African Commission continues to ignore humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe

By Tererai Karimakwenda
22 November 2006


The African Commission on Human and People's Rights (ACHPR) currently meeting in The Gambia has revealed its agenda for the next meeting in July 2007 this week and Zimbabwe was nowhere on the agenda. The schedule specifies that only three reports from Zambia, Nigeria and Ghana will be discussed and gives no reason for excluding the serious situation in Zimbabwe.

It was expected that Zimbabwe would finally be tabled since Harare had submitted a report defending its appalling human rights record after failing to do so for eight years. The three reports to be dealt with were made public according to the rules, but again Zimbabwe is being handled with kid gloves. The Mugabe regime’s response was embargoed. Civic organisations from Zimbabwe have sent several representatives to The Gambia to pressure AU commissioners to deal with the issue finally. But there seems to be no political will to handle or criticise Robert Mugabe despite all the evidence the groups provide.

At the centre of the ACHPR criticism of Zimbabwe was the destructive cleanup campaign Operation Murambatsvina which displaced about a million people and deprived even more of their livelihood. But nothing has been done by the regional and continental groupings. The credibility of the AU should be at stake here. But the international community has not pressured the heads of state to act according to their own mandate of good governance and peer monitoring.