Zimbabwe

Just a thought.  I know I’m being way theoretical here, but sometimes we just need to think principals–so just hear me out:

Okay, so strip away the ideas of “my country” and “your country.”  Let’s take it down a notch.  You’re just a person, living in a community of people. Your neighbor’s dad is a drunken mess… as in, he beats his kids, cheats on his wife, takes lunch money from his kids so he can buy beer and get wasted.  Kitchen’s empty–no food in the fridge since there’s no money to buy it.  Kids are sick, but they have no money for food, let alone a doctor.  Wife has tried to divorce him, no luck–he just beats her when she brings it up.  Kids have tried to lock him out of the house, no luck–he smashes a window, gets back in, and beats them, too.  It’s complete hell, and the family is dying from the inside out.

Well, we’re just a neighbor–and one of many–so why should we intervene?  Besides, we’ve got enough of your own crap to deal with, thankyouverymuch.  But at what point do we say, “Enough is enough?”  At what point do we recognize the principals of the situation, and see that our inaction is unacceptable?  Well, I think Zimbabwe has reached that point for a while.

Sadly, according to the BBC, “African leaders have generally refrained from criticising Mr Mugabe in public.”  But I think things are changing.  This week, Kenya’s PM, Raila Odinga, denounced Mugabe and said it was time for African governments to force him out of power–some of the strongest words by an African leader against Mugabe.  In particular, the Kenyan PM believes strongly that if the leadership in South Africa, which borders Zimbabwe, “took a firm stand and told Mugabe to quit he will have no choice but to do so.”  With Mugabe obviously unwilling to loosen his power grip, this might be Zimbabwe’s last straw.

Zimbabwe is practically imploding right now–I don’t even know how to comprehend the current dire situation.  The country’s unemployment rate is at 80% (to put this in perspective, the unemployment rate in the US–with all the corporate layoffs happening and hiring freezes–is 6.5%).  Inflation in Zimbabwe is over 2 million percent.  And then there’s the cholera outbreak, which has already killed more than 500 people since this August. There’s literally no food (grocery store shelves are literally empty), no money (people queue up in lines all day at ATMs because the government has put a daily limit on how much money you can withdraw–not enough to even buy a loaf of bread), and no water (serious lack of safe water supplies, one of the root causes of the cholera outbreak).  Zimbabwe is hell on earth.

I really pray that the international community, especially the African nations, recognize that they have a responsibility to speak up. UK Prime Minister Brown has already spoken out against him, I hope other world leaders follow suit.  “If this is not evidence to the international community to stand up for what is right, I don’t know what would be,” South African activist Desmond Tutu said. “And frankly the nations of the region have to do it.”