Ranting Mugabe Campaigns

3^rd February 2002

President Robert Mugabe launched his re-election campaign in familiar fashion Friday, blaming Britain for all of Zimbabwe's problems and branding the black opposition "puppets of the whites".

Wearing a white baseball cap and a three-piece suit, he addressed 8,000 subdued supporters at a carefully staged rally in a rural stronghold of his Zanu-PF party.

His speech will have done little to stem the growing campaign to oust him and his country from the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, to be held in Brisbane next month.

Nor will it have stilled worldwide concerns over the atrocities being reported from his country.

To chants of "Down with the British" and "Down with the whites", Mugabe turned on Britain and its Prime Minister, Tony Blair.

"We are in a state of political war," he said. "We are in a war to defend our rights and the interests of our people. The British have decided to take us on through the MDC [Movement of Democratic Change]."

The campaign for his re-election in six weeks' time began as Mr Mugabe's Government faced the worst diplomatic crisis in its relations with the developed world since Mugabe came to office in 1980.  

Mugabe and wife on the campaign trail

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said he found it "almost impossible to comprehend how free and fair elections can be held".

Condemning the passage on Thursday night of a draconian new media law, which will make it impossible for journalists to work in Zimbabwe without State approval, Mr Straw said it could trigger the imposition of European Union sanctions next week.

Any sanctions would be aimed at Mr Mugabe and his allies and take the form of travel bans and the freezing of overseas assets.

Mr Straw's tough message was delivered in Washington and echoed by US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

America has already passed a law empowering President George Bush to impose personal sanctions on Mr Mugabe. Mr Powell said the Bush Administration was working "in close co-ordination with our British colleagues".

But British Foreign Office sources played down suggestions that the media law alone would trigger the onset of sanctions. They said the key test would be whether Mr Mugabe admits the first six EU election observers, who are due to arrive in Harare today.

Mr Mugabe's half-hour speech at the rally was peppered with racial insults directed at Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, whom he accused of being a British stooge.

"Tsvangirai has decided he must be white," he said. "How can we have blacks who masquerade as whites? Whatever Blair tries to do, we will not back down. We went to war; we went to prison; we have suffered over the years but we are not afraid of the struggle. We will not run away. You can count on us to fight."

The rally was held in Mutawatawa, a dilapidated town 210km north-east of Harare. Mr Mugabe said the area was undeveloped and "this was brought about by the British and Tsvangirai".

For all the displays of confidence, evidence is mounting that Zimbabwe will run out of maize well before the election on March 9th and 10th. The World Food Program estimates that 558,000 people need emergency supplies.