Yes, we all know that the UN is bound by its own reams of diplomatic tape, and I think there are few people who genuinely believe that the UN has much credibility anymore (just read "Complicity with Evil: The United Nations in the age of Modern Genocide" by Adam Lebor). But this does not change the simple fact that the UN is the face of the most powerful nations on earth who have the mandate and responsibility to cry out when things are wrong.
Or so we would like to believe, because believing there is a higher level of authority as outraged as the rest of us mere mortals by the state of the world, makes coping with this state somewhat easier.
So why the silence on Zimbabwe?
Zimbabwe has slipped off the public awareness radar in recent years, and whether this is a sign that the rest of the world is too focused on the chaos elsewhere or because the fatigue over Zimbabwe's crisis has reached the ultimate point of lethargy, I'm not entirely sure.
But whatever the reason, there should be no excuse, for example, for the UN to ignore Zimbabwe's shocking record of politically motivated rape during election periods. Which is precisely what someone was finally spurned into using a very public platform to say.
Stephen Lewis, the co-director of the international advocacy group AIDS-Free World, last week called the UN out over this silence, calling it ‘unforgivable’ that the plight of Zimbabwe’s rape victims was being ignored. Speaking on International Women’s Day last week at the UN Human Rights Council, Lewis questioned what hold Mugabe has over the UN, that Zimbabwe was left off a ‘Name and Shame’ list of serious sexual violence during elections in different countries. (Read his statement here: http://aids-freeworld.org/Publications-Multimedia/Speeches/Honor-Women-by-Naming-and-Shaming-Zimbabwe.aspx)
This list was the result of a UN resolution adopted in 2010, which has aimed to correct years of impunity for perpetrators of sexual violence and rape around the world. The document has been lauded as one that could change the course of history for the world’s women, by naming and shaming the countries leaders and where possible, the perpetrators of such attacks.
But, as AIDS-Free World’s Lewis (pictured above) discovered when the list was released in January, there was a glaring omission in that Zimbabwe was not mentioned at all.
I spoke to Lewis this week and couldn't pin down why there is this 'unforgivable' silence from the EU, saying it is likely the attitude of South Africa's leaders that are perpetuating this behaviour, referring to Thabo Mbeki's and (in a lesser sense) Jacob Zuma's respectful, action-less camaraderie with a fellow freedom fighter.
Referring to Mugabe as a “crazed politician” who has used sexual violence and rape as part of his “strategy in his political apparatus” since the 80s, Lewis said it is a “startling omission” that he is not being ‘named and shamed’ by the UN. He also called the Mugabe regime's behaviour as 'berserk' and 'demonic', and I applaud him for this brutal honesty that so many people are too 'diplomatic' or afraid to voice.
Lewis hopes, as much as I do, that this is the last time that Zimbabwe will be exempt from such a list and I sincerely hope that it is not just in this category that abuses in Zimbabwe will receive such high level blanking. (I won't hold my breath however.)
You can hear my interview with Lewis on my Diaspora Diaries series on SW Radio Africa here:
http://www.swradioafrica.com/podcasts/wordpress/?p=14158
And if you can read the AIDS-Free World report on the campaign of politically motivated rape in Zimbabwe in the 2008 election period here:
http://aids-freeworld.org/Publications-Multimedia/Reports/Electing-to-Rape.aspx
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