MIDRAND, South Africa – ZIMBABWE will weather the sanctions storm and emerge even stronger with home-grown economic solutions being proffered by President
Mnangagwa’s Second Republic already starting to bear fruit, Pan African Parliament (PAP) president, Chief Fortune Charumbira, has said.
Chief Charumbira told African Ambassadors accredited to South Africa during a meeting between the latter and the PAP bureau that Zimbabwe has already survived the heinous sanctions onslaught by the West.
The PAP president called on the West to lift the illegal embargo on Harare saying it was unfair to punish Zimbabwe for rectifying a skewed land ownership system that favoured the minority white people and was the ‘’casus belli’’ for the war of liberation that culminated with independence in 1980.
The meeting between the PAP bureau and African Ambassadors at the seat of the continental legislative body in Midrand under the theme,’’Enhancing collaboration between the PAP and Diplomatic
Corps,’’ came on the backdrop of the Zimbabwe Anti-Sanctions Day that was marked by SADC on 25 October to push the West to unconditionally lift sanctions against Harare.
Chief Charumbira told the Ambassadors that the sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe were meant to economically strangulate the country.
‘’Our independence in Zimbabwe was very clear that it was predicated on the fight to get back our land and after independence we changed our laws to enable us to take back our land and we did that of course because it was in the interest of our people. The West then said we will fix you (with sanctions) and indeed they are fixing us,’’ said Chief Charumbira.
“However as you know we have survived and we will survive and even more over let them (West) lift sanctions and they will see how Zimbabwe develops. If they lift the illegal sanctions they will see Zimbabwe start to prosper within hours.’’
He paid tribute to African countries for showing solidarity with Zimbabwe in the face of bullying by the West that is using sanctions as a weapon to punish Harare.
According to Chief Charumbira, sanctions were imposed on Zimbabwe at the turn of the millennium when the country embarked on land redistribution because most of the white former commercial farmers who lost land were of American and British ancestry.
He chronicled the history of Zimbabwe’s land question dating back to the war of liberation which culminated in the attainment of political independence from the British in 1980.
‘’The war of liberation was principally about the fight for land and without land our independence would be meaningless. The issue of land was very sensitive and it took centre stage that is why the Lancaster House talks for Zimbabwe’s independence dragged on from September to December, it was about land,’’ said Chief Charumbira.
There has been mounting pressure on the West to unconditionally set Zimbabwe free from the yoke of sanctions which has cost the African country over US$100 billion while other countries especially within the SADC region are also complaining about the contagion effect of the embargo on their economies.
At the meeting with the PAP bureau, the African Ambassadors also pledged unwavering backing to PAP to help the continental legislative body effectively deliver its mandate as a representative of the African people.
Leader of the Ambassadors’ technical team, Ambassador Ahmed Taher Elfadly, told the meeting that PAP should reflect on the composition of its membership saying the number of each member state’s representatives at the continental legislative body should be proportional to the size of its population.
He assured PAP of the ambassadors’ preparedness to help expedite ratification of the Malabo Protocol.
There were also calls at the meeting to ramp up PAP’s budget from the current US$11 million annually which was way inadequate to finance operations.
The First Ordinary Session of PAP’s sixth Parliament is currently underway in South Africa. – The Herald
