Raila Odinga and Barack Obama
Citing a hyper-inflation rate of 231 percent and rampant cholera outbreak, Kenyan PM Raila Odinga has called on fellow African nations to “dislodge” Marxist dictator Robert Mugabe from power in Zimbabwe.
“The crisis in Zimbabwe has now reached a point where further lack of action by the African Union and the international community will constitute nothing less than a crime against humanity,” said long-time Mugabe critic Odinga.
The African Union “must formulate a resolution to send African Union troops into Zimbabwe,” he said. “If no troops are available, then the AU must allow the U.N. to send its forces into Zimbabwe with immediate effect, to take over control of the country and ensure urgent humanitarian assistance to the people dying of cholera and starvation.” If Mugabe does not co-operate, then international troops should “dislodge Mugabe from power.”
Raila Obdinga joins a growing chorus of international leader calling for regime change in Zimbabwe, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Archbishop of York, South African political party COPE, British PM Gordon Brown, former UN General Secretary Kofi Annan, US President George Bush and US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice.
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Nairobi, Kenya – Foreign Affairs Minister Moses Wetangula has dismissed calls by Prime Minister Raila Odinga to have the African Union (AU) send soldiers to Zimbabwe to forcefully remove incumbent President Robert Mugabe and instal a new government.
Wetangula said the Zimbabwe crisis was not a rebellion that would warrant military intervention.
"What the Zimbabwe crisis is lacking is a 'father figure' who will guide the talks the way former South African President Thabo Mbeki had guided them until he was removed from office,” said Wetangula Monday here.
Wetangula told a press conference that the AU did not have the capacity to inter vene militarily in the Zimbabwe crisis.
He expressed the hope that the African Heads of State meeting, slated for January in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, would help bring peace to the southern African country, currently ravaged by soaring inflation and disease.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Odinga asked the AU Chairman, Jakaya Kikwete, who is also Tanzanian President, to urgently convene an extra-ordinary meeting of AU member states to discus the Zimbabwe crisis and send a peace-keeping African force to the southern African country.
Raila said Kikwete should act fast and stop the continuing suffering in Zimbabwe in which scores of people have died from a cholera outbreak.
He said it was wrong for African governments to continue staying aloof and using what he termed “kid gloves” on Mugabe, while people died of preventable diseases in Zimbabwe due to the callousness of the current leadership.
“It is wrong for African states to stand aside and watch while Zimbabwe faces a total collapse in the face of high inflation and disease,” said Odinga.
“The African Union must not wait any longer,” he said.
But Wetangula says whereas the government is alive to the fact that the people in Zimbabwe are suffering, sending military troupes or even declaring sanctions will only make the innocent Zimbabweans suffer.
“Sanctions always hurt the wrong people,” the Minister said.
He said the Southern African Development Community (SAD) should come together as a block and seek to make the Zimbabweans see the need to find a workable soluti on in their country and deal with the Zimbabwe crisis decisevely.
Reports say Zimbabwe, continuously isolated by Western countries under Mugabe’s authoritarian rule, is now on the verge of collapse.
Food stocks are running out fast, official inflation is at 231 million per cent and a cholera outbreak has so far killed 575 people while another 13,000 are hospitalized yet it is facing a serious shortage of medicine and clean water.
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe on the other hand, has been unable to print money fast enough to keep up with soaring inflation and prices, which double every 24 hours, and has also tried to stamp out a thriving black market for US dollars and other foreign currencies.
Zimbabweans have grown increasingly angry over the government’s failure to tackle the crisis.. Many are forced to line up outside banks for hours to try to get scarce bank notes, often coming away with barely enough to buy a loaf of bread.
Tensions flared in the capital Harare last week when mobs and police clashed with groups of unarmed soldiers who had seized cash from foreign currency traders and shops.
Trade union activists also took to the streets to protest against the crisis.
The central bank said it would soon introduce a Z$ 200 million note (worth US$ 20 on the black market) after launching Z$ 10 million, Z$ 50 million and Z$ 100 million notes on Thursday.
The economic meltdown has led to the crumbling of basic services, including heal th care and water treatment facilities..
Cholera has spread to neighbouring South Africa, Mozambique, Zambia and Botswana and forced Mugabe’s government to declare a national emergency and appeal for in ternational aid.
Western nations as well as Zimbabwe’s neighbours have pledged humanitarian assistance, while sharpening their criticism of Mugabe’s government and his failure to establish a unity government with the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC).