By Bernard
Bwoni
“The US takes great care to minimise any unintended consequences from
targeted sanctions and I can tell you that my embassy works hard to try to
resolve any that may arise. But, blaming targeted sanctions for Zimbabwe’s
serious economic challenges or for issues such as potholes and road accidents
is diversionary,” US Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Mr Bruce Wharton. This very
unfortunate and bold statement from US Ambassador to Zimbabwe is not only
disrespectful but highly insensitive to the predicament of the ordinary people whose
lives have been downgraded to absolute destitution due to the effects of these
unacceptable and unwarranted sanctions. With all due respect Ambassador
Wharton, I remember when you first arrived in Zimbabwe you vowed to ‘’engage in
a dialogue that was respectful’’ and you expressed a commendable desire to ‘’listen
and learn’’. Your statement above clearly shows that you have not been
listening to the sanction-induced poverty-stricken plight of the people of
Zimbabwe and clearly you have not learned anything since. For you to say that
the impact of sanctions on Zimbabwe is ‘’diversionary’’ is not only insincere
but a clear denial of your responsibilities as the real architects of these
merciless economic measures.
Sanctions
create massive sinkholes in every aspect of life of the intended victim be it
economic, social and political and there are no exceptions. There is no way correcting
this crude reality or patching the aftermath of these man-made sinkholes and
all we can do is endure in the hope that the US moral compass starts navigating
again. Mr Obama might ‘take great care to minimise the unintended consequences
from the sanctions’’ far removed in the comforts of the White House away from
the maddening crowds and the commotion created by the intended consequences of
these heavy-handed sanctions. There are no ‘unintended consequences’ of these sanctions
Mr Ambassador, what we are experiencing in Zimbabwe is a conscious and planned
outcome of the sanctions. Mr Wharton you are clearly aware of the economic
impact of the sanctions on the Zimbabwe economy and the unbearable hardship
this has caused the blame-free people of Zimbabwe. You live in Zimbabwe at the
moment Mr Ambassador and you have firsthand experience of the devastating
nature of these abominable sanctions on the most vulnerable groups in our society.
It is those people at the bottom end of the scale who have had to bear the full
brunt of it and have seen their livelihoods reduced to absolute destitution. These
are the very same people whose civil liberties you are purporting to be protecting
and now you have relegated the crisis you created in the first to ‘unintended
consequences’! Mr Ambassador how do you sleep at night after making such
insincere utterances?
You deliberately
referred to the Zimbabwe sanctions as ‘targeted measures’ which again is very sneaky
of you Mr Ambassador. These are and have always been full blown economic
sanctions against Zimbabwe. It was only a few days ago that the EU was lifting
the ‘economic sanctions’ against Zimbabwe and you Mr Ambassador are still stuck
in the now discontinued ‘targeted sanctions’ mode. Even the white community in
Zimbabwe has come out in support of the unilateral lifting of these economic
sanctions. The Zimbabweans against Sanctions Chairman Mr Matthew Smith said the
‘sanctions were not targeted, but were a broad-based financial
embargo in their nature and impact whether you call them smart or targeted measures or
financial sanctions, their effect has neither been smart nor targeted as it
consumed Zimbabwe and all its citizens in one and the same negative way without
discrimination,"’. Surely Mr Wharton you want us to believe
that the BIG superpower of the USA drafted a whole Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act 2001 Bill with the
intention of targeting Robert Mugabe and a few of his ‘cronies’ in your
philanthropic desire and self-appointed duty to ‘protect’ the people of
Zimbabwe and ‘promote’ rule of law and democracy? A Bill to target the
President of a small sovereign country thousands of miles away that I find far-fetched to believe the motives were all
altruistic and humanitarian exclusively.
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