Published by the government of Zimbabwe
25 June 2008
Harare — The United Nations yesterday blocked attempts by Britain, the United States and France to declare MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai as the President of Zimbabwe on the basis of the results of the March 29 harmonised elections.
This came as South Africa's ruling ANC party rejected foreign intervention in Zimbabwe, especially from erstwhile colonisers.
Britain, the current president of the Security Council, tried to use Belgium to halt Friday's presidential run-off election and illegally install Tsvangirai as president, but South Africa's Ambassador to the UN, Mr Dumisani Khumalo, blocked these attempts.
Associated Press reported that the US and France also tried to include in the Security Council statement language asserting that Tsvangirai should be considered the legitimate president of Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe's permanent representative to the UN Ambassador Boniface Chidyausiku said submissions by South Africa and Zimbabwe convinced the 15-member Security Council that it would be legally improper to halt the run-off and install Tsvangirai.
The original draft compiled by the British had claimed that the elections would not be free and fair, but the Security Council eventually issued a watered down non-binding statement condemning political violence.
"We would like to pay tribute to Ambassador Khumalo for the sterling work he did. It is a big victory for us.
"Britain, through Belgium, which is not a member of the Security Council, tried to get the UN to impose Tsvangirai as president in contravention of the country's Constitution and electoral laws.
"But South Africa made it clear that this would not be acceptable and we also made submissions indicating that it would be improper to subvert the law like that," Ambassador Chidyausiku said.
He said last week, Belgium-- apparently acting on orders from Britain -- had asked for a Security Council brief on what was going on in Zimbabwe.
The strategy was to use this as an excuse to criticise the electoral process, negate the need for a run-off and then recognise Tsvangirai as president on the basis of the March 29 poll results.
"The draft that we saw on Friday was mild. It was something that we could have UN blocks British, US attempts to halt run-off lived with. But over the weekend Tsvangirai said he didn't want to participate in the run-off anymore and this gave Britain, through Belgium, ammunition to attack Zimbabwe," Ambassador Chidyausiku said.
On Monday morning, he said the draft was suddenly harder and bent on preventing a run-off as if they were aware Tsvangirai would lose the election.
"They were happy to go with the results of the March 29 poll when the law is clear that there should be a run-off.
"We, too, respect the results of the harmonised elections and that is why we agree that there should be a run-off. For anyone to prevent a run-off is to prevent the free expression of the will of the people as provided for by the law," he said.
Ambassador Chidyausiku said Britain and its allies tried to argue that a cancellation of the run-off would be necessitated by the prevalence of State-contrived violence.
However, Zimbabwe's mission to the UN presented the Security Council with statistics indicating that the opposition was mostly behind the political violence in the country.
"The figures we have show that 400 MDC-T supporters have been arrested for political violence compared to 160 Zanu-PF supporters.
"We also demonstrated that there have been numerous cases of MDC-T supporters going around dressed in Zanu-PF regalia and beating up people.
"This is an outdated strategy used by the Selous Scouts during the liberation struggle and with the predominance of Selous Scouts in the MDC-T it is obvious what is going on.
"We managed to get them to recognise these realities and they failed in their bid to install Tsvangirai."
He said the people of Zimbabwe would determine the future of Zimbabwe.
Ambassador Chidyausiku also said that it was imperative for Sadc to remain united under the Lusaka Summit resolution to respect South African President Thabo Mbeki's mediation role.
"Sadc gave President Mbeki the mandate to mediate in Zimbabwe and that should be respected. That is a mandate that came out of a summit and no pronunciations by any individual outside of a summit should nullify this reality.
"Lusaka stands," he said.
The ANC, South Africa's ruling party, rejected any outside diplomatic intervention in the Zimbabwean matter yesterday arguing that "any attempts by outside players to impose regime change will merely deepen" the problems in Zimbabwe.
Although it said it was concerned with the situation in Zimbabwe, the ANC evoked Zimbabwe's colonial history and insisted that outsiders had no role to play in ending its current problems.
"It has always been and continues to be the view of our movement that the challenges facing Zimbabwe can only be solved by the Zimbabweans themselves," the statement said. "Nothing that has happened in the recent months has persuaded us to revise that view."
In what seemed a clear rebuke to the efforts of Western nations to take an aggressive stance against the Zimbabwean Government, the ANC included a lengthy criticism of the "arbitrary, capricious power" exerted by Africa's former colonial masters and cited the subsequent struggle by African nations to grant new-found freedoms and rights.
"No colonial power in Africa, least of all Britain in its colony of 'Rhodesia' ever demonstrated any respect for these principles," the ANC said, referring to Zimbabwe before its independence.
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No people who claim there are no sanctions are relying on official UN documents, not the word of some US politician.
When the west undermined Mugabe, by prevailing on companies and other countries not to invest in Zimbabwe, thereby destroying the country's economy, what did they think they were doing? Even right now Gordon Brown and others are trying to prevail on Anglo American not to invest $400 million in platinum mining in Zimbabwe. Anglo American is resisting, and rightly so.
Isn't it obvious that it was only because they inflicted this hardship on Zimbabweans that Zanu-PF lost the election? However, notwithstanding the 'playing field' that was not level, they've accepted the results and now they want to fight the second round of the presidential poll, and people who think Africans are children, morons or idiots, are saying the elections will not be free and fair? What are they smoking?
When Mugabe was undermined, was the election free and fair? These white idiots have invalidated any talk of free and fair elections in Zimbabwe, period. When they tilted the playing field in favor of one candidate there was nothing wrong, nobody should say a word, because they think they are god. Well, little Osamas are being born to continue these types of struggle. Win or lose, Mugabe will die fighting, as that is what we expect of our liberation heros.
"Win or lose, Mugabe will die fighting, as that is what we expect of our liberation heros."
So you expect your "heros" to fight their own people to stay in power? What an idiot!
As for free and fair elections it is YOU who must be smoking something if you think that's what they would be. Even African leaders who have never critisized Mugabe are now saying that the run-off wouldn't be free and fair. Are they all "western puppets" now?
How would these "African leaders" know whether the elections are "free and fair" since they don't live in Zimbabwe nor were they there as observers. Oh I know, they have the reports, staged and historical, by the western media, right? We know that they don't lie and distort things don't we? Or maybe they got their inside information from MDC officials and members. If Mr. Mugabe and his party have been stealing elections for the last 28 or 8 years (depending on the western source), why didn't they just steal the most critical one of all on March 29th. In fact if Mr. Mugabe is such a "murdering dictator" as western media keeps convincing those with low mentality and aversion to truth, why was Ian Smith allowed to die a natural death in Zimbabwe and the West's candidate for president was allowed to run around the world calling for foreign intervention in his country and still was allowed back into the country to run for president. Do the contradictions of what is being said and what is the actual truth ever register with you? Indeed if Mr. Mugabe were half the things that western media says about him there would not have been any runoff for the western candidate to pull out off 5 days before the elections nor would there still be 30 - 40 thousand whites still living there. As to whether your "African leaders are...", if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck.... You know what I'm saying.
Destroying a country is not diffucult. Just give it to Rob and he will show you how make all the residents of a country very poor and fill his pockets more than any other leader??? in the world!
this is a waste of time...i dnt know y they lisned to a south african while their president is the one supporting mugabe....innocent people are dying and many will die after the election results...pliz use force to remove mugabe..i personally dont tolerate what he is doing..he should be arrested for what he said that when he loose it s war...he already said it.so why waste time and let innocent people die!!mugabe should die plizzzz!!!
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Africans who have been brainwashed for years by the Western corporate media must understand that the current crisis in Zimbabwe can in no way be viewed as a “post electoral crisis”, such as the one witnessed in Kenya early on this year, or as issue of “bad governance”. It can only be regarded as a "proxy war" waged by Britain and its allies against Zimbabwe which is not a "client state". The "Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act of 2001" which was passed by the United States Congress is an “act of war” which has effectively condemned 13 million Africans in Zimbabwe to severe economic suffering over the past six years, as the country is unable to borrow or get any credit or debt cancellation on the international markets.
People in this forum who claim that sanctions against Zimbabwe do not exist are probably relying on the lies of Jendayi Frazer,US under secretary of state for African affairs)who was claiming on CNN 2 days ago that there are only "targeted sanctions" against Zimbabwe which do not affect the people.
More details on this bill which was drafted with the assistance of those who fund the MDC can be found on the website of the US Congress at http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/12/20011221-15.html.