Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I agree completely with the member for Batman. The member for Cook is a very fine contributor to this place and that is evident from the motion before us today. It is really important that this discussion takes place and that we propose further motions along these lines. That is not because we perhaps live in a bit of a whitebread, white-skinned comfort zone here in Australia but because we value, as one of the world’s longest continuous democracies, what a democracy actually represents. A democracy is where the people are in charge—not those who have the biggest guns, the biggest voices or control of the infrastructure. A democracy is where the people are trusted with an opportunity to participate, and Zimbabwe simply is not that.

I am a member whose electorate has been one of the great beneficiaries of the thuggish and dreadful regime that Mugabe presides over. In south-east Queensland, 97 per cent of the Muslims who have come out of Southern Africa—that is, Zimbabwe, Malawi and South Africa—have come as business migrants. So, in my area, there are a lot of people who are opening businesses and bringing their professional skills. They are lawyers, accountants, doctors, dentists—you name it; they do it. And they are employing people and investing in Australia. I sit down and talk to people at places like the Kuraby Mosque and the Algester Mosque, and they are so sad about what the remnants of their families in Zimbabwe are telling them. If you drive around my electorate, you will see personalised registration plates like ZIM80, which spells out ‘ZIMBO’. This is a really obvious footprint in my local community.

In 1999, 2000 and 2001 I was honoured to represent members in this place as a member of the international executive of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. Too much of our time was spent talking about what to do about Zimbabwe. That was not because we were against Mugabe—Mugabe would put out a press release and the state media would say that the Australian parliament was picking on him—it was actually about the displacement of good order and good prospects for Africa that Zimbabwe represented.

I went to Kenya when I was a minister, in early 2003. I went to the Kakuma refugee camp. On the way through, I spoke to a fellow who was then the Minister for Home Affairs in Kenya, Moody Awori. He had just been elected. I think he is now the Vice-President of Kenya, although I do not pretend to be following Kenyan affairs as closely as some others. The reason I speak about Minister Awori is that his government had just been elected, and it was through the ballot box that they changed government. So Kenya is the exact opposite, if you like, of Zimbabwe, and shows that governments can come and go at the will of the people. I think Australia needs to be more than just a very strong voice, as it is, against this thuggish, bloodthirsty, despicable regime—I cannot find words parliamentary and polite enough to fully express my view, but you will make sure I do not use others, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is important that Australia also discriminates in favour of countries that are doing the right thing by their people and that are on the frontiers of other countries where there are great injustices occurring.

In my contribution to this debate I want to put a hand up and say that Kenya as a country needs to be recognised as a regime that has been prepared—as Taiwan has been, among the Chinese communities of the world—to change its government through the ballot box. Kenya is also carrying so much of the refugee load that has come from the displacement out of Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Rwanda and all those countries that are now becoming the source of so much migration to Australia. And Zimbabwe continues to languish in this awful set of circumstances. I think the member for Batman mentioned the figure of 1,000 per cent inflation. The Reserve Bank acknowledges, apparently, that there is 3,700 per cent inflation per annum in Zimbabwe. The figure is enormously mind-boggling. Unemployment is at 80 per cent. What does this regime actually deliver, other than death and despair? With the enormous percentage—20, 30 per cent or more—of Zimbabwe’s population suffering from HIV-AIDS it is an example of all that could go further wrong in Africa.

This parliament should not debate this just once. We should keep it up and do it with a bit of light and shade—not just see it as a black-and-white problem. I was talking earlier about the Muslims from an Indian ethnic background. They could have been the energy of the modern Zimbabwe; they have instead come to be the energy of the modern Australia. Mugabe stands condemned—there is no doubt about that—but we as a parliament, the sixth oldest continuous democracy, have a role to play in advocating for all those voiceless people who do not have a chance to speak for themselves in their own country.

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