Zimbabwe: Let Vavi act as mediator, Mbeki is needed at home

With all the problems arising out of, inter alia, the Ginwala commission, xenophobia and power shortages, perhaps the time has come for the president to travel less and spend more time in office.

In his stead, appoint Zwelinzima Vavi, general secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, to act as mediator in the matter of Zimbabwe.

President Mugabe and his mouthpiece the Herald often praise the role of South Africa — and in particular our president — in achieving free and fair elections in Zimbabwe, so I’m sure they won’t mind sparing our leader and accepting one of the heads of the tripartite alliance as his replacement. This will also help our president achieve “noise” reduction.

Of course as South Africans we’d be annoyed if Zimbabwe barred Vavi entry or could not find time between detaining all the foreign ambassadors, shooting and torturing opposition leaders and supporters, and arresting editors and trade-union leaders to meet the new mediator. After all, South Africa has done so much for Zimbabwe and so little for the people of Zimbabwe in the past.

Vavi would need to first pay a visit to the Southern African Development Community to brief it on his mandate. This is to ensure a free and fair election as understood by countries the world over. In return for South Africa funding the trip, Vavi could repay us by listing those leaders who wink at him after he mentions the words “free and fair”. I’m sure the SADC leaders would love him — particularly those from Swaziland.

The briefing will confirm the following:

South Africa is happy to provide all the monitors for the run-off, which spares the need for international observers.

In return, Vavi expects Zimbabwe to allow him to bring an expanded delegation to assist him. This will comprise about 750 000 members of South African trade unions who can’t wait to see members of Zanu-PF, the police or army within 20km of a polling station.

Because the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission is exhausted from its marathon counting of the presidential votes, South Africa will provide its own people who do the same job in our elections. This should save the Zimbabwean economy money and shorten the count by about five weeks.

Because South Africa is such a good friend to Zimbabwe, all South African television, radio and newspaper concerns are to be deemed accredited until such time as the run-off is concluded.

Zimbabwe, in consideration for the provision of neutral observers, undertakes to ensure that all military and police personnel are advised that they may not interfere with the South Africans, who are after all their friends, until the conclusion of the election. Should they be attacked, South Africa would obviously take an extremely dim view of the same. (Please do not confuse this with the extremely dense view we’ve taken on Zimbabwe up to now.)

The South African electoral commission in return undertakes to frame the half-dozen or so votes that Mugabe obtains in the run-off. (Please note a dozen frames have been ordered — should any of them not be used, they will be donated to Foto-Katz.)

As a result:

South Africans will be able to look their Zimbabwean brothers and sisters in the eye.

Mugabe and the Herald will style South Africa as a bunch of treacherous colonisers and counter-revolutionaries, which we can then wear as a badge of genuine honour.

Normal relations between the two countries can resume as the Zimbabweans return home to the government of their choice with aid starting to pour in.

Mugabe is presented with a copy of George Michael’s Father Figure as a memento of the time he spent with our president before sanity was restored.

Last but not least, Alec Erwin can stop telling us that not supplying Zimbabwe with power is tantamount to electrical xenophobia. Mondli, if that doesn’t score “Mampara of the Week”, then your editors win that prize.

Viva, Vavi, viva!