Tutu calls for Zim transitional government and peace keepers

By Alex Bell
02 July 2008

Archbishop Desmond Tutu on Tuesday night said South Africa had failed its “Apartheid era friends” by supporting Russia and China in the UN Security Council vote with regards to Zimbabwe.

He was speaking at the Difficult Dialogues debate at the University of Cape Town and said he wanted peace and calm restored to Zimbabwe.

He said: “Who would ever have imagined that Zimbabwe, our proud showcase country that used to export food, would today be a dream turned into a horrible nightmare? Mr Mugabe and his cohorts have become corrupted”. He said the “nightmare” showed what happened in a country where people are prepared to kill for their leaders.

The Nobel Laureate told a packed audience that one of the ways for peace to be restored would be for African leaders to reprimand Mugabe and insist on negotiations for a transitional government, with the MDC in a prominent role. He also added that “perhaps we have to consider deploying armed personnel to oversee a return to normalcy”.

Tuesday night’s public discussion also featured former Cape Town University vice-chancellor Mamphela Ramphele and the co-founder of the Economic Justice Initiative, Wilmot James.

James said UN peacekeeping troops should be sent to Zimbabwe to protect people from further abuse. He added he was tired of the “smug arrogance” of the South African government and said it was “hugging and coddling a dictator for reasons that defy rationality and diplomatic progress”.

Ramphele said the “culture of impunity” was to blame for the crisis. She said: “Impunity is defined as the freedom of punishment or loss. We see it with Uncle Bob in Zimbabwe, we saw it in Liberia with Charles Taylor and we saw it with Idi Amin in Uganda.”