Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - African Dictators

Profound analysis-  although the" animal kingdom" reference may be misconstrued

 and misquoted. I  have doubts as to whether Mnangagwa will actually hand over power in 2018.

Chances are that he would bring back the big  white farm owners and trade that off for

 indefinite tenure. Western criticism will be muted by such action, and as in the case of Rwanda,

he would become one of the darlings of the West. Time will tell.

Mugabe's blunder was his failure to seek a successor outside of his family circle.

Professor Gloria Emeagwali

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Okey Iheduru <okeyiheduru@gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2017 7:44 PM
To: USAAfrica Dialogue
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - African Dictators

 

It's appropriate that we adopt a guarded optimism about the "transition" in Zimbabwe, while giving Emmerson Mnangagwa the benefit of the doubt to, hopefully, rise up to the occasion and convince Zimbabweans and the world community that he's a changed man.

Yet, un-examined in this piece and so many celebratory analyses is the new role of the Zimbabwean Defense Forces (ZDF) in this vaunted transition. The change in the occupancy of the presidency in Zim was not the result of "citizens who are increasingly able to confront their dictators and even remove them from power." Instead, it was an entirely military affair. Mnangagwa, the crocodile has used the military to outfox Mugabe, the Fox of African politics, but in the process he has shown the ZDF that they, rather the voters, are now the arbiters of choice in elite political contests. The danger, of course, is that once they've tasted power, the ZDF are not going to be satisfied to stay out of the lime light any longer. 

The first real test of Mnangagwa, ZDF and ZANU-PF's commitment to democracy is what they would do in 2018, should the opposition win either the presidency or a majority of the Parliamentary seats. Prof. Jibrin correctly stated that "the infamous Grace, First Lady to Mugabe ... wanted to takeover a regime that belongs to old war veterans of the liberation struggle" (emphasis added). 

This quote, however, amplifies the concern

 that 

this "transition"

 amounts to Zimbabweans not being given a chance to choose between good and evil, to finally end the dictatorship, instead of just swapping one dictator for another.

 

The unanswered question is whether Mnangagwa will serve out the remainder of Mugabe's five-year term and stand down after the next elections which must be held by 31 July 2018, when the term of the present government's term end

s

. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that President Mnangagwa would be tempted to postpone next year's elections to give himself time to show the nation that "he is his own man" and is competent enough to turn the country's battered economy around. What would the opposition MMD, the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC), the African Union, the markets, and the "international community" do

in such a development

? Not much has been done in a similar regime elongation run-arounds in the Democratic Republic of Congo by Pres. Joseph Kabila!

In fact, President Mnangawa –an acclaimed despot with vicious bragging rights– will be so consumed with the 2018 elections that the ZANU-PF will be busy perfecting how to rig the elections (as usual) than bothering with serious economic management. Otherwise, the already fractured ZANU-PF will fizzle out. The anger on the streets currently is 

still

so palpable

--and will escalate as the new president is preoccupied with placating the quarrelsome Liberation struggle" tribe and the ZDF--

 that ZANU-PF 

will

 lose a free and fair election in 2018; but that's the last thing President Mnangagwa and the ZDF (who continue to hold on to the "ideals of the revolution") would tolerate. Will the ZDF accept anyone who is not an alumnus/alumna of "the liberation struggle" as Commander-in-Chief? The numerous statements from senior officials of the ZDF (in their food fights with Grace Mugabe, and even Morgan Tsvangari)  indicate that they would do so over their dead bodies. 

Secondly, Major General  Moyo's Nov. 15th announcement that the ZDF "[were] only targeting criminals around him who are committing crimes that are causing social and economic suffering in the country in order to bring them to justice" is farcical. The reality is that the rot in Zimbabwe started soon after independence and has gotten worse and worse all these last 37 years, but the ZDF obviously did nothing to stop these "criminals" until now. Indeed, the root cause of Zimbabwe's social and economic suffering is the gross mismanagement and rampant corruption by the criminals in Zimbabwe, aided and abated by the ZDF many of whose hierarchy may be in the Top Ten List of Zimbabwe's "criminals." More interesting would be how the ZDF hierarchy and rank-and-file would react once President Mnangagwa starts cutting down on the outrageous perks and good life of the especially coup-proofed ZDF as part of needed painful economic reforms to put the country back on the path to economic revival. Let's not forget that one of Gen. Chiwenge's reasons for staging the coup-non-coup was credible reports of Mugabe had planned to fire him. Pres. Mnangagwa is similarly beholden to the ZDF. What makes him think that another set of generals in the next two years would not want their own share of the loot, and that these Generals would not stage another drama "targeting criminals around" the Crocodile?

Call me a skeptic, but I base my guarded optimism on the Mugabe regime which was a by-word for a "coup-proofed regime." Coup-proofing refers to regime survival strategies and tactics employed to prevent the military from seizing power. It entails unrestrained access to state resources for the military hierarchy and minimal civilian intervention in, or supervision of, the internal affairs of the military in exchange for regime security. In Zimbabwe, this political culture has not only exacerbated organizational decay in the ZDF; it has also induced stagnation in doctrine and organizational evolution to keep up with the changes in mission and environment of the ZDF. The coup-proofed political culture privileged the armed forces' organizational biases and personal interests of some of the hierarchy, over the geo-strategic or technological and institutional reform requirements for a wide range of asymmetric violent conflict the military subsequently faced. The result has been a decline in military professionalism and deterioration in military effectiveness.

Coup-proofing has also created a huge gap between the officer and non-commissioned officer corps. The lowest paid private soldier earns an average $340

monthly

before transport and housing allowances, and the next nine ranks to that of

Major are separated from each other by a mere $20 a month. While a Major earns $470, the next rank above, Lt Colonel, pockets $1,500. After benefits such as transport, housing, entertainment and communications are added, the junior officers take home over $2,000 plus service vehicles and free fuel

monthly. The salary difference widens with each senior rank. Generals enjoy salaries in the $5,000-$10,000 range plus fleets of modern vehicles. Senior army officers have access to unlimited travel and subsistence allowances whenever they leave base, and sources sa

y

some of the trips serve no tangible purpose and are just an excuse for the bosses to get the money. This hefty remuneration goes on in a country where 72.3 percent of the population lives on US$1 or less a day!

 There is no doubt that the coup-proofing

regime survival strategy

will get even nastier and more lucrative for the top brass of the ZDF as the post-Mugabe factions fight it out.

Sadly, f

or most Zimbabweans, they may have reconcile their aspirations to the

posibil

ity that they would have to wait on God and the military for any real change in the country's politics.

For more on my guarded optimism about the "transition" in Zimbabwe, see my piece entitled "The Crocodile and the Fox: Zimbabwe's Fate as a Ruthless Animal Kingdom" and other opinion pieces at

http://www.myknowledgeresources.com/2017/11/19/crocodile-fox-zimbabwes-fate-ruthless-animal-kingdom/

On Fri, Nov 24, 2017 at 8:13 AM, Jibrin Ibrahim <jibrinibrahim891@gmail.com> wrote:

African Dictatorship and the Coup that Claimed it wasn't

 

Jibrin Ibrahim, Friday Column, Daily Trust, 24^th November 2017

 

Today, former Zimbabwean Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa would be crowned President as had always been planned by the regime. He is eminently qualified to takeover having served his boss Robert Mugabe faithfully over the years. He has already gone down in history as the brutal loyal servant who supervised the massacre of 20,000 people in Matabeleland for daring to oppose their regime. Today, he is being celebrated at home and abroad as the hero who saved the country by disrupting and ending the thirty-seven year rule of Mugabe. The joys of the Zimbabwean people on the transition is however very real and we should all pray that Mnangagwa is a changed man and would deliver the democracy he promised on his return to the country on Wednesday.

 

The real disruption of the Zimbabwe regime was done by the infamous Grace, First Lady to Mugabe who wanted to takeover a regime that belongs to old war veterans of the liberation struggle. She had used the "other room" to get her husband to disregard the regime pecking order and seek to install her as successor to her husband who was supposed to have been all powerful. We now know that he was not more powerful than the regime. The ZANU-PF regime has always been powerful and the real illustration of the power was when they lost the general election to the opposition MDC party and refused to handover power introducing the concept of a dual mandate in which the loser of the election remains the senior partner in a diarchy with the winner of the election as junior partner. The diarchy was a stepping-stone for returning the country to one party ZANU-PF rule after battering and humiliating the opposition leader.

 

The coup that ended the 37-year dictatorship of Robert Mugabe had to claim that it was not a coup. The reason was simple; it is very difficult to justify a coup in contemporary Africa for the simple reason that all our regional institutions and the international community have zero tolerance for coups. At the same time, Africa and the world knew that it has been impossible to remove Mugabe from power through elections and democratic means. He had become part of the group of dictators who are the villains of democracy and are determined to rule for the rest of their lives.

 

Fifty years ago, Professor Ali Mazrui published his famous essay on: "Monarchical Tendency in African Political Culture". He was talking about the first republic governments in Africa, which were characterised by personal authority of emerging dictators that were sacralising, their authority. That was the process that led to political decay, economic regression and civil wars on the continent. The trend they set placed Africa at the bottom of all political, social and economic indices in the world.

 

I have just returned from a dialogue in Cotonou, Benin Republic on three decades of democratic transition in Africa organised by International IDEA and the African Union. The meeting was reviewing trends in Africa since the second transition flagged off by the National Conference in Benin in 1990. We identified a number of positive trends that followed the second transition. The first is the end of military rule and the great difficulty of organizing a coup on the continent today. The second is the spread of democratic culture with multiparty democracy, media pluralism and even alternation of power occuring in many African countries. Thirdly, mass protests and demonstrations have emerged as legitimate forms of political action in most countries.

 

These positive trends notwithstanding, there is a clear pattern of democratic regression especially in Central and East Africa. Mugabe was not alone as a despot determined to rule to the end of his life irrespective of the cost of his rule for the welfare of citizens. The 75-year old Obieng of Equatorial Guinea has been in power for 38 years and has concluded plans for his son to continue after his demise. The 84-year-old Paul Biya of Cameroon has been in power for 35 years and has no intention of ever stepping down as senility creeps into his rule. In Uganda, the former revolutionary, 73-year-old Museveni has been in power for 31 years. Idris Derby of Chad, El Bechir of Sudan, Sassou-Nguesso of the Congo, Kabila of the other Congo, Kagame of Rwanda and Nkurunziza of Burundi have all become despots determined to rule forever. In West Africa, Eyadema the father and his son have been in power for over fifty years. Yes Professor Mazrui, the monarchical tendency is fully back on our continent.

 

During the first Republic, African dictators were crude. They dismantled multiparty democracy and ruled through one-party regimes or military juntas. Now, they have become more wily. Except for the Eritrean dictatorship, all other despotic regimes in contemporary Africa today claim to run multiparty democracies with regular elections. They have mastered the game of playing democracy to defeat it. We have too many "democracies" that are not ruled by democrats.

 

There is however another tendency that is emerging within the continent that can checkmate the game of despots. African is breeding citizens who are increasingly able to confront their dictators and even remove them from power. In countries such as Burkina Faso, Senegal, Tunisia and Egypt, citizen action has led to the chasing out of despots. Sometimes, popular revolts fail to achieve their objectives after the first attempt but experience and skills are accumulating. The social media has also provided effective mobilization tools that are broadening possibilities of action. Yes, the despots are determined to cling to power but the good news is that the people too are learning what is means to be a citizen. People like Robert Mugabe who made the transition from nationalist hero to a rampaging despot are beginning to have citizens demanding for accountability.

 

 

Professor Jibrin Ibrahim

Senior Fellow

Centre for Democracy and Development, Abuja

Follow me on twitter @jibrinibrahim17

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