Mugabe regime evoked more critical voices from within the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the African Union (AU), long-standing divisions between the West and Africa on the Zimbabwe problem reasserted themselves. On 21 July 2008 the major political parties in Zimbabwe signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to begin negotiations for a political settlement under the auspices of the Mbeki-led SADC mediation begun in 2007. It remains to be seen whether the South African President can bring a positive conclusion to his much criticized policy of 'quiet diplomacy'.
Journal description