Staff Writer
The Zimbabwe Information Centre (ZIC) in Sydney, Australia has launched an online anti-sanctions campaign to request the Australian Government to remove its sanctions regime against Zimbabwe, as this has continued to be an impediment to an independent Zimbabwe trajectory to development since 1980.
To sign its petition follow link https://chng.it/tm62HLSy Australia imposed sanctions against Zimbabwe in 2002 following similar actions by the United States and European Union at the behest of Britain at the onset of the land reform programme which sought seeking to correct historical injustices in land ownership brought about by years of colonial misrule. For more details follow the link https://saynotosanctions.com/
Australia adjusted these sanctions in 2012 and 2013 due to progress made and the change of circumstances ushered in by the Inclusive Government.
This regime of sanctions follows the long-running United Nations, British sponsored, mandatory economic sanctions (see UNSC Resolution 232 of 16 December, 1966) which were meant to bring down the minority Smith regime within ‘weeks’ according to then British Prime Minister Harold Wilson.
Rhodesia survived till 1980 when Zimbabwe gained independence thus showing that sanctions do not work but hurt the ordinary citizens.
ZIC insists the Australian sanctions are out of date and urges Australians, Zimbabweans and people from other parts of the world to add their voice to the petition by signing it in support of social justice, restoration of dignity of the Zimbabwean people and a new chapter of psycho social and economic development, in line with the rest of the international community.
“By lifting these residual ‘smart sanctions’, Australia would increase pressure on the USA, UK and Europe to also lift these outdated measures with their perverse sweeping impacts on ordinary Zimbabweans,” reads the petition initiated by ZIC and addressed to Australian Fforeign Aaffairs Mminister Senator Penny Wong.
ZIC (the Zimbabwe Information Centre) is an Australian civil society organisation, supporting the people of Zimbabwe, borne out of student activism of the 1960s/70s as part of the Anti-Apartheid movement worldwide.
In this case ZIC is made up of Australians and international students, who operated under the auspices of the Alternative Rhodesia Information Centre, later the Free Zimbabwe Centre, Southern Africa Liberation Centre (SALC) and key First Australian organisations in the 1970s.
To this day, ZIC is still active, some of that original Committee, having risen to prominence in Australasia, were involved in for organising and hosting chairman Herbert Chitepo in a visit to Australasia in 1973, who the authorities then, introduced him to the region as, as Chairman of the Joint Military Command in Zimbabwe, and, in that visit, representing all the African Liberation Movements.
Mwalimu Julius Nyerere representing the Organisation of African Union (OAU), emphasised that to all that, all Liberation Movements accepted enjoyed the supervision of their policies and programmes, coordinated by the Dar es Salaam-based Liberation Centre in Dar es Salaam, itself an organ supervised by the OAU.
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