ZIMBABWE: HOW BERLIN WALL COLLAPSE AFFECTED US

ZIMBABWEANS have no compelling reason to remember the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 – or the fall of Communism, which followed it, domino-like. True or false? Most zealots of the original plot to turn the country into a one-party state pretend it never happened.

Or that if it did, it had little effect on their politics or the country’s political destiny.

That, some would say, was the height of self-delusion.
The two liberation movements, Zanu PF and PF Zapu were proteges of communist China and the Soviet Union respectively.

Without their material, ideological and moral support, they wouldn’t have made any headway in the struggle against the white supremacists.

Then, after independence, the short-lived coalition government chose Marxism-Leninism – almost inevitably. Zanu PF was more obsessed with that goal than PF Zapu.

There is little doubt that Robert Mugabe was keener on controlling everything and everyone in the country than Joshua Nkomo.

Journalists working for the private media found themselves, after 1981, suddenly working for the government media. This point of "control" was brought home to them with the violence of a tsunami. Those who had visited the Soviet Union and China saw the stark similarities: the campaign of regimentation, of all people dwelling on one thought – serving the Sate and The Party. For them, it had a sickening sense of de javu.

Overnight, there were incessant briefings, not just by Mugabe himself, but by diverse cabinet ministers. Their theme was the same: acquaint the people with the government programme – which was of implementing "Gutsa ruzhunji" – socialism.

There was no time for according capitalism any special mention, except as the No. 1 Enemy of the People. Capitalism had backed the Smith regime against the socialist-backed struggle of the guerillas of Zanla and Zipra.

Most of the journalists had learnt their journalism through Western eyes. Their view of both China and the Soviet Union was jaundiced: intrigue, murder, lies and falsehoods and the "oneness of the people" – the one party system.

After the fall of both the Wall and communism, there was an embarrassed, ambivalent silence among the leaders. Most whispered among themselves that there would be a reversal: Mikhail Gorbachev was pilloried. He didn’t know what he had started, they warned darkly.

He had taken on more than he could chew, they said. They predicted he would bite the dust. There was an inept attempt to pretend the crisis was overblown. It was no crisis at all – Communism would survive, would bounce back, they insisted, rather desperately.

Remember Hungary in 1956? Remember Alexander Dubchek in Czechoslavakia? They had all fizzled out and communism had triumphed. It was indestructible.

Then Gorbachev won the Nobel Peace Prize. No leader in Zimbabwe came anywhere near to winning anything of anything. Nobody was giving awards for bungling an economy that should have been nursed carefully to achieve its potential. So, who had bitten the dust?

Rather apologetically, both Russia and China made gestures to the leadership that they were still looking after their interests, even if less glaringly than before.

Both could not disguise their willingness to profit from the change in their ideological thrust: the Russian Federation was manifestly capitalist. China went crazy over the consumerism of free enterprise.

Still, Zimbabwe was not shepherded into the paradise of free enterprise that many had anticipated: Robert Mugabe, to this day, seems to have set his eye firmly on the "ownership of the means of production" by the people – in other words, the State. This is notwithstanding the recent headline in the government-owned Herald newspaper – No nationalisation: President.

Fifty-one percent local ownership of companies can translate into the same thing. Zanu PF still has its eye on owning and controlling everything and everyone. But the grip is being slowly loosened.

The MDC factor has had a lot to do with this. If Mugabe wishes to have the economic might of the West on his side, (on Zimbabwe’s side, rather) he must play his cards accordingly.

He can hardly tell anyone in that bloc to "go to hell", as he used to not so long ago. The West might have its economic crisis, but it doesn’t need Zimbabwe. The country, unfortunately, does need the West to help prop up its economy. After all, it is virtually a "currency colony of the US". Where would we be without the Greenback?

If Barack |Obama wasn’t so level-headed, he might demand to be invited on a State visit to Zimbabwe. The purpose would be to formalise the use of the US dollar as Zimbabwe’s official currency.

He could demand a ceremony at Mugabe’s State House. After the playing of the two national anthems, Obama would hand to Mugabe one US dollar note – one side with Obama’s picture and the other with a picture of the two of them, shaking hands

In essence, 1989 was a disaster for Zanu PF. The party had always hoped that it would implement its Marxist-Leninist policies in a world which would be sympathetic to the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Such a world would not blink if the civil and human rights of the citizens were trampled underfoot in the name of promoting Marxism-Leninism.

If 1989 had not happened in Europe, Edgar Tekere might not have been able to challenge Mugabe for the presidency in 1990. His one-man rebellion against Zanu PF was the clearest indication that the events in Europe in 1989 had changed, for all time, the political landscape of many African countries, Tekere was able to speak boldly of "democracy (in Zimbabwe) being in the intensive care unit" only because Zimbabweans in general had had a glimpse of what Zanu PF had in store for them – it was not democracy at all.

In Zanu PF, there was a period – albeit a brief one – of soul-searching: their entire political manifesto was in tatters. In reality, the party revised its manifesto, but there was massive resistance. How would they surrender to the forces of capitalism? But the die was cast.

If anyone still believed the cherished dream of a Marxist-Leninist regime in Zimbabwe was still feasible, then they must have been among those who would be thrown completely off their feet when, in 2000, the party lost 57 seats to a nine-month-old party led by someone who had not been active in the armed struggle.

The reality of 1989, for Zanu PF, must have been the 2000 parliamentary elections and the 2002 presidential election. In the latter, Mugabe escaped defeat by the skin of his teeth. The voters were rejecting Zanu PF’s Marxist-Leninist manifesto time and time again.

In the 2008 elections, they repeated their rejection of all things Marxist. Mugabe only postponed the day of his and Zanu PF’s Armageddon. He should have accorded the events of 1989 in Europe their proper place in the political history of the world.

They spelt disaster for all who still thought dictatorship was here to say.