Oz apology: What about Gukurahundi?

Oz apology: What about Gukurahundi?

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By Mary Revesai

THE formal apology issued by the Australian government last month to that country’s 450 000 aborigines for past wrongs and injustices focuses attention on other atrocities throughout the world for which atonement has yet to be made.

When, for example, will former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and American President George Bush express regret for their blunders in Iraq? While their intentions may have been noble at the beginning, there is no denying that the situation has spiraled out of control, resulting in the unnecessary and continuing loss of human life.

As a Zimbabwean, the news of the Australian government’s gesture reminded me of crimes against humanity perpetrated in my own country for which regret is yet to be expressed.

Specifically,I recall with horror, the butchering of 20 000 Zimbabweans during the Gukurahundi massacres in Matabeleland and the Midlands about 20 years ago and wonder whether President Mugabe, who turned 84 this month, will ever apologise for those atrocities.

South African cleric, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, has pointed out that it takes “bigness” to say sorry and the problem for Mugabe, who is known for his intransigence over less grave issues, could be his usual disdain towards the people who have suffered anguish and injustice at his hands.

Tutu has been quoted as saying: “How wonderful if politicians could bring themselves to admit they are only fallible human creatures and not God and thus by definition can make mistakes. Unfortunately they seem to think that such an admission is a sign of weakness. Weak and insecure people hardly ever say ‘I am sorry’.”

A number of leaders have earned, not lost, respect throughout the world for expressing regret for various wrongs and injustices. During his reign, Pope John Paul II asked for forgiveness for Roman Catholic sins against the Orthodox faith. In 1998, the Pontiff apologised for injustices, including sexual abuse, committed by Roman Catholic clergy in the Pacific nations.

Likewise, during his presidency, Bill Clinton apologised for slavery and Tony Blair followed suit during a state visit to Britain last year by Ghanaian President John Kufuor.

In 2001, the European Union apologised for slavery and colonialism in the final declaration of the World Conference Against Racism held in Durban, South Africa.

While expressions of regret for historic injustices are mostly symbolic, it has been shown, however, how potent an apology can be in changing the dynamics of a situation.

The announcement by Australia’s Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin of a formal apology to Aborigines on February 13, must have taken the wind out of the sails of Zimbabwe’s propaganda machine .Over the past few years, government apologists never missed an opportunity to accuse former Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, of hypocrisy when he took an uncompromising stance against President Mugabe’s repressive governance, persecution of political opponents and human rights abuses.

They regularly denounced Australia, which towards the end of last year expelled the offspring of Zimbabwean officials who were studying in universities there, saying it had no moral authority to lecture anyone on human rights abuses because it discriminated against the Aborigines.

The spin doctors went as far as insisting that the people of Australia were criminals because their ancestors, who began settling there in 1788, were mostly British convicts and soldiers. But now that new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, whose Labour Party was swept into power in November, has successfully campaigned for a formal apology, Zimbabwean government spin doctors and sycophants have been deprived of a favourite hobby horse.

A debate had been underway in Australia for almost a decade on how best to acknowledge the atrocities perpetrated against Aborigines who suffered injustices, particularly in the last century.

It is estimated that between 1910 and the 1970s, about 100 000 Aboriginal children of mixed blood were forcibly separated from their parents on the premise of saving them from certain doom.

The apology made on behalf of the Australian government did not attribute guilt to the current generation of Australians but signaled the beginning of a new relationship, the authorities have said.

The Australian development should prick the consciences of those in the Zimbabwean government, which is also guilty of large-scale displacement of people and the creation of a ‘lost generation’ through the massacres perpetrated by the Fifth Brigade in Matabeleland. A few years ago, Mugabe acknowledged the injustices and atrocities perpetrated against the people of the region during the so-called dissident era when he described the episode as “a moment of madness.”

However, since that admission, he has steadfastly ignored calls for the matter to be officially addressed either by compensating the victims or setting up a truth commission to bring culprits to justice and facilitate healing and reconciliation. Most importantly, the aim of such a process should have been to get to the bottom of what happened so as to ensure that such horrors would never be allowed to happen again.

South Africa did this under its Truth and Reconciliation Commission and President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has announced the setting up of a similar body in Liberia.

Mugabe should have been big enough to realise that the genocide his government perpetrated in Matabeleland was not something that could be swept under the carpet and forgotten. But in the absence of any commitment on his part to deal with that dark period in the country’s history, many people will, therefore, have welcomed the announcement by the Morgan Tsvangirai faction of the Movement for Democratic Change that it will set up a Truth and Justice Commission to bring perpetrators of those atrocities to justice if it wins next month’s elections.

Things could have been handled differently if Mugabe had signed the 1987 Unity -- Accord that officially ended the atrocities --- in good faith but events on the ground continue to show this was not the case. Matabeleland has continued to be marginalised in terms of development and allocation of resources. This proves that over and above the genocide, the people of the region continue to pay a high price for their ethnicity.

Mary Revesai is a New Zimbabwe.com columnist and writes from Harare

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