THE government is seething with anger after regional
powerhouse, South Africa, commented on Zimbabwe’s long-running political and
economic crises earlier this week, the Daily News can reveal.
This comes after Pretoria’s International Relations
minister, Naledi Pandor, was interviewed by the Johannesburg-based Power FM
radio station — where she, among other things, urged Zimbabwe’s political
players to engage in dialogue.
Well-placed sources told the Daily News last night that
local authorities — apparently including President Emmerson Mnangagwa — were
not impressed by Pandor’s comments, especially her throw-away remark that South
Africa was not considering military intervention in the country.
“We are not happy. Even the president (Mnangagwa) is not
happy about what the minister said in her interview.
“We are going to launch a formal complaint to the South
African government through the country’s Foreign Affairs ministry.
“This is because the minister is offending against the
principle of subsidiarity … which means that even though South Africa is the
current chair of the African Union (AU), it has no right to interfere on
regional issues.
“That is the function of regional structures. So, the
minister is offending against the principle of subsidiarity,” one of the
sources said.
“Areas of politics and security come under the direct
responsibility of the Sadc Organ on Politics, Defence and Security Co-operation
and Zimbabwe is the current chair of this organ.
“That gives us the latitude to intervene in Mozambique and
to intercede between Zambia and DRC, and also to deal with the Lesotho issue,”
another source said.
The second source also claimed that this was not the first
time that Pandor had spoken out of turn on Zimbabwe.
It was also claimed
that Pandor had been organising meetings on Zimbabwe without the approval of
either President Cyril Ramaphosa or Mnangagwa — allegedly prompting Ramaphosa
to apologise to Mnangagwa on numerous occasions over his minister’s conduct.
“Many people have gotten jobs at the United Nations by
attacking Zimbabwe. I believe this is one of those situations where people want
to be seen speaking up about the country’s situation to get international
recognition,” another angry senior government official said.
The same official also said it was noteworthy that South
Africa had declined to bail out Zimbabwe over the years, in addition to
Pretoria imposing many tariffs and non-tariff barriers on the country’s
exports, thereby negatively affecting the two countries’ trade.
“All initiatives for economic support from South Africa
have come to nought. From the days of the First Republic it was (former SA
Finance minister) Trevor Manuel who was shooting down the agenda for a
financial package for Zimbabwe, even after the leaders had agreed on this.
“This time around it is Finance minister Tito Mboweni …
including things as elementary as allowing us to use their rand. They will just
not allow us to use it.
“If anything, the help we have had from them is that of
political hot air, and I don’t know if that is their sense of assisting us,”
the fuming official said.
“You can all see that the relationship is inherently
imbalanced in many ways, and then someone dares tell us they are assisting us.
How are they assisting us?.
“The solutions to Zimbabwe will be generated by
Zimbabweans. South Africa is already over extended in terms of its domestic
challenges. It has no capacity to go abroad and there should never be that
misconception,” the official added.
Speaking to Power FM on Monday, Pandor said Pretoria would
not use a hawkish approach to end Zimbabwe’s growing problems.
“I think the South African government is in consistent
engagement and interaction with the Government of Zimbabwe, both to persuade as
well as to provide support where it is needed.
“Let me give you an instance of the opposite of our policy
… you had Saddam Hussein with respect to Iraq. The decision of (former US
president) George W Bush was to use American warfare in Iraqi.
“Where is Iraqi today? It is a shell of what it was under
what was a dictatorship of (the late Iraqi president Saddam) Hussein,” Pandor
said.
“We engage consistently. Non-interference means we wouldn’t
use our soldiers, our army to invade Zimbabwe, to enforce a platform of democratic
practice that we have in South Africa.
“We believe that such is a decision that Zimbabwean people
must make.
“However, we are able — through diplomatic engagement — to
persuade the people of Zimbabwe that they need both political as well as an
economic revival, which does mean that they have to change in policy and
practice,” Pandor said further.
She emphasised that South Africa would continue to
encourage dialogue in Zimbabwe.
“It is the political actors who, sitting around the table,
will resolve those issues.
“South Africa or any other country trying to invade
Zimbabwe in the belief that it can resolve the problems will be totally
mistaken … this will lead to disaster, and in fact, may turn the people of
Zimbabwe against South Africa,” Pandor added. Daily News
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