MDC Alliance president Nelson Chamisa says institutions such as the African Union (AU) must take a tough stance against leaders on the continent that abuse human rights, including killing peaceful protesters.
Chamisa told The Standard in an interview
yesterday that the use of soldiers by African leaders to kill and silence
citizens was now a major challenge confronting the continent.
He singled out President Emmerson Mnangagwa and Ugandan
leader Yoweri Museveni. At least 37 people were killed in Uganda last week
after protests erupted following the arrest of presidential candidate and pop
star Bobi Wine.
In Zimbabwe, soldiers killed six protesters after the
controversial 2018 elections and in January last year several people were
killed and tens of others were tortured after the military was deployed to
quell protests over a steep increase in the price of fuel.
“Africa has a new challenge,” Chamisa said. “In solving our
old problems of colonialism and imperialism, we have created new ones of
dictatorship.”
He described as cowardice the use of the military in
silencing the people. “Why does Museveni and some of his cousins in Africa,
southern Africa and Zimbabwe included think that they are bigger than the
country?” Chamisa said, adding that the country needed a new and different
calibre of leadership.
“That is the problem in Uganda and in Zimbabwe among other
countries in Africa where individuals want to appear bigger than the country.”
He said regional and continental blocs must be capacitated
to deal with dictatorship that is rearing its ugly head on the continent.
“The capacity must be built, political will must be
cultivated and their interests must be motivated so that they provide African
solutions to African problems,” Chamisa said.
He added: “That is the challenge that is there. It is a
cause for concern. “Manipulating elections by these dictators is a big issue.”
“It is a symptom of a bigger problem, unwillingness to
allow the new to be born, the old must retire for the new to rise, but we have
the generational conflict that is manifesting even in inter-party politics in
Africa, they can’t allow the new to bloom and conspire against young bloomers.
“This whole G40 concept is actually an illustration of
discomfort around young people. Even contradictions that you have seen in
liberation movements is refusal to pave the way for young people, who are
treated as stakeholders instead of stockholders.
“They make nations and institutions weak because they are
weak. What kind of a country leaves a legacy of killing its own people and
stealing from the people?
“Let us leverage on the wisdom of the founding fathers and
deliver that idea to have modern economies, modern infrastructure, universal
visa, one good Parliament to deal with African issues — that is the Africa we
want.
“What is happening in Uganda is not good. The African Union slogan is ‘Silence the guns’ yet you see there are certain individuals who are loading the guns and are trigger-happy with the gun as if it’s a guitar. Museveni must know a gun is not a guitar.
“You and your cohorts and brothers, a gun is not a guitar
and do not spray bullets at unarmed civilians in the streets of Africa like you
are spraying seeds at your farms.”
“The AU says let us silence the guns, but you have cowards
firing at innocent unarmed civilians. That’s what cowards do. There is no
normal country that deploys guns against its people like what we are seeing.”
South African opposition leader Mmusi Maimane also weighed
in, pleading with South African president and African Union chairperson Cyril
Ramaphosa to rein in Museveni in Uganda and Mnangagwa in Zimbabwe over a series
of human rights abuses.
“I also call on the African Union and its chairperson Cyril
Ramaphosa to talk to his friends Mnangagwa and Museveni and tell them to comply
with the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, and the African Charter
on Democracy, Elections and Governance,” Maimane said on Twitter on Friday.
Standard
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