South Africa Is Not Zimbabwe.(though two often linked by association)(Brief Article)

If things go as planned, Zimbabweans will go to polls this weekend to choose a president. After months of state-sanctioned political terror, President Robert Mugabe has made it clear he'll stop at nothing to win. If he does, Zimbabweans lose a historic opportunity for change. That's tragic enough. But far more important will be the impact across the Limpopo, on a larger and more globally connected South Africa.

South Africa has been suffering a bad case of guilt by association. As Zimbabwe has disintegrated, South Africa's reputation (and currency) have taken a beating. "They are facing a very serious perception crisis," says Konrad Reuss, managing director for sovereign rating at Standard and Poor's. "They are lumped together with Zimbabwe... Many international investors can't differentiate." The neighbors share similar histories of racial strife. Both broke free of white-minority regimes. Both face challenges of income inequality, black poverty and land redistribution. As a result, Americans and Europeans, appalled by the racial violence and tumult in Zimbabwe, ask: can South Africa go the same way?

So, let's end the speculation here and now. South Africa is not Zimbabwe. Let's all say it together: South-Africa-is-not-Zimbabwe.

South Africa is a democracy. It has one of the most progressive constitutions on the planet, and an independent judiciary empowered to uphold it. South Africa has a strong and growing civil society, an increasingly multihued middle class, a free media (witness the very public brouhaha over President Thabo Mbeki's views on HIV transmission) and a powerful and vocal business community. After decades of doomsaying about the coming Armaggedon during white rule, and years of hand-wringing about what a black government would do, South Africa's economy is growing. Unlike the United States, it has a budget surplus. It has a debt level that would qualify it for membership in the European Union, today. In his annual budget speech two weeks ago, Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, lauded internationally as South Africa's Alan Greenspan, actually announced a tax giveback--and an increase in social spending.

Zimbabwe? Zimbabwe has had the same leader for its entire existence. (South Africa's first universally elected president stepped down after a single term.) Mugabe is part of a moribund breed of corrupt autocrats ruling failing kleptocracies that have little transparency. There is no rule of law. Zimbabwe is suffering from international opprobrium, fuel and food shortages and 100 percent inflation. Mugabe's heroic accomplishment, leading his people to freedom, has putrefied to a legacy of failure. The power of the Big Man never became the power of the state. Mugabe and his ...