We pay lots of money to go there at the Security Council. We make speeches, we go home year in, year out and at the end of the day, the bosses in the Security Council say we shall never have the powers that we have as the permanent members”, said Mugabe. He was talking about the failure to walk the talk. In the eyes of Mugabe, UN meetings turned to be a routine formality, which at the end of the day did not bring change, which members especially in Africa were seeking. When appraising the work of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) since inception over 40 years ago, one cannot resist the temptation of borrowing a leaf from Mugabe, to say despite successes here and there, SADC has largely remained a talking shop on many fronts. The spirit of nationalism, which had gathered momentum in the 1960’s, began to pay dividends as many colonial masters began to pack and leave, ushering in a new era of self-determination and freedom in many African countries.
However, by the 1980’s Southern Africa remained unique and peculiar, as there were some pockets of the sub-continent still labouring and suffering under the yoke of colonialism and apartheid. Namibia in the West remained under the shackles of the stubborn apartheid South Africa, Zimbabwe in the north and South Africa toiled under white minority racist regimes.
