Where is the outrage?
The white press has been careful about the Zimbabwe story-lest they be accused of racism. Cynthia Tucker doesn't need to worry about that, and she
rips into Mugabe and his kleptocracy.
Here is the most interesting part:
If a racist white dictator were creating conditions that starved millions of black Africans, the Congressional Black Caucus would have demanded severe sanctions, and a long line of African-American celebrities would be lining up to picket the nation's embassy, taking turns getting arrested and handcuffed for the TV cameras. But Mugabe's thuggery has barely roused America's black elite.
One of the fruits of Tranzi thought-that shares an awful lot with right-wing racialism of ages past-is that only people of color can represent people of color authentically. Therefore, incompetent black elite have squandered Africa's natural resources and hoarded its riches to themselves. And yet Tranzis naively assume that because Mugabe and his ilk share racial and cultural ties (though a large minority of Zimbabwe's population-the
Matabele-are culturally persecuted, but white liberals can't be expected to differentiate between black folk, they all look alike, no?) with the population they rule that they will treat them better than a white oppressor like
Ian Smith did.
Addendum: Let me add one thing to this specifically: I believe apartheid was good for South Africa. By this, I mean that
if South Africa had achieved independence in 1960-it would have been a disaster. I believe Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo is a good analogy of what would have happened-for Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo too is a resource rich nation. I read once that when Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo achieved independence-there were only a dozen
indigenous holders of university degrees (this is a nation the size of western Europe!). The 35 years of oppression and apartheid after 1960 in South Africa allowed the formation of an educated black elite. It gave the black masses two generations of breathing space between their tribal past and their post-tribal future. Though the black elite of South Africa leaves something to be desired-as all political classes naturally do-it is far more competent and stable than the one-man rule in places like Zimbabwe or anarchy in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The transition to a post-colonial polity in South Africa seems to have followed a model closer to India-where an indigenous governing class was in place-than the rest of sub-Saharan Africa.