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Published by the government of Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe: Get Rid of the Cynical Agenda

Stephen T. Maimbodei

10 June 2008

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opinion

Harare — Last Tuesday and Wednesday June 3 and 4, I listened to Julian Marshall on BBC World Service's News Hour (22:00 CAT) and was surprised with the tone of his report on President Mugabe's attendance of the recently held world food summit in Rome.

In the past I have always found Julian's presentations on Zimbabwe, especially interviews, slightly balanced. I was, however, surprised by the manner in which he handled the interview he had with an American woman author regarding President Mugabe's presence at the summit. The Associated Press and others also reported that "Western leaders had attacked President Mugabe for participating in the UN summit on the global food crisis while his people are going hungry", and described the attendance as "obscene".

However, what I really took exception to was the Wednesday interview with an American author, and you badgered her about why the FAO had allowed President Mugabe to attend the summit.

On Tuesday the focus of your attention was that the Zimbabwean leader's presence would overshadow the goals and objectives of the summit. You went on to make claims, just like the rest of the anti-Mugabe media establishment, the US President George W. Bush included that President Mugabe was attending the summit while Zimbabweans were starving.

Dan Damon, another BBC presenter, did the same in 2006 when he also took the Food and Agriculture Organisation to task for inviting President Mugabe to the food summit. His justification: the Zimbabwean leader used such forums like UN meetings to criticise the British and American leaders.

Your Wednesday News Hour interview with an American author was surprising because instead of questioning her about the summit and her book, you concentrated on President Mugabe.

This just goes to show that when the West claims that they want to ensure that poverty is eradicated it is just but hot air. What was supposed to be a non-issue became an issue. So who then is your newsmaker?

As the FAO spokesperson Nick Parsons, poignantly pointed out: "The fact that President Mugabe and other leaders the leaders of the West may not approve are attending a UN meeting in Rome is not a scandal. The UN is about inclusiveness, not exclusivity, giving all nations the right to participate . . . in the face of the looming, impending food crisis that the FAO first warned about a year ago, a high-level meeting between countries is the serious issue, the rest is irrelevant in the overall significance of what the meeting is about."

We, therefore, ask what happened to humane attitudes such as accommodation, inclusion, embracing, co-operation and acceptance at the BBC and the rest of the Western media?

I salute the lady you interviewed for her professionalism and her refusal to be swayed about the importance of the summit. She answered you very frankly and forthrightly.

She asked you this rhetorical question: Which nation has the right to tell another nation not to participate in UN activities? You also preferred a situation whereby the FAO should have invited Zimbabwe with the instruction that President Mugabe should not be leader of the Zimbabwean delegation, let alone speak at the meeting.

What you deliberately ignore is that Zimbabwe as a sovereign state was admitted to the 192-member state of the UN General Assembly on August 25, 1980. In principle, only sovereign states can become UN members.

Zimbabwe, like the United Kingdom, is a UN member state with an equal membership based on the UN Charter. Like the UK or other Western nations, Zimbabwe was admitted by the approval of the Security Council and the General Assembly, and they are the bodies that should decide on Zimbabwe's continued membership, and not Western members of the UN.

The UN Charter also guarantees the equality of all the 192 member states, whether or not they are members of the Security Council, and whether or not they have permanent status on the Security Council.

Is it any wonder then when people sometimes question who exactly makes up the United Nations when the BBC and other Western media outlets display such double standards thinking that they are more equal than others? World Service listeners will recall that the American author was very objective in her response as she explained and justified President Mugabe's attendance.

She also made it very clear that no leader had the right to tell another leader to speak or not to speak at the summit. In her argument, she pointed out that her own leader President George W. Bush plunged the US into a war in Iraq, without the mandate of the American people.

It was when she started chronicling some of the injustices perpetrated by the United States that you stopped her, and thanked her for her participation.

But in the age of connectivity and open news, a vigilant Nigerian listener sent you a text message barely minutes after the interview, which you also read:

"Shame, shame, shame Julian. You stopped that American lady because she was going to talk about the Americans' crimes against humanity! Mugabe is our hero on the African continent."

However, you defended your action and said it was due to time constraints. In fact, each time Zimbabwe features "prominently" on Focus on Africa and Network Africa, some African brothers and sisters, especially from Nigeria and Uganda, stand up for President Mugabe, telling the West to back off, and maintaining that President Mugabe is an African hero and statesman.

I am sure that there would have been an international outcry of condemnation and labels of propaganda reporting and censorship if what happened last Tuesday and Wednesday had been done by one of our anchors at the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation.

The bottom line is that the BBC wanted to cast aspersions on President Mugabe's right to attend the summit notwithstanding the fact that in your reports you had no qualms about calling him, the Zimbabwean leader, President Mugabe.

However, as a Zimbabwean whose daily diet includes negative images about Africa, your actions were in keeping with what we have always experienced. Africa is a cesspool of disastrous events, and nothing positive ever comes out of it except its resources.

For more than eight years now, the Western media machinery has been working hand in glove with their governments and the local opposition parties in their bid to effect illegal regime change, and thus see the demise of President Mugabe for daring to repossess Zimbabwean land. We know that the British government will never forgive President Mugabe for actually reversing the British's claim on Zimbabwe land and redistributing it to indigenous landless people.

We also find it obnoxious that the BBC, state sponsored and state owned, thinks it was OK for the British government representatives to attend the summit after the historic defeats that Gordon Brown's government suffered recently in local government elections and the by-election in Crew. What legitimacy does Brown have when he was not voted into power? What legitimacy does he also have when right now he is the most unpopular leader in Britain and people are clamouring for change and an early election?

As Zimbabwe goes for a run-off, we also see the West, and its diplomats accredited to Zimbabwe and their media, the BBC included acting like Press officers for MDC-T and its leader Morgan Tsvangirai, and we wonder who exactly is creating an unfavourable environment for conducting free and fair elections. Isn't it now so clear that the MDC-T is a front for British and American interests, not only in Zimbabwe, but also throughout the Sadc region?

You are crying more than the bereaved, and it is quite evident that your agenda is bigger than just seeing due process take its natural course on June 27. This is why President Mugabe and Zanu-PF continue to argue that Britain and her allies externally induce the Zimbabwean problem. The demonisation and vilification that started when President Mugabe embarked on the land reform programme and last week's attacks were all meant to portray him as a failed and irresponsible leader.

You, however, selectively chose to forget that the very fact that world leaders, including leaders of the most industrialised nations, were gathered in Rome to discuss a critical issue that is a major threat to peace and security on the whole planet was a pointer to unworkable policies that the West force-feeds developing nations. The global food crisis together with issues such as global warming; global fuel price increases and the global economic crunch are all an indictment of the Western leadership. These problems are a result of failed and unworkable socio-economic and political policies, whose main architects are the rich and powerful member states in the UN.

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