The Day I Shook Mugabe's Hands

Left of What’s Right
By Marlan Padayachee
Marlan Padayachee is a freelance journalist and a media communications strategist and he writes in his personal capacity.
The day I shook Robert Mugabe’s hands and he acknowledged our struggle for democracy in South Africa I knew there was light at the end of the tunnel for a country divided by state-inspired racism, social injustices, economic imbalances and political crisis.
I was heading back to Africa via Munich after attending the United Nations Special Conference against Sports Apartheid in London, where I met President Mugabe’s Sports Minister who facilitated a visa from the Zimbabwe’s High Commission.
Mugabe had just entered the hall for the Zanu-PF Youth Rally in Harare when I met him, shook his hands in admiration of one of the region’s top guerilla leaders who led blood-stained and racist Rhodesia to uhuru in the 1980s. His charm offensive and warm tug in our hands told me he would stand by South Africa in its own quest for a post-Harare uhuru.
No-one who knows and benefited from liberation history will challenge Mugabe as one of the inspirational leaders of the brutal bush war. No-one can even challenge his academic track record as one of the most educated liberation leaders with more than six degrees to his credit.
But were many of us may depart from the point of dissent is that one of Africa’s most decorated leaders had overstayed his welcome. The rule of law has to kick in ahead of the June 27 president run-off with MDC candidate Morgan Tsvirangai. High level state tactics and violence had forced the MDC candidate to pull out of the race and seek refuge in the Dutch Embassy with the United Nations merely condemning the pre-poll violence and intimidation against dissidents.
But South Africa has been blowing hot and cold over Mugabe’s iron-fisted rule across the Limpopo River.
Beit Bridge as I knew it as a border crossing has changed dramatically in the past decade as thousands flee poverty, joblessness, lack of provisions and a diabolical currency that makes a joke of of the SADC’s fiscal system.
I returned a few more times to this new African model of a breadbasket with skyscrapers reflecting a new skyline of hope after years of a horrendous bush war that resulted in many Rhodesians seeking economic and social refuge and a better lifestyle in apartheid’s land of milk and honey.
But it was often difficult to put a finger on Harare-Pretoria relations as I witnessed a resentful Mugabe lose his badge of liberation status to Nelson Mandela who went on to marry the widow of another distinguished freedom fighter Samora Machel. Mugabe may have been cheesed off when our Old Man married Graca Machel. Then Mugabe gave President Thabo Mbeki a nasty diplomatic snub at an African Union assembly.
In my opinion, Mugabe will never hold a candle in front of Mandela, South Africa’s symbol of care, compassion and crusader for a culture of a cosmopolitan country, and now the subject of admiration on his 90th birthday as he sets the stage for a worldwide campaign against HIV-AIDS.
Before that the penny dropped when Mugabe was trumpeted into Mbeki’s presidential inauguration ceremony at the Union Buildings in 2004 when the huge crowd rose to their feet and roundly applauded the ever-green president-for-life, sending a mixed message to many despite having rigged elections since 2000 and bad-mouthing the MDC as capitalists’ stooges.
Hence, the Union Buildings quiet diplomacy to Harare and since then until the political and economic meltdown began eroding local jobs. Almost two decades later, Zimbabweans have become the new refugees heading down south and until recently among the highest casualties of the shocking xenophobic attack on foreigners.
The human drama continues in a country that once had as its tourist landmark the Zimbabwe Ruins.
Whether we like it or not, the presidential election across Beit Bridge affects all of us. We are dealing with a stubborn dictator chasing his sixth term, largely paranoid about being unseated by Downing Street and Pennsylvania Avenue rather than by a tough trade unionist that refuses to give up despite the shifting of goalposts.
Also envious about Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s halo in the world, Mugabe has rubbished our revered theological icon as an “irrelevant old bishop”. Tutu’s got no time for this ageing despot and has grave doubts about a free-and-fair election.
For beleaguered Mbeki, his rapprochement across Beit Bridge is a diplomatic foray of too little, too late while his possible successor, ANC president Jacob Zuma has bluntly dismissed a fair vote.
The June 16 celebration was followed by World Refugee’s Day with the United Nation’s High Commission for Refugees stating that the world’s exiled, homeless, persecuted, banned and banished people were numbering more than 12-million, and they ranged from Iraq, Afghanistan, Somali, Palestine and the Sudan.
Remember the days when carrying a UN refugee status passport was prestige?
It’s often dangerous to be insulated and act inwardly and think that we are only ones in the global village beset with the ordinary headaches of rising mortgage bond, fuel and electricity, food riots, racism and xenophobia.
Look left or right and maybe we need to digest some of the issues that are causing grief above our radar screen. The UN says five-million Zimbabweans face the risk of starvation as grain output tumbles due to bad weather, lack of seeds and fertiliser, fuel costs and poor grain prices for farmers; the US Government condemns Zimbabwe for seizing truckloads of American food aid that are dished out to Mugabe’s supporters.
So, we all have a vested interest in what’s happening across Beit Bridge, simply because the spillage, pilferage and spoils will affect our pockets.
As our home fires continue to burn with dissent and discontent, ANC Youth League President Julius Malema should reading and researching Roman political history and grasp how Caesar was knifed from office; and he will also find himself in the dock at the palace of justice if he does not apologise to an already nervous nation about his call to arms and murder if the judiciary does not let Zuma off the hook.
Until next week, take note of Richard Carlson’s “Remember to Acknowledge” verse: “You can acknowledge others in many ways. When someone calls you, acknowledge the call. When they send you something, remember to say thank you, or take the time to write a note. When someone does a good job, say so. When they apologise, acknowledge that too. It's especially important to acknowledge acts of kindness; doing so reinforces the act and encourages more of the same. We all benefit!”