Posted on 07/18/2002 3:59:32 AM PDT by Clive
The power to stop this nonsense is in our hands
IN 24 days’ time 3 000 commercial farmers are expected to be off their land and out of their homes, when the government’s deadline for them to leave runs out.
Along with the 3 000 farmers will go hundreds of thousands of farm workers, their wives, children and other dependants.
Officials estimate that almost 2 million people will be made homeless, jobless and destitute on 10 August 2002, but this is only the tip of the iceberg.
When these farmers are forced to close their operations they will have to sell or slaughter all their remaining livestock including chickens, beef and dairy cattle, sheep and pigs.
Every single Zimbabwean will be directly and immediately affected when 3 000 commercial farms are shut down on the orders of the Ministry of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement.
Shortly after the departure of 3 000 commercial farmers Zimbabweans must expect immediate and massive shortages in eggs, milk, dairy produce, meat and vegetables.
All commercial enterprises in the manufacturing and industrial sectors who use agricultural inputs will be affected within months.
This includes food processing, canning, clothing, tanning and leather industries. It includes paper and wood industries, packaging, stationery, furniture and even the box of matches you use to light your stove.
It includes agricultural machinery and toolage which will directly affect all the companies which serve the farming community’s needs.
All the export crops that farmers grow will also come to an end.
This includes roses, paprika, exotic vegetables, herbs and tobacco.
The loss of export revenue from these crops will affect every single one of us as there will be even less foreign currency to pay for fuel, spare parts, vehicles and medicines.
When 3 000 commercial farmers are forced off their land in three weeks’ time, they will take with them decades of expertise in a huge diversity of crops and products.
If indeed Dr Joseph Made, the Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement, has put 300 000 peasants onto commercial farms they will be subsistence farmers who have no capital, no title deeds, no collateral and no experience in growing the highly specialised crops which have made Zimbabwe into what it is today.
They will grow enough food for themselves and their families and the rest of us face a desperate future surviving on imported goods.
This is not a racial statement. It is a plain and simple fact because you cannot take a penniless peasant who knows how to grow maize and expect him to be able to produce export quality roses.
Made’s 300 000 resettled villagers cannot afford their own seed maize, let alone fertiliser, pesticides and herbicides.
They do not have the money to pay for electricity with which to run their newly acquired irrigation equipment.
They do not have the money to employ people to help cultivate the crops and tend the livestock.
They do not even have transport to get their crops to the market.
By all accounts, it seems that our government is not going to change its mind on this mass eviction and many hundreds of farmers are already packing up their lives and belongings in preparation.
These 3 000 farmers do not have a voice in this madness. Their union is crumbling, its leaders divided, its members desperately hoping for intervention.
They have no one to turn to for help.
The courts make rulings saying their properties have been de-listed, but on the ground the settlers and war veterans do not go away and the police do not step in to help because they say it is political.
It is up to the people of Zimbabwe to decide if this is what they want.
It is now up to each and every one of us to decide if we can afford to stay silent for one more day.
It is up to every man, woman and child in Zimbabwe to demand the right to be able to buy home-grown food.
The power to stop this is in our hands and we have less than a month in which to do it. No one can help us until we begin to help ourselves.
This issue is a question of survival.
One was under the office of the Political Editor and the other destroyed th printing press.
Daily News editors and reporters are routinely harrassed and arrested on trumped-up charges.
Yet the Daily News continues to print editorials such as this.
Indeed, there is a whole cadre of courageous people in the independent press who seem to be competing with one another to be the one who is arrested most often.
Such fine people, they are the hope of Zimbabwe. The only answer is to get rid of Mugabe. Once he's gone, the whole house of cards will collapse.
"We know that Gaddafi is the only person who is in support of Mugabe's land reform programme which is completely destroying your country," said Corrie from Scotland. "And he is the only person who has agreed to accept your currency for fuel. But that will create a huge deficit for your future generations - that is mortgaging the country." The State media said Mugabe left for a week-long state visit to Cuba but sources within the government said he might make a surprise visit to Venezuela, a member of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).
Venezuelan Energy and Mines Minister, Alvaro Silva Calderon, was appointed the Opec secretary-general last month. "The fuel situation is getting worse and with the Libyans reportedly turning a cold shoulder after amassing land in Zimbabwe, there is a pressing need to take the begging bowl to other oil-producing countries like Venezuela to avert the crisis," said the source. "Why would the President honestly spend a week in Cuba when he has been there before?" he said. Last week, parts of the country were hit by fuel shortages triggered by hoarding amid reports that the commodity was in short supply.
Zimbabwe has been facing perennial fuel shortages since senior executives at the State-owned National Oil Company of Zimbabwe were alleged to have misappropriated millions of dollars a few years ago. The situation was further compounded by the shortage of foreign currency as many countries have stopped doing business with Zimbabwe, now regarded as a rogue state. George Charamba and Jonathan Moyo, the government spokesmen, could not be reached for comment on Mugabe's itinerary. Charamba was said to be travelling with Mugabe while Moyo was said to be out of town. Sources within the government said pressure was mounting on Libya - which provides 70 percent of the country's fuel requirements - to cut the supplies.
Last week, the EU parliament passed a resolution to urge "Libya and other states to end material support that reinforces President Mugabe's intransigence". "Because of the Lockerbie issue and our approach Gaddafi will give in. We are asking all developed countries which buy fuel from Libya to pressurise it to stop trading with your country otherwise it will risk their orders," said Corrie. With the maverick Libyan leader set to become a member of the New Partnership for Africa's Development, relations with Zimbabwe are expected to turn icy as he could sign up for a peer review arrangement.
This would see African leaders being subjected to scrutiny on issues of democracy, good governance and accountability. [End]
It is a matter of life or death.
The weeping and handwringing is on hold until black Zimbabs begin to starve. Then the UN will announce that the famine is a crisis caused by the evil white farmers who spitefully liquidated all their holdings and fled with the country's riches to other shores. Naturally, the usual media suspects will harp upon this lie as though it were gospel and insist that the American taxpayer shoulder yet another burden.
The writer of the article below (and his editor) were arrested by Mugabe after exposing what is going on. But so far, the article is still on the net:
In addition, ex-Mossad officer (is there really any such thing?) is in the employ of Mugabe:
Government Pays Ben-Menashe US $400 000 for Lobbying
Zimbabwe was allied against UNITA in the Angolan war. Arkadi Gaidamak provided the GPS equipment used to assisinate Savimbi (a man Reagan called a "freedom-fighter") and end the war. Gaidamak was part owner of Africa Israel controlled by ASCorp and Lev Leviev. Rumors in the diamond trade are that ASCorp abuses its Angolan monopoly by forcing down prices to encourage smuggling. This allows high quality stones to reach cutters in Antwerp without paying an export tax. Former IDF officer Yair Klein has been doing the same thing in Sierra Leone with Leonid Minin. There diamonds are smuggled to Monrovia under the protection of president Charles Taylor and transport to the mideast under diplomatic cover by Liberian's ambassador to Israel.
Mugabe is crazy but he is not crazy alone. There is money to be made and some are raking it in. Those are the ones who need to be stopped.
Strange that I do not hear a chorus of weeping and wailing and wringing of the hands screeching from the vaunted UN , or CBS, NBC, ABC, New York Times or even Fox.
Perhaps the above answers that question.Too many powerful people making money from Mugabe.
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