Robert Mugabe Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===Economic decline: 1995–2000=== {{Quote box | width = 25em | align = right | quote = By the mid-1990s Mugabe had become an irascible and petulant dictator, brooking no opposition, contemptuous of the law and human rights, surrounded by sycophantic ministers and indifferent to the incompetence and corruption around him. His record of economic management was lamentable. He had failed to satisfy popular expectations in education, health, land reform, and employment. And he had alienated the entire white community. Yet all the while Mugabe continued to believe in his own greatness. Isolated and remote from ordinary reality, possessing no close friends and showing clear signs of paranoia, he listened only to an inner circle of conspiratorial aides and colleagues. Whatever difficulties occurred he attributed to old enemies—Britain, the West, the old Rhodesian network—all bent, he believed, on destroying his "revolution". | salign = right | source = — Mugabe biographer [[Martin Meredith]]{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=131}} }} Over the course of the 1990s, Zimbabwe's economy steadily deteriorated.{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=39}} By 2000, living standards had declined from 1980; life expectancy was reduced, average wages were lower, and unemployment had trebled.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=17}} By 1998, unemployment was almost at 50%.{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=39}} As of 2009, three to four million Zimbabweans—the greater part of the nation's skilled workforce—had left the country.{{sfn|Onslow|Redding|2009|p=71}} In 1997 there were growing demands for pensions from those who had fought for the guerrilla armies in the revolutionary war, and in August 1997 Mugabe put together a pension package that would cost the county Z$4.2 billion.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=39|2a1=Holland|2y=2008|2p=123}} To finance this pension scheme, Mugabe's government proposed new taxes, but a general strike was called in protest in December 1997; amid protest from ZANU–PF itself, Mugabe's government abandoned the taxes.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=39|2a1=Norman|2y=2008|2p=83}} In January 1998, riots about lack of access to food broke out in Harare; the army was deployed to restore order, with at least ten killed and hundreds injured.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=39|2a1=Norman|2y=2008|2p=110}} Mugabe increasingly blamed the country's economic problems on Western nations and the white Zimbabwean minority, who still controlled most of its commercial agriculture, mines, and manufacturing industry.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=42|2a1=Meredith|2y=2002|2pp=17, 128}} He called on supporters "to strike fear in the hearts of the white man, our real enemy",{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=17}} and accused his black opponents of being dupes of the whites.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=18}} Amid growing internal opposition to his government, he remained determined to stay in power.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=17}} He revived the regular use of revolutionary rhetoric and sought to re-assert his credentials as an important revolutionary leader.{{sfn|Onslow|Redding|2009|p=68}} Mugabe also developed a growing preoccupation with homosexuality, lambasting it as an "un-African" import from Europe.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=129}} He described gay people as being "guilty of sub-human behaviour", and of being "worse than dogs and pigs".{{sfnm|1a1=Meredith|1y=2002|1p=131|2a1=Norman|2y=2008|2p=115}} This attitude may have stemmed in part from his strong conservative values, but it was strengthened by the fact that several ministers in the British government were gay. Mugabe began to believe that there was a "gay mafia" and that all of his critics were homosexuals.<ref name="bbc_perspective_2009">{{cite news |title=Meeting Zimbabwe's 'Uncle Bob' |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7899057.stm |work=BBC African Perspective |date=21 February 2009}}</ref> Critics also accused Mugabe of using [[homophobia]] to distract attention from the country's problems.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=129}} In August 1995, he was due to open a human rights-themed [[Zimbabwe International Book Fair]] in Harare but refused to do so until a stall run by the group Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe was evicted.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|pp=129–130}} In 1996, Mugabe was appointed chair of the defence arm of the [[Southern African Development Community]] (SADC).{{sfn|Meredith|2002|pp=147–148}} Without consulting parliament, in August 1998 he ordered Zimbabwean troops into the Democratic Republic of the Congo to side with President [[Laurent Kabila]] in the [[Second Congo War]].{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=148}} He initially committed 3000 troops to the operation; this gradually rose to 11,000.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=148}} He also persuaded Angola and Namibia to commit troops to the conflict.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=148}} Involvement in the war cost Zimbabwe an approximate US$1 million a day, contributing to its economic problems.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=148}} Opinion polls demonstrated that it was unpopular among Zimbabwe's population.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=41|2a1=Meredith|2y=2002|2p=148}} However, several Zimbabwean businesses profited, having been given mining and timber concessions and preferential trade terms in minerals from Kabila's government.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=148}} In January 1999, 23 military officers were arrested for plotting a coup against Mugabe. The government sought to hide this, but it was reported by journalists from ''[[The Standard (Zimbabwe)|The Standard]]''. The military subsequently illegally arrested the journalists and tortured them.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=41|2a1=Meredith|2y=2002|2pp=149–150}} This brought international condemnation, with the EU and seven donor nations issuing protest notes.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=151}} Lawyers and human rights activists protested outside parliament until they were dispersed by riot police,{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=151}} and the country's Supreme Court judges issued a letter condemning the military's actions.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|pp=151–152}} In response, Mugabe publicly defended the use of extra-legal arrest and torture.{{sfn|Meredith|2002|p=153}} [[File:Tony Blair 2010 (cropped).jpg|left|thumb|250x250px|British prime minister [[Tony Blair]], with whom Mugabe had a particularly antagonistic relationship]] In 1997, [[Tony Blair]] was elected Prime Minister of the UK after 18 years of Conservative rule. His [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour]] government expressed reticence toward restarting the land resettlement payments promised by the Lancaster House Agreement, with minister [[Clare Short]] rejecting the idea that the UK had any moral obligation to fund land redistribution.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=133|2a1=Holland|2y=2008|2pp=95, 97}} This attitude fuelled anti-imperialist sentiment across Africa.{{sfn|Holland|2008|p=102}} In October 1999, Mugabe visited Britain and in London, the human rights activist [[Peter Tatchell]] attempted to place him under [[citizen's arrest]].{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=134|2a1=Holland|2y=2008|2p=95}} Mugabe believed that the British government had deliberately engineered the incident to embarrass him.{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=135}} It further damaged Anglo-Zimbabwean relations,{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=135}} with Mugabe expressing scorn for what he called "Blair and company".{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=136}} In May 2000, the UK froze all development aid to Zimbabwe.{{sfn|Blair|2002|p=138}} In December 1999, the IMF terminated financial support for Zimbabwe, citing economic mismanagement and widespread corruption as impediments to reform.{{sfnm|1a1=Blair|1y=2002|1p=49|2a1=Norman|2y=2008|2p=119}} To meet growing demand for constitutional reform, in April 1999 Mugabe's government appointed a 400-member Constitutional Commission to draft a new constitution which could be put to a referendum.{{sfnm|1a1=Sithole|1y=2001|1p=163|2a1=Meredith|2y=2002|2p=163}} The [[National Constitutional Assembly]]—a pro-reform pressure group established in 1997—expressed concern that this commission was not independent of the government, noting that Mugabe had the power to amend or reject the draft.{{sfn|Sithole|2001|p=163}} The NCA called for the draft constitution to be rejected, and in a [[2000 Zimbabwean constitutional referendum|February 2000 referendum]] it was, with 53% against to 44% in favour; turnout was under 25%.{{sfnm|1a1=Sithole|1y=2001|1p=164|2a1=Blair|2y=2002|2p=58|3a1=Meredith|3y=2002|3p=165}} It was ZANU–PF's first major electoral defeat in twenty years.{{sfn|Sithole|2001|p=165}} Mugabe was furious, and blamed the white minority for orchestrating his defeat, referring to them as "enemies of Zimbabwe".{{sfn|Holland|2008|p=138}} Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. 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