The World

In some ways I can sympathise with Thabo Mbeki’s reluctance to throw South Africa’s weight behind a campaign to shove Robert Mugabe out of power in Zimbabwe. The South Africans sometimes complain that the world should understand that Zimbabwe is not a colony of South Africa – which is true enough. Its also true – unfortunately – that there is considerable sympathy for Mugabe among black South Africans. Any South African politician has to take that into account.

But the South Africans should realise that they have a lot at stake in Zimbabwe – and I’m not just talking about the threat of refugee flows and chaos on their borders. Gordon Brown was probably too polite to put it this way when he met President Mbeki, but many people wonder whether – when they look at Zimbabwe – they are looking at a vision of South Africa in 30 years time. Zimbabwe looks like a vindication of every white racist prediction made at the time of independence, that African self-government would end in disaster. It is urgently in South Africa’s interests to help turn the country round.

That is all the more the case when South Africa’s own problems look like they are mounting. The prospect of President Jacob Zuma is not going down well overseas. Crime is still terrible. White flight continues. And now there are daily electricity cuts. One government source has even suggested that foreign investors delay investing for a few years, since the country could not handle the extra power demand new investment would create. As a frustrated South African puts it: “That is shooting a gift horse in the head.”

If Mbeki could help to get Mugabe out, he would be doing his country a favour in more ways than one.