After days of anticipation, Robert Mugabe seems ever closer to losing his hold on the people of Zimbabwe. This is cause for celebration: under Mugabe, a once-rich country has been racked by inflation rates of 100,000 percent. The U.S. State Department declared 2007 the worst yet for human rights in Zimbabwe, citing political abductions, killings and torture by government security forces. By any standard, Mugabe’s was a regime that had to go.
(My Walrus blogging colleague Arno Kopecky agrees, with some great on-the-ground reporting in Zimbabwe.)
But Zimbabwe’s dilemma won’t end with the inauguration of a new president, whenever that day comes. Mugabe’s likely successor, Morgan Tsvangirai, will face two crucial decisions soon after taking office, and those decisions will test both his resolve and the country’s chances for success.
The first issue facing the new president will be dealing with the crimes committed by the state security services Mugabe’s watch. Tsvangirai will need to decide whether to prosecute those responsible for the abuses, or whether to institute some form of amnesty, possibly in conjunction with an official commission to sort through questions of responsibility, similar to the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation commission established in South Africa after Nelson Mandela took office.
Dealing with crimes committed under Mugabe will not be easy for Zimbabwe’s new president, who will face strong pressure from some quarters for a reckoning. The international community, and in particular the Commonwealth, no doubt eager to welcome Zimbabwe back into its fold, may urge a sort of negotiated amnesty, conscious of the risk of further division in the country. For the new president, the choice will not be easy.
Nor will the choice be easy for another pressing issue: what to do about Mugabe’s legacy of land reform. In September 2005, Mugabe’s government nationalized the country’s farmland, evicting the largely white landowners whose commercial farms had provided much of the country’s income. Those who took the land had little or no experience running farms. To make matters worse, Zimbabwe’s banks largely refused to provide the new farmers with loans, further limiting their chances of success.
From an economic standpoint, the best solution may be simply to reverse Mugabe’s land reforms, returning much of Zimbabwe’s farmland to those who owned it before the 2005 decree. But even in a country where Mugabe is deeply unpopular, pushing Zimbabweans off their new land may be politically impossible. Yet the new president will face strong pressure from Western countries to do so, especially Britain, to which most of the displaced farmers trace their roots.
If and when Tsvangirai finally takes office, there will be no shortage of accolades from the international community. But Zimbabwe’s challenges will not end with Mugabe’s departure. Countries that celebrate Zimbabwe’s change in government will need to follow with offers of assistance, on terms that Tsvangirai can live with.
Saturday’s election was a triumph for Zimbabwe. But the country may soon find that getting rid of Mugabe was the easy part.
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