Political commentary
The last imperial illusion
Ferdinand Mount
Outside Hardy's, the fly-fishing shop, are massed the supporters of the Patriotic Front. It is a small mass. There are thirty black men and women dancing and waving stencilled placards: Power Must be Vested in the Masses of Zimbabwe — R. Mugabe, Muzorewa is raping woman and whipping men in Zimbabwe, Down with Settlers Nonsense. On the other side of Pall Mall, a more subdued group of blacks and whites, not dancing, have placards 'with pictures of the bishop saying Welcome Muzorewa Smith and Thatcher — Zimbabwe Blood is thicker than Nigerian oil.
How neatly these placards feed the prejudice which slips uninvited into the most sophisticated argument about Rhodesia; how hard to disregard the Sambo-English and the Masses-talk mimicked down to the mock-humble initial, R. Mugabe=V.I. Lenin. Revolutionaries and old-fashioned rugger internationals eschew Christian names. Even old Africa hands – in fact particularly old Africa hands – like to claim that Africans are different, and not just because their command of English idiom may be flawed. Even when they use our language perfectly, they mean different things from what we would mean. Andy Young, late American Ambassador to the United Nations, invites us to disregard the Marxist language of Mugabe's party: 'in conversation that I have had privately, I got the impression that their concept of society would be muth more along the lines of Willy Brandt and the Social Democrats of West Germany.' Ah, yes, a good social democrat like Castro and Mao and Tito were in their day. There's a plenipotentiary sucker born every minute. How many men of good will have been seduced by private conversation with the Great: 'of course, you understand, I only have to spout this far-out stuff to keep the people happy.' And how often it is the public words that have provided the terrible guide to future actions.
The cultural arrogance is scarcely concealed. Mr Mugabe is at least as clever and articulate a man as Mr Young, and yet Mr Young assumes that Mr Mugabe does not, cannot mean what he says about being a Marxist, and wanting a Communist Zimbabwe. Because Mr Young is black, sort of black anyway, and has an engaging style, he is still regarded in America as having some special understanding of African sensibilities not granted to chalkies. In reality, as time goes by, it seems clear that he has all the psychological insight of Governor G. Mennen 'Soapy' Williams joining in a tribal war dance. In short, Mr Young is very, very American in his enthusiasm and his provincialism, a sort of Eleanor Roosevelt in blackface.
It is safer to assume that African politicians are no more and no less devious than any other politicians and that they are as quick to accommodate to the fleeting exigencies of the moment as they are tenacious in pursuit of their ultimate goals. All the actors at Lancaster House have passed through so many public guises. Throughout the years in which Mr Nkomo was held in detention, the Smith regime put it about that he was incapably drunk; then the regime negotiated with him as the elder statesman of African nationalism; now he is a bloodthirsty terrorist. Mr Sithole was denounced as a murderer, then briefly became a moderate and responsible African leader and is now denounced again as a discredited crook. Within the Tory Right, Bishop Muzorewa was disliked as a turbulent priest who stirred up opposition to Sir Alec's settlement; he was booed at Blackpool two years ago as the ally of terrorists; now he is the darling of the Monday Club.
The African leaders are just as quick to redefine one another. Before the conference began, we are told, the 'Muzorewa team and the Patriotic Front greeted each other warmly over tea and orange juice. Mr Ernest Bulle, the Bishop's Industry Minister, pointed out that half of them were cousins and old schoolfriends. Dr Mundawarara shook hands with Mr Nkomo. Mr Nkomo shook hands with Mr Nyandoro. An hour and a half later, the Patriotic Front announced that its representatives could not possibly attend Lord Carrington's reception where they would have to 'socialise with murderers and puppets.' And so on.
The next day the Patriotic Front held up proceedings till the afternoon to draft, so they said, a suitably careful reply to Lord Carrington's statement. Mr Nkomo wanted to make it clear that this was to be a peace conference first and a constitutional conference second. The Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference at Lusaka might have laid down guidelines for a new constitution and for ending the war but had not designated in which order the topics should be taken. Oh yes, it had, Lord Carrington said politely.
Unlike at the Geneva talks where not even the British seemed to be trying very hard, it is hard this time to be sure that any faction is not trying. Both Mr Nkomo and Mr Mugabe are striving hard to bit the right balance between geeing •up their home audiences and establishing themselves as serious negotiators.
The whites' best hope unmistakably lies in a successful treaty and swift progress towards recognition and legitimacy. Those blacks who have committed themselves to Bishop Muzorewa may need a settlement merely to stay alive.
For the two wings of the Patriotic Front, the calculation is less straightforward. The conventional view is that Mr Nkomo would have more to gain from a settlement. He himself is well into his sixties. He wants a turn with the fly-whisk. His force of personality and the resonance of his past would enable him to dominate the Bishop in any alliance even if his tribe, the Matabele, does represent only 19 per cent as against the 75 per cent in the Mashona group to which the Bishop's tribe belongs. Successive British governments have felt that business could be done with Mr Nkomo. His links with the Soviet Union were born of necessity, not dogma; he is, after all, Tiny Rowland's man. 'Pragmatic' is the polite word. A Nkomo government, we are led to believe, would be relatively benign, not intolerably corrupt and with the aid of white military, economic and administrative expertise, strong enough to crush th.e Mugabe hard men.
Is all this true? If true, is it desirable? And even if it is both, will not Mr Mugabe presumably have thought of it too? You have only to look at the history of Ireland to see the disadvantages of forming the anti Treaty party. The levers of a modern state are well worth having a hold on. In Eastern Europe after the war, how, often the Communists demonstrated that the quickest and least painful route to power is to form a united front with democratic parties which can be quietly crushed at a later date. If, on the other hand, you go back to the bush, you may be condemned to fight for twenty years and possibly lose at the end of it. If yours is numerically the largest force actually fighting inside the country, all the more reason to join a coalition government while you still have the troops. But if we accept this calculation, then presumably Mr Nkomo has thought of it too and may fear being swamped in an initial Grand Coalition by Mr Mugabe's tribal base. In which case, contrary to the usual view, it might be more to Nkomo's advantage to sabotage the conference and do a deal with Muzorewa at a later stage. The balance of advantage – to sabotage or not to sabotage – seems delicate for both wings of the Patriotic Front. And any settlement which does emerge is likely to be upset by the rush of events. But a settlement is still earnestly to be desired. With luck, it will shore up the Bishop and finally release Britain from this last shadowy burden of empire. But even if the Bishop fails, the quicker events come to a head, the shorter will be the time of killing. Britain cannot guarantee peace, let alone justice; we can only conduct the conference at a brisk and purposeful pace. Those who claim that Britain has or had the power to secure .the Muzorewa regime by giving it swift unilateral support after the elections are victims of the last imperial illusion, which is the illusion of power, of power to dictate the future.
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