Zimbabwean Cholera Outbreak - Politicisation

Politicisation

As the outbreak and health crisis grew worse, American and British leaders cited the crisis as further proof that it was, in their view, "well past time for (President) Robert Mugabe to leave" and that Zimbabwe had become a failed state. The Zimbabwe government and state media responded by blaming the outbreak on European and American sanctions and accused Britain of plotting an invasion under the cover of the outbreak. Information minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu blamed the cholera deaths on Western sanctions, saying "the cholera issue has been used to drive a wedge among us". On 12 December, Ndlovu repeated his accusation, and claimed that the cholera outbreak was actually a "serious biological-chemical weapon" attack by the United Kingdom, which Ndlovu asserted was trying to commit genocide. Said Ndlovu:

Cholera is a calculated, racist, terrorist attack on Zimbabwe by the unrepentant former colonial power, which has enlisted support from its American and Western allies so that they can invade the country.

In the meantime, a senior ZANU-PF official argued that the government and party leadership was more focussed on the forthcoming ZANU-PF conference than on the current crisis. On 11 December 2008, President Robert Mugabe made a speech screened on national television in which he said:

I am happy to say our doctors have been assisted by others and WHO (the World Health Organization)... so now that there is no cholera... Because of cholera, Mr Brown wants a military intervention... Bush wants military intervention because of cholera... There is no cause for war any more. The cholera cause doesn’t exist any more.

Reports from the WHO contradicted Mugabe’s view and indicated a growing death toll. According to the WHO, as of 8 December nearly 800 people had died of cholera and more than 16,000 cases were being treated. Later that same day, Zimbabwean visas were denied to six French aid workers, including three crisis management specialists, two epidemiologists and a water treatment expert. Britain's Africa minister, Mark Malloch-Brown, dismissed Mugabe's claim that the Zimbabwe cholera crisis is over, commenting as follows:

I don't know what world he is living in. There is a raging humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe as well as an economic crisis and still there is no representative government able to lead the country out of this disaster.

The French foreign ministry and USAID also contradicted Mugabe's statements and called on him to allow aid to reach the people in need.