Robert Gabriel Mugabe: Decline and Fall
He is a man of whom much has been written; and much more said: some to praise and celebrate him; others to disparage and condemn him. They have all or, more accurately, almost all, made sound judgments, but always partially.
Born on 21 February 1924, he is the son of a carpentering father, Gabriel Matibiri, and of Bona. For his early education, he went to a Roman Catholic school. Thereafter, upon graduation, he won a scholarship to further his studies at Fort Hare University (a then black university) in South Africa. He returned home to teach (and spend four years in Ghana, where he married his first wife, Sally Hayfron, and was greatly influenced by the then Ghanaian President, Kwame Nkrumah).
In 1960, as the African continent was experiencing the sweeping waves of independence, he returned to Rhodesia to start his political career. He was subsequently arrested and jailed for about 11 years. While in jail, however, he carried on his mission of teaching his cos- (particularly, teaching them English) and studying on his own; as a result, he obtained three additional degrees in law, education, administration, and economics from the University of London (through correspondences). Upon his release, in 1975, he went to Mozambique to organize the insurgent resistance against the unrecognized Rhodesian white minority rule. After years of armed struggle (civil war), a free and fair election was held in 1980, which saw him elected as Prime Minister of the will-become Republic of Zimbabwe. Seven years later (1987), he made himself President of Zimbabwe, head of the State, and Commander-in-chief. This is, in a nutshell, the background of the will-be a political dinosaur, Comrade Bod: Robert Gabriel Mugabe.
What is to be remembered of his nearly four decades, more precisely, 37 years rule? What legacy has he left for Zimbabwe, and Africa as a whole? Here is where opinions differ.
For some, he is a hero, a freedom fighter, a liberator, an emancipator, etc. The list of the proponents of this view is limitless; and in any case, it would be an utterly useless labor to endeavor to enumerate them. Nonetheless, some of the most vocal warrant exploring. Immediately, the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, comes to mind. Shortly after his abdication or, more correctly, his resignation (after all, he was a lifetime president, not a king!), Mahamat had this to say: “President Mugabe will be remembered as a fearless pan-Africanist liberation fighter, and the father of the independent Zimbabwean nation. Today’s decision will go down in history as an act of statesmanship that can only bolster President Mugabe’s political legacy”. Alpha Condé, the Guinean President and the current head the African Union (AU), who once told his Guinean voters to have brought Guinea back (whence? That is another discussion; I rather leave that to Guineans!), could not agree with the Commission more. In fact, he had a warning, an alert that “We must never forget that Mugabe was a very great fighter, an African hero”. One is tempted to conclude that birds of a feather flock together!
Yet, it would be inaccurate to think that only leaders are defenders of the brightness of Mugabe’s legacy. I remember, quite vividly, a very long and passionate discussion we had, nearly two years ago, in one of Turkey’s coastal cities. It was summertime. We were all international students, predominantly African students. After spending the fairly heat-day by the sea, we gathered for various presentations, followed by questions & answers, then open discussion. In the last part, which is relevant to my point here, it was remarked that Mugabe was the last standing president who endorsed and embodied ‘pan-Africanism’ (whatever that is taken to mean seemed to be of little importance to my fellow students). And many of the participants there agreed. They proudly cited his courage to denounce Western imperialism, interventionism, and colonialism; he is also praised for his determination to speak for Africa, while other leaders keep quite.
In a sharp contrast, however, other people see Mugabe as a dramatically failed ruler, as the symbol of African dictatorships and oppression, as the mastermind of despotism. Here too, the list of the advocates of this standpoint is endless. Nevertheless, for the matter of convenience, I will briefly review the most vocal ones. Mugabe has, throughout his reign, particularly targeted Britain and the United States in his anti-Western rhetoric and political discourses. Not surprisingly, his fall was joyfully celebrated first by Theresa May, for whom “The resignation of Robert Mugabe provides Zimbabwe with an opportunity to forge a new path free of the oppression that characterised his rule”. While the U.S contented itself with “Tonight marks an historic moment for Zimbabwe” (short, but no less telling), Boris Johnson—the UK’s Secretary of State for Foreign & Commonwealth Affairs—was blunter, however: “I will not pretend to regret Mugabe’s downfall. Today is a moment of hope for the people of Zimbabwe. The UK will support them.” And Johnson was wright; it is not that Mugabe was domestically less despised. But that he is even more abhorred by many Zimbabweans, many of whom were expressing their joy by pouring in the streets and publicly stating that they were silent for the fear of their lives: even the Zimbabwe’s parliamentarians are seen dancing and shouting with delight in the parliament as soon as Mugabe’s resignation letter was submitted and read out loud. While many African leaders and scholars had long been calling for his retirement with somewhat more dignity. Of the latter, no other voice was more vocal than that of Prof. Patrick Loch Otieno Lumumba of Kenya. He has been, for many years now, critical of Mugabe’s corrupted and failed governance.
From my point of view, however, while both of these two positions are not false, or not entirely false, they are both partially accurate. Robert Mugabe is, beyond any doubts, a controversial and deeply complex figure. Therefore, to analyze him in a black and white framework, to scrutinize his leadership in an “either-or” scheme, to venture that one could grasp his legacy, the results of his 37 years in power at a glance, would be simplistic—too simplistic, in fact—and misleading. Instead, I venture to review his 37 years in leading Zimbabwe, the results of his reign, and the state in which he left the country on the date of his political coup de grace. I will, therefore, let facts speak for themselves; thereafter, the necessary conclusions will be drawn.
Like in many other places, the end of Britain’s colonial rule in Rhodesia (present Zimbabwe) was followed by the white minority rule. Despite being only about 40% of the general population, the white minority had complete control in Rhodesia: government, land, resources, etc. It was against this racial discrimination, social injustice, and political segregation that Mugabe and his compatriot stood. As explained above, Mugabe’s political career start with a pacific resistance and civil disobedience. After spending nearly 11 years in jail, however, he was completely radicalized. As he fled to Mozambique in 1975, Mugabe sought and won control over the resistance movement, which then had recourse to armed force. The struggles (a civil war, for some) lasted until 1980, when the internationally unrecognized and pressured Rhodesian Government agreed to organize a free and fair election. Mugabe won by a landslide to become Prime Minister; that is, he now has the destiny of what they renamed Republic of Zimbabwe. The victory was not just Zimbabwe’s victory; rather, it was another victory for the African continent; a symbol of Africans’ hopes and aspirations. The hopes of ending the brutal colonial occupations and oppressive rules; the aspirations for freedom—political freedom, economic freedom, and psychological freedom—development, progress, and prosperity.
It marked the beginning of a new dawn full of a promising future: food, more jobs, equal pay for equal jobs, good housing, and end racial discriminations. Plainly, the victory was a victory of social justice over political, social, and racial discrimination, minority’s tyranny and oppressions. Indeed, Mugabe was elected to bring social justice, equal opportunities to all (blacks and whites alike), democracy, and political freedom. He promised to strive for economic prosperity and development, reconcile blacks and whites, and promote their co-existence: all this he achieved, at least for a few years.
As a trained teacher, for instance, Mugabe succeeded in expanding access to education; thus raising literacy rate to 89% of the population. To be fair (and to his credit), Zimbabwe’s literacy rate is still amongst the highest in the whole Africa. Also, in the first years of his leadership, Mugabe expanded healthcare coverage. These achievements were doomed to short-live, however.
In 1987, Mugabe managed to change the constitution and made himself president of Zimbabwe. It was the first step, amongst many others to follow since he was unwaveringly determined, à l'image de Louis XIV, to declare: l'état zimbabwéen c'est moi. To achieve this, to establish himself as one-man-rule, however, sound social policies had to be overlooked, good and responsible governance forgotten, and social justice and accountability transformed into anachronism and glaring oblivion. In lieu, corruption and nepotism must become the tools to buy acolytes and political allies—brothers-in-despotism. And this is what Mugabe became—a despot, a dictator, a failed ruler, an oppressor vis-à-vis his people—till his last minute in office. One hardly need remind us that power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Like any other dictator, to consolidate his power, Mugabe had to instigate fear and terror; dissenting opinions had to be suppressed, oppressed or, simply marginalized through demonization; the dissidents had to be arrested without warrant, and jailed with no trial; or simply killed. Dickens has it: “prisons [are] gorged with people who had committed no offence, and could obtain no hearing”. They just vanish into nothingness; of which no one knows how or when (of course except for the perpetrators). And no other case could have half illustrated this better than that of Gukurahundi mass massacres from 1983 to 1987. No wonder, since 1980 elections, which brought him to power, no other elections were ever held freely and fairly to these days.
He led the fight against white minority rule to enslave the whole nation (politically, economically, and psychologically) for 37 years. While there is no doubt that lands in Zimbabwe, like in any other places with a history of minority rule, needed reforms to ensure social justice, solidarity, and sustained development, Mugabe dramatically failed; instead, he managed to bring the country to its knees, yet kept his job: he would rather destroy Zimbabwe (as he notoriously succeeded in doing) than face destruction himself. He started the land reforms in late 1990s. By 2000, however, the reforms became anything but peaceful.
In an attempt to dimly legitimize his actions, he called for a national plebiscite on expanding his presidential powers and allowing his government to pursue land reforms (or white-owned land seizures). The ‘nay’ passed and Mugabe’s proposals were rejected. Yet that did not stop him.
Mugabe’s oppressive policies on land reforms led to what one may accurately call ‘white flight’—like capital flight, which actually followed later on as sanctions, against him and his government, mounted and investors turned their back on the drowning economy—for white Zimbabweans had to flee en masse to save their lives as their commercial-farms were confiscated. Subsequently, the agricultural sector, an important contributor to the economy, collapsed altogether. That is not all. As export shrank drastically and abruptly, the country experienced an unprecedented trade deficit and an enormous food shortage, adding to the already unstainable budget deficit. In response, the government, in order to keep itself running, ordered the Central Bank to print money. One need not an introduction in Economics to understand that an irresponsibly uncontrolled money supply would only generate higher inflation; yet we are told that Mugabe has a degree in Economics.
Not surprisingly, inflation hiked up. The consequences are well-known and need no further details. Suffice it to say that Zimbabwe was doomed to face liquidity crisis, unbearable indebtedness. Nor was it all. Unemployment rose to more than 90% while the moderate or conservative estimations (i.e. the IMF) of inflation level claim the rate to be about 500 billion percent. Nonetheless, Steve Hanke of Johns Hopkins University and Cato Institute, who recently published a book on the Zimbabwean economic crisis, estimates it at 89.7 trillion percent. Though Hanke is fairly critiqued for using a method that inflates and exaggerates Zimbabwe’s alarming hyperinflation, it gives us a picture of how dim and blink the economic situation had become by 2008. In fact, the hyperinflation reached an unprecedented record high making Zimbabwe’s national currency worthless and useless. As result, from 2009 onwards, the country had to simultaneously use three foreign currencies: the U.S dollar, the British pound, and the South African rand. It is a great pity that the country possesses a national Central Bank, but no currency; it is naturally possible for a sovereign country to have a currency without needing a national central bank, but to have a standing central bank with no sovereign currency? What is its use then? What is its raison d'être? No wonder that Zimbabweans “people trust bitcoin more than anything else to maintain the value of their money”.
Yet, Mugabe prides himself (as do his supporters) for having fought and safeguarded the country from “westerners” and Western imperialists (primarily the US and Britain; though he is not ashamed he had recourse to their currencies to face the hyperinflation he generated). He effectively used the painful colonial pass to harness political support well beyond Zimbabwe and well beyond Africa.
He was lucky enough to be highly educated; yet, he failed to serve his country he fought for and the people he swore to lead for betterment. History will remember that Mugabe had dramatically failed to preserve his legacy of heroism; that he became the caricature, the symbol of African dictatorships; that he had destroyed the country, enslaved, oppressed, suppressed and traumatized the people—he had sworn to protect—to keep himself in power; that he blamed the world for the failures of his own policies. History will remember him as a corrupted leader, as human right abuser, and as a suppressor of dissenting voices. His mismanagements have been too loud and too long. He has been intermittently and justifiably accused of human right abuses by various organizations and entities so much so that the University of Edinburgh and that of Massachusetts had to withdraw their honorary degrees they had awarded him in 1984 and 1986, respectively, to show “the people of Zimbabwe that we recognize their struggle."
According to his bibliographers, Mugabe’s mentor had described him, in his youth, as having “An exceptional mind and an exceptional heart”. Right, his mentor may have been. If so, he should also know that Mugabe, for 37 years, had shown himself to be an exceptional leader: a hero first, shortly; then a despot for too long.
Can Mugabe’s failures and those of many other post-colonial leaders’ justify Bruce Gilley’s call for colonialism? Can their dramatic failures justifiably defend his “case for colonialism” no less because “For the last 100 years, Western colonialism has had a bad name”? I’ll waste not even a second of my precious time to discuss such a pseudo-scholarship!