Zimbabwe’s opposition MDC leader Nelson Chamisa has
announced plans to visit Moscow and Beijing to seek help in settling the
political and economic logjam gripping the southern African country, Russia’s
Sputnik news agency reported yesterday.
This follows the police’s brutal clampdown on
anti-government protests organised by the
opposition party since last week over the country’s
worsening problems.
The situation in Zimbabwe has remained tense since July
last year when Chamisa refused to concede defeat to Zanu PF leader Emmerson
Mnangagwa in a closely-fought presidential race, claiming that the result was
rigged.
Zimbabwe’s economy has tanked, and economists say the
country is entering hyper-inflation after inflation peaked at 176% in July —
the highest in over a decade.
Western powers, on whom Mnangagwa had banked for debt
forgiveness and fresh investment, have held back after the Zimbabwe government
cracked down on protesters in August last year and January this year.
Rights groups say two dozen activists were killed in the
anti-government protests.
Over the past few days, the opposition had to call off its
mass demonstrations in Harare and Bulawayo after police issued prohibition
orders, which the MDC says are unconstitutional.
In Harare last Friday, hundreds of protesters defied the
decision, prompting the police to use tear gas and truncheons to disperse
crowds. Nearly 100 people were arrested.
“The (MDC) president is open and has plans to travel to
major international centres, including Moscow and Beijing, some capitals in
Europe and the West, just to highlight the extent of the problem in terms of
how the problem is man-made and how the problem is costing millions of lives
and has threatened food security for millions of people,” Chamisa’s
spokesperson Nkululeko Sibanda told Sputnik.
According to Sibanda, the economic meltdown in the country
is unprecedentedly fragile.
“In just a few weeks, I’m told, we would completely run out
of electricity. And we haven’t got money to buy electricity from other
countries like we have done in other years when there was a drought.
“The situation has been made worse as in the last 12
months, we have lost about $3 billion to corruption in one transaction. It
means that the country doesn’t have money to pay for electricity, the country
doesn’t have money to pay for food,” he argued.
Chamisa’s efforts to urge the African Union (AU) and the
regional bloc, to heed his party’s distress call, have hit a brick wall after
the latter sprang to Mnangagwa’s defence.
Sadc, instead of censuring the Zanu PF leader for gross
human rights violations, at the weekend gave him a key role to chair the Sadc
troika on defence and security.
Namibian President Hage Geingob, then Sadc leader, early
this year after dialogue with the Zanu PF leader said Mnangagwa was working
flat out to address Zimbabwe’s socio-economic challenges.
“Since coming to power, the new Government of Zimbabwe has
continued with concerted efforts to address socio-economic challenges and
transform the economy, particularly through the Zimbabwe Transitional
Stabilisation Programme, and to consolidate unity and peace in the country,”
Geingob said in a statement.
Sadc blamed some internal groups, in particular
non-governmental organisations, which it said have “continued with efforts to
destabilise Zimbabwe”, supported by “external forces”.
Sadc and the AU have also backed Mnangagwa’s call for the
unconditional lifting of sanctions against Zimbabwe, and have not censored
government’s violent crackdown on protesters, leaving Chamisa hanging out to
dry.
Zimbabwe’s opposition believes that Mnangagwa’s government
is not much different from the one of Robert Mugabe, who ruled the country for
37 years.
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