Peter Hain: England should not play into the hands of Mugabe's odious regime

Hit Zimbabwe hard by transferring all its World Cup games to South Africa

It's hard not to sympathise when England's cricket captain, Nasser Hussain, pleads for others to take moral decisions for him over staging some of the World Cup matches in Zimbabwe, though the idea that this crisis has come out of the blue is risible: everyone has known for months, from their television screens, of the violence and mayhem that the President of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, has wreaked on his people.

But listening to the views of cricketers and their officials reminds me of the 1960-70 era. Then, they just wanted to play South African teams, regardless of the fact that blacks were denied by apartheid laws from doing so, that sport was a weapon of white South African tyranny, and that our sports boycotts of that era delivered what Nelson Mandela later confirmed was a mortal blow to apartheid.

Although the cricketers' scheduled visit to Zimbabwe raises different issues from apartheid in sport – because cricket there is multi-racial – the common principle is that sports people cannot divorce themselves from life and the moral decisions of life. What made apartheid South Africa unique was that all sport – from school to club to provincial to national level – was organised on racist lines. From the bottom to the top of all sports, blacks and whites could not be members of the same team.

Politics in the old South Africa infected the very organisation and spirit of sport as no other tyranny, whether communist or fascist, had done then, or has done since. At the time, other tyrannies – from military regimes in Pakistan to fascist juntas in Latin America, Spain or Portugal, to Stalinism in Russia – were abhorrent. But their nasty politics rarely, if ever, infected their sport. If South African-type boycotts and protests had been applied to every country deemed to have strayed from democracy and freedom, international sport would have ground to a halt.

Equally, let us be clear, sport has always been mixed up with politics. For example, in his rapprochement with China in 1971 President Nixon used "ping-pong diplomacy". In 1973 the French cancelled a sports tour to Australia after protests about French nuclear tests in the Pacific. And so on. Additionally, there were moments when to proceed with a prestigious sporting event was to endorse tyranny. That was true of the 1936 Berlin Olympics, which Hitler milked mercilessly. It was the case, too, with the Moscow Olympics in 1980 following the invasion of Afghanistan (which I argued – unsuccessfully that time – should be boycotted).

As arrangements in Harare and Bulawayo have confirmed, Mugabe wants to exploit the cricket World Cup to project an image of normality: as if the civilised ambience of the village green – its peaceful decency, its multi-racial tolerance – applies in Zimbabwe today. But, of course, it doesn't. Zimbabweans who don't support Mugabe are deliberately deprived of food aid: in all, seven million people – half the population – are estimated to be starving. Opposition supporters are violently attacked and sometimes killed. Elections are rigged.

The country is being devastated by a man interested in one thing only: his personal enrichment and absolute power. The shameless way he and his élite have destroyed the economy, driven away investment, pushed inflation up to 150 per cent, eliminated the rule of law and transformed an African success story into a crying failure is nothing short of criminal. When Mrs Mugabe helped herself to a farm recently she followed others in the ruling élite who had not only driven a white farmer off the land but 100 or more skilled black workers too. And even worse, these captured farms have become derelict: instead of being the "breadbasket" of southern Africa, Zimbabwe is now dependent upon imported food and aid.

I wonder whether Mugabe and his henchmen ever recall the spirit of the freedom struggle that they so bravely waged, with the active support of many in the West. It was both a struggle against white oppression and a fight for freedom, democracy and non-racialism: the very same values that they are so ruthlessly destroying today. It is important for British opinion to be absolutely consistent. Black tyranny is no better than white tyranny. It is tragic that Mugabe is no better than the leader of white Rhodesia, Ian Smith, who locked him up, and whose security services bred exactly the kind of terror inflicted on Morgan Tsvangirai and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change today.

But consistency also requires acknowledging hypocrisy. What a comfort it is to see Conservative politicians and right-wing newspapers fearlessly leading the charge against Mugabe. But where were they in the fight against apartheid? They were backing sports tours to the hilt. They were fraternising with white South Africa's rulers and betraying Nelson Mandela and the rest of us involved in the anti-apartheid struggle. No wonder the black and brown cricketing nations have greeted the white attack on Mugabe with some sourness.

But they, too, have some questions of consistency to answer. I know Commonwealth leaders detest Mugabe's atrocities. I know African leaders are appalled by what he has done to Africa's name, and the way he has shaken international investor confidence. I know because they and their colleagues have told me so. But what are they actually doing about Mugabe? What are they doing to help oppressed Zimbabweans? As the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have made clear, an African solution is needed to this desperate problem – one that would immediately attract support from donor countries such as ours.

The truth is that this World Cup is not really about the anguish of English, or now Australian, cricketers. It is about the credibility of the International Cricket Council and the Commonwealth – white, brown and black member countries all together. As the Zimbabwean opposition is pleading, the ICC should act to transfer every game to be played in that country to South Africa, which is a beacon of multi-racialism, tolerance and democracy, just as Zimbabwe is a beacon of the very opposite.

If Mugabe gets his way and the event proceeds, England should not go. But if their international sister organisations will not stand up for morality against oppression, if other governments will not back our own government's stand, then it is still important for English cricket to show some moral backbone.

What about those Zimbabwean youngsters unable to play because they haven't been fed? What will the English team do if British sports journalists are blocked from covering not just the overs and the runs, but the context too? What will they do if ordinary Zimbabweans protest against the matches – as they well might – and are clubbed away mercilessly, maybe to death? The temperature on the streets in Zimbabwe is rising. Starvation and desperation is widespread. It could well erupt around the World Cup as people demand food and freedom.

If international cricket doesn't care about this then what are its values? What does it really stand for except the right to bat on regardless? The odious Mugabe regime would gain an enormous propaganda victory if the World Cup went ahead. Which is why it shouldn't.

Peter Hain, Secretary of State for Wales, was minister for Africa, and before that a leading anti-apartheid campaigner