Quote of the week
Universal adult suffrage on a common voters roll is one of the foundational values of our entire constitutional order. The achievement of the franchise has historically been important both for the acquisition of the rights of full and effective citizenship by all South Africans regardless of race, and for the accomplishment of an all-embracing nationhood. The universality of the franchise is important not only for nationhood and democracy. The vote of each and every citizen is a badge of dignity and of personhood. Quite literally, it says that everybody counts. In a country of great disparities of wealth and power it declares that whoever we are, whether rich or poor, exalted or disgraced, we all belong to the same democratic South African nation; that our destinies are intertwined in a single interactive polity.
August and Another v Electoral Commission and Others (CCT8/99) [1999] ZACC 3
More about Zimbabwe: does it ever end?
A reader responds to this somewhat provocative post on Zimbabwe by arguing that just because Robert Mugabe said that Mbeki had agreed with him regarding the Western conspiracy against liberation movements, doesn’t hold much water.
Bob is clearly off his rocker and I’m sure he manages to perceive support where there is none, just as much as he is able to perceive threats where there are none. The Weekender had a different take on all this.
Some analysts have now also come out saying that it might not have been plain sailing for Mugabe at the SADC summit. The Weekender article seems particularly optimistic though. They write:
By the time the summit was over, Mugabe had been told by his peers that his time was over, and all that was left to do was negotiate a smooth exit. He was given two choices: quit at the end of his current term in March next year as he promised last year, or introduce far-reaching reforms to end the political and economic crisis.
But regional leaders are not waiting on him to act. Following the summit, the SADC is now putting together an exit package for Mugabe underwritten by western countries. Sources say the US and UK have drafted a five-point plan, including an economic rescue package, as part of the way forward to complement the SADC initiative.
I sure hope this is true, but we have been here before. On several previous occasions we have been told (also by Mbeki) that Mugabe had agreed to this or that course of action (and maybe he had), but the action never materialised. The SADC leaders argue that public criticism of Mugabe would only weaken their influence on them, but there is no evidence that they have any influence on him at all.
If the leaders of all 12 countries stood up and publicly announced that Mugabe’s regime had overstepped the line, that it was not respecting the Rule of Law or even the most basic tenets of human rights, it would have been a powerful statement not easily dismissed by Mugabe as the ranting of Western stooges.
Criticising Mugabe in private and showing solidarity with him in public is deeply dishonest and disrespectful to the people of
Maybe I am wrong (and I hope I am). If anything comes of Mbeki’s mediation, I will be the first one to apologise to SADC leaders. But looking back over the past ten years, I am unfortunately fairly confident that I will not have to apologise anytime soon – or, for that matter, until the cows come home.
