There is no doubt that Zimbabwe needs financial help to revive itseconomy and social services. It is also indisputable that the SouthernAfrica Development Community (SADC) is the best-positioned organizationto spearhead this effort. An extraordinary summit of SADCleaders last month pledged to support Zimbabwe in implementing ashort-term emergency recovery plan, with promises of “budget support,lines of credit, joint ventures and toll manufacturing.” But while theregional group’s ambition to raise $10 billion for Zimbabwe is noble,its approach is bound to fail. A figure like $10 billion mightnot sound like much to Western observers. But in Africa, that amountrepresents the annual budget of [...]
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Zimbabwe’s national unity government faces imminent collapse, due to its failure to get critical financial aid from the international community. Experts have now warned that the government might soon fail to pay its workers, with the potential for serious civil unrest as a result. Zimbabwe needs at least $8.5 billion in financial aid in order to reconstruct its economy. But its appeals have so far drawn blanks due to donors’ skepticism over President Robert Mugabe’s sincerity in working with the opposition. Even the regional Southern African Development Community (SADC) — which brokered the accord establishing the [...]
Only a few days remain before the opening of the United Nations anti-racism conference in Geneva, and maneuvering surrounding the controversial event is reaching a fever pitch. The stated goal of next week’s Durban Review Conference, as it is officially named, is to “evaluate progress” in the global fight against racism since the U.N.’s 2001 anti-discrimination conclave held in Durban, South Africa. That original Durban meeting turned into an embarrassing fiasco for the U.N., prompting Western nations to brace for a difficult and possibly unsuccessful effort to keep the “Durban II” gathering in Geneva from becoming another propaganda tirade in [...]
