February 11, 2009 2:44 PM
- Text
The Trouble With Zimbabwe
(CBS)
The State Department said Tuesday that if Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe goes ahead with a run-off election scheduled for Friday, the world will reject his rule.
In the past three months, soldiers and armed gangs have killed dozens of Mugabe's opponents. This week, fearing for his life and those of others, opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai pulled out of the race, leaving 12 million people without a choice.
Tsvangirai has taken refuge in the Dutch embassy in Harare. CBS News anchor Katie Couric asked him over the phone about Mugabe's statement today that he is not in danger.
"Is there a threat?" Couric asked.
"I have been arrested; I've been stopped at roadblocks," Tsvangirai said. "I have been treated like a common criminal ... and not as a leading contender in this campaign. I don't believe. He may be saying one thing for public consumption, but certainly may act in another manner."
"In fact, Mr. Tsvangirai, what kind of violence have you heard about or witnessed against those individuals opposing Mugabe?" Couric asked.
"Now, just after the March 29 election, Mr. Mugabe embarked on a military rollout plan to target MDC support of using the military militias and all veterans to kill, maim and beat everybody into submission," Tsvangirai said. "This has been the incidents of violence, raping, murder and beating which has result in thousands needing hospitalization, and I think over 85 deaths have been reported. Over 200,000 thousands internally displaced. This is the extent of the callous disregard by Mugabe of the people of Zimbabwe."
The fear and danger that now pervades the streets of Zimbabwe under President Mugabe is a tragic departure from the hope and promise that began with his landslide victory nearly 30 years ago.
When Mugabe was first elected in 1980, he was a hero. He was seen as one of Africa's most promising black leaders.
He said then: "We must now, all of us, work for unity, whether we have won elections or lost them."
Son of a carpenter, a revolutionary and a former schoolteacher, he said he had, "inherited the Jewel of Africa." Zimbabwe, which is rich in natural resources, claimed independence from Britain in 1965, when it was known as Rhodesia.
During the 80's, Zimbabwe's government received international support at a time when its neighbor, South Africa, was governed and divided by apartheid. Zimbabwe's economic condition and public health improved.
The country has been in economic freefall since 2000. Six years ago, Mugabe ordered all white commercial farmers to abandon their farms with no compensation. Once Africa's breadbasket, the country now relies on outside food programs and half the population is undernourished. Four out of five Zimbabweans are unemployed and inflation there is the world's worst - an astonishing 355,000 percent.
"A woman has a one-in-16 chance of dying in childbirth in Zimbabwe, half the children are malnourished, the life expectancy has dropped from 63 to 36," said New York Times columnist and reporter Nicholas Kristof.
Last March, Zimbabweans took their despair to the voting booth and elected opposition party leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
The 84-year-old Mugabe came in a close second and stepped up his brutal campaign to keep himself in power.
A run-off election is to be held on Friday, but Mugabe will be unopposed now that Tsvangirai has pulled out of the race.
"Finally, what would you say to your supporters, those who see you or had seen you as a real possibility for change?" Couric asked Tsvangirai.
"My message is very, very simple. We went to an election in March. We had a relatively peaceful election and the people spoke. We won the parliamentary election, we won the presidential election. We want to thank our supporters for that support. What is happening at this runoff election is not an election," Tsvangirai said.
"Mugabe declared war, and we have said that we don't want to be part of that war. If he wants to go and rule by decree, let him. But we cannot, I cannot go to the state house over dead bodies. And women's limbs having been chopped by axes and hacksaws. That is not the kind of political future we would like to create in the new Zimbabwe."
In the past three months, soldiers and armed gangs have killed dozens of Mugabe's opponents. This week, fearing for his life and those of others, opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai pulled out of the race, leaving 12 million people without a choice.
Tsvangirai has taken refuge in the Dutch embassy in Harare. CBS News anchor Katie Couric asked him over the phone about Mugabe's statement today that he is not in danger.
"Is there a threat?" Couric asked.
"I have been arrested; I've been stopped at roadblocks," Tsvangirai said. "I have been treated like a common criminal ... and not as a leading contender in this campaign. I don't believe. He may be saying one thing for public consumption, but certainly may act in another manner."
"In fact, Mr. Tsvangirai, what kind of violence have you heard about or witnessed against those individuals opposing Mugabe?" Couric asked.
"Now, just after the March 29 election, Mr. Mugabe embarked on a military rollout plan to target MDC support of using the military militias and all veterans to kill, maim and beat everybody into submission," Tsvangirai said. "This has been the incidents of violence, raping, murder and beating which has result in thousands needing hospitalization, and I think over 85 deaths have been reported. Over 200,000 thousands internally displaced. This is the extent of the callous disregard by Mugabe of the people of Zimbabwe."
The fear and danger that now pervades the streets of Zimbabwe under President Mugabe is a tragic departure from the hope and promise that began with his landslide victory nearly 30 years ago.
When Mugabe was first elected in 1980, he was a hero. He was seen as one of Africa's most promising black leaders.
He said then: "We must now, all of us, work for unity, whether we have won elections or lost them."
Son of a carpenter, a revolutionary and a former schoolteacher, he said he had, "inherited the Jewel of Africa." Zimbabwe, which is rich in natural resources, claimed independence from Britain in 1965, when it was known as Rhodesia.
During the 80's, Zimbabwe's government received international support at a time when its neighbor, South Africa, was governed and divided by apartheid. Zimbabwe's economic condition and public health improved.
But in the 90's, Mugabe became more authoritarian; the one-time revolutionary squashed all opposition and faced charges of cronyism and corruption.
The country has been in economic freefall since 2000. Six years ago, Mugabe ordered all white commercial farmers to abandon their farms with no compensation. Once Africa's breadbasket, the country now relies on outside food programs and half the population is undernourished. Four out of five Zimbabweans are unemployed and inflation there is the world's worst - an astonishing 355,000 percent.
"A woman has a one-in-16 chance of dying in childbirth in Zimbabwe, half the children are malnourished, the life expectancy has dropped from 63 to 36," said New York Times columnist and reporter Nicholas Kristof.
Last March, Zimbabweans took their despair to the voting booth and elected opposition party leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
The 84-year-old Mugabe came in a close second and stepped up his brutal campaign to keep himself in power.
A run-off election is to be held on Friday, but Mugabe will be unopposed now that Tsvangirai has pulled out of the race.
"Finally, what would you say to your supporters, those who see you or had seen you as a real possibility for change?" Couric asked Tsvangirai.
"My message is very, very simple. We went to an election in March. We had a relatively peaceful election and the people spoke. We won the parliamentary election, we won the presidential election. We want to thank our supporters for that support. What is happening at this runoff election is not an election," Tsvangirai said.
"Mugabe declared war, and we have said that we don't want to be part of that war. If he wants to go and rule by decree, let him. But we cannot, I cannot go to the state house over dead bodies. And women's limbs having been chopped by axes and hacksaws. That is not the kind of political future we would like to create in the new Zimbabwe."
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