The Price of Failure.

To go along with it's economic crisis, political crisis and food shortages Zimbabwe is now in the grip of a health crisis with outbreaks of Cholera across the country. During the past week this has led to political and public figures including Condoleezza Rice, Raila Odinga, John Setamu and Archbishop Desmond Tutu to call for the overthrow of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe. British Prime minister Gordon Brown, on Saturday, added his voice to those calls and sadly couldn't resist taking the opportunity to have a metaphorical little dig. This is particularly unfortunate when you consider that the Mugabe regime stands accused of ignoring the rule of law and using sustained violence against it's own people to cling to power.

The most recent chapter of Zimbabwe's disastrous history began in March 2008 when the country held it's general election. With neither the ruling Zanu-PF or the opposition MDC winning the required 50% majority the election collapsed into chaos amid accusations of ballot rigging and voter intimidation. After all the interested parties had finished stomping their feet, beating thier chests and throwing around empty threats it was decided that Zimbabwe would continue in accordance with it's own Constitution and hold a presidential election run-off between Zanu's Robert Mugabe and the MDC's Morgan Tsvangirai. On the Sunday before that vote Mr Tsvangirai received news that made him lose faith in the process causing him to pull out leaving Mr Mugabe as the only candidate. Even though the result of the vote meant that Mr Mugabe was the properly elected President of Zimbabwe the violence that proceeded it meant that many people, myself included, weren't prepared to accept that result. In response the Southern African Development Committee brokered a power sharing deal that would see Mr Mugabe act as President and Mr Tsvangirai act as Prime Minister with cabinet positions being appointed to the MDC and Zanu-PF alternatively.

Since then the country has been paralysed with both sides failing to participate in the power-sharing process and appoint a new cabinet. This paralysis of the government alongside Zimbabwe's economic problems have meant that the countries water supply, sanitation and medical services have all but collapsed with raw sewage running in the streets and little safe drinking water creating the perfect conditions for the spread of Cholera a water borne disease that causes vomiting diarrhea and death. So far in Zimbabwe there have been around 600 deaths and 100,000 cases across multiple locations. Robert Mugabe has responded by calling a state of national emergency and appealing to the international community for help to treat the victims.

I think now is the time for all the separate nations and individual actors who make up the mythical international community to act. First by providing the medical resources needed to tackle the crisis free from agencies whose presence may delay the distribution of those resources. Then they need to exert real pressure on both Mugabe and Tsvangirai to make the power sharing deal work. If that cannot be achieved then western nation such as the US and the UK need to be prepared to deploy military force to remove the current power sharing government.