Guest 653- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,540
#1
Just in from my brother in South Africa
Letter from Zimbabwe sent in by John Winter
I reckon that these are the last days of TKM and ZPF. The darkest hour is always before dawn.
We are all terrified at what they are going to destroy next........I mean they are actually ploughing down brick and mortar houses and one white family with twin boys of 10 had no chance of salvaging anything when100 riot police came in with AK47's and bulldozers and demolished their beautiful house - 5 bedrooms and pine ceilings - because it was "too close to the airport", so we are feeling extremely insecure right now.
You know - I am aware that this does not help you sleep at night, but if you do not know - how can you help? Even if you put us in your own mental ring of light and send your guardian angels to be with us - that is a help - but I feel so cut off from you all knowing I cannot tell you what's going on here simply because you will feel uncomfortable. There is no ways we can leave here so that is not an option.
I ask that you all pray for us in the way that you know how, and let me know that you are thinking of us and sending out positive vibes... that's all. You can't just be in denial and pretend/believe it's not going on.
To be frank with you, it's genocide in the making and if you do not believe me, read the Genocide Report by Amnesty International which says we are - IN level 7 - (level 8 is after it's happened and everyone is in
denial).
If you don't want me to tell you these things-how bad it is—then it means you have not dealt with your own fear, but it does not help me to think you are turning your back on our situation. We need you, please, to get the news OUT that we are all in a fearfully dangerous situation here. Too many people turn their backs and say - oh well, that's what happens in Africa. This Government has GONE MAD and you need to help us publicize our plight--- or how can we be rescued? It's a reality! The petrol queues are a reality, the pall of smoke all around our city is a reality, the thousands of homeless people sleeping outside in 0 Celsius with no food, water, shelter and bedding are a reality. Today a family approached me, brother of the gardener's wife with two small children. Their home was trashed and they will have to sleep
outside. We already support 8 adult people and a child on this property, and electricity is going up next month by 250% as is water.
How can I take on another family of 4 -----and yet how can I turn them away to sleep out in the open?
I am not asking you for money or a ticket out of here - I am asking you to FACE the fact that we are in deep and terrible danger and want you please to pass on our news and pictures. So PLEASE don't just press the delete button! Help best in the way that you know how.
Do face the reality of what is going on here and help us SEND OUT THE WORD.. The more people who know about it, the more chance we have of the United Nations coming to our aid. Please don't ignore or deny what's happening. Some would like to be protected from the truth BUT then, if we are eliminated, how would you feel? "If only we knew how bad it really was we could have helped in some way".
[I know we chose to stay here and that some feel we deserve what's coming to us]
For now,--- we ourselves have food, shelter, a little fuel and a bit of money for the next meal - but what is going to happen next? Will they start on our houses? All property is going to belong to the State now. I want to send out my Title Deeds to one of you because if they get a hold of those, I can't fight for my rights.
Censorship!----We no longer have SW radio [which told us everything that was happening] because the Government jammed it out of existence - we don't have any reporters, and no one is allowed to photograph. If we had reporters here, they would have an absolute field day. Even the pro-Government Herald has written that people are shocked, stunned, bewildered and blown mindless by the wanton destruction of many folks homes, which are supposed to be 'illegal' but for which a huge percentage actually do have licenses.
Please! - do have some compassion and HELP by sending out the articles and personal reports so that something can/may be done. "I am one. I cannot do everything, ---but I can do something.. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by the grace of God, I will do." - Edward Everett Hale
You saw the photos of Robert Mugabe's Palace in Harare a couple of months ago and the ordinary african is having their humble home flattened by Mugabe.
We all know that evil succeeds when good men do nothing.
The rhetoric he spurts out is so far from the truth - he is a vile man and he must be stopped.
Roger
Guest 666- Registered: 25 Mar 2008
- Posts: 323
#2
Roger,
So true....
My brother-in-law and family are still out there, as are many friends and extended family.
I have tried repeatedly to e-mail or call them but only get an occasional text message through to a friend's mobile who is presently in Botswana.
Post never gets through and parcels disappear, inflation is worse than post-war Germany (have a receipt for a Coke that's got so many zeros next to it that it almost reaches off the till roll!) and it is from late last year.
Mugabe has control of all media, I can only pray for them all and hope for the best.
When I last visited you could not get anywhere near his palace for roadblocks and armed police. Had to wait for an interconnecting flight from Harare to Bulawayo and as there was no fuel to fly, eventually went by private car after overnighting with friends in the capital.
Friends have left the country to set-up again in Canada with all the setbacks a fresh start entails, but are at least free and improving their lot.
Oh Boy!, That'll be the day.........
Guest 653- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,540
#3
Thanks Buddy
Mugabe has got to be the worst President of any post-colonial country in Africa and the neighbouring countries of South Africa, Mozambique, Malawi, Zambiqa and Botswana must be just as bad as they won't say anything to ZANU-PF or Mugabe.
The International Community sit and wring their hands and do nothing and say about never allowing this kind of thing to happen again - but it IS happening again - NOW.
I haven't been to Zims since 1975, Rhodesia it was called then: 32 years ago and what a beautiful, peaceful country it was then; everyone - black and white were well fed, well educated, medical services the best in Africa, employment very high - and pay too.
No apartheid that I know of; they couldn't import things after sanctions, but it made them stronger and more innovative at making things and at this very difficult time, they were feeding all the neighbouring countries as well as their own.
The only thing they didn't have, was the vote and this was exploited by Russia and China.
Glad to hear your friends got out safely, but as you say, they now have the hard-time of starting afresh, albeit free.
I hope your brother-in-law's family are safe and his extended family.
May God bless the people of Zimbabwe and allow them to be free of ZANU-PF and Mugabe.
Roger
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
#4
Yes of course God bless tham all as they do indeed need help from on high. The latest suggestion coming we beleive from Mugabe is a form of power sharing with the new and almost certain election winner Zimbecki ( not sure of the spelling). However, while it might seem like a step forward out of the abyss for some, its also ever so slightly a horrifying prospect, almost like Tony Blair sharing power with Saddam Hussein for a better Irag....or Churchill sharing power with Hitler for a united Europe.
It is almost hard to beleive now but Robert Mugabe was once a heroic figure and highly thought of in the west...in the same mould one might almost say, as Nelson Mandele, but alas it was a paper thin illusion.
Yes Roger I remember those pictures of the Mugabe house and still have them about my person somewhere. May get a chance to add one or two later.
Guest 654- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 169
#5
Roger
Just a small point on part of your comment, wasn't it when it when it was rhodesia that it was whites for white? and blacks were not allowed to be in same places as whites etc etc??
hats not to say this president is the most vile person ever, the International community needs to to step in, he clearly lost the election, but hes not going to give up, he has the army behind him, and the rounding up of opposition party members/supporters to weaken them is a worry.
Unless he's stopped soon theres going to be a lot of blood shed.
This is indeed a sad day
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#6
luckily our victor is on his way there at this very moment, his special brand of diplomacy should bring peace
to that troubled country.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#7
Keef: I think you will find that Roger is right that there was no apartied in Rhodesia. The argument back then was over independence and 'universial suffrage'. They fortunately escaped the worse excesses of aparteid though of course it was not what we would call an 'equal' society. The whites feared that if the vote was extended to uneducated blacks Rhodesia would go the same way as so many other ex-colonial states and descend into a tin-pot dictatorship.
Mrs Thatcher managed to get a power sharing agreement and solved the Rhodesia issue at the time. Sadly the whites worse fears have materialised with Mugabe and a once prosperous country that fed half of Africa has decended into the same mess as many other African countries.
There can be no doubt at all that all the people in Rhosesia were much better off back under Iain Smith compared to now.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#8
barry
you seem to be saying that uneducated black people should not have had the vote.
that thinking from the colonial government spawned support for mr mugabe.
#9
When Iain Smith ceased to run the place, it also lost considerable investment. Might this have contributed to the decline? I also think we should be able to say, without fear of accusations of racism, that culture played a part in the same way that cultural fear of "the establishment" in the form of priests contributed to collusion with abuse inthe Cathlic Church - that didn't make Catholics or catholocism bad in the same way that the resultant Mugabe doesn't make democracy for poor blacks a bad thing.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
#10
I am not saying that howard. I merely point out the situation as it has developed. Sadly most of post-colonial Africa has brought nothing but poverty and misery to many previously wealthy and well run countries.
This is not about loss of investment, Bern, more about how the country has been misruled. The way the white farmers have been forced off their farms, that have been in their families for generations and produced a surplus of food that fed much of Africa. The new 'owners' did not have the knowledge and skills necessary and the land has gone to rack and ruin. So Zimabwe falls into famine.
It is tragic. Is all that starvation, death and misery worthwhile just for some 'principal' or political objective?
In Rhodesia a new African middle class was starting to emerge and given time these would have grown in numbers, confidence and skills, they would have played a full part in Rhodesian democracy. The handover of power came too soon, before they were ready so the country decends into chaos.