President Robert Mugabe used the recent G-15 summit in Tehran to make new threats to grab British and other foreign-owned business interests in Zimbabwe.

The threats were accompanied by the kind of extreme, almost incoherent rhetoric which places him in the same league as former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, who hounded out the Asian population from that country in the 1970s through similar racial and economic persecution.

Mugabe, 86, who faces an imminent election campaign after the end of the current transitional unity government, upped the stakes by threatening to seize foreign-owned mining interests, after “indigenising” all foreign-owned business interests. He accused the former colonial power, Britain, and other foreign interests of milking his country and denying its African inhabitants their birthright.

Rio Tinto, Anglo-American and Lonmin are among the British-American concerns which could see their assets in Zimbabwe confiscated. They mine copper, gold, asbestos and iron in the mineral-rich country. The world’s two largest platinum miners, Anglo Platinum and Impala Platinum, who have multi-million dollar investments in Zimbabwe, have also expressed concern at the new “indigenisation” legislation.

Mugabe said that after redistributing farmland confiscated from whites – ostensibly to benefit landless blacks but in reality to enrich himself and his supporters beyond their wildest dreams – his next goal was the “Africanisation” of the rest of the economy.

He singled out the mining sector for “aggressive indigenisation”. Speaking in a  speech peppered with hardline demagoguery, Mugabe slammed Britain and the US for “threatening to occupy smaller and weaker nations which are seeking to assert sovereignty over their resources for the betterment of their own people”.

“There must be Africans in there, as owners, not just as workers,” he thundered  to the G15, a group of 17 developing countries from Asia, Africa, and Latin America, set up to foster cooperation and provide input for other international groups.

“We are gold, copper, asbestos and iron producers. But most of the benefits are enjoyed by the former colonialists. At the end of the day, black people must be able to say, the resources are ours – our people own the mines, our people own the industry.”

Political analysts who have been critical of Mugabe’s rule warned him sternly against his plans. “This cannot help Zimbabwean jobs, wealth and opportunities,” said political commentator Ronald Shumba.

International mining giant Anglo American, which has significant interests in Zimbabwe, said this week it had discussed its operations with the Zimbabwe government but said that respect for the rule of law was of “prime concern to us and other investors”.

His Indigenisation minister, Savior Kasukuwere, insists he is plodding ahead with indigenisation plans, which took effect on March 1 – forcing foreign-owned companies to submit plans to show how they will sell 51 percent of their shares to black Zimbabweans within five years.

International jitters about Zimbabwe’s economy in the wake of planned expropriations can be expected to turn to full-blown panic at Mugabe’s latest position.

This is the umpteenth time he has said he would Africanise the mining sector. And his tone suggests there may be nothing that can sway him.

The MDC has accused him of trying to buy votes with a plan that could lead to economic disaster. Observers describe it as a desperate move by a desperate party that will do anything to stay in power.

Mining accounts for about 8 percent of Zimbabwe’s GDP, generating about 40 percent of annual export earnings. At its peak, Zimbabwe produced 28 tonnes of gold, raising nearly US$450m. Other mines extract coal, copper, nickel, chrome, asbestos and iron ore.

By setting his sights beyond land reform, Mugabe appears to be following the well-trodden – but discredited – path of Africanisers such as Uganda’s Idi Amin and Mobuto Sese Seko of Zaire.

Amin’s deportation of about 50,000 UK passport-holding South Asians in 1972 failed to bring promised prosperity, and saw the collapse of the commercial sector.

Meanwhile, the economic outcome of Mobutism was the wholesale plunder of Congo’s resources by the ruling elite.

(Source)