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Howard's Way.... a weekly column from the Rt. Hon. Michael Howard QC. MP. 

3 July 2008

Last week I speculated about some of the things that I hoped would happen to increase the pressure on Robert Mugabe.

Two of the three steps I identified have been taken.

Nelson Mandela, to his great credit, has condemned, cryptically but effectively, what he called the failure of leadership in Zimbabwe .

The United Nations Security Council has condemned the elections though it stopped short of describing the regime as illegitimate.

And the observers from other African states have condemned the threats and violence which accompanied the elections.

Only President Mbeki of South Africa has stayed silent and indeed it was South Africa that insisted on watering down the Security Council resolution.

As I write, Mugabe is on his way to the African Union summit in Egypt . That will be a crucial meeting and a real opportunity for other African countries to make clear their disapproval of Mugabe. But the extent to which this will happen is very uncertain.

South Africa is key. It could bring the Mugabe regime to its knees very quickly. And within South Africa there is obviously a growing mood of revulsion about events taking place in its neighbour. Jacob Zuma, the leader of the African National Congress, and likely successor to Mbeki as President of the country has been very forthright.

And it would, of course, be in South Africa ’s interest to do this. The flood of migrants desperate to escape Mugabe’s tyranny is causing acute tensions in South Africa itself.

So I think the best thing our Government could do would be to maximise the pressure on President Mbeki to stop acting as Mugabe’s protector and instead to do what is needed to bring to an end the terrible suffering in his neighbouring land.

I very much hope this will now happen. But again I’m not holding my breath.