Tafadzwa Choto, ISO Zimbabwe's national coordinator, urged activists protesting at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Brisbane in October not to be taken in by Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe's "anti-imperialist" rhetoric. "Mugabe talks left but acts right", she told GLW.
"The West is now hostile to Mugabe because he can no longer guarantee the profits for their capitalists. They were friends until 1996, because Mugabe loyally implemented the World Bank's Economic Structural Adjustment Program. In 1996, the workers started to rise up against ZANU-PF's IMF and World Bank policies. That is when the friendship broke.
"ZANU-PF has grasped the significance of the anti-capitalist demonstrations that have taken place in the West. So Mugabe is taking an 'anti-imperialist' stand and denouncing the IMF and World Bank. But in Zimbabwe, he doing completely the opposite. He is privatising university services, his police shoot striking workers, there are no medicines in the hospitals, he has outlawed strikes.
"Today, he hammers the IMF and World Bank, but his ministers are attending their meetings and promising to repay their loans. This anti-imperialist rhetoric is believed by some people on the left, not only here in Zimbabwe but also in other parts of the world. They see him as someone who is moving in the right direction.
"They ask us, 'Why are you supporting the Movement for Democratic Change instead of supporting Mugabe and his government?'. They don't understand the need to move with the workers. Mugabe doesn't have the support of the workers anymore. ZANU-PF did not manage to win even one seat in the urban areas in last year's election.
"We are going to send a statement to be read at the CHOGM demonstration exposing the hypocrisy of Mugabe and exposing Mugabe for the dictator he is. His government is a puppet of the IMF and the World Bank, which has caused untold suffering to the Zimbabweans."