Sanctions fears

Zimbabwe’s embattled government is talking tough in the face of rising international pressure, but political analysts allege its senior members are growing concerned over the threat of sanctions, Reuters reported.

“There is a sense of panic when you talk to some of these people,” Reuters quoted Emmanuel Magade, a political commentator and law lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe as saying. “It’s dawning on some of them that the world mood has changed and things could get pretty tough.”

The US Senate Sub-committee on African Affairs last week approved the Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Act proposing sanctions against Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe, his political associates and their families, and passed it to the House of Representatives. The International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think-tank, at the weekend called on the international community to consider a Yugoslavia-style strategy against Zimbabwe should next year’s presidential elections prove stolen.

Solomon Nkiwane, a political science professor at the University of Zimbabwe, said many Zimbabwean officials were worried about targeted sanctions because their wealth is abroad, where their families also live. “For all their rhetoric, some of these people will be so vulnerable,” he told Reuters. “The best way for some of them is to negotiate, but some are also worried that abandoning their current strategy could lead to loss of power.”