I’ve been thinking about this “inclusive government,” and about the notion that that MDC had no choice – that it couldn’t risk “defying SADC,” that it had to agree to the terms of the 27 January SADC Communiqué.

One problem with that whole theory is that it gives to SADC an authority that I don’t think it deserves. Granted, some heads of certain SADC countries respect the rule of law, treat their citizens fairly and promote justice at home. But since when has SADC been an honest, reliable broker when it comes to Zimbabwe? It’s always had a bias – as evidenced by the very fact that the Zimbabwe crisis has stretched out as long as it has. And it feels like Mugabe has a case of selective sovereignty. Mr You keep your Britain and I’ll keep my Zimbabwe suddenly cares what other countries think about what he does at home? Yeah, right.

It also comes back to this question of desperation. The MDC say they’re weren’t desperate to be in government, but their actions tell a different story.

Along these lines, Dale Doré sent in these comments recently which resonated with me:

In September 2008 the MDC was pressured by Mbeki into a deeply flawed agreement. For all Mugabe’s loathing and contempt for the MDC and its leaders, there are those in the opposition who still believe that a deal with Mugabe is their only option. Instead of believing in themselves, they believe in Mugabe’s omnipotence. Instead of sticking to their democratic principles as the route to legitimate political power, they believe that power can be shared with Mugabe. Instead of believing themselves to be the true heirs of democratically-won political power, they fear that Mugabe will form a government without them. Until and unless the MDC believe in themselves and move boldly to capture the high moral and political ground – nothing will change.

Even after Mugabe illegitimately grabbed the lion’s share of power, SADC has still put their trust in him to negotiate in good faith when implementing the power-sharing agreement. Instead of fair and unbiased arbitration, Mbeki and the SADC leaders have now placed the MDC in a lose-lose situation. If the MDC pulls out of the agreement, they will look like the spoilers. If they enter the agreement, they will be completely dominated by the very forces they oppose and make them complicit in Mugabe’s dictatorship. However, our first responsibility is not to Thabo Mbeki or leaders of other countries.

We must not sign any agreement to appease Mugabe, Mbeki or SADC. Our responsibility is first and foremost to the people of Zimbabwe. Having tried our utmost, but having failed to reach agreement, we must now put aside any kind of power-sharing deal, including that which SADC has put on the table. A bold, new approach is needed.

Read more here

In a statement issued following a meeting of the National Executive of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) today, Morgan Tsvangirai announced that his party has agreed to form an inclusive government with Zanu PF and the other MDC, led by Arthur Mutambara.

This agreement has felt increasingly inevitable since the SADC summit communiqué earlier this week. If things go according to the SADC timetable, Parliament will debate Constitutional Amendment 19 this coming week, and Tsvangirai will be sworn in as Prime Minister 11 February.

The sky tonight is, fittingly, dark and stormy. As the finalisation of this deal has crept inexorably closer this week, my emotions have also been dark and depressed. It’s hard to articulate how utterly disheartening this agreement is. Reflecting tonight, I thought that my heart has just taken the last break it can take.

This deal is entirely detestable. In its statement today the MDC said this didn’t mean it was giving up the struggle, just taking it to a different arena. But it’s hard to imagine that the party will have much success fighting for true democracy inside a flawed government, when it has come to such little effect outside it. A friend of mine yesterday said he’d heard this deal likened to putting on a dirty shirt. I said it’s more like putting on a dirty condom – smelly, sticky, damp, diseased and distasteful.

Admittedly, I don’t know what other the option the MDC had. A different party – one which was more Movement than Party might well have had different cards to play. But the MDC lacks the capacity to lead any sort of civil disobedience or “make the country ungovernable” movement, which might have resulted in a different outcome. Instead, the MDC has tended towards negotiations and legal challenges and contesting undemocratic elections. This strategy has left it high and dry at this most recent negotiating table.

Yesterday, Acting Minister of Finance Patrick Chinamasa, himself a snake of a man, announced the 2009 Budget Proposal – which sees the Zimbabwe economy increasingly dollarised. City councils, taxation, plus local goods are to be sold in forex, not in Zimbabwe dollars. How are Zimbabweans meant to survive the latest economic and political onslaught? The future is looking bleak.

My colleague walked into the office and announced that Morgan Tsvangirai is to be sworn in as Prime Minister on 11 February. He’d heard it on the state radio this morning.

Surprised, we checked the news. One story confirmed what he’d heard – but the headline was curious: SADC agrees on Zim unity govt. That’s great if SADC agrees on what Zimbabwe should do. But what has Zimbabwe agreed Zimbabwe should do?

The international press was less convincing. Reuters says Opposition disappointed with summit – and reports that the MDC says the conclusions “fall far short of our expectations,” and that they’ll meet this weekend to think about it. CNN reckons  Conflicting reports blur Zimbabwe deal and reports that the MDC says its “concerns remained unresolved.” So what is going on? According to CNN:

A source close to the talks said Tsvangirai agreed to all the decisions that the SADC made, but that other MDC leaders were unhappy with the agreement once he left the talks.

So does Operation Flip Flop continue? Will the MDC continue to waffle its way through these negotiations – when the very notion of negotiating with an entrenched and recalcitrant dictator is absurd.

A comment on our blog reads “Mugabe and Tsvangarai ‘working together’ was never a realistic or desirable outcome. Tsvangarai shouldn’t be working with Mugabe, because Mugabe is not capable of sharing power.” I agree with the theory of that. But unfortunately, as another colleague just pointed out, Tsvangirai is more desperate than Mugabe – desperate enough that he’s willing to negotiate in the first place.

I’ve been reading Padraig O’Malley’s Shades of Difference. It uses the life of Mac Maharaj, who according to Nelson Mandela, “ran the ANC’s underground in South Africa,” as a lens through which to discuss the anti-apartheid struggle. O’Malley introduces each chapter to set the historic or political context of that section of the narrative, and then Maharaj recounts a few years of his own autobiography. It’s clear, well written, and I’ve been so grateful for the insights that a story of that struggle can lend to Zimbabwe during ours.

I’m currently in the early 1980’s. Mac has served his 12 year sentence on Robben Island, after his conviction in the Little Rivonia Trial. And he’s escaped South Africa to rejoin the struggle outside the country. Meanwhile, the ANC’s progress has been slow. Frustrated by the pace of reform, and forced ever-deeper underground by the apartheid regime’s policies, the ANC is increasingly attracted to the strategy of armed struggle – despite its failures. In his introduction to Chapter 10, O’Malley credits the United Democratic Front (UDF)’s civil disobedience campaign with greater effectiveness than the armed struggle organised by Umkhonto weSizwe (MK) (Spear of the Nation). This despite the fact that it was 11 years from the formation of UDF to South Africa’s first democratic election.

Here are some excerpts:

The opposition to the tricameral parliament led to the creation in 1983 of the anti-apartheid United Democratic Front (UDF), a broad, non-racial grouping of about 650 affiliates with a total membership of more than 2.5 million who collectively put the emphasis on mass mobilisation and protest politics.

Meanwhile, the ANC had become addicted to the idea of armed struggle. The more it failed, the more the ANC pinned its hopes on guerrilla warfare and armed insurrection. The ANC’s armed struggle failed by almost every yardstick.

The post-1963 generation grew comfortable in exile. With no secure base from which to launch attacks on South Africa or to infiltrate operatives, getting MK cadres into the country was a disheartening process. There was no existing political underground in South Africa with which the exiled ANC could easily communicate. One estimate put the number of formal structures inside the country at fifty, the number of members at two hundred – hardly the makings of an adequate network.

As we start a new year – and thinking about Bev’s blog yesterday about the MDC’s need to rethink its strategy – I’ve been reflecting on O’Malley’s comments on the ANC in the 1980s – and what lessons we can learn for our situation today. If we replace the ANC with the MDC, South Africa with Zimbabwe and armed struggle with elections and negotiations, the paragraphs above sound eerily similar to what we are experiencing today.

The more elections and negotiations fail, the more the MDC wants to try them. The MDC’s structures are weak, and constantly under assault from the ruling party. Not exactly a recipe for success.

But discussing things with some colleagues yesterday, we realised – the objective of the MDC isn’t to oust the regime. The objective of the MDC, as a political party, is to win elections, get elected to power democratically, and to govern the country with the majority it has won. So, then, why are we surprised that they focus on elections and negotiations. I may think that’s a naively narrow strategy – since when is that small dicktator gonna share power equally just because we’ve politely requested that he play nice? – but it’s the strategy they’ve chosen. It’s even more naïve of me to expect otherwise from them.

Rather, thinking of Maharaj and O’Malley again, it’s time to take Natasha’s advice. Instead of looking for the MDC to restrategise, let’s look at how civil society can restrategise. The MDC wants to lead Zimbabwe’s democratic transition. But it’s not willing to lead the campaign to make the country ungovernable, so that the regime has no choice but to transition. If South Africa is anything to go by, it’s time for Zimbabwe’s UDF.

Everywhere I go, I hear people talking about change. In the shops, at the café, on the street, at the bank – change, change, change, we need change. This morning I overheard two pensioners talking. Change is the issue, the one told the other. There is no change.

This shouldn’t be surprising – Zimbabwe has been in desperate need for political change for years now. But that’s not the kind of change people are talking about. They’re talking about change for a ZWD 50 million note. Or change for 20 US dollars. Or change for 100 Rand.

And, in the absence of change, people are doing flick flacks to make sure their purchases come up to a nice round number. Shops are getting creative about whether they give you a credit slip for the difference, or urge you to buy a few rolls of sweets to bulk up your bill. Till operators are getting shifty – hiding small notes at the bottom of the drawer, lying to customers that they don’t have change when they do.

I dropped a friend at the airport the other day. When I went to pay for the parking, I asked the guy at the gate how he was. I have a headache, he told me. Because people keep giving me big notes, but I don’t have any change. Adding to his headache, I offered him a ZWD 50 million note for the ZWD 30 million I owed for parking. He counted out his Zim dollars – around 15 million. I offered to take them even though it was less than he owed me – but then he wouldn’t have any change at all. He offered me a small gold coin. I looked at it puzzled – turns out it was a two pound coin. It was worth more than the change he owed me, but it was useless to me. I gave it back. I offered him the only USD 1 note I had. He got a big smile. It was worth less than I owed – but having some small notes was worth more to him. He took it.

Big notes, big bills, big chefs, big motorcades, big dicktators. Zimbabwe needs change.

Six days after Jestina Mukoko was abducted from her home, she is still missing. This morning, two of her colleagues were also abducted from the ZPP’s Harare offices. Just days before her abduction, in remarks to the Women’s Coalition to mark the 16 Days of Activism, Jestina discussed the horrors experienced by many Zimbabwean women during political violence this year.

We got this email recently from Tonderai X – who took the photograph of Jestina Mukoko we put on our blog last week.

To: Government of Zimbabwe
Heads of SADC
Those who think they are men

Not-So-Dear-Anymore Sirs

As a son of Zimbabwe, I am appalled that one of my mothers, Jestina Mukoko, was taken from her house without her permission.

She was almost naked and is a woman who is in need of medical care on a regular basis.

The cowards who took her had to come as a mob – as did the soldiers for Jesus. Her little child watched in horror as this happened to her. My question to you men of the government and of SADC is this: Are there no real men among you? Will not one stand up for Jestina and other abducted Zimbabweans? Will not a single one of you say that enough is enough?

Martin Luther once said: “In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” That silence from our “friends” is painful. Too too painful to bear.

I am a son of Zimbabwe. Will you please free my mother.
Tonderai X