dpb

Well after conversation with the gfriend tonight im about ready to throw in the towel - Apparently its seen as outrageous that Brown should be putting his oar in and that the language hes using so closley mirrors Tsvangarias 'rhetoric' that the two are obviously be in league and therefore Mugababe is the only candidate trustworthy enuff not to let the white man invade ,again

The us abassador is clearly correct and we just have to wait and see the what ever happens this weekend or some other weekend as it maybe

The Zohan

I Heard Peter Allen on R5 Live this evening interviewing Zimbabwes UK ambassador.

When Allen asked if Mugabebwe(sp) staying in power would be a good thing and would it m put an end to the suffering of the people the Ambasador stated that the suffering was caused by the UK and our friends (US and EU) and our sanctions, not mugbabwe.

I suppose that just about sums it up from the gov't. Not their fault but everyone eleses and who suffers, the poor people least able to do anything.

TBH i would rather the UK military went into Zimbabwe and captured this mass murderer, liar and thief (allegidly) and tried him as a criminal and get the rightful election winners into place and give them help and support to get it right.

Realistically the only people who can apply pressure is SA and they do not see a problem, well the ANC does but the president Embekke does not, so until SA get tough then nothing good will happen.

damn shame.

dpb

Im sure the sanctions are biting but surely the fact is the place is becoming bankrupt and ANYBODY coming in has more money/clout - not just the british or the yanks

The Zohan

It is become bankrupt due to selfish idiots driving out a lot of the white farmers who understood how to farm and get the most from the land, and had done so for generations farms now taken over in a lot of cases by subsistence farmers who live from one day to another. ground and crops ruined.

Zimbabwe - the breadbasket of Africa now has a begging bowl

Travel and tourism - now non existent.

Thi is mostly due to mugabwe and his government and their dislike bordering on hatred of the west and whites.

This is due to Mugabwe refusing to pay back loans made in good faith to help the country - anybody suprised at the lack of further investment i wonder.

This has been helped by the likes of SA just standing by and not saying a thing or doing a thing to help or advise.


I do doubt Mugabwes family and friends are dying from lack of food or illness somehow.

It is a poor situation exploited and old fear exploited to suit Mugabwe and not to heelp his people. It is not right and should not be allowed to continue!

dpb

The crux of the problem i guess indeed - the belief that everyone can exist if given their plot of land

Suresh

Zimbabwe is an African problem and needs an African solution. The 'evil west' should wash their hands of it and let them solve it themselves.


Either that or re-colonise...

PeteBrant

Not really. If the "evil west" hadn't turned up, enslaved the populace, taken all the best land and raped the countries resources in the first place then the problem, wouldn't exist.

We have a moral obligation

The Zohan

Oh come on, since the prediminantly white farmers left - often under duress the farms have been destroyed and the land not looked after by the subsistence farmers. No crops - no money. This is purely down to Mugabwe and his people, eve nafter kicking out the white farmers then just let it go to rack and ruin.

No tourism - people scared off, not wanting to go.

You can keep whinging on about what whitie did, that is not going to help the people whatsoever.

Mugabwe has relied on this and spread this rhetoric and what has it done, brought the country to its knees.

No foreign media allowed

Election didn't go his way so recount - i wonder what result that will have.


Mugababwe is poison and killing the country.

Zimbabwe needs to get over ity=s past, stop harping on and get on with now and the future. The country was not on its knees, economy fecekd untill Mugabwe started to ruin it, he is the problem.

It was the breadbasket of Africa, could be agian.

Tourism could be a huge source of income - again.

You can lead a horse to water....

stilover

True.
I remember seeing the images on TV. Gangs of black people invading farms owned by White farmers, hell bent on destroying/stealing everything in sight. The White farmers fleeing for their lives. No doubt beaten to death if they got caught.

They have brought it all on themselves. Destroy the farms, equipment, crops because you are an uneducated idiot and you'll pay the consiquences when there is nothing to eat.

They wanted their land back and got it. Now look whats happened.

PeteBrant

I agree with all of that, Paul - The white farmers situation is a sticky one, They weren't doing it for the benefit of Rhodesia, that for sure, and I'm pretty sure they didn't say, pay the local chiefs for ther land they stole.

But, yes, thier effect on the economy and welfar eof Zimbabwe was generally good.

Your assesment of Mugabe I would go along with.

I was generally making the point to Suresh that we can't just walk away from it.

dpb

Yeh thanks Sti - wouldnt have expected anything less from you

stilover

Care to explain what you mean by that?

The Zohan

In Fairness to Suresh, i am not too sure what we can do, we are seen and portrayed as evil by Mugabe and his regime.

There is little if nothing we can do.

SA would be the logical choice to help but they do not seem to register the problems and the severity.

Unless they ask for our help and invite us we will be seen as the enemy.

The whole situation is fecked up.

PeteBrant

Could you not apply that same statement to the white farmers? They stole the land, they didn't exactly "Share the wealth" - The standard of living difference between whites and black was absolutely enourmous.

Of course, the whole thing could have been handled better, but, it would have been fairly easy to work up the black population into a frenzy when they were earning an average of $40 dollares a month compared ot the white mans $8,000 per month.

davegtt

YouTube - Old Mugabe had a farm

Leslie

I think it is a bit unfair to blame the white farmers so heavily for taking a profit from the land. They had the entrepreneurial skill to establish the farms and they people they employed were paid and had a far better living then they have now under this despotic and evil man.

It is internationally illegal of course to use force to take the country's leader out, in the same way that it was wrong to use the excuse of removing SH for attacking Iraq. As ever it is down to the people to sort their bad leader out and we can only hope that they manage to succeed. It is difficult because Mugabe still has the power over the forces of law and order. It does not help when other African leaders kow tow to him also. Flash can make all the comments he wants of course but Mugabe will just continue to put up a couple of fingers to such a "small dot in the world"! Its a useful sound bite at the UN though.

Les

PeteBrant

Les, they were paid an absolute pittance - Compared to enourmous profits for the white farmers. The white farmers grew far and rich from land they stole, whilst the Zimbabwe people, who "owned" the land got paid in pennies.

Saying they had a better life with the white farmers than under Mugabe is a bit like saying that it would be far more prefereable to live in a carboard box than under a pile of newspapers.

vindaloo

Only way to sort out Zimbabwe is to D-notice the entire country. Drop it off the reporting radar and let it stand or fall by its own efforts.

Mugabe is a conundrum.... We know he's a bad leader of his country but they know he's a war hero who delivered them from the white man.

There are more important issues to deal with closer to home than worrying over the fate of an illegal 19th century adventure by Cecil John Rhodes.

J.

Leslie

Well you must know more detail than I do Pete. It is bad if they were not paid a fair wage Did they actually steal the land from someone or did they get possession of it legally i wonder.

Maybe the real difference is that they were not being beaten up and killed and were not starving at the time. In that case the cardboard box would be preferable I reckon.

Les

The Zohan

A friend of mines family was run off of their farm.

They provided safe homes, health care/access to doctors for them and their families and a decent/fair wage to their employees.

The family where intimidated and eventually run off by ex so called -freedom fighter/rebels whipped up and motivated by Mugabe told they could have the land.

The employees did not want to get involved or want the my friends' family to go but they had no choice but to go along with the so called freedom fighters

I think you will find this the case in many different farms.

Of course the only reporting was via Mugabe's press as the worlds press where evicted before this all kicked off.

Fat Boy

I have the very dubious honour of having had dinner with Mugabe back in the early 90's - In person he's every bit as shallow, sly and vicious as you might imagine. The sooner he dies the better as he has broken the back of his beautiful country.

Unlike a lot of other sub Saharan countries, Zim is, broadly speaking, lacking in most commodities other than water and good land - hence the fact that their main source of hard currency was the tobacco crop followed by tourism. That's why the farming being destroyed in the name of restoring human rights is so laughable - this excuse from a man who slaughtered 20,000 of his fellow Zimbabweans (but not his tribe, so that's alright then...) to come to power with our help via the Lancaster House agreement. His argument that the Uk didn't stick to it's side of the bargain by not paying for land re allocation is dubious given that he's hardly stuck to his side of the bargain to run the country to the benefit of (all) his people.

Now that the agricultural sector has been destroyed, following his short sighted driving out of the organised white farmers and the wholesale gifting to his cronies of the best farms which are now just unproductive overgrown bush with starving former workers living in shacks on, he thinks he is fooling everyone by just printing more money and getting the pathetic State controlled media to produce Stalinesque denials of the painful truth. The country is on it's knees, it's a human catastrophe worse than anything imposed on the indigenous population by the white farmers "taking" their land. If they had Oil the UN/George W would be flying in as we speak.

Sadly the tosser is in rude good health and Thabo Mbeki with his "quiet diplomacy" is just underlining why he is, and has been, such a weak president and role model for the region as the head of the regional economic super power.

Mbeki sat at the same table at that meal back in the 90's and true to form didn't say a word all the way through the meal - but, hey, he was only a deputy president then and not the real "Father of the Struggle" as Mugabe sees himself... In connection with that, a final illustration of Mugabe's lack of class is that when Mandela went to shake his hand earlier that same morning Mugabe turned his back on him in front of all of us as "Mandela had delayed Mugabe's plane when landing at Jo'burg that morning and who did he (mandela) think he was to do such a thing to person of my (mugabe) stature"

Mandela had flown in from his first meeting in Washington as SA president with Clinton that morning ( roughly 20 hour flight) and arrived at the same time as Mugabe who had flown 2 hours from Harare. Given that 1. Mandela's plane was probably flying on fumes,2. it's his country, and 3. he, and not Mugabe, was one of the moral giants of the 20th century it seemed quite reasonable to make Mugabe's plane go round one more time.

Complete tragedy and sadly a lot more people will suffer before he goes

dpb

Mbekis going to do sweet fa - hes out in a few months and is prolly in mugbabes favour in some way .!
Id love to know how different things would have been had he not decided to ditch the commomwealth before he was pushed ..

David Lock

That's a very interesting post Fat Boy. I know the country a little bit but am certainly no expert. And I think I would like to revisit the history of Rhodesia as my recollection is that it was a very unstable country with much tribal fighting before the whites arrived and they stabilised the place, the population increased enormously whilst the "whites" became the dominant tribal force. I agree that RSA holds the key but I am not clear what action we would like to see them take aside from warm words to Mugabe to quit?

I would have thought Mugabe was very close to a coup attempt by say, the police or military who must see the writing on the wall.

It's a shame he's black because had he been white he wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes. Evil b,astard and probably mentally damaged. dl

Fat Boy

I had high hopes for a coup this time following the shameful performance re the election, but most Zimbabweans are gentle people who just don't seem to have the will to do it.....yet

Suresh

Total rubbish. The moral obligation ended with independence, even though the actual funding hasn't stopped yet. Its an African problem which they are determined to do nothing to solve themselves. If the evil west hadn't gone there they'd be murdering each other and those they didn't murder would be sold into slavery by their own kind

Did other colonies turn into such basket cases? Can you explain why they didn't? I can!

dpb

Cos they got more minerals ?

jonc

I think with Brown on Mugabe, its a case of the pot calling the kettle black!!

cster

Thats true, who the f*ck voted for Brown to lead the country?
Certainly no one in England!

Holy Ghost

sanctions, schmanctions. 165,000% inflation. a formerly vibrant economy that has shrunk by 40% since 1999. average adult life expectancy of 39 years. rampant AIDS infection.

the cost of change is x1 5.56mm full metal jacket. kill mugabe. bring in the aid. clear the house. start the rebuild. stop pi55ing about.

Fuzz