Analysis lacks subtlety

TWO CRUCIAL FACTORS MISSING: SA’S DESTABILISATION OF ZIMBABWE

World Bank insists on structural reforms put economy in decline.

Robert Mugabe

A Jacana Pocket Biography

Authors: Sue Onslow and Martin Plaut Review: Brendan Seery

Robert Mugabe is a polarising figure. Depending on where you sit, he is either a mass murderer who wrecked his country – or the man who stuck it to whites in Zimbabwe by taking back the land from them.

It saddens me, as someone born in that country and who reported on events there, that much of the analysis on him is very simplistic. Mugabe is the classic case of the reality that the truth in Africa is in not in black and white (not referring to race here) but in the subtle shades of grey. I suppose I didn’t really have high hopes of this small book because exploring nuance takes space.

The book – like the opinions of many South Africans, including academics and historians who should know better – fails to mention at all two of the crucial factors in what happened in Zimbabwe after Independence in 1980.

Firstly, the South African apartheid government had a policy of “destabilisation” against the then Frontline States, to keep them off balance and weak and, therefore, unable to support the liberation struggle in South Africa.

Included in that campaign was the sabotage of Zimbabwe’s main army armoury, the destruction of the bulk of the country’s air force, the sabotage of the oil pipeline from Mozambique and last, but not least, the support of rebels in southern Matabeleland. South African-supplied weapons were used in atrocities there – including where white people were murdered – and the situation provoked the deployment of the North Korean-trained Five Brigade and the murderous campaign in which thousands were killed, maimed and tortured.

It was not surprising Mugabe’s trust of whites declined, especially as so many of them in his intel- ligence services were working for Pretoria.

The decline of the economy, many either don’t know – or won’t accept – was not sparked by Mugabe, but was set in motion by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, which would not advance loans to Zimbabwe unless Mugabe implemented its dire Economic Structural Adjustment Programme (Esap).

The core of this was the demand that he remove “socialist” policies like food subsidies – which originated, ironically, in the white government of Ian Smith. Once this happened, the cost of living soared. The “war veterans”, who had been given a government stipend to keep them quiet, got angry as their money’s value declined dramatically. To silence them, Mugabe looked at the white farmers … And the rest, as they say, is history.

It is a pity this book is another opportunity gone begging to have a balanced, nuanced analysis of a man who had such impact on southern Africa.