Submitted by admin on Sun, 2007-03-25 08:00. ::
Mugabe's notorious North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade waged war against the Ndebele people in the provinces of Matabeleland and the Zimbabwean Midlands during the mid- 1980s. Mugabe's own Shona-dominated government and armed forces organised the killings, which cost an estimated 20,000 lives among the other ethnic group. Most of their operations were targeted at defenceless civilians, whom Mugabe referred to as supporters of dissidents. In April 1983 Mugabe stated: "We eradicate them. We don't differentiate when we fight because we can't tell who is a dissident and who is not."
Most of the dead were shot in public executions, often after being forced to dig their own graves in front of their families and fellow villagers. The largest number of lives to have been taken in a single incident was 62, when a group of young men and women were killed on the banks of the Cewale River, Lupane, on 5 March 1983. The soldiers would also often burn their victims in their huts.
A 2005 campaign involved bulldozing the homes of around 320,000 people. Although the move was ostensibly aimed at eradicating shanty towns and illegal settlements in which poverty and disease were rife, the end effect was to drive out and make homeless large sections of the urban and rural poor, who comprise much of the opposition to the Mugabe regime. The operation caused mass unemployment across the country. Those whose homes have been flattened have been told to return to their traditional dwellings in rural areas of the country or they will be "dealt with" by the dreaded Central Intelligence Organisation, Mugabe's intelligence service.
Police arrested 50 people at a banned Harare prayer rally on March 11. They included Morgan Tsvangirai, the opposition figure and founder of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). All were beaten up while in detention, and Tsvangirai was attacked so severely that he had to be treated in intensive care for a fractured skull. Only the quick-thinking of his lawyers saved him when they realised how badly he had been attacked. Since then, other MDC figures have been attacked, supposedly by unidentified assailants, although few believe there is no link to the government. Nelson Chamisa, the MDC's spokesman, was beaten with an iron bar by eight assailants at Harare's airport in broad daylight and in front of people about to catch a flight to London. His skull was fractured. At first, injured MPs were not allowed to seek medical care in South Africa.
Prices rise daily. At 1,700%, Zimbabwe's annual inflation rate is the highest in the world. Many citizens spend their money in a rush as soon as they are paid, before its value evaporates. The International Monetary Fund estimates that inflation will hit almost 4,280% this year. Basic items such as bread, sugar, petrol are often not available in shops. Most factories and other employers have closed as the economy has gone from bad to worse. In the mid-1970s, £1 bought about one Zimbabwean dollar. Now, it will fetch $38m.
According to statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO), Zimbabweans have the shortest life expectancy in the world - listed as 37 years for men, and 34 years for women. Hospitals are affected by a chronic lack of money and resources, in some cases closing their doors to patients because they have no food, and others have made do without ambulances for months or even years. Hospitals are also afflicted by a brain drain, as qualified staff have fled for greener pastures abroad, often to neighbouring South Africa.
There are severe restrictions on freedom of assembly, and peaceful protests and meetings are either banned outright or broken up by the police. Last year, hundreds of demonstrators were arrested and many were violently attacked. Homosexuality is banned, and gay people are pursued through a "moral campaign" which makes "unnatural sex acts" illegal, with a penalty of up to 10 years in prison. Mugabe has even used this law to sideline other politicians, including his predecessor as President of Zimbabwe, Canaan Banana, who was convicted of gay sex offences.
Tough new laws restrict the freedom of the press in Zimbabwe. Journalists are regulated by a government-dominated Media and Information Commission, which retains the power to licence and to fine journalists who spread "false" stories. Journalists are threatened with being stripped of the ability to work legally if they displease the government, and have to re-register each year with the government to be allowed to carry out their jobs.
The state has used the re-registration system to intimidate critical newspapers, insisting they must retract "unhelpful" pieces or have their accreditation renewal turned down. The government's intelligence services buy out newspapers and then sack dissident editors and reporters, replacing them with government-friendly stooges. Many foreign media are banned, including the BBC and CNN.
Today there about 600 white farmers left in Zimbabwe, down from 4,500 in 1999. In 2000 the government decided to "fast-track" land reform in an effort to win over a hostile electorate, resulting in farm seizures by supporters of his ruling Zanu-PF party, who claimed to be landless veterans of the country's war for independence. Dozens of white farmers and black farm workers were killed in violent land seizures.
The takeover of white-owned farms turned one of Africa's most productive farm systems into a shambles. Most people are now trying to feed themselves by growing food where they can find space. Commercial production of maize, the main staple, has fallen from 810,000 tonnes in 2000 to barely 200,000 today.
The Commonwealth group of observers invited by the Zimbabwean authorities to observe the presidential election in 2002 strongly condemned the conduct of the poll. They said it was conducted in a climate of fear. The group blamed "paramilitary youth groups" for a systematic campaign of intimidation against known or suspected opposition supporters.
In addition, international observers said that opposition officials were unable to oversee polling in about half of constituencies, that they were deliberately waylaid on their way to polling stations and were subjected to violence and harassment by police and government-supporting militants. Furthermore, a law passed just ahead of the election stripped many citizens of their right to vote.
Edinburgh University originally awarded Robert Mugabe his honorary degree in 1984 for his services to education in Africa. At the time, there was considerable justification for the award as he rapidly expanded free primary and secondary education across the country, including the traditionally deprived rural areas.
However, the very reason for the award has now evaporated and the progress in the initial phase of independence has been largely undone. Those schools which are still operating are struggling to function with a shortage of teachers and books, and many have returned to levying fees, which few families can afford.
The economic crisis means that, the fees notwithstanding, families are often forced to remove their children from school in order to earn a living and help provide for their parents and other family members.
Anyone with anything to do with Edinburgh University will want them to remove his degree and take steps to distance the university from this ogre and do it as soon as possible. Perhaps the left-wing liberals who feted him in the 1980s should now admit that they have some egg on their faces and that maybe they should have seen this coming. His actions are completely unacceptable and the university should have no link with this man.
If there is to be a list of the people who should lose their degree, Mugabe should be near the top, and it should be removed. The university should definitely act. I do think that what the university does is somewhat peripheral to the wider issue of improving things for the ordinary people of Zimbabwe.
Speaking as a graduate of Edinburgh University, I would welcome such a step as a sign of the university's revulsion at Mugabe's treatment of the people of Zimbabwe.
We want the university to strip him of his degree. Maybe Mugabe himself will act like he doesn't care. But an honorary degree is a sign of approval and therefore its removal is a sign of disapproval and it would show critics of Mugabe that the world is taking notice.
The guy is going to be known as the next Idi Amin,he just turned a very rich country into mess,and he took only a few years to do it,but its sad to say since Ian Smith broke away from the commonwealth and he was turfed out by this Dictator,the country has gone from bad to worse,the poor people are begging and there are no farmers to feed them.So I know that the people will eventually overthrow him, but how many of them will die in the process.Lets get rid of him now?
I would have thought it was obvious that this man was ignorant and unsuited to rule a country when some years ago he insisted that Aids was not a problem and refused to do anything about it! It is no surprise to me that he is now demonstrating that ignorance and brutality for all the world to see! An Honorary Degree .......... you are joking?
While we may take issue with Mugabe's government, are any of the Western complaints truly out of concern for black Africans? Aren't these the same people who were slow to assist Darfur, Rwanda, Somalia, Uganda, Zaire, and (particularly for the U.S.) black Americans during Katrina? Where are the scholars on these issues?
Shouldn't the world, regardless of what they think about Mugabe, support the efficient operation of farmlands in Zimbabwe so that the entire region can feed itself? Yes. However, this does not happen. How can the West claim concern for the democratic rights of Africans when they refuse to help them eat? Democracy on an empty stomach is empty democracy, indeed. So you should be asking yourself about the true efforts behind Western suppression of Zimbabwe?
The answer is quite simple. The nations all lined up to suppress Mugabe are the same nations who claim to respect national sovereignty, but who are also the very same national actors who have violated human life for centuries.
These morally bankrupt nations, particularly England and the U.S. refuse to apologize and make amends for their current and historic evil participation in events that have shattered lives on the African continent.
However, as soon as Mugabe finds a solution for managing the African nation in an international environment where powerful Western nations suddenly develop amnesia for why Africa is in ruins in the first place, he is suppressed. I am referring to Mugabe's moves to restructure Zimbabwe such that whites are NOT the rulers over black life. Western attacks on Mugabe is about the West’s failure to deal with the white control of black land issues that infuriates blacks around the globe.
In short, the West is not the least bit concerned for African life. How can any rational human being believe this? What serious accounts in Western history would draw any serious thinker to this conclusion? The West has plenty of opportunities to prove me wrong, but as outlined above, have failed miserably on all counts.
The real issue behind suppressing Mr. Mugabe is more related to his example of how the black man may have to respond to Western amnesia. This in Western eyes is indeed a dangerous lesson. It is the very reason why the West, even when pressed, refuses to apologize for slavery and conquest. They do not want to lend legitimacy to black claims. Western responses to actions in Zimbabwe has less to do with the local issues of democratic participation and more to do with punishing a man who would dare reason that whites should not be in control of the most productive farmlands in Africa. Think!
If Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) had oil or uranium we'd have sorted it years ago. Talk about double standards where these african dictators are concerned.
#7 Eloquently written,but screwed up as soon as you offered 'support the efficient operation of farmlands in Zimbabwe'. Have you been asleep for the past 20 years? It is this despotic, monster who has turned the 'breadbasket' of Africa into a 'basket case' NO ONE ELSE, NO ONE!
Idi Amin, Robert Mugabe, and other 'black' Africans have been to blame for untold death and misery in Africa. Not Westerners, AFRICANS. Congo,Darfur,Somalia, Eritrea, the list is endless. Tribalism and Greed can not be laid at the feet of non Africans. The West were 'fair' to Zimbabwe when they interfered and ensured the fall of the Smith Government (of course, with the best of intentions for Africans, not the white Rhodesians). The persecution of 'white farmers' by this truly man is the SOLE reason for the total collapse of the country's economy. No other reason even comes close.
As for the old hoary chestnut of apologies for slavery. Have we heard ONE APOLOGY from any African state, or Arab state for their participation in the slave trade? Nary a one. They were the ones who had their noses in the trough as deep as anyone else. Apologise, them?Dream on, and neither should we.
Only one of many very bad leaders. What about Bush of the US or Harper in Canada. All killers, each in his own way. As said many times "power corrupts and absloute power corrupts absloutely.
#10 you are a sick puppy, comparing Mugabe with Harper and Bush is a huge stretch of the imagination.Disney are looking for new material, should give them a ring! Dangerous talk too. Assassination your answer to everything is it? Blaming them all as 'killers in their own way'and advocating 'Assassination is too good for any of them!!!!? You didn't pull the wings off flies when you were younger did you?
"A defiant Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said SA would not be put off its "quiet" diplomacy by foreign critics and would continue to try to bring the two Zimbabwean sides together in a dialogue."
Explaining the government view that both sides in the conflict should exercise restraint and contribute to national dialogue, Pahad said that, according to the Zimbabwean government, there had been many petrol bombings and looting of shops, burning of buses, hijacking and destruction of vehicles and injuries to policemen, three of them serious. Pahad attacked the SA media for its critical reporting on Zimbabwe, saying this was not helping towards a constructive solution."
#7 Kurt You are clearly out of touch, my man. There are millions of Zimbabweans who are "thinking" very hard as to why so much productive farmland is left fallow while they watch their children starve to death. Even Mugabe has asked the white farmers to come back!!!!!!!
#7 Kurt You are clearly out of touch, my man. There are millions of Zimbabweans who are "thinking" very hard as to why so much productive farmland is left fallow while they watch their children starve to death. Even Mugabe has asked the white farmers to come back!!!!!!!
And before you justify some of those political stances (which are based purely on skin colour) can you IMAGINE what it must be like to watch your children starve to death in front of your eyes?
This is cache, read story here
