So it has come to this. Zimbabwe’s parliament, that flaccid rubber stamp for the ruling Zanu-PF party, has done precisely what was expected. It passed a bill to extend the president’s powers, consolidating control over the judiciary, security forces, and electoral commission. The usual chorus of Western condemnation has followed, led by the United Kingdom, which tuts and clucks from a safe distance. But let us not pretend this is a surprise. History, as I have observed time and again, does not repeat itself. It merely echoes. And this echo is unmistakably that of Rome’s late empire, where the Senate voted away its authority to a single man in exchange for illusory stability.
Compare this to the decline of Victorian liberalism. Once, the British Empire fancied itself a beacon of parliamentary democracy, gradually extending the franchise and curbing executive overreach. Today, that same empire’s successor state issues statements from Whitehall, impotent and moralising, while a strongman in Harare tightens his grip. The lesson is plain: the West has lost the will to enforce its values. It offers sanctions and sternly worded letters, but these are merely the gestures of a decadent civilisation that no longer believes in its own creed.
Zimbabwe is a case study in what happens when a nation abandons the delicate balance of powers. The bill, euphemistically called the "Constitutional Amendment Bill," strips the very checks that protect citizens from despotism. The president will now appoint judges at will. The security forces answer to him alone. The electoral commission is his creature. This is not reform. This is a funeral for the rule of law.
Some will argue that such measures are necessary for stability in a troubled nation. Nonsense. Stability purchased at the price of liberty is not stability; it is a prison. The Roman Republic learned this when it appointed Sulla as dictator to restore order. Order was restored, yes, but at the cost of the Republic itself. Zimbabwe is walking the same path.
What, then, can be done? The UK’s condemnation, while morally correct, is hollow. The true tragedy is that Zimbabwe’s citizens, weary of economic collapse and political dysfunction, may well accept this power grab. They have been told that democracy is a Western luxury, that unity requires a firm hand. This is a lie, but a seductive one. It is the same lie that has doomed nations from Rome to Russia.
We must ask ourselves: if Britain cannot even defend democratic norms in a former colony, what hope is there for the global order? The answer is grim. We are witnessing the slow erosion of the post-1945 consensus, a world built on the ashes of fascism and committed to liberal democracy. That consensus is dying, and Zimbabwe is just one of its tombstones.
I will leave you with this: every citizen who fails to oppose such bills is complicit. Every nation that condemns without acting is complicit. History watches, and it will judge us not by our words but by our deeds. So far, the ledger is not flattering.
