Trinicenter.com - Zimbabwe: The DNA of illegal regime change

By Stephen T. Maimbodei
The Herald
August 08, 2007

The current flurry of international media activity is hard to ignore as we approach the national Heroes commemoration on August 13 and the subsequent Sadc heads of state and government summit in Zambia and the UN General Assembly in September.

The BBC World Service is airing a 'special' documentary on Zimbabwe on August 13, titled, "The BBC investigating a country on the brink: Zimbabwe, a country out of control", a day when the nation commemorates its 27th National Heroes' holiday.

This analysis is an attempt to pre-empt the documentary and its intended impact. What is their motive or agenda?

Has something new been added to the all familiar picture we are accustomed to? Is the picture getting larger since there is a new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, in the UK who says his policy on Zimbabwe will not be different from his predecessor's?

For the superstitious, the figure 13 spells doom, but for the patriot, airing this programme on August 13 is a smack on the face for it is not sheer coincidence that this programme, whose trailers started airing more than two weeks ago and is building up momentum, was poignantly slotted on this date in order to make our defence forces react to the current hardships.

It is like the BBC is spoiling for a real fight. What is there about Zimbabwe that they are investigating when it is their former colony, and when they have an embassy in the country, and when Zimbabwe is equally represented in the UK?

Their disclaimer that 'the BBC is not allowed to operate in Zimbabwe, so they used their correspondent in South Africa or entered the country secretly' is quite annoying because the BBC is a state sponsored media house.

Why again should they sneak into the country when they have the full services of their embassy?

Where do people like Brian Hungwe and sometimes Steve Vickers report from?

In this highly technological environment, does the BBC need correspondents on the ground in Zimbabwe? Peter Bailey has interviewed Zimbabweans many times for radio, TV and the Internet.

Therefore, who is fooling whom?

Some of the highlights of the programme are Zimbabwe's hyperinflation and its effect on ordinary people.

They claim that about 3 000 starving Zimbabweans cross into South Africa every day as border jumpers.

They also claim that thousands are crossing into Botswana and Zambia to buy basic commodities, and that according to Zimbabwean opposition MPs and activists, some people are already dying of hunger.

Number crunching when it comes to Zimbabwean issues is quite problematic.

When one adds up the HIV and Aids deaths, the economic migrants in various parts of the world, then Zimbabwe is empty, save for government officials.

In one of the trails, a reporter struggles to make a Zambian minister want to admit that the Zimbabweans crossing over into Zambia are refugees, but he could not budge.

Christopher Dell, former US ambassador to Zimbabwe must be singing: " ... Diplomatic etiquette was not necessary nokuti basa ndakasiya ndapedza."

The last article he did for The Guardian newspaper, and the subsequent interview on the BBC World Service were those of a man who had accomplished his mission. Where other men had feared to tread, including Sir Brian, he had, and he had even made sure that he had himself detained by Zimbabwean police, just to show the world the 'gross human rights violations by the Mugabe Government.'

And sure enough most brainwashed Zimbabweans and the gullible international community bought into that. In his valedictory interview, he admitted their failure to effect regime change through all the methods that they had used since the formation of the MDC.

But, he was very confident that the hyperinflation would do the job, and that President Mugabe would not be in power for much longer since the people were suffering immensely.

Please! This is the ambassador of the so-called most powerful nation in the world bragging so unashamedly about a problem they aggravated in a sovereign state.

And this is also an ambassador prophesying doom and gloom for our nation, making it sound like he was saying that all Zimbabweans will be millionaires.

He forgets that his own president – George Bush – cannot clean up the mess he caused in different parts of the world.

Right now, Iraq and Afghanistan are burning, in some cases with American weaponry that was 'carelessly' distributed to soldiers turned insurgents.

So much for lectures in western democracy, human rights and the global village where the village bullies lord it over the weak.

But as a nation we also have discerning people. A few years ago Professor Sheunesu Mupepereki kept on telling the nation on a TV talk show programme moderated by Professor C. Mararike as a people, "takagarigwa pasi." On each programme he reiterated,

"VaMararike, takagarigwa pasi!" (Professor Mararike, our fate was determined by westerners.)

This figurative statement is very true and telling, but because many of us suffer from tunnel vision, and that we have selective amnesia regarding matters of state, we did not take him seriously.

We thought that it was the usual ZTV propaganda.

Instead we were happy to see the cut and paste BBC panorama programme.

In the same vein, those who will have the opportunity to listen to this programme next week will realise that some of the so-called border jumpers speak with a very distinct South African accent, and that one of the young men struggles to speak in broken English.

It is quite surprising because in most BBC programmes, they use translators for people who are not very conversant in the English language.

What Prof Mupepereki meant was that on foreign policy issues, especially on Africa, the western nations (the UK, EU and the USA) work hand in glove.

On Zimbabwe, takagarigwa pasi; on slavery takagarigwa pasi; on the partition of Africa takagarigwa pasi; colonialism takagarigwa pasi; post-colonial/neo-colonial state, takagarigwa pasi; globalisation, takagarigwa pasi; etc, etc.

They will continue kutigarira pasi kusvika ameni, isu tichingoti, bva rega ndione (lets see).

To them, Zimbabwe is a stage, and they are playacting.

Their aim is to upstage and receive standing ovations.

To them, what they are doing in the name of effecting good governance is even more legitimate because some of our own are supping with them, although they just receive breadcrumbs.

The resources so far used in the regime change game plan mean that there is a lot more about Zimbabwe than their kith and kin that were displaced from the land.

That diamonds were found in a poor village in Marange shocked them and this was an indicator to them that there are vast natural resources in this country, and they want them, come rain come fire.

Remarking that 'for a country that used to be the bread basket of Africa' to have such levels of poverty is a naïve and myopic analysis of a problem that dates back more than a century.

It is a fact that as a nation, we are facing serious challenges, but they actually aggravate the problem by working with some of our sons and daughters who are supposed to be part of the long-term solutions.

This is why the timing of this programme is a real smack in the face for all those who love this nation, and who wish that these problems should be resolved by Zimbabweans through a unity of purpose approach.

Don't they also realise that such an action is a deliberate ploy at "placing the devil in the detail?"

Just as they resolved the problems in the former Yugoslavia on their own and right now, Tony Blair waited less than a day to get a job as a Middle East envoy, Africa did not complain.

So, why the continued bully tactics on Zimbabwe when the people are suffering the way they are?

We refuse to be treated as poodles. We will soldier on as we commemorate the gallant work done by our sons and daughters throughout the three Chimurengas.

Yes, you say that we should not tempt fate, but the truth of the matter is that Zimbabwe will never be a colony again!

The BBC can do a zillion programmes on us, but this will be just like chasing the wind.