No tears for Mugabe

So, Robert Mugabe has finally resigned as president of Zimbabwe. Good riddance. He was an authoritarian dictator who fixed elections, looted his country, and tortured and murdered his opponents, so I'm glad to see him go. At the same time, its a shame that it was the army, rather than the people, who removed him. At least nobody was killed, but it looks more like an internal power struggle in an authoritarian government than the transition to democracy Zimbabwe desperately needs. One dictator replacing another is hardly progress, and the new boss may simply turn out to be the same as the old boss. All we can do is hope that its not going to be like that, and that the new regime will actually respect democracy and human rights, rather than just changing the names of the abusers.

No tour

The New Zealand and Zimbabwean cricket authorities have decided to delay the Black Caps' tour of Zimbabwe for a year to allow the situation in Zimbabwe to stabilise. Good. While Mugabe has recently signed a power-sharing deal with the opposition, we have yet to see whether it will work, or whether the country will continue to be a shitty, torturing despotism. A voluntary delay gives us time to assess the situation, and spares us the hassle of trying to find a legal way to stop it. It also shows a marked change in attitude from New Zealand Cricket, who last time were reciting the old apartheid mantra, "sport and politics don't mix". I guess the public revulsion - and the threat of undermining their sponsor's brands - was just too much for them.

A solution in Zimbabwe?

The Independent reports that the ruling ZANU-PF party and the Movement For Democratic Change have a draft agreement for a solution in Zimbabwe. Mugabe would receive an amnesty, and be ceremonial "founding president" for the rest of his life. But Morgan Tsvangirai would become Prime Minister with greater executive powers, and there would be fresh elections.

Letting Mugabe off the hook leaves a bad taste in my mouth - I want to see him prosecuted for his crimes against his people. But if his victims can stomach it, then so should we. At this stage it is more important to stop the torture and oppression than hold out for justice. Besides, as we've seen in South America, such amnesties tend not to last once the regime is gone. But Mugabe is old, and will probably die before the consensus shifts towards prosecution.

Terrorising his way to a majority

Back in April, Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change won a plurality in the Zimbabwean parliament, allowing them to pose the first real challenge to Mugabe's rule. But now that he's murdered and tortured and brutalised his way to "victory" in the presidential runoff election, Mugabe has turned his attention to regaining control of Parliament and cutting back the MDC's lead. How? By imprisoning, disappearing, and murdering them. Ten MDC MPs have already been arrested on trumped up charges, one has been disappeared and is presumed dead, and another was kidnapped in broad daylight by soldiers outside the High Court in Harare.

The opposition said the abduction is part of a strategy confirmed by a handwritten document obtained by the Guardian and drawn up by a senior Zimbabwean intelligence official for delivery to foreign observers, including a group of South African army generals sent to scrutinise the political violence. It says that opposition MPs are to be "silenced", jailed on charges of treason, and not allowed to move in their own constituencies.

[...]

The ruling party's forces are also targeting the families of MPs they are unable to find. Five relatives of Festus Dumbu, MP for Zaka West, were abducted earlier this week, and are still missing, when the assailants discovered he was not at home.

As a result, many opposition MPS are now in hiding. Which is the point: to stop them from showing up to parliament and contesting the government's rule. And if they don't show up for long enough, they can be stripped of their seats and a by-election held. Mugabe is terrorising his way to a majority, and there seems to be little anyone can do about it.

Mugabe has won

So, it's over - and Mugabe has won. Zimbabwe's dream of a peaceful democratic revolution has been crushed by torture and murder. For a while there was some hope that Mugabe's brutal dictatorship could be overthrown at the ballot box, but with opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai withdrawing from Friday's run-off to prevent further bloodshed, that hope is dead.

It is unclear whether the withdrawal will have any legal effect (it wouldn't in New Zealand - you can only withdraw before nomination day - but Zimbabwe's electoral law may be different), whether Mugabe will be declared the winner by default, or if the elections will go ahead anyway. But if they do, they will not confer legitimacy - there is none to be gained from an "election" with only one candidate.

As for Zimbabwe, it's clear now that their only hope of freedom is to wait for Mugabe to die. Given that he's 84, that could happen quite soon (OTOH, look at how long Castro has held on for). But even then, the transition might not be smooth.

A run-off in Zimbabwe

The Zimbabwean Electoral Commission has finally begun releasing results for March's presidential election. The good news is that MDC candidate Morgan Tsvangirai beat Rubert Mugabe 48% to 43%. The bad news is that he didn't get 50%, so there will now have to be a run-off election. Which means another month of thuggery as Mugabe tries to beat, intimidate, torture and murder his way to re-election.

The numbers match the earlier independent counts, so I don't think there's much reason to doubt them. Which really makes you wonder why they didn't just release them a month ago.

Zimbabwe: back to thuggery

With Zimbabwe looking likely to go to a runoff in its Presidential election (despite no official results having been released), Mugabe and Zanu PF are goign back to thuggery, and trying to intimidate people into voting for them:

The patients at Louisa Guidotti hospital said there were eight men, one carrying a shotgun, another with an AK-47, others with pistols, and they went from bed to bed forcing out anyone who could walk.

Nurses were dragged away from the sick. Motorists driving by the hospital, 87 miles north-east of Harare, were stopped and taken from their cars.

About 70 people were gathered in the grounds. Then the lecture began. "This is your last chance," said one of the armed men. "You messed up when you voted. Next time you vote you must get it right or you will die."

One of the men selected people to stand and shout slogans of Zimbabwe's ruling Zanu-PF party and to sing songs from the liberation war . Those who did not do so enthusiastically were beaten. Another cocked his gun and told the crowd to point out opposition supporters.

Meanwhile, the leaders of Africa's democratic states remain silent. I know that Mugabe has a lot of mana from being a revolutionary fighter against colonialism a couple of decades ago, but that shouldn't be a blank cheque, and it shouldn't give him immunity from criticism when he behaves in a blatantly undemocratic manner.

A glimmer of hope in Zimbabwe

Yesterday the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission announced the final results of Parliamentary elections, giving the opposition Movement for Democratic Change a plurality over ZANU-PF for the first time in Zimbabwe's history. Even given the legislature's subordination to an executive presidency, it's a hopeful sign that change may be coming to Zimbabwe. But more hopeful is the government's admission that a run-off may be necessary in the Presidential election. While the independent counts disagree about whether this is the case (it's tight - MDC claims they have 50.3% of the presidential vote based on the popular parliamentary vote, while the Zimbabwe Electoral Support Network gives them 49%; the official results have been fixed to inflate the ZANU-PF popular vote to around 46% to the MDC's 43%), it's still the closest Mugabe has come to admitting that he is not the automatic choice of the people.

If it goes to a runoff, Mugabe will probably try to fix the results. But like many, I think it is interesting that it is taking so long for results to be announced. If Mugabe was that certain he could steal the election, he would just do it. The fact that he hasn't suggests that top members in his party are unsure that they can put one over on the Zimbabwean people one more time.

And OTOH, now that the police are back to raiding the MDC's offices, maybe the regime isn't so afraid after all.

Update: The Guardian reports that Mugabe is (through proxies) offering to quit if he does not face prosecution. While I'd rather see him in jail, what's important at the moment is getting him off the political stage and allowing a democratic system to reassert itself. Besides, the government or courts can always reverse the amnesty later, as happened in Argentina.

Zimbabwe: the waiting

On Saturday, the people of Zimbabwe went to the polls to elect a Parliament and President. And today, three days later, they're still waiting for results. In previous elections, these have generally been available within a few hours of the polls closing. This time, it has taken days. The reason? With local, Parliamentary, and Presidential elections all happening at once, Robert Mugabe's thugs can't just make up the results like they have in the past; it would look suspicious (to say the least) if the opposition won a landslide in Parliament and the local bodies, but this wasn't reflected in the Presidential result. So they have to work at it, inflating the vote count here, disappearing votes there, to produce a consistent set of lies. Trickling the Parliamentary results out is a part of this strategy, to create a false impression of a close race.

How do we know its a false impression? Because this time round, polling places have been posting local results. Zimbabwean NGOs have been going round photographing these, and can thus get their own picture of the election. The independent count, and estimates the Movement for Democratic Change winning 102 of the 176 seats they have data on, with MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai winning 51% of the presidential vote (it is unclear how this figure is computed, but the Zimbabwe Electoral Support Network [slow] gives a similar but slightly lower figure based on a random sample of 5% of polling places). In addition, international media are reporting that Zanu PF officials have privately admitted that the results are known and that they have lost. Unfortunately, they are refusing to accept the people's will, and are instead going to rig the results again.

It'll probably take a few more days for this parody of democracy to finally play out. The question at the end of it is what should the opposition do? Accept yet another fraudulent denial of the people's will, or risk bloodshed and take to the streets? While I think everyone would welcome seeing Mugabe unseated by a "people power" revolution, the sad truth is that they only work against governments with a sufficient sense of shame to not just massacre their opponents. Mugabe has already shown he has no shame, and so the result of such a protest is likely to be a bloodbath.

Zimbabwe elections

Zimbabweans went to the polls yesterday, in presidential elections widely expected to be rigged. Despite that, they voted anyway, with some queueing all night to exercise their right. The mood in the country seems to be for change - no-one can stomach Mugabe anymore - and this seems borne out by interim results (illegally) released by the Movement for Democratic Change, which show a clear win for the opposition. Of course, these are interim results from actual polling places, before they've been doctored by Mugabe's thugs, so the end results will probably look quite different.

The question then is what happens next. Mugabe has already said that he will use the army to crush any post-election protests, but people might be willing to run that risk anyway. The result will almost certainly be a bloodbath. Alternatively, Mugabe could meekly accept the people's will, and either bow out or accept a runoff election which, if it were free and fair, he will lose. But sadly, that's probably too much to hope for.

Highlighting the hypocrisy

While torture and human rights abuses aren't on Helen Clark's agenda when she goes to Washington, they are very much on Winston Peters' agenda in the case of Zimbabwe. Peters has strongly criticised the Mugabe regime's violent crackdown on protestors, and is promising that New Zealand 'will do what it can' to push for change in Zimbabwe. The double standard couldn't be any clearer: we will criticise our enemies, but not our friends.

Not only is this hypocritical, it also undermines our stance. Regimes with poor human rights records can point to our silence on US abuses and use it to undermine our criticism. Mugabe will allege that he is being singled out because he is poor and black, while the US is white, rich and powerful - and he'd be at least partly right. If we want to be taken seriously, we must be impartial, and reject torture and human rights abuses, no matter who they are committed by, and regardless of whether we hope to gain a free trade agreement from them. Otherwise we're not supporting universal human rights, but instead using them as a selective weapon.

Welcoming Zimbabwe

Having made it clear that the Zimbabwean cricket team were not welcome to visit here last year, the government is now saying that it will welcome them with open arms if we are hosting the 2011 world cup. Can anyone else smell the reek of hypocrisy here, of principles being sacrificed in the name of tourism dollars again?

Of course, 2011 is a long way away, and hopefully by that time Mugabe will have died of old age and we will not need to refuse to have his team in the country. But we certainly shouldn't be making any promises about it. Instead, we should be making it clear that we reserve the right to refuse entry to the official representatives of regimes which grossly abuse human rights, and if this is too uncertain for the ICC, they can take their world cup elsewhere.

Motions

Via Frogblog: Parliament has just passed its motion on Zimbabwe:

That this House, noting with grave concern the oppression by the Government of Zimbabwe of its own people and its gross violation of human rights, calls upon New Zealand Cricket to abandon the proposed Black Caps tour to Zimbabwe, and urges the International Cricket Council to exclude Zimbabwe from international tours while gross human rights abuses continue in that country.

This is good, but they need to go further. If the Black Caps continue their tour, Parliament should pass a second motion disowning them. If they can not or will not take legislative action, then they can at least make it absolutely clear that the New Zealand public opposes the tour and contact with the Mugabe regime, and that the Black Caps do not represent us in this.

Sporting tours and human rights

The chief reason given by the government for its refusal to support the Zimbabwe Sporting Sanctions Bill (which would impose sporting sanctions on Zimbabwe and thus give the Black Caps an out from their contract with the ICC) is that such action would violate the human rights of New Zealanders. The New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 affirms the right of freedom of movement - including the right of everyone, regardless of citizenship, to leave New Zealand. The Greens have responded with a legal opinion from one of New Zealand's top law firms, arguing that the bill does not violate those rights.

I've finally got round to reading the opinion, and I agree. The argument really boils down to two questions: whether the right of freedom of movement applies to legal persons such as companies and sports teams, and (if it does) whether the restrictions proposed in the bill is a "reasonable limit" as allowed under s. 5. Their response is "no" and "yes" respectively. While it has never been tested in court, it is generally held that the right to leave New Zealand is the sort of right only applicable to individuals, not to legal entities. People have freedom of movement; companies don't, and the bill only limits the latter. But even if this is wrong, and companies do (somehow) enjoy freedom of movement, they argue that it falls well within the "reasonable limits" clause. Travel bans can be a legitimate means of applying pressure to states which refuse to uphold human rights, and in this case the restriction is very narrow; "it is only travel for certain limited, but high-profile, sporting purposes that is prohibited". No individual is prevented from travelling to Zimbabwe, or even from playing cricket there.

If people still have concerns, then the bill can easily be modifed. One obvious amendment would be to remove all references to "travel" entirely, and redefine "Sporting tours of Zimbabwe" to mean the playing of sport in Zimbabwe by any New Zealand national sporting team. Again, this would not criminalise behaviour by individuals, or prevent a "cavaliers"-style "independent" tour, but instead would make it clear that this is about whether a national team should be "doing business" with Mugabe - something the government has every right to prevent.

Hiding behind process

The government seems to be slowly buckling under the pressure over the Black Caps' tour of Zimbabwe. In the face of overwhelming public opposition and repeated calls from public figures and major newspapers for government action to get New Zealand Cricket off the hook, they are slowly retreating to their fallback position. Initially, they had ruled out any legislation to ban the tour as a violation of New Zealanders' human rights. The public didn't buy that, and so over the past few days, they have shifted to saying that it would be wrong to legislate under urgency. But as Frogblog points out, urgency is intended to be used in situations that are, well, urgent - and this is a perfect example. The team leaves next month, and Parliament will have only three sitting days in which to act. If there is to be a legislative solution (as most New Zealanders want), then urgency is required. But rather than bite that bullet, the government is trying to stall and hide behind process, run out the clock so they can say "sorry, its too late to do anything now".

We shouldn't let them get away with it. The government has shown in the past that it is willing to use urgency for far less important things than this (Harry's Law, anyone?), so it seems more than a little disingenuous of them to now be appealing to the sanctity of the Parliamentary process. They can act, and the only question is whether they are going to. And if they don't want to, they should have the guts to come out and say so, rather than trying to hide behind a procedural smokescreen.

A gentlemen's game

many have suggested the Black Caps show their disapproval of the Mugabe regime while on tour - for example, by wearing black armbands exactly as Henry Olonga did. But as Rod Donald points out, this could cost the players their cricketing careers: the ICC's clothing and equipment regulations bar any political messages, on pain of suspension from international play and a US$25,000 fine.

Why do they do this? Because cricket is "a gentleman's game". And calling a murderous thug a murderous thug would be ungentlemanly...

Zimbabwean voices against the tour

Over the past few weeks, we've seen Zimbabwean voices speaking out consistently against the Black Caps' plan to tour their country. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change has condemned the tour, as has Zimbabwe's Archbishop. Now some of those voices are coming here. The Greens have invited former Zimbabwean cricketer Henry Olonga - who famously wore a black armband to protest the death of democracy in his country, and was forced to flee the country as a result. And Global Peace and Justice Auckland are bringing over human rights campaigner Judith Todd - the daughter of the former Rhodesian Prime Minister and a consistent opponent of both white minority rule and Mugabe's thuggery. Both will be lobbying New Zealand Cricket, the players, and our politicians to do the right thing and cancel the tour. They will also be speaking at public meetings in the main centres - Frogblog has Olonga's itinerary here. Or, if you're in Auckland, you can see both of them at a public meeting on Friday night (details in either of the above links), or at Saturday's demonstration.

The government does nothing

The government has ruled out legislative action to stop the Black Caps' tour of Zimbabwe. This means that the only way the tour can be stopped is if the ICC relents and allows teams not to tour on human rights grounds, or Sneddon changes his mind. The former is highly unlikely - they are a morally blind organisation which cares about nothing other than money and cricket - and even if they did, Sneddon would likely still chase the money and go regardless. Which means we have to focus on the latter. And the only way to produce change is to target the sponsors so they will apply pressure to NZ Cricket. Global Peace and Justice Auckland will be holding a march on July 16th to protest the tour and The National Bank's sponsorship of the Black Caps; hopefully they'll have some flyers up soon if you want to stage something outside your local National Bank branch.

The government is also reportedly considering compensating NZ Cricket for the income lost by the cancellation of Zimbabwe's tour here. Frankly, I don't see why we should give them a cent when they're pissing in our faces by going in the first place. Perhaps if they'd shown some backbone and stood up to the ICC themselves, but compensating them for phantom revenue when they are doing something we fundamentally disagree with is simply encouraging a repeat performance. They're independent (their supporters keep telling us that), they have sponsors, let them carry the can.

A fizzer

So, Rod Donald's bill looks to be a fizzer, with Helen Clark condemning it and other parties refusing to back it. Meanwhile, a gathering of Methodist Bishops in Johannesburg has warned that Robert Mugabe's slum-clearances are "a complete recipe for genocide" and "a tragedy of unprecedented enormity".

Criticisms of the bill as limiting the freedom of movement are misplaced. It is not freedom of movement the bill restricts, but freedom of association (which, lest it needs to be pointed out, is also affirmed in the BORA). And as I argue below, the government has an unquestionable right to limit freedom of association in this manner by imposing economic sanctions on another country. We've imposed such sanctions on human rights grounds in the past, notably on apartheid South Africa. We already bar New Zealand companies from exporting weapons and other "tools of repression" to the Mugabe regime, on the basis that he is a repressive dictator. Barring sporting contacts by recognised national representatives is just an extension of this.

But while disappointing, the failure of this bill would not be the end. We have three weeks to find a legislative solution, and Jim Anderton reportedly also has a bill in the works. Ideally, though, I'd hope that public pressure, rather than legislative action, will cause NZ Cricket to change their mind and call off the tour.

Stopping the tour

Via Frogblog: Rod Donald has released his Zimbabwe Sporting Sanction Bill aimed at stopping the Black Caps' tour of Zimbabwe and giving them an out under the "force majeure" clause. If passed, the bill would prohibit any sporting tour of Zimbabwe by any nationally recognised sporting body (such as NZ Cricket). Breaking the ban would result in a $50,000 fine, the revocation of recognition by SPARC, and the withdrawl of any government funding. The right of sportsmen to leave the country, whether to play sport or otherwise, would not be affected.

This does not violate the BORA. It does not affect the right of any person - natural or legal - to leave the country. It does limit freedom of association, but this limitation is a reasonable one which can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. The government has an unquestionable right to impose economic sanctions on another country as part of its foreign policy. This is simply a subset of that.

I don't like having to do this. I would much rather NZ Cricket did the decent thing and decided to stay home. The New Zealand public have shown a clear willingness to cover the fine and any costs imposed, and if the ICC imposed an international ban, I think that that would only support our position. This bill would give NZ Cricket an out, a way to stay home gracefully. The real question is whether they take that out. It's entirely possible that NZC will look at the money they stand to earn from the tour, and decide to wear the fine and go anyway. But then it will be quite clear where they stand, and the public will react accordingly.