BBC news is reporting that Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party has lost its majority in Zimbabwe's parliament. This is very bad news for the despotic African leader who has ruled his country with nothing but sheer brute force for the last 28 years. More importantly it signals a light at the end of the tunnel for Zimbabwe which has been drowning in a cesspool of dereliction and turpitude under Mugabe.
Inflation in Zimbabwe is insane, running well over 25000%. The Government has been forced to print notes valuing as high as $10,000,000 Zimbabwean dollars. This means that simple things like a roll of toilet paper or a loaf of bread cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. The Zimbabwean people have been reduced to forming crippling queues at banks and supermarkets which have next to nothing on their shelves. Unemployment is over 90% and chronic poverty and hunger persists. Throw in an HIV infection rate that is one of the highest in Sub-Saharan Africa and you get what is probably the most depressing country on earth even more so than Iraq which is in the middle of a war.
In addition to the ridiculous state of the economy, ordinary Zimbabweans have had to deal with severe repression from the Mugabe Regime which eyes any opposition with a sense of paranoia. The Security Forces in Zimbabwe have basically served as the armed wing of the ruling ZANU-PF party and have been used by Mugabe to intimidate the opposition with beatings, torture and abductions. The leader of Zimbabwe's main opposition party, The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), was soundly beaten by police at an opposition rally just last year.
The real tragedy of Zimbabwe is that it was actually an African success story before Mugabe came to power. Once the envy of its neighbors, Zimbabwe had a stable economy and was often described as the breadbasket of Southern Africa producing bumper harvests that could feed itself and its neighbors. Many blame the current state of the economy on Mugabe's land reform program which seized almost all commercial farms from the white minority and gave it to landless black Zimbabweans. This lead to a drastic decline in food production and a collapse of the once thriving agricultural sector. Although it effectively destroyed the economy, Mugabe's land reform program made him enormously popular in rural areas which has served as his base of power over his long years of rule.
The MDC is claiming victory for its leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the Presidential vote held last Saturday. Nonetheless, there is no sign that Mugabe is ready to throw in the towel. There is already talk of a run off election in the State run newspaper which indicates at least that the Regime probably already knows that Mugabe was not re-elected. However, the Zimbabwe Election Commission has not yet announced the official results even though it's four days since the election. The opposition claims that the delay means some form of rigging maybe going on and that the Mugabe Regime is trying to find a way to alter the results. The 84 year old Mugabe would be serving his 6th term as President if he is declared the winner of the election.
The fact that it's already established that Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party lost its parliamentary majority is a very significant development. It is the first time that this has happened since the country gained it's independence in 1980 and the strongest sign yet that impoverished and demoralized Zimbabweans are desperate for a change. Also there are signs that many rural voters who were usually loyal to Mugabe are deserting the ZANU-PF. It seems that the Zimbabwean people have hit rock bottom; an oppressed people will only bear so much. They are itching for a change but if Mugabe have his way, democracy and economic stability will never return at least not in the near future. 3 million Zimbabweans have already fled the country. Most of them to neighboring South Africa which like other African countries have simply refused to put any pressure on the Mugabe Regime.
I think it is imperative that the West affirm a democratic transition in Zimbabwe. Where is the leadership of President Bush "The Great Democracy Exporter" when we need it. The world should not stand by and allow Robert Mugabe to strangle the Zimbabwean people to death. If progressives found it morally expedient to denounce the genocide in Darfur then we should be equally tenacious in speaking up about Zimbabwe.