SANF 08 No 80
In a new book entitled Zimbabwe’s Casino Economy, the Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, Dr Gideon Gono, describes economic sanctions imposed against his country as a form of “terrorism”.
He also thanks the US President, George W. Bush, for the offer made by the US ambassador in Zimbabwe, of a top management job (Vice President) at the World Bank, which he declined, believing it was an attempt to remove him from his influential position in Zimbabwe.
The revelations in the book include the lengthy letter he wrote in response to the offer, in which he raised questions about how he, as a subject of “targeted sanctions” which restrict travel to Europe and North America, could be expected to take up a strategic post at the World Bank offices in Washington.
Gono makes a comparative analysis of the measures he has implemented to address Zimbabwe’s financial crisis, in the context of interventions currently being undertaken by countries in the North to confront the global financial crisis, dubbed the “credit crunch”.
He analyses the market economy as a “casino economy” and gives an exposure (in a chapter entitled Corrupting Banking and the Stock Exchange) of how some of the banks, insurance companies and pension funds have been gambling on the stock exchange using non-existent resources, thus placing great strain on the demand for cash in the country.
“I believe that, if properly scrutinised in diplomacy, politics and ethics, it should not be very difficult to appreciate that illegal economic sanctions are not different from sanitised terrorism,” Gono says.
“As instruments of foreign policy, the objectives of terror and illegal economic sanctions are the same: terror, which is generally described as a state of fear or an overwhelming sense of imminent danger.
“The individuals, institutions and companies in Zimbabwe that have been targeted for sanctions from the powerful Western countries are supposed to be terrorised by a continuing sense of imminent danger.
“The same is true of ordinary people who are being made to understand that economic sanctions would not be lifted as long as ZANU PF and President Mugabe remain in power: they are supposed to fear ZANU PF rule by definition and to see it as a very dangerous thing to have.
“As such, it seems to me clear that illegal economic sanctions have been to Zimbabwe what terrorism has been to the United States, Britain and other European countries.
“It should not therefore surprise anyone that the government of Zimbabwe has responded to the threat of illegal economic sanctions in the same way that the United States and Britain, for example, have responded to terrorism.
“Countries, big or small, respond to terror in the same way, notwithstanding the fact that the response of small countries does not have the same weight and moral justification as that of the big and powerful countries that are in a better position to use overwhelming propaganda to justify their response. …
“Put differently, the illegal economic sanctions are an example of coercive terrorist diplomacy insofar as their objective is to induce fear.
“This is partly if not mainly why I have characterised the situation I found on the ground when I assumed my appointment in December 2003 as very extraordinary and requiring extraordinary interventions. Terrorism by any other name and under any other cover is extraordinary and invites an extraordinary response.”
In writing the book, Gono says that he drew “liberally and immensely from the invaluable insights put at my disposal by a wide range of national and international players in industry and commerce, mining, agriculture, tourism, banking, teachers, medical practitioners, lawyers, engineers, the academia, workers, trade unionists, politicians, students, civil society, diplomats, churches and our traditional leaders.”
He thanks in particular President Robert Mugabe for the life-defining professional opportunity “he availed me to serve my country” as Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe for the past five years.
Gono has been reappointed for a second term.
The book, he says in an introduction, is not his memoirs or an autobiography but rather an analysis of the measures taken to meet “extraordinary challenges”.
“Last but not least, it is my humble hope that this book which salutes those who dare and actually go on to think and act outside the box, will inspire others, especially the younger generation, to rise to the challenge of their own calling and to stand up to be counted as responsible members of society with a sense of national identity within a globalised world.”
He adds that his intention in writing the book was to “enrich future policy formulation, not only in Zimbabwe, but also in the region and beyond…”
