Main News Opinion & Columnist

West lacks moral high ground to lecture us on human rights

Americans tend to babysit other nations on human rights, but they have a serious habit of disenfranchising the minorities

Ranga Mataire Writing Black
There were many lessons from the total failure of the Western instigated July 31 regime change planned demonstration.

The first lesson that must have dawned on local opposition, including their Western backers, was that social media, particularly Twitter, was not Zimbabwe. The majority of Zimbabweans are not avid followers of Twitter.

In fact, contrary to presumptuous attitude of some among us, the majority of Zimbabweans understand that the thing that really matters to them is the productive ownership of the means of production.

All they aspire for is central Government support to enable them to produce not just for subsistence, but for the nation.

The second take away from the glaringly embarrassing no-show was the lack of strategic thinking on the part of the opposition, which is more obsessed with the optics of creating chaos and mayhem ostensibly for the attention of their benefactors.

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How does one explain the lack of emotion and no introspection on the part of opposition figures like Charlton Hwende and Tendai Biti, who in a matter of hours after the failed protests were already fervently tweeting about their favourite English team Arsenal’s FA Cup triumph over Chelsea?

It is clear that the two senior officials regarded the planned protests as inconsequential.

It also proved that what mattered more to them were their self-pleasures in the comfort of their splendid homes instead of the so-called anti-corruption protests they had spent almost a month harping about.

The third and most important lesson to be derived from the monumental failure of the planned demonstration was the fact that the majority is aware that outsiders cannot dictate how we should govern ourselves, particularly when such outsiders were on the forefront of opposing our fight for liberation from colonial repression.

We gleefully note the embarrassing desperate spin from some opposition supporters and their leaders claiming some morsel of victory over the no show.

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Well, in Shona tinoti afirwa haatariswe kumeso. There is need for some serious introspection on the part of opposition leaders, including those that are daily harangued by delusional regime change dreamers.

Sensing a resounding no confidence show, some desperate opposition figures literally invited arrest by illegally picketing at some shopping malls while others indulged in some kindergarten tomfooling provoking some security personnel for the camera’s attention.

Of course, the security personnel obligingly arrested them. The culprits will soon have their day in court.

What saddens some of us is the lack of shame on the part of some opposition figures who have literally become pliable regime change instruments. We are aware that like any other country, Zimbabwe is not heaven.

People are bound to have disagreements but as people of the same nation, we must be clear of our national interests.

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We must have sacrosanct values that bind us as a nation.

We are aware that the West, particularly America, is averse to the reality of former liberation movements running the affairs of their respective countries.

We are aware of a perennial attempt to roll-back the map of liberation in Southern Africa.

We fervently pray that our brothers and sisters on the other side of the aisle realise that the West is motivated by their self interest.

It is surely preposterous to have the same countries that supported apartheid and opposed the liberation of Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Angola and are still causing chaos in the DRC to suddenly prance about being champions of democracy and human rights.

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The same countries that react with instantaneous moral indignation whenever something goes wrong in Africa are the same countries that enslaved and colonised us yesterday.

Is it not ludicrous for America to make boisterous and unremorseful comments when something happens in Zimbabwe, yet the same country that continues to treat African-Americans as second class citizens through systematic racism that perpetually relegates them to the fringes?

Is it not apparent even to some of our compatriots that they too need to question the unrelenting stream of patronising diplomatic self-righteousness peddled by America to young democracies in Africa?

The truth is the West does not care about human rights, especially the rights of Africans. If the West really cared about human rights, America would not be engulfed in nationwide protests we are witnessing today. Again, we wonder why the West is not condemning these human rights violations in America.

One thing that some of our compatriots might not be aware of is the continued disenfranchising of minority voters in America particularly Latinos and African-Americans who over the years have struggled to participate in national elections.

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The hypocrisy stinks to heavens as Americans are fond of lecturing to Africa about free and fair elections and flaunting the American system as a model.

Why has America done nothing in prosecuting serious human rights violations and killings by its soldiers in Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan?

America has gone as far as intimidating the International Criminal Court (ICC) that opened an investigation into US crimes in Afghanistan.

We, the people of the South, reiterate the fact that the leading nation of the “free world” lacks the moral high ground to lecture us on human rights and this is precisely the reason why we will always take the American system not as a model, but something not to be assimilated.

HERALD