Published by the government of Zimbabwe
24 June 2008
Harare — As US President, George W. Bush met with European Union leaders in Kranj, Slovenia, last Tuesday for the annual US-EU summit, Zimbabwe's rate of hyperinflation surged past the unprecedented six-digit level.
The US president, in apparent show of moral and ethical concern for the need for financial commitment to combat tropical diseases afflicting about one billion inhabitants of developing nations, implored EU leaders to make good commitments made last year to provide US$60 billion to fight HIV and Aids in Africa. Dan Price, US deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs, announced on the fringes of the US-EU summit that the Bush administration had already committed US$350 million over the next five years to fighting the seven major tropical diseases such as hookworm, malaria, tuberculosis and river blindness.
To be sure, Bush, as part of his foreign policy agenda, has been talking a lot about global health care issues, to divert attention from unsettling news headlines about wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Far removed from Slovenia and the moral and ethical grandstanding of leaders of the US and the EU, an economic catastrophe, some say apocalypse, appears imminent in Zimbabwe. Eight years of sanctions imposed by the US and EU in 2001 and 2002 respectively are now being felt in earnest, precipitating accelerated economic decline and mayhem. Even Reserve Bank Governor Dr Gideon Gono, the key architect and driver of the strategy for economic survival and turnaround, admits to the debilitating effect of the sanctions. Questions are being asked over the moral and ethical justification by the big powers, the US and EU to use sanctions as a foreign policy tool, to coerce, cajole or force less developed and weaker states into adopting policies compatible with their long-term strategic interests. These are at most shaped by liberal democratic capitalism, as authored for the New Labour by Tony Blair, Robin Cook and Gordon Brown.
There, therefore, have been heated debates about the appropriate relationship between individuals and society, and states and markets within and between Western states, but these have not detracted Western powers from using economic sanctions for foreign policy objectives. This has been largely due to the ideological convergence of foreign policy objectives in Europe, so-called Common Foreign and Security Policy aimed at promoting ideas of economic and political liberalism and human rights. In the case of Zimbabwe, what is the moral justification for visiting such economic hardships, pain and suffering on a civilian population that can hardly be said to be responsible or complicity in the actions of their Government?
This is attributable to what some scholars have called the Europeanisation of British foreign policy under Tony Blair, now being pursued by Gordon Brown. The contradiction between policy intent and outcome in the use of sanctions remains monumental and inescapable, from the time the US imposed the questionable sanctions on Haiti. Then, the desire was to influence political outcomes, whose intent and justification were the need to end the suffering of the ordinary people at the hands of what was perceived to be a brutal and oppressive military junta. The net result, however, as in the case of Zimbabwe, was unprecedented economic hardships resulting in immense human suffering, hunger and disease.
Most prominent scholars of international relations have questioned the moral and ethical justification as well as the efficacy of the use of economic sanctions on perceived rogue regimes, however defined. The US is a leading proponent of the use of economic sanctions, having used sanctions on more than 75 occasions, the most protracted in recent times being the economic blockade of Cuba still in place to this day. The other is the now ended siege on Serbia, whose rate of hyperinflation at the peak of sanctions, though exceeded by that of Zimbabwe, is comparable in extent. Nearer home, the experiences of Kenya under Daniel arap Moi and others are worth considering. Within the European Union itself, there has been widespread debate on the use of sanctions to the extent that they have contagion effect on civilian populations that can hardly be blamed, as in Zimbabwe's case, for the actions of their governments.
This is why, because of the knowledge and appreciation of the negative contagion effect, the EU has sought to justify use of sanctions on Zimbabwe by sanitising them interchangeably as "smart" or "targeted".
It is a glaring fact that there has been nothing smart or targeted on the sanctions regime imposed on Zimbabwe.
By limiting or denying Zimbabwe access to international financial institutions that they control, Western powers are eminently aware of the ripple effects of sanctions to cause economic hardships, and in turn political and social discontent. The motive and overall policy objective is no doubt to force out of power a non-compliant and confrontational regime stooped in an agenda for distributive justice.
In the circumstances, whatever the Government of Zimbabwe can do, realignment with the international community and the leading financial institutions, specifically the Briton Woods institutions, is not possible.
Not even the legal challenges to the validity and moral justification of the punitive sanctions imposed by the EU and US may succeed, judging by authority and precedent.
What then is Zimbabwe to do?
Is there an escape route out of the political and economic quagmire in which the nation finds itself? What is the exit strategy?
Will the US and EU settle for anything less than the removal from office of the uncompromising President Mugabe?
Has he presented his case for global equity and that of equitable redistribution of Zimbabwe's economic resources to correct past injustices adequately that the US and EU may be forced into a policy retreat or reversal? Not so!
Aguy Clement Georgias, Zimbabwe's current Deputy Minister of Economic Development, an idealist and obsessive optimist, is challenging the EU sanctions as a lone ranger, hopeful that he may legally force the EU to revoke the sanctions regime imposed on Zimbabwe.
In a landmark case before the British courts, Georgias is questioning the morality of the EU sanctions package. Through his solicitors in London he is to petition the European Court of First Instance to review the sanctions on Zimbabwe.
He is unperturbed by the fact that he is alone in mounting the legal challenge.
To be sure, Zimbabwe's case, judging by percent, would have been stronger constituted by a class action. But there appears to be no takers for such a course of action for the moment, despite the economic paralysis facing the nation.
Says Georgias: "My issue is that whatever the justification for the sanctions, however, much it may be plausible, it is simply immoral and unethical to cause such immense human suffering on the altar of politics.
"It is unconscionable, insensitive and just outright wrong that the sanctions are hurting the very people they purport to protect.
"There is no worse violation of human rights than when you cause hunger, disease, joblessness and widespread social stress, as is the case in Zimbabwe under the US and EU sanctions.
"The talk about the Zimbabwe Government undermining democracy and human rights is sounding increasingly hollow.
"It is apparent that US and EU policy considerations are less inspired by the desire to uplift the living conditions of the people of Zimbabwe than by a hidden agenda for liberal democratic capitalism to suit their own interests."
There is a formidable challenge ahead for Georgias. This is apparently so because there has been a major conceptual shift in British foreign policy under New Labour. In the words of Tony Blair, "Britain should not continue to be mesmerised by the choice between the US and Europe" because it is "a false choice".
Rather Britain should act "as a bridge between the EU and the USA". Here's is the crux of new British foreign policy.
As defined by Tony Blair at a luncheon with the Associated Press "though Britain will never be the mightiest nation on earth, we can be pivotal. It means realising once and for all that Britain does not have to choose between being strong with the US, or strong with Europe; it means having the confidence that we can be both.
"Indeed, that Britain must be both; that we are stronger with the US because of our strength in Europe; that we are stronger in Europe because of our strength with the US."
As one outstanding scholar has put it, this "conceptual departure" in the essence of British foreign policy in Blair's vision required "some practical flesh to be placed up its theoretical skeleton".
The case of Zimbabwe has made it possible for that flesh to be placed up its theoretical skeleton. And the unrelenting political and economic pressure on the Zimbabwe Government ought to be seen in that light.
Perhaps only Cuba knows how best Zimbabwe can survive such an onslaught by the US and EU in what has become an unpopular world order.
It was evident that, to the summiteers at Kranj, Slovenia, last week, the pain and suffering of the people of Zimbabwe under the US/EU sanctions, like that of the people of Iraq and Afghanistan, was not even on the agenda.
We can only wish Georgias success.
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