Tsvangirai calls for UN intervention
Following is a copy of Morgan Tsvangirai's speech which he delivered to the NCA on the 7th October 2002. He shared the platform with Lovemore Mhaduku, the chair of the NCA.
Tsvangirai called for UN intervention in order to create conditions conducive to a re-run of the presidential election held under free and fair conditions. As part of this process a Transitional Executive Council would be created to produce a new constitution and create the framework for free and fair election. This is NOT a Government of National Unity. The MDC rejects any notion of Govnt of Nat Unity.
Tsvangirai rejected the use of violence to challenge Mugabe and advocated the need to plot a peaceful path to victory.
Press
Monday, October 7 2002.
Tsvangirai Calls For Un Intervention In The Zimbabwe Crisis
Monomotapa Crowne Plaza,
Harare.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The pathways to Zimbabwe's future can never be the responsibility of one man or the prerogative of a single political party. Rather, if a common future is to be deliberately invented, as I believe it should, then such a heavy task must be the shared collective responsibility of all the democratic forces and peace-loving people of Zimbabwe.
It was therefore, a pleasure to accept this invitation from the NCA to come and share some thoughts on the crisis that confronts our country and how it might be resolved.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The fraudulent presidential election has come and gone and yet the crisis of governance is deepening. The nation is still deeply divided. The recent local government elections have demonstrated the Mugabe regime's determination to continue to wedge war against the people of Zimbabwe. At the Luanda Summit, through some form of token censure, SADC finally conceded that the crisis of illegitimacy, and therefore governance in Zimbabwe, is far from over. If anything it has assumed qualitatively more dangerous dimensions with a felt regional impact.
As the party that was violently deprived from receiving the people's mandate to govern, we have sharply demonstrated the potential of what a legitimate government could achieve. With our MPs in Parliament, with the five major cities that we control and with the selfless dedication of our various councillors in local government, we have demonstrated that change is not empty or fictitious. It is possible, it is real and it is achievable.
We have announced effective policy packages designed to revive our economy and create more wealth and jobs. We will seek to create industrial hubs throughout the country so as to maximize the beneficiation or value addition to our natural resources. Blueprints for the resuscitation of the health, education, housing and social services are ready for implementation. Our agricultural policy seeks to install a viable, sustainable, non-racial and non-ethnic land reform policy that caters for the genuine desire of Zimbabweans for productive land.
The overall aim is to create productive agricultural communities sustained by the necessary infrastructure. This will lay the basis for a national green revolution in agricultural production.
So, as the party that won the presidential poll and is therefore the legitimate representative of the aspirations of the Zimbabwean people, we are ready to govern.
The major problem that confronts us remains the political impasse caused by regime illegitimacy, and which is degenerating daily into a dangerous crisis.
In this context, the real way forward must therefore come from the recognition that the stolen presidential election marked both a crossroads and a watershed.
A crossroads in that the people's opportunity to choose a hopeful, democratic, peaceful and prosperous future was violently subverted and ultimately negated. Through the force of arms, the illegitimate Mugabe regime has locked the nation onto a path towards darkness, destruction and death.
It was a watershed in that we now face vastly changed and ominous circumstances in all aspects of our lives-----social, political and economic. The act of stealing the presidential election amounted to a veritable coup de' tat because it overthrew even the shoddy constitution that is in place today.
The aftermath of the fraudulent poll therefore did not usher in a dictatorial civilian regime. Instead, a civil-military junta presided over by a civilian absolute dictator was installed and continues to impose violently, an illegitimate government over the people. It is this civil-military junta that underpins fascist rule and protects and insulates the dictator against the forces of democracy and good governance.
So what this means is that we are confronted by a post coup de' tat situation with an illegitimate regime is in power. Civil authority and civil power have been crushed. It is a dictatorial political dispensation that is more dangerous and qualitatively different from all other Mugabe dictatorial projects between the achievement of national independence in 1980 and the March 2002 presidential poll. Its impact in scale, magnitude and wickedness surpasses all the evil forces that have been unleashed on this nation in the past. The preliminary results of this fascist programme are there for all of us to see.
The people of Zimbabwe looked to the presidential poll as their only antidote against violence, corruption and decay. They looked forward to a period of national healing. A period of hope.
A period in which the prediction of state protection was a certainty. They looked forward to a new democratic dispensation that guaranteed freedom from want, penury and deprivation. They looked for a new economic dawn where they could live in common decency with their families.
What they have received since then is a regime of sustained state terror and violence. A regime that literally feeds on the people. National sovereignty and basic freedoms have been subverted and ultimately destroyed. Freedom of thought, expression, association and assembly has been criminalized to become treasonable offences.
People's sovereignty has been redefined to mean that Mugabe is the sovereign and the whims of his temper are the law of the land. We now live in a state of super autocracy or tyranny where one absolute ruler wields the judiciary, legislative and executive functions.
It is the age of total absolutism. Mugabe has even failed as a benevolent dictator. Unlike his patron, Muammar Qadhafi, Mugabe is a dictator without oil and he will therefore find it impossible to maintain his tyrannical rule indefinitely. He is aware of that.
Whereas between 1982 and 1987, the infrastructure of genocide and crimes against humanity had a restricted regional rooting, this has now been extended to envelope the whole nation with increased ferocity and intensity. The overall motive is not simply the ordinary strategy of dictators to brutalise and cow down the opposition through suppression, but rather the primary goal is to impose a final solution to all democratic forces through a general programme of mass physical extermination.
The new infrastructure of state sponsored violence and terror that is now in place is therefore not an accident of circumstances. It is there by deliberate design. It is a clear demonstration of the regime's determination to settle the issue of its illegitimacy by military means. It is bend on an all-out war against the democratic forces and the people of Zimbabwe, which will result in the physical elimination of all voices of democratic dissent.
The regime stands ready to confront the people in the streets in order to achieve what can be referred to as a simplifying catastrophe. A simplifying catastrophe in the sense that with the physical extermination of all organised democratic political opposition, the issue of its illegitimacy will become purely theoretical. This is how the rogue regime conceives its way out of illegitimacy.
This has consequences on the way we chart our pathways to the future. Should we confront a well-prepared illegitimate regime on its own chosen terrain of combat? At what cost in terms of human lives?
The regime is prepared to rule over a graveyard than engage in democratic combat with democratic forces. This is therefore a critical period that calls for new strategies of resistance to tyranny. Strategies that do not fall into the straitjacketed slaughter house which has been prepared by the illegitimate Mugabe regime.
To some, a violent response to tyranny might appear exciting and attractive. But is it sustainable?
In my view, if this nation is to take a long look beyond the dark and savage days of the illegitimate Mugabe regime, it must reject the use of violence in the resolution of political disputes. We can never build a viable democratic future if we do not control the knee-jerk tendency to resort to a culture of violence each time we are confronted with seemingly intractable national political problems. Violence will only assist ZANU PF to reduce this county to ruins and its citizens to the level of desperados.
No one will benefit. We will not benefit. And certainly those who command the forces of repression today will not benefit either.
Look at the Ivory Coast. Is that what we want? Is that an attractive blueprint for change? As a political party that has been given the mandate to represent the legitimate aspirations of the people, we remain beholden to our strategy of peaceful change.
As I said elsewhere, last month, now is the time to transform all our lived circumstances into scenes of democratic resistance. It is time to broaden the arena of struggle and confront the regime in all aspects of our battered lives.
It is time to build new, broad and effective coalitions.
To formulate new strategies and chart new directions for resistance.
Whenever and wherever Zimbabweans confront the symptoms of the regime's illegitimacy, we must transform that encounter into a new site of the struggle for freedom.
Defy unjust and inhuman laws, because freedom comes from such an exercise. Transform food and fuel queues into theatres of the struggle for democracy. Turn hunger into fortitude. Unemployment and poor wages must constitute the driving force for this inevitable change.
Women's groups must organise and resist the starvation of their families.
The youth must reject the bleak and hopeless future that is being forced on them by the rogue regime.
The long-suffering people in the rural areas must turn despair and hopelessness into new visions for change.
And to the Churches I say: Preach the Gospel of the cleansing value of suffering in order to achieve liberation and justice.
A nation cannot go on in a state of siege indefinitely. It cannot continue to be governed through violence and terror in perpetuity. This regime cannot go on forever preaching a message of hatred and vengeance against the people. All the indications are that the regime is in an advanced state of decay. It is collapsing because it has no capacity to govern.
Since March 2002, the only programme that the regime has offered is the intensification of violence and terror against the people. Wherever you choose to look everything has collapsed---the economy, health, education, the social services etc.
There are no available solutions for the illegitimate regime except to engage the democratic forces of this country in a serious and irrevocable process leading to a return to legitimacy. But any such political process must be predicated upon mutual respect among political parties and on tolerance of opposing views.
In our view, there are only two available ways to resolve the Zimbabwe crisis. First, a re-run of the presidential poll under free and fair conditions. Under electoral laws and conditions that are seen by Zimbabweans, the region and the international community to be legitimate, free and fair. This has been our position and it remains so to this day. But there has to be in place an enabling environment to ensure that the process is irrevocable.
The election re-run must be preceded by an immediate stop to all state-sponsored violence and an end to all political persecutions and prosecutions. ZANU PF militias, vigilantes, youths and thugs must be disbanded. The so-called war veterans must be disarmed and there must be guarantees that they will not be rearmed and that they will not engage in political activities as an armed group operating above the law, but only as ordinary citizens of Zimbabwe.
There must be an immediate stop to the on-going human rights violations and no amnesty should be granted for the perpetrators of murder, rape, torture, political violence and other serious crimes. Selective, partisan and biased law enforcement and the politicisation of the police must end immediately and the CIO must be disengaged from ZANU PF political activities. There must be respect and impartial enforcement of the rule of law. The Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) must not be engaged in civilian policing duties and political activities of any kind.
POSA and the so-called Access to Information and the Protection of Privacy Act must be repealed immediately and the ZBC must stop operating as a ZANU PF propaganda mouthpiece. There must be an irrevocable commitment to humanitarian ethics in the distribution of food relief on the grounds of need rather political affinity. Finally, Mugabe must stop the abuse of presidential legislative powers in order to undermine parliament in all these areas that I have outlined.
Zimbabweans in all walks of life must now organize to demand that the illegitimate regime accepts this road map to free and fair elections and therefore to legitimacy.
But the Mugabe regime cannot be trusted to implement to all these measures as preconditions for a return to legitimacy, because all these violent transgressions constitute the pillars of its violent tyranny.
In this regard, the region, the continent, the Commonwealth and the international community must now come out in full force to assist Zimbabweans in creating a political environment that is conducive to the implementation of this road map out of autocracy to democracy and justice.
Perhaps it is now time that the United Nations, through the Security Council, guided by its Chapter VII powers, joins the democratic forces in Zimbabwe, SADC and the Commonwealth in finding an internationally guaranteed lasting peace to the Zimbabwe crisis. The Mugabe regime is now clearly bend on exporting anarchy and instability to the region and this constitutes a clear threat to international peace and security, something which the UN Security Council is mandated to stop under its Chapter VII powers. The observation and admission by some SADC foreign ministers at the Luanda Summit recently, that the situation created by the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe is a threat to regional stability is a good starting point for the involvement of the UN through the Security Council under its Chapter VII powers.
We know that the Mugabe regime will, starting from tonight and for the foreseeable future come up with the usual shrieks, shrills and hysterics about sovereignty and the so-called non-interference in internal affairs of nation states etc.
Zimbabweans and the international community must not deterred and swayed by such cheap criminal subterfuge in the same manner that they dismissed Ian Smith's appeal and abuse of these tenets. The illegitimate regime seeks to abuse sovereignty and the doctrine of non-interference as a smokescreen behind which to slaughter innocent civilians and commit all manner of crimes against humanity. Indeed the international community has frequently rejected fake pleas to sovereignty as an alibi for murder, torture and rape. It must do the same in the case of Zimbabwe.
Whose sovereignty will be violated in this case? Is it Mugabe's sovereignty? Well, he is not sovereign.
Already the international community is in Zimbabwe to avert Mugabe's man-made humanitarian disaster and deliver much needed food to the starving millions. Is Mugabe pleading a violation of sovereignty?
The international community should simply broaden its already significant and effective presence in Zimbabwe and tackle the root cause of the crisis, which is Mugabe's violent illegitimate regime.
Despite all the incompressible noises from ZANU PF, there is no substitute for legitimacy that is freely granted by the people. No amount of torture or other brutalities will confer legitimacy on Mugabe's rogue regime. Its pariah status and its regional, continental and international isolation are set to worsen over the next few months. It will never have the capacity to govern this country. It can only continue to operate like the gang of bandits that it is.
The second option, though more circuitous is worth seriously considering. There has been a suggestion that perhaps what is needed in order to get out of the crisis is to lay a fundamental framework of governance. It has been pointed out that such a fundamental framework of governance can only be achieved through a new Constitution that is acceptable to all Zimbabweans.
We in the MDC have never been averse to any patriotic suggestion that is genuinely intended to bring back the country from the brink of catastrophe. We are aware that in any situation of conflict dialogue cannot be avoided. But it must be principled dialogue. There must be an enabling environment to ensure that such an exercise is worthy a national effort.
We totally agree that a new constitution that meets the aspirations of all Zimbabweans is a fundamental requirement in the quest to build an enduring democratic culture in Zimbabwe. But such a constitution can only be the product of the efforts of a legitimate government working together with the legitimate representatives of the people and all the democratic forces in the country.
In the absence of a legitimate government in place, then alternative arrangements would have to be put in place to ensure that the legitimate voice of the people of Zimbabwe dominates and shapes the new constitution.
As in the case of our preferred scenario, i.e. a direct re-run of the presidential poll, in order to succeed, such an effort at a constitutional solution must be guided by a legitimate authority. An illegitimate regime is certainly not acceptable to superintend that process. We have a national historic precedent for this.
The racist Smith regime could not be trusted with such a process in the late 1970s and so is the illegitimate Mugabe regime today.
The constitutional route to the resolution of the Zimbabwean crisis can only be a viable option if Zimbabweans put in a place a nationally acceptable transitional authority, such as a Transitional Executive Council, charged with the specific and limited responsibilities of putting in place a new constitution and prepare for a fresh presidential poll under free and fair conditions guaranteed by the international community through the United Nations.
The confidence building measures that we demand for a presidential election re-run in our preferred scenario will become automatically applicable if the constitutional route to the resolution of the crisis is chosen. The UN must also be in a position to monitor progress in the deliberations of such a transitional authority. In particular, measures will have to be put in place to ensure that the Mugabe regime will not discard the whole process when it deems it opportune to do so.
I must hasten to add that the proposed transitional authority should not be confused with the dead issue of the so-called government of national unity. Such a transitional authority must be located outside Mugabe's illegitimate regime.
It should not have governmental executive responsibilities.
It should not be used to sanitize Mugabe's illegitimacy through the back door.
We remain vehemently opposed to such an edifice. We are convinced that it can never underpin and guarantee the fortunes of a future culture of democracy in our country and therefore we shall never be part to such fraud. It only serves to give the illegitimate Mugabe regime a mantle of legitimacy.
In conclusion, let me assure fellow Zimbabweans that we in the MDC remain ready to embark on any genuine process designed to bring about democracy, peace, justice, security and development to our troubled country.
The nation cannot be maintained in this state of decline forever. The challenge that we face is to ensure that the nation comes out of this painful crisis with a clear and courageous programme of national healing, social and political emancipation.
In the quest for this noble cause, the MDC must never be tempted to use violence as a means of settling political differences.
In many parts of Africa this has resulted in national tragedies, national collapse, the disintegration of the state and untold human suffering.
Those with the means to brutalize people today must realize that this shall come to an end, and very soon. Crimes against humanity will come back to haunt their perpetrators.
The MDC has one agenda.
It is not about power.
It is about creating a new political culture.
We have been through times so perilous that it is humanly impossible to imagine them.
But we hold no bitterness.
We seek no political retribution or vengeance against anybody.
For what kind of people would we be, to recoil in horror and agony at the crimes against humanity that are daily committed against the people and then seek a repetition of the outrage once in government?
I am certainly not prepared to be the head of a state that leads people in acts of criminality. The MDC government will lay the roots of an irrevocable culture of democracy, tolerance, the rule of law, human rights and security for the nation so that future generations, nurtured in peace and tranquillity will look back to these dark, dark days of danger and despair and say, with prophetic confidence: NEVER AGAIN.
I Thank You.
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