Zimbabwe crisis

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ANDREW MARR: The Archbishop, Doctor John Sentamu is here. Archbishop welcome.

DR JOHN SENTAMU: Thank you ... Andrew.

ANDREW MARR: Apart obviously from Mr Mugabe who is responsible for this? Who should we be pointing the finger at?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: I think it is Mugabe because he inherited a very, very rich country and now it is running at about 8000% inflation.

There is starvation and the medical services have nearly collapsed, except for the very rich up in the northern part of Harare.

And he took on a fantastic place, very much like Idi Amin.

He took on a beautiful Uganda with good education, good health, good roads, good infrastructure, and he ruined it.

And it really takes generations to recover. So he's responsible.

But I also want to think that the international community has been to coalescent in really putting pressure on Mugabe.

The African Union has been promising that they'd provide an African solution but actually they haven't succeeded in doing this.

ANDREW MARR: What about South Africa?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: I think South Africa in many ways people have looked to it as a livery because the economic relationship between Zimbabwe and South Africa is very close.

And we know looking towards Thabo Mbeki to do it but actually he hasn't put the pressure. He now has got three million refugees from Zimbabwe in South Africa.

Some of them are professionals - teachers, doctors, nurses - and in fact they're helping that economy. But what they've left behind is a devastated nation. And I believe that something needs to be done.

You know what surprises me, you see the President of Uganda and I, ... you know in our young days, were at a Christian Union Conference, the day you know Mr Ian Smith declared UDI and he's protested and actually left the conference because he thought we should all protest.

So I want to remind my good friend, Yoweri Museveni that you did not protest to end up with a country in chaos in Zimbabwe. It is high time he and our own prime minister and all those other people to begin, really get a better United Nation resolutions and simply say enough is enough.

ANDREW MARR: So what should Gordon Brown do? Have you had any dealings with him, discussed this?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: Yes. I spoke to the Prime Minister last night and in fact he said that I should say that I have spoken to him. He is concerned.

He saw your report which again I must say that Sue Lloyd Roberts has done the international world a lot of good by her report which is very brave and very courageous. So I'm hoping that this coming week the Prime Minister is going to make some response.

And he says part of the trouble has been whenever the international community has wanted to do something the African Union have said "We will give it an African solution" but I don't think they're going to do it, just as I don't think they've been successful in Darfur really.

ANDREW MARR: So if the time for an African solution is passed what should Gordon Brown and other western leaders now be doing?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: I think what he should do is get a coalition of the international community to get sanctions. You see sanctions were passed against the then Ian Smith, they were passed against Apartheid in South Africa. And people were always saying "Oh but it will hurt the poor and ..." but they didn't.

Those who've got a lot of money survive but the poor really end up being very poor. So I think a very robust United Nation resolution, things like boycotting sport activity with Zimbabwe, reducing the number of their sort of embassy staff all over the world because you see those embassies become places which are conduits for some of the money to be taken out of the country.

ANDREW MARR: The elite can use them as refuges?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: Elite can use them as refuges. They can actually deposit huge sums of money outside of Zimbabwe. They can get goods through the diplomatic bag into Zimbabwe. Really the country will come to its many senses if the elite and those who support Mugabe actually were not longer having that access.

ANDREW MARR: So you're talking really about a full economic boycott until Mugabe is toppled?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: Absolutely. I mean ..

ANDREW MARR: Because things couldn't get any worse?

DR JOHN SENTAMU: They can't get any worse. I mean he's really, he's got, either he's got to realise that his time is up and that actually he's ruining the country and somebody else should take over or really the international community have got to make sanctions work and actually they can make them stick.

Because that country is so wealthy, it's the bread basket of that region. And what's happening to it? People are starving.

ANDREW MARR: I mean there has been a natural recoil I suppose in countries like Britain from taking this kind of action, partly for fear that it looks like a return of white colonialism which is of course what Robert Mugabe keeps describing.

DR JOHN SENTAMU: Oh he's been, he has been mastering at it with African Union.

Every time he says "My trouble is not with my people and the country, is with Britain because they didn't sort out the land reform, because they didn't promise everything else". He's been good at it. But I'm afraid he really has been telling an untruth.

A lot of farms were actually illegally acquired. He's changed the way the law actually applies. And the time has actually come for people to get rid of their guilt and see the suffering in Zimbabwe. It is an international problem and we've got to give it an international solution.

ANDREW MARR: Archbishop, we'll talk again in a moment but for now thank you very much indeed.

INTERVIEW ENDS

NB: this transcript was typed from a recording and not copied from an original script.

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