It’s business as usual for China in Africa even as Zimbabwe swaps Mugabe with the ‘crocodile’
Beijing’s interests in Zimbabwe are undoubtedly strong, but its influence under the wily Emmerson Mnangagwa remains to be seen
The anointment of the “crocodile” Emmerson Mnangagwa as Zimbabwe’s new president, has brought sighs of relief both at home and abroad. Whether the joy and new hopes at the fall of 93-year-old Robert Mugabe and his ambitious wife Grace, prove justified will only in time be seen. I suppose we can say with reasonable confidence that for the 16 million ill-served people who call Zimbabwe home, life can hardly get worse.
Watching from afar the dramatic events unfolding over the past two weeks in Harare – a place few of us have spared a thought for over the 37 years of its life as an independent nation – raises three sets of thoughts: first, about the uncomfortable legacies of British colonialism; second about how misrule can reduce a potentially rich country to penury; and third, about China’s increasingly significant role in Africa.
Whatever the power of the British Empire built ruthlessly over two centuries, Britain’s post-colonial legacy has been an embarrassing one wherever in the world you look (let’s hope Hong Kong proves an exception). The institutions built have almost nowhere been fit-for-purpose, and the post-liberation leaders left behind – many of them like Mugabe forged in bloody bush wars for independence – have been inept at best, and brutally tyrannical at worst.
It seems Mugabe falls into the former “inept” category, only occasionally unleashing brutality. For that you have to look to the likes of Idi Amin in Uganda and the post-independence generals in Myanmar. In his early years, Mugabe seemed the kind of radical reformer that a newly independent country needs, building a strong education system and good health care. There were echoes of Castro’s Cuba here.
Even his ruthless ejection of the large rich white Rhodesian farming class was welcomed at home and in African nations nearby. The tragedy there was in the “land grab” execution, rather than the principle, which gave farms to people who knew nothing about farming, and who reduced one of Africa’s most agriculturally fecund economies to poverty and reliance on imported food aid.