The crisis in Zimbabwe took a turn for the worst on Thursday when thousands of paramilitary police from Angola arrived on the government’s request. Zimbabwe’s Home Affairs Minister, Kembo Mohadi, confirmed their imminent arrival. Thousands more are expected on first April. After South Africa, Angola is believed to have the most powerful military in Africa.
The townships around the capital Harare have been under curfew for about three weeks. Hundreds of civilians have been injured in police attacks. The leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, Morgan Tsvangirai and scores of opposition activists are still recovering from the beatings they received when police attacked and dispersed a rally on March 11. Several opposition leaders and activists are under arrest since that time.
Mohadi said that he had signed an agreement with General Roberto Monteiro, the Interior Minister of Angola last week for the deployment of the Angolan paramilitaries. It is meant to ensure public order and security for both our peoples and the whole southern African region, he said.
These fighters are dubbed ‘Ninjas‘ for their all-black uniform of combat trousers and tunics, boots and balaclavas. They form part of the presidential guard of Jose Eduardo dos Santos of Angola. They patrol in pickup trucks with mounted heavy machine-guns, and are dreaded by the public in their own country.
Zimbabwe’s own police force has been severely depleted in recent months by mass resignations due to paltry pay and poor conditions. Discontent with the regime is also one of the reasons.
Mwanawasa, the president of Zambia, had said at the end of a meeting of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) on Wednesday in Namibia that quiet diplomacy had failed to help solve the political chaos and economic meltdown in Zimbabwe. He continued ‘As I speak right now, one SADC country has sunk into such economic difficulties that it may be likened to a sinking Titanic whose passengers are jumping out in a bid to save their lives.‘
Though the SADC is primarily an economic body, it has a security and defence protocol which allows military intervention only in cases of threat by external forces. Brian Raftopoulos, a political commentator on Zimbabwe said ‘but this is a domestic problem and Zimbabwe is not under external military threat. It [the deployment] is interference. Mugabe is bringing a military power of the region into Zimbabwean politics.’
Mugabe, in his desperation to cling on to power in the face of severe opposition and economic chaos in Zimbabwe, is apparently pushing southern Africa into a period of armed conflicts while endangering democracy and safety of the people in his own country.
