Category Archives: Zimbabwe

The witness of David Livingstone

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Today is the 197th anniversary of the birth of Dr. David Livingstone, the great medical missionary and missionary explorer to Africa. Though he’s far less well remembered in the West than was once the case, he was a man who did great work for God and, I think it’s fair to say, brought real blessing to the peoples of southern Africa. His Wikipedia entry sums up his legacy thus:

He had made geographical discoveries for European knowledge. He inspired abolitionists of the slave trade, explorers and missionaries. He opened up Central Africa to missionaries who initiated the education and health care for Africans, and trade by the African Lakes Company. He was held in some esteem by many African chiefs and local people and his name facilitated relations between them and the British.

Partly as a result, within fifty years of his death, colonial rule was established in Africa and white settlement was encouraged to extend further into the interior.

On the other hand, within a further fifty years after that, two other aspects of his legacy paradoxically helped end the colonial era in Africa without excessive bloodshed. Livingstone was part of an evangelical and nonconformist movement in Britain which during the 19th century changed the national mindset from the notion of a divine right to rule ‘lesser races’, to ethical ideas in foreign policy which, with other factors, contributed to the end of the British Empire. Secondly, Africans educated in mission schools founded by people inspired by Livingstone were at the forefront of national independence movements in central, eastern and southern Africa.

As it goes on to note, his life in Africa took a real toll on his family, which he regretted; he should not be idealized any more than any other human being. And yet, he is remembered and honored across southern Africa because of the work he did and the witness he bore for the gospel. And while he also endured considerable suffering and danger over the course of his life, he kept those things in gospel perspective:

For my own part, I have never ceased to rejoice that God has appointed me to such an office. People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa. . . . Is that a sacrifice which brings its own blest reward in healthful activity, the consciousness of doing good, peace of mind, and a bright hope of a glorious destiny hereafter? Away with the word in such a view, and with such a thought! It is emphatically no sacrifice. Say rather it is a privilege. Anxiety, sickness, suffering, or danger, now and then, with a foregoing of the common conveniences and charities of this life, may make us pause, and cause the spirit to waver, and the soul to sink; but let this only be for a moment. All these are nothing when compared with the glory which shall be revealed in and for us. I never made a sacrifice.

While we might do things somewhat differently than he did, we would do well to learn from his example.

HT: John Piper

Zimbabwe PM Morgan Tsvangirai injured, wife killed

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in a highly suspicious car crash.  They were on their way to their rural home when they were hit by a lorry, which PM Tsvangirai says drove at them deliberately.  The roads in Zimbabwe are bad enough that car accidents are nothing unusual, but this one smells like an assassination attempt, especially as the recently-formed unity government has so far been largely non-functional—despite the formal agreement to power-sharing, Robert Mugabe and his thugs have been unwilling to let the MDC do little things like actually govern.  PM Tsvangirai has left the country, going to Botswana for medical care and a little emotional space.When my father-in-law heard this, he said, “That’s blood on the hands of South Africa.”  If this does turn out to be a deliberate attack on the prime minister and his party, then I’ll have to agree.

Good news in Zimbabwe: unity government in place

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It looks like Robert Mugabe finally buckled—enough, at least, for the opposition to agree to form a unity government.  When the power-sharing agreement was first reached in principle, the sticking point was which ministries the MDC would get, and they were crystal-clear on their wish list:

The MDC wants to take control of ministries of home affairs in charge of the police, local government to oversee councils, one of the justice ministries, foreign affairs and the finance ministry—giving it responsibility for rescuing the shattered economy.

They look to have gotten much if not most of what they wanted.  MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, the new Prime Minister (the leader of the breakoff faction, Arthur Mutambara, will be his deputy), named an MDC minister of finance and co-minister of home affairs (that portfolio will be shared with a co-minister from Mugabe’s ZANU-PF), and a deputy minister of justice; the ministers of foreign affairs and local government are as yet unnamed.  MDC also took the health ministry and the ministry of water development, meaning it will also be their job to deal with the cholera epidemic.This isn’t a guarantee of anything, but it’s a hopeful sign.  Keep praying.HT:  Skanderbeg

A land of scars

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My wife’s cousin Jonathan, who’s a bright and talented sort, has an interesting post up on his blog riffing on a Zimbabwean proverb to the effect that “a coward has no scars.”  Now, if you want a riff on the proverb itself, I’d suggest you look to his blog for that; as will be no surprise to anyone who’s followed this blog a while, my reaction to it was rather different.  Given the news from Zimbabwe—if you were to write a novel about the Mugabe regime, you might call it Tyranny in the Time of Cholera, as that bloody autarch clearly would rather see his whole country die than let go of even one of the reins of power—my thoughts immediately went there.There are a lot of Zimbabweans who aren’t cowards, and they have the scars to prove it; and there were many, during the last presidential “election,” who were scarred badly enough for their opposition that they opted for what you might call a little tactical cowardice—they backed down long enough to live to fight another day.  That even included Morgan Tsvangirai, the chief opposition leader, who bought himself a little time and a little breathing room by pulling out of the “runoff” before diving back in later.  (So far, he’s holding steady and refusing to let Mugabe make a farce out of the power-sharing agreement; as a result, some folks are blaming him for the country’s woes, but I hope he keeps it up.)  They’re proof, I guess, that sometimes the line between bravery and foolhardiness, and that which divides cowardice from prudence, can be awfully fine; and for that matter, that everyone has a limit, and everyone can be broken.There are a lot of Zimbabweans who are badly scarred, simply because they want to live free under a just government that exists to serve its people rather than to leech off them.  I continue to pray that that day will come, and soon.

The situation in Zimbabwe worsens

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As the deadlock between Robert Mugabe and the democratic opposition continues—as his intransigent refusal to offer anything but the appearance of power-sharing prevents the formation of a functional government—the cholera epidemic there that began in August is spiraling out of control. According to the Telegraph,

More than 425 people have died since the outbreak in August and the number is expected to rise due to poor sanitation worsted by the onset of the rainy season.Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has accused the government of under-reporting the deaths, saying that he believed more than 500 people had died and half a million were affected by cholera. Zimbabwe’s dilapidated infrastructure has made clean water a luxury, with many people relying on shallow wells and latrines in their yards. . . .Hopes for easing the humanitarian crisis have dimmed as President Robert Mugabe and Tsvangirai have been locked in a protracted dispute over how to form a unity government after controversial elections earlier this year.Zimbabwe’s economy has collapsed under the weight of the world’s highest inflation rate, last estimated at 231 million per cent in July but believed to be much higher.

If the report in The Independent is correct, even Tsvangirai is understating the scope of the disaster:

A senior official in the health ministry told The Independent yesterday that more than 3,000 people have died from the water-borne disease in the past two weeks, 10 times the widely-reported death toll of just over 300. “But even this higher figure is still an understatement because very few bother to register the deaths of their relatives these days,” said the official, who requested anonymity.He said the health ministry, which once presided over a medical system that was the envy of Africa, had been banned from issuing accurate statistics about the deaths, and that certificates for the fraction of deaths that had been registered were being closely guarded by the home affairs ministry.

As Peter Davies points out, Mugabe isn’t responding to this disaster like a man who cares about his country and its people, either; his actions make clear that all that matters to him is keeping power, never mind the cost.

Mugabe refused to grant entry visas to Zimbabwe for “elder statesmen” Ex US President Carter and former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan last week, when they offered to visit the beleaguered country. Mugabe has much to hide.

Unfortunately, the South African government hasn’t exactly covered itself in glory here; rather than taking a strong stance against Mugabe’s blatantly illegal rule, they’ve essentially aided and abetted him in hanging on to power, and provided him cover as he does so. Zambia and Botswana have shown signs of wanting to stand up to Mugabe, but South Africa is the big power in the region; as long as they refuse to tell him he has to let go of the reins, no one else is going to be able to budge him (short of a sniper with good aim).Pray for Zimbabwe. I had hope for a while there that Mugabe might actually be willing to share power, and that things might get better . . . but short of divine intervention, it isn’t going to happen. Please, pray for Zimbabwe.

Reason for hope in Zimbabwe

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I’ve been distracted enough the last little while that I missed the latest news from Zimbabwe—which is a shame, because there’s actually some good news for once: Robert Mugabe has agreed to share power. I suspect that if there hadn’t been a split in the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), he wouldn’t have agreed on these terms, because his party, ZANU-PF, will actually have a minority of the 31 cabinet seats, but because three of those seats will go to a breakaway faction of the MDC, ZANU-PF will still have a plurality. Mugabe will continue as president, but Morgan Tsvangirai, head of the MDC, “will become prime minister and chair a council of ministers supervising the cabinet” if the agreement goes through. That “if,” of course, is the silver lining to this cloud, because it’s a very real if; just because Mugabe has signed the deal doesn’t necessarily mean he intends to comply with it in any meaningful way. As always, the Devil is in the details; it’s one thing to agree to give up cabinet ministries to the opposition, and quite another to let important ones go, and the agreement could still come apart in consequence. The MDC, though, is clear on what they want:

The two political rivals met on Saturday and agreed to share out the cabinet posts. The powerful state security ministry was abolished while the justice portfolio was split into two and a new prisons department was created.The MDC wants to take control of ministries of home affairs in charge of the police, local government to oversee councils, one of the justice ministries, foreign affairs and the finance ministry—giving it responsibility for rescuing the shattered economy.In return, the MDC is ready to leave Mugabe’s ruling Zanu PF in charge of other key ministries, including defence.

Unfortunately, with Mugabe telling members of his party that the agreement is a “humiliation” and insisting, “We remain in the driving seat,” he’s trying to avoid ceding any of the major ministries to the MDC; his aim is to try to give the appearance of power-sharing without giving up any real power. The agreement was brokered by Thabo Mbeki, the president of South Africa, and now that Mbeki’s party (the African National Congress) has forced him to resign, Mugabe might be thinking that he can break the agreement and get away with it. One thing is certain: the MDC won’t go along with a farce.

Nelson Chamisa, a spokesman for Tsvangirai’s MDC faction told the private SW Radio Africa Mugabe and Zanu PF wanted to take “all the key ministries, literally rendering the government exclusive . . . and we are not going to countenance that approach.”

No more they should. Yes, Mugabe can always refuse to cooperate, let the deal collapse and blame it on Tsvangirai, but not without consequences to himself. Inflation in Zimbabwe is over 11 million percent, and the country is in dire need of outside help—which it isn’t going to get if he goes back on this agreement. Keep praying for Zimbabwe, that the opposition would have the courage and will they need to stand strong, and that this time, Mugabe would fold.HT: Itayi

Calling all feminists for Zimbabwe

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Doug Hagler has an important post up on the group Women of Zimbabwe Arise! (WOZA); like most Zimbabwean groups that care about anything other than keeping Robert Mugabe in power, they’ve been taking a pounding from the government and its affiliated thugs. In a pattern drearily familiar from corrupt and brutal tyrannies throughout history, the abuse of women to keep the opposition down is a real problem under Mugabe’s misrule, which makes it particularly important, I think, to support WOZA’s peaceful witness.

A bruised reed he will not break

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and a smoldering wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.So it is said of the Servant of God in Isaiah 42:3; so it will be when he comes again. Right now, though, we live in a very different world. I was reflecting on this this morning, thinking about the state of affairs in Zimbabwe. If you’ve been following the news, you know that it looks like Robert Mugabe’s succeeded in hanging on to power (though he said he’s “open to discussion” with the opposition), since the opposition party pulled out of Friday’s presidential runoff in the face of the Mugabe government’s terror campaign, and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai sought refuge at the Dutch embassy in Harare. Freedom and justice in Zimbabwe are smoldering wicks, indeed.There is one small, very small, bright spot, though: at this year’s meeting of the PC(USA)’s General Assembly, the Peacemaking and International Issues Committee approved a resolution in support of the church in Zimbabwe, and against the Mugabe government. I hope and firmly expect to see the whole GA approve it; and I further hope that this encourages the Uniting Presbyterian Church of Southern Africa (UPCSA), to which the Presbytery of Zimbabwe belongs, to take a similar stance at their General Assembly in September. I miss being a part of the relationship between Denver and Zimbabwe—it’s perhaps the biggest thing I miss from having left that presbytery—and I wish I could have been there. I’ll have to get on top of the schedule and see if I can at least watch the plenary session when this resolution comes to the floor; I suspect my friends from Zimbabwe won’t speak then (since they’d be on video for the whole world, including Mugabe and his thugs, to see), but I’d at least be able to share the moment with them a little.Please, keep praying for Zimbabwe.

On praying for heart attacks

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As Robert Mugabe continues to dig in his heels, I’m reminded of a conversation I had a while back with a couple folks I know in Zimbabwe. When we asked them how we should pray for them, one of them said, “Pray that God will strike Mugabe with a lightning bolt.” We were rather taken aback by that, but they know their country can’t begin to recover until Mugabe is gone, and in their view, the only way he’ll leave is feet first. As long as he’s alive, they don’t believe he’ll ever relinquish power. It’s hard to argue with them.

There are those who would have trouble with the idea of praying for the death of our enemies; that point of view came up last summer when the Thinklings discussed this question. Certainly I understand the concern, given that Jesus tells us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us; but he doesn’t tell us what to pray for those who persecute us. Clearly, we should strive not to pray anger and hatred against our enemies, but I don’t think that means we can’t or shouldn’t pray that God would bring them down, one way or another. I remain convinced as I was at the time of that discussion that David’s prayers serve as a model for us on this point, boiling down roughly to this: “God, either bring my enemies to repentance or strike them down, I don’t care which, but remove them as my enemies.” As Jared put it at the time, “in extreme cases, in unrepentant, ongoing, debilitating situations of abuse on those who cannot protect themselves, I am driven to pray for God’s justice in a radical deliverance. So the motivation is not ‘kill this person’—it’s ‘make them stop or make them gone.'”

That’s where I am with regard to Robert Mugabe. If God wills to strike him dead, good. If God wills to strike him to his knees in full repentance, good—indeed, better; better that he be redeemed, and besides, with all he’s done, I think for him, repentance would hurt more. But whichever kind of heart attack God may send, I’m praying he sends it soon, for the sake of my friends, and the sake of all Zimbabwe. Amen.