African nations were to blame for the ongoing repression of Zimbabwe by President Robert Mugabe because they refused to pressure the strongman to step down, the country's Catholic archbishop said on Thursday.Archbishop Pius Alick Ncube said the president would never surrender power until South Africa, the region's heavyweight, stopped treating its neighbour as part of an untouchable club.
"The international community has tried its best. The people letting us down are the African nations. They will not come out and clearly condemn the injustices that are in Zimbabwe," Ncube told Reuters in Canberra.
Ncube, the Archbishop of Bulawayo, has been one of the strongest critics of 83-year-old Mugabe, who last year accused the cleric of being "possessed by a demon".
In reply the Roman Catholic Church has been asked by Mugabe critics to consider excommunicating the president - an action not taken against a world leader since Cuban leader Fidel Castro's 1962 excommunication.
Ncube said South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki was reluctant to criticise Zimbabwe because he shared Mugabe's mistrust of former colonial powers and it suited his country's economy.
"It's a kind of club of African leaders trying to defend one another. They will not listen to the West," he said.
"South Africa seems to be benefitting economically, because they are buying up property and investing in Zimbabwe."
African Union chairman and Ghanaian President John Kufuor said this week Africa should be worried about the growing crisis in Zimbabwe and he planned to question Mbeki on the situation.
Mbeki was recently appointed by the Southern African Development Community to mediate in Mugabe's crackdown on political rivals, which saw the police beating of opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
Ncube urged Australia to abandon a planned September cricket tour of Zimbabwe to avoid handing Mugabe a propaganda victory.
The archbishop, who met Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer on Thursday ahead of talks between Downer and Cricket Australia, said the situation in Zimbabwe was "unbearable".
Zimbabweans were coping with shortages of food, medicine, fuel and foreign currency, and the government had just announced electricity rationing, he said.
"I encouraged him that the Australian cricket team should not go. The tour would be propaganda. Mugabe will spend a lot of money on cricket to try and show things are normal," Ncube said.
Downer said he also wanted the team to abandon tour plans, with the government prepared to pay a possible $2 million fine.
"They are the world champions. The regime will be able to say 'well some politicians are isolating us, but look, we have the world's greatest cricket team here'," Downer told Australian television.
Mugabe, in power since independence in 1980, says the MDC is being funded by the West to carry out a campaign of terror to topple his government. The MDC denies the charges.
Ncube, who returns to Zimbabwe on Friday, said a solution in Zimbabwe would come only through the Southern African Development Community, which was slowly beginning to harden against Mugabe.
"Change must come, Mugabe knows how unpopular he is," Ncube said. "He regularly changes his bodyguard. He is shaking.
"Something must happen for Zimbabwe to continue to exist."
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