Thirty-seven years ago, a young Portuguese law student and university activist stole several items of furniture from the office of the dean of the faculty of law at Lisbon University.
He carried his loot, in the dead of night, to the headquarters of the underground Reorganising Movement of the Proletariat Party, of which he was a member.
The 18-year-old youngster who thought he had thrown a heroic blow for the resistance, however, did not get the welcome he expected as party leader, one Arnaldo Matos, ordered him to immediately return the stolen property to the campus.
The crestfallen young man complied, even though he had believed his stunt was a political statement.
This incident occurred at the height of Portugal's trying period under the regime of Marcelo Caetano, who was latter deposed by carnation-wielding civilians and army rebels on April 25, 1974 during a bloodless military coup that lasted six hours. That coup is now dubbed the Portuguese revolution, or romantically - the Carnation revolution.
This was to be the highlight of the young man's early political career. That teenager has since morphed into a seasoned politician, a former prime minister of Portugal and incumbent EU Commission president José Manuel Barroso, the man who presides over the European bloc that has maintained an illegal, unjustified economic sanctions regime on Zimbabwe since February 18, 2002.
The EU, is meeting again, in 10 days time to review that embargo, and I am under no illusions that it will be extended by another year for the simple reason that we are going for elections, and sanctions are integral to the MDC-T's quest for protest votes.
For all his political savvy, Barroso does not seem to have learnt from that incident, 37 years ago, as he seems to be unaware that all stolen property, not just furniture, should be returned to its rightful owners. And this includes even our land that was pillaged during the colonial era, which is where Barroso and his allies misconstrue the standoff between Zimbabwe and Britain in particular, and Zimbabwe and the EU in general. For how else would Barroso make the scandalous allegations he has made over the years when he lampooned Zimbabwe for alleged human rights excesses?
A case in point is the article titled "Africa and Europe, a new departure" that he wrote a few years back and which was reproduced on these pages.
Said Barroso: ‘‘The violation of human rights and the lack of democratic freedoms in Zimbabwe, unacceptable as this situation may be, must not be allowed to interfere with relations between the two continents.''
With this statement, Barroso bought into British and American propaganda that the standoff between Harare and London is about the quest for democracy and human rights.
In so doing, he inverted reality by passing the biggest abusers of them all - the US and Britain to be fighting to introduce these values in Zimbabwe while portraying the Government of Zimbabwe as a repressive regime stubbornly violating the rights of its own people.
As such Barroso starts off on a wrong footing altogether, for the converse is true. Zimbabwe is fighting to preserve democracy in all its manifestations while Britain and its big brother Uncle Sam are fighting to subvert these values in Zimbabwe, continuing from where they left off during the liberation struggle.
In case Barroso does not know, we had to fight for 14-long years to win independence from the Rhodesian regime that had the covert support of Britain and the United States. This was a bloody struggle that can not be equated to his country's six hour carnation parade.
Ours was a struggle for democracy in all its manifestations be it electoral or economic. Our standoff with London stemmed from our wish to see through that revolution, demanding the jewels that had been retained by those who surrendered the crown at independence.
In fact when the UN imposed sanctions on the Smith regime in the wake of UDI, the US refused to endorse the sanctions and continued buying chrome from Rhodesia to use on the monstrous vehicles that were being rolled off US assembly plants daily.
As such to Uncle Sam chrome-plated car bumpers were more important than the democratic and human rights of Zimbabweans.
As such as the EU meets to review its sanctions regime on February 18, Barroso needs to remember the lesson he was taught by Arnaldo Matos, all stolen property should be returned to its rightful owners.
Initially the sanctions were imposed on the pretext that the Zanu-PF government was ‘‘ closing'' democratic space, following the expulsion of the head of the EU observer mission to the 2002 presidential elections, one Pierre Schori.
Thereafter the ‘‘justification'' became alleged human rights abuses, when that yarn became threadbare, the implementation of the GPA became the convenient scapegoat.
Ironically, the same GPA identifies economic sanctions, western interference in our domestic affairs and pirate radio stations as outstanding issues to its full implementation.
So by maintaining the illegal sanctions regime, pirate broadcasts and continuously meddling in our internal affairs, Westerners flagrantly violate the GPA and prevent its full implementation.
But such is the rank hypocrisy that Barroso is party to. Punishing the property owner at the instigation of the thief is the height of injustice, and Barroso was taught this at an early age.
It's said the boy is father to the man, lets hope Barroso remembers that when EU leaders meet to review the illegal embargo later this month. |
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