The Mugabe dead end

Robert Mugabe is making a mockery of liberal interventionism. He has become God8217;s gift to cartoonists, politicians and commentators. He is depicted wielding clubs dripping in blood. He stands triumphant over a pile of skulls. He is Bokassa out of Idi Amin out of Charles Taylor. He is that old familiar, the African heart of darkness, monstrous, buffoonish, grotesque and evil. There is a sense in which Mugabe8217;s hysterical anti-British analysis of his predicament is correct. His Zimbabwe is a creature of British imperialism and post-imperialism8230; Britain duly tolerated the suppression of Mugabe8217;s enemy, Joshua Nkomo, and Zimbabwe8217;s conversion into a one-party state. It turned a blind eye to the 1983 Ndebele massacre by Mugabe8217;s Shona Fifth Brigade. Margaret Thatcher8217;s Whitehall gave Harare lavish aid and barmy advice, helping turn a viable economy into a basket case of pseudo-socialist kleptomania. Now Zimbabwe is declared outrageous8230; So what is to be done? The government8217;s answer is splutter. Abuse is heaped on Mugabe8217;s head in a ministerial cascade of brutals, bloodthirsties, illegitimates and revoltings. As for sanctions they never work8230; any protracted squeeze leads only to internal economic adjustment. Control of money and goods shifts from merchants to rulers, driving the former to exile and increasing the wealth of the latter8230;

We can portray Mugabe in the press as a bloodthirsty gorilla and impose so-called smart sanctions, in order that Gordon Brown, David Miliband and the rest can feel a little better, but our fine feelings are hardly central to Africa8217;s predicament. So-called liberal interventionism is a will-o8217;-the-wisp, a vapid, feel-good refashioning of foreign policy8230; motivated by self-interest or passing mood. We should send food to the starving of Zimbabwe however much Mugabe distorts the supply. But as for dreaming of toppling him, those days are over. Britain has done enough damage to Zimbabwe over the years. Prudence tells us please to shut up.

Excerpted from a comment by Simon Jenkins in 8216;The Guardian8217;