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NEWS & LETTERS, MAY 2003
Our Life and Times
Zimbabwe crackdown
by Kevin A. Barry With the world's attention focused on the war in Iraq,
Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe cracked down hard on supporters of the
Movement for a Democratic Change (MDC), who had staged a successful general
strike in mid-March. As Mugabe declared in a speech that he was capable of
becoming a "Black Hitler, tenfold," pro-government militias attacked
MDC supporters with iron bars and whips, arresting at least 500 people. The MDC has called for the disbanding of the militias,
restoration of freedom of the press, and release of all political prisoners.
These confrontations were all part of the run-up to the March 30 elections in
which the MDC, despite pervasive voter intimidation, again carried Harare, the
capital, in large part due to its support in working class communities. Mugabe, a former Marxist who led the country to independence two decades ago, has consistently played the narrow nationalist card, emphasizing the largely urban MDC's links to both white farmers and various Western powers. While buying him time, such arguments have had only limited appeal in a society plagued by deep economic crisis, corruption, and increasingly authoritarian rule. Nevertheless, they also point to severe limitations of the MDC's politics of democratization through greater links to global capitalism. |
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