A bit of the Ultraviolence, or The Mugabe thread

seems like the majority of African neighbours of Robert Adolf Mugahitler are calling him out, finally. but they took their damn time, and they are still not calling for his removal, just for him to play nicely. that’s not going to happen, folks: he’s an obstinate megalomaniac, and those just don’t simply walk away.

you need to go in there and forcibly remove him and his, put him on trial at the Hague, and castrate him and his inner coterie publicly and without anaesthetic. and then you need to put some plan in place to run down the power of the ‘veterans’ and bring back some form of law and order to the country. the place has a good state institution infrastructure already, it should not be too hard with a fresh set of faces to put things back on track in five years or so.

if nothing happens, prepare yourself for another Rwanda. and piss on China for their veto in the UN, they are complicit in this whole affair too.

[quote=“JMcNeill”]So, America needs to take the lead on this one too? Why can’t someone else man up and take this a-hole out?

Oh that’s right, then you wouldn’t be able to bitch and moan about it if some innocents get hurt in the process.[/quote]

You’re quite right, of course. I live in daily shame as a South African that our “illustrious” leaders have done absolutely nothing about Zimbabwe in the last eight years. It’s a situation of, “He helped us pre-1994, so now he can do no wrong.”
Shameful in the extreme.

I was going to open a thread on this before I saw this thread:
How about this for double standards/double think…

[quote]Fellow African leaders showed little willingness on Sunday to stand up to President Robert Mugabe and condemn the longtime Zimbabwe ruler’s disputed, violent reign ahead of his arrival at an African Union summit.

Despite international calls to isolate Mugabe, the AU readied to welcome him as a legitimate head of state. [/quote]

and then…

I guess the Zimbabwean masses aren’t suffering enough yet…

[quote=“urodacus”]seems like the majority of African neighbours of Robert Adolf Mugahitler are calling him out, finally. but they took their damn time, and they are still not calling for his removal, just for him to play nicely. that’s not going to happen, folks: he’s an obstinate megalomaniac, and those just don’t simply walk away.

you need to go in there and forcibly remove him and his, put him on trial at the Hague, and castrate him and his inner coterie publicly and without anaesthetic. and then you need to put some plan in place to run down the power of the ‘veterans’ and bring back some form of law and order to the country. the place has a good state institution infrastructure already, it should not be too hard with a fresh set of faces to put things back on track in five years or so.

if nothing happens, prepare yourself for another Rwanda. and piss on China for their veto in the UN, they are complicit in this whole affair too.[/quote]

Problem is, no one is calling him out, let alone the “majority.” He ios recognised as the legal head of state and that’s that.
You’re right about one thing, he won’t simply walk away. As was the case with Angola, the civil war continued until Jonas Savimbi died. Now Angola is at peace and starting to flourish.

The situation in Zimbabwe can only change in one of two ways:

  1. SADC, led by South Africa, or the AU, led by South Africa and/or Nigeria need to send a sizable military invasion force into Zimbabwe. They need to crush the Zimbabwean Armed Forces, capture Mugabe and his entire cabinet and hold free and fair elections with the SADC/AU military still in the country and other international election observers to ensure its free and fairness. After the election which, if it is free and fair, Mugabe could never hope to win, Mad Bob and his cabinet should be handed over to the new government for trial.
    This is the best option, but I have a better chance of growing a vagina than that ever happening.
  2. Mad Bob will die, because that’s what old people do. Unfortunately, the psychotic SOB will probably still hang on for another ten years or so. Once he dies Zimbabwe will be truly free and things will improve. Perhaps the population will be encouraged to dance on his grave and piss on him, because that’s all he deserves.

This is Africa, gentlemen. Forget your pre-conceived ideas of freedom and democracy, it doesn’t exist on that continent in any form you would recognise. Not even in South Africa. In Africa, change only comes at the end of a barrel or with death (natural or otherwise), and nothing but power is respected. Simple as that.

I forgot to post the article in my previous post. Here it is:
news24.com/News24/AnanziArti … 53,00.html

Someone mentioned ‘Tears of the Sun’. To quote Bruce Willis’ character, “God has left Africa a long time ago…”

Love this quote:

And to think this thug was once the savior of the left in the last part of the 20th Century. I think it is utterly shameful that notable South African politicos such as Mandela and Mbeki and the new rapist guy aren’t even criticizing him at this time. Perhaps, in their hearts, they still respect such a representative /symbol of the totalitarian left. Perhaps this is what the ANC will degenerate to in the coming years.

What about eight years ago, when the Mugabe regime encouraged and participated in the violent seizure of 90% of white owned farms? Where was Mandela and the other so-called human rights activists of the ANC, when over four thousand white families were driven from their land, after suffering abuse, rape, and murder?

they made no noise because that’s exactly the thing they are doing in south africa too. they can’t very well complain about forced land redistribution in one country if they do it themselves.

i did think too fast a little earlier, and i expected more momentum to build for sensible pressure on Mugabe from his neighbours, and from the AU. but as usual, Africa has let itself down. some noise about expelling him from the AU is different to actually doing it, and talk about inviting Tsvangirai for ‘discussions’ is a bit empty when in the same breath, Tsvangirai is invited to attend Mugabe’s inauguration.

zimbabwe does not need a political solution anymore, it needs a criminal court solution, or an execution solution. it needs an international monitoring and intervention force to go in and put the fire out, and it needs a generation of reeducation and rebuilding of people’s attitudes and lives, which means nothing will happen. sad.

I know. I addressed that in the apartheid thread. Amazingly, liberals still consider Mandela to be the Second Coming.

[quote=“Chewycorns”]Love this quote:

And to think this thug was once the savior of the left in the last part of the 20th Century. I think it is utterly shameful that notable South African politicos such as Mandela and Mbeki and the new rapist guy aren’t even criticizing him at this time. Perhaps, in their hearts, they still respect such a representative /symbol of the totalitarian left. [color=red]Perhaps this is what the ANC will degenerate to in the coming years[/color].[/quote]

Good chance of that, especially when the ANC Youth League announced that they are “willing to kill for Zuma.” That’s the “new rapist guy” by the way…

What about eight years ago, when the Mugabe regime encouraged and participated in the violent seizure of 90% of white owned farms? Where was Mandela and the other so-called human rights activists of the ANC, when over four thousand white families were driven from their land, after suffering abuse, rape, and murder?[/quote]

Didn’t you know? When this sort of behaviour is directed against white people it isn’t called racism. It’s called re-appropriation of land and wealth. The argument being, had there been no colonialism then Africa would look like America today. Technologically advanced, with roads, universities and all that. In Africa it’s a well known “fact” that the colonial nations only stole land and resources. They built nothing and brought nothing to the continent.

To quote Orlando Jones in Primeval after his chatacter is asked by a local how he got to America, “My people came over in slave boats. It’s not that easy anymore…”

The other Zimbabwe, “forgotten” by the West.

news24.com/News24/AnanziArti … 58,00.html

[quote]Equatorial Guinea’s only opposition legislator said in an interview published on Friday the situation in his country is worse than in Zimbabwe, but Western nations turn a blind eye because of its oil reserves.

“The situation is worse than in Zimbabwe,” Placido Mico Abogo said of the west African country, ruled with an iron fist by President Teodoro Obiang Nguema. [/quote]

But it does make one wonder, why does the population never rise up against these tin pot dictatorships? Lack of a middle class maybe?

Not to defend Mugabe in the least, but just to point out, there is definitely a double-standard with regard to US policy when it comes to ruthless dictators. Here’s more on what Bismark posted:

As world attention is fixed on Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, there has been hardly any outcry from the international community about the dire human rights situation in another African country—Equatorial Guinea—where Teodoro Obiang has ruthlessly ruled for nearly thirty years. Obiang has been called the worst dictator in Africa, but since vast oil and natural gas reserves were discovered in the mid-1990s, he has become a close US ally.

A very interesting read on how oil influences who we do and don’t point our collective fingers at. Gabon is pretty much the same story, from what I recall.

Bismarck -

Some tried…but Rhode…err, Zimbabwe had a US President fighting against it also.

edit added:
Vay -
Amb. Frank Ruddy is a good man to listen to:

The Right Replacement for John Bolton: Frank Ruddy

Speech delivered by Amb. Frank Ruddy - LOFTY GENERALITIES - INDECENT PARTICULARS
THE U.N. IN ACTION - AFTER THE GALAS ARE OVER

As for the importance of EG to US petroleum, its negligible.
Petroleum Import #'s as of Apr 2008:
Crude Oil and Total Petroleum Imports - Top 15 Countries

So, let me get this straight. The US isn’t doing anything about Zimbabwe because they don’t have any oil and yet, the US isn’t doing anything about EG because they have oil?

Oh that’s right, it’s all Bush’s fault.

uhh…sure…
Its the UN under discussion here…that’s U ‘N’[b]…think:alphabet.

Back to the real world…from the Telegraph

[quote] UN impotence against tyranny cannot continue

Just how bad does the tyranny in Zimbabwe have to get before the world takes action?

Robert Mugabe has already installed himself as President-for-life, having stolen two elections and had more than 5,000 of those who supported the opposition party either killed or imprisoned. He also ensured that a further 200,000 were evicted from their homes.

Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition, sensibly decided there was no point in continuing to co-operate with Mugabe’s grotesque parody of democracy. Mugabe then claimed victory in a sham of his own creation.
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The condition of Zimbabwe’s people grows daily more desperate - solely because of Mugabe’s abysmal mismanagement of the country.

The leaders of the democracies in Europe and America tried to persuade the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions on Zimbabwe, as well as a travel ban on Mugabe and 13 of his top henchmen. Their attempt failed.

Russian and China, both permanent members of the security council and able to veto any proposal, torpedoed the idea of punishing Mugabe’s regime.

David Miliband, Britain’s Foreign Secretary, called their decision “incomprehensible”. In fact, it is only too understandable, for it derives from the ruthless pursuit of self-interest that has characterised the foreign policies of these states.

China’s investment in Africa has increased hugely recently, but the real reason for both these vetoes isn’t economic: it is fear of the precedent that would be set if the UN explicitly authorises action against a country because it is governed by a tyrannical autocrat.

Zimbabwe, as Russia’s ambassador to the UN correctly pointed out, is no threat to international stability.

“The security council’s application for enforcement measures,” he concluded, “has no foundation under chapter 7 of the UN Charter. This draft is nothing but the council’s attempt to interfere with the internal affairs of states.”

China agrees with that judgement, confirming that there is a tacit pact between the world’s dictatorial regimes to ensure that they can continue to deny their people basic democratic rights: they know they themselves will become vulnerable if it is established as a principle of the UN that there is a limit beyond which governments are not entitled to oppress their own people.

China and Russia have largely co-operated in the global “war on terror”, essentially because they feel at least as threatened by fundamentalist terrorism as America and Europe do. But they are not interested in spreading democracy and respect for human rights around the globe.

Russia uses the leverage that its control of gas and oil gives it to prevent its neighbouring states from embracing full democracy, just as China uses its power to ensure that the citizens of countries such as Burma and Tibet are denied elementary democratic rights.

Reducing all matters of foreign policy to a calculation of naked self-interest certainly makes everything simpler, and there are Western politicians who insist that our democracies should give up on idealism and concentrate on the “realistic pursuit of self-interest”.

That, however, would leave the world defenceless in the face of the grim expansion of Russia and China’s vision of the future, a vision that does not include the two most precious ingredients of peace and prosperity: democracy and the respect for human rights.

John McCain, the Republican candidate in America’s presidential election, has suggested an alternative to a UN deadlocked by the vetoes of China and Russia.

He proposes a “league of democracies”, in which nations committed to what might be termed “the Western system” would come together and use their joint power to try to advance more enlightened forms of governance. It wouldn’t be an alternative to the UN. But it would tackle some of the problems which vetoes from the tyrannies on the security council ensure that the UN cannot.

There are many difficulties with turning McCain’s vision into reality. Yet the failure of the UN, like the impotence of the G8, which was also on display last week, requires serious debate on how to remedy the ineffectiveness of global institutions.

The alternative is that the West sits on the sidelines as tyranny crushes democracy - and Zimbabwe becomes the latest failure to confront autocracy.
UK Telegraph Opinion[/quote]
Good, well humorous, comments on the article.
Apparently the affliction of ‘head-up a**’ is considered required when posting on some topics there.
People would do well to look at what countries are setting on what commissions in the UN.
A bit of analyzing that info would prove ‘enlightening.’

Is that what jambanja means? [[color=red]Warning: Link is to CNN article containing graphic pictures of heavily battered people[/color]]

[quote]Battered but not beaten, Zimbabwe farmers seek justice

(CNN) – [b]It was a frigid June night at Pickstone Mine in Zimbabwe when 67-year-old Angela Campbell – soaking wet, her arm broken and a gun to her head – signed a document vowing to give up the fight for her family’s farm.

The kidnappers demanding her signature at gunpoint were “war veterans” from President Robert Mugabe’s heyday as a liberation hero, and they made it clear that her refusal would mean more beatings.

Though Campbell signed the document, her son-in-law said she has no intention of giving up her battle[/b]; Campbell’s family will be in Windhoek, Namibia, on Wednesday to present arguments to a Southern African Development Community tribunal.

In pursuing the case, the Campbells and 77 fellow Zimbabwean farmers are risking theft, torture and death for what may be their only remaining chance to save the homes and farms so coveted by Mugabe and his loyalists.

Mugabe blames the West for his nation’s soaring inflation and poverty. But analysts say Mugabe’s 2000 “resettlement” policy, in which property was snatched from white farmers and redistributed to landless blacks, is more to blame for the country’s turmoil.

“All I want to see is justice,” said Richard Etheredge, 72, a white farmer who was evicted from his farm last month. “The world cannot carry on with criminals.”

On June 15, Etheredge, who has joined the case, and his family received word that a Zimbabwean senator planned to take over his Chegutu farm, a process known as “jambanja.”

“We’re going to murder you if we catch you,” Etheredge recalls an assailant yelling from outside his son’s house two days later.

The senator bused “criminals” to his property, Etheredge said. Etheredge, his wife and one of his twin sons escaped, but the other twin and Etheredge’s daughter-in-law were later beaten, he said.

Looters stole his computers, farm equipment, antiques, custom gun collection and a safe with billions in Zimbabwean currency (hundreds of thousands in U.S. dollars). Etheredge said he watched the thieves abscond with his possessions in vehicles belonging to the senator.

The looters also caused about $1 million in damage to his property, which includes three houses and a fruit-packing plant that was once among the most sophisticated in southern Africa. The Etheredges have been farming for 17 years and, before the attack, were producing 400,000 cartons of navel oranges and kumquats a year, he said.

“The destruction is absolutely incredible,” Etheredge said.

Mugabe’s cronies visited the adjacent Mount Carmel farm about two weeks later, just days after Mugabe won a majority of votes in a runoff denounced as a “sham” by the international community.

Like the Etheredges, Mike and Angela Campbell were warned that Mugabe loyalists, members of his Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front, were planning to invade their farm. The government had given the 1,200-hectare (2,965-acre) tract to a Zanu-PF spokesman who also served as Mugabe’s biographer, according to the Campbells’ son-in-law, Ben Freeth.

Two nuns went to Mount Carmel on June 26, the day before the runoff, wanting to buy sweet potatoes, Freeth said. But their quest for tubers was a ruse; they actually wanted to tell Freeth that Zanu-PF members were planning to raid the Campbell land, where the Campbells and Freeth and his wife, Laura, live.

On June 29, Freeth received a phone call: “War veterans,” as the clans of pro-Mugabe thugs call themselves, were heading to his in-laws’ house. Laura and her brother, Bruce, gathered their children. Laura fled with the children through a fence on the northern boundary of Mount Carmel farm, Freeth said.

Freeth jumped in his car and sped 1½ kilometers to the Campbell house.

“These guys had already arrived, and they started shooting at me as soon as I drove through the gate,” he said.

The bullets missed, but one of the war veterans hurled a rock through the driver’s side window, smashing Freeth’s right eye shut.

“They dragged me out of the vehicle and began beating me over the head with rifle butts,” Freeth said.

The men tied up Freeth, he said, and took him to where his in-laws were lying bound on the gravel outside their home.

Angela Campbell was still conscious. The men had caught her on her way to feed a calf. They had beaten her and broken her upper arm in two places, Freeth said. Mike Campbell was in bad shape, “just groaning on the ground; in fact, he remembers nothing.”

The heavily armed men threw the three in the back of Mike Campbell’s Toyota Prado truck, and “the next nine hours were quite a nightmare,” Freeth said.

Freeth and the Campbells were driven about 50 kilometers (31 miles) to Pickstone Mine. Their captors stopped at a dairy farm on the way and killed a white farmer’s dogs, Freeth said. Night had fallen by the time they arrived at the mine to find about 60 men in Zanu-PF regalia waiting for them.

“They were pointing guns at us the whole time, telling us they were going to kill us,” Freeth said.

Freeth and the Campbells were doused with cold water and left “shivering in the dust on the ground,” Freeth said. They received more beatings, and Freeth said one of their captors thrashed the bottom of his feet with a shambock, a whip made of hippopotamus hide.

It was during this time that their captors made Angela sign a document promising to drop the case scheduled this week before the tribunal.

Mike Campbell moved in and out of consciousness, as Ben and Angela prayed – not for their lives, but for their captors. Freeth said he had never understood Luke 6:28 – “Bless those who curse you” – until that moment, and a “supernatural” peace came over him.

Freeth told God, “If I’m going to be with you today, then I’m ready.”

It was almost midnight when Freeth and the Campbells – still bound – were tossed in the back of the Prado. They bounced around the sport-utility vehicle as their captors drove 30 kilometers down a craggy dirt road to Kadoma, where they were dumped in the streets.

“I managed to walk toward a light and knocked on the door of a house and used the phone to phone my wife,” Freeth said.

The Campbells were released from the hospital last week. Both remain weak and still bear considerable scrapes and bruises. Angela has a pin in her arm. Mike, 75, suffered four broken ribs, a broken collarbone and a dislocated finger.

Mike is recovering just enough to sit up, and “he can walk a few paces,” Freeth said Monday, complaining that his hands were “still tingly” from being bound so tightly.

The hospital released Freeth at the weekend after neurosurgeons had to drill a 4-centimeter (1½-inch) hole in his skull to relieve pressure from a hematoma stemming from the rock and rifle-butt blows to the head.

One thing not battered is the farmers’ resolve to remain on the land that the Campbells have owned for 34 years.

“We intend to be there on Wednesday, and we just hope for an outcome that is good for everyone, an outcome for justice,” Freeth said of the hearing, which is slated to last through Friday.

Freeth said he believes that the tribunal will carry more clout with Mugabe than do Western nations and the African and European unions. Many of its member nations are led by Mugabe’s contemporaries, and Mugabe is aware that his status as an African hero is waning, he said.

“I think it means a lot to him whether SADC is going to isolate him or continue to support him,” Freeth said. “Once we get to the SADC tribunal and we get a judgment and it’s basically binding in black and white, it’s going to be difficult for Mugabe to say, ‘We’re abiding by our own law.’ It’s going to be very difficult for him to defend what he’s doing.”[/quote]

the printing company that makes all of the Zimbabwe money has just stopped printing as their german supplier of paper has cancelled deliveries. no paper, no new money, and no way to pay soldiers and politicians and thugs.

hopefully this brings the end closer, though it will only get worse before the end. perhaps a total loss of a money economy will break up the ZANU-PF. on the other hand, they are more than likely to just steal everything in sight now, but there’s only so much a bunch of non-producing thugs can steal. the big men may well flee and collapse will occur from the top too.

Can someone please explain this to me. I’ve heard these kind of figures before and I honestly have no idea how it’s possible. In fact it seems completely impossible to me.

CNN just reported that in the month of July, Zimbabwe’s inflation rate reached 230 million percent.

Of course I fully understand that Mugabe’s a brutal thug, dictator, incompetent, ignorant pig who has been steadily robbing his country blind, stealing elections and driving the entire nation into the ground. Of course I fully recognize that they’ve experienced a massive drain of foreign money, foreign business, foreign brains, local brains, local business and whatever is left must be truly pathetic.

But, prices up 230 million percent in a month? I’m not certain my math is correct, but it means pretty much that:

  • if a piece of candy costs $0.01 on July 1 (and with the astronomical inflation they’ve suffered for years, surely nothing is that cheap) it will cost $2,300,000 on July 30.

  • if a loaf of bread cost $5 on July 1 it would cost $15,000,000 on July 30.

  • if a house cost $100,000 on July 1 it would cost $23,000,000,000 on July 30.

I don’t believe that. I don’t see how that’s possible. Any fool knows the magic of compounding interest – how even a modest rate of 7 or 8 or 10 percent over time yields big results. But when you’re talking crazy numbers like 230 million percent per month, I just cannot comprehend how that can be sustained for more than a few days.

I don’t mean this as a matter of, “oh poor people, how do they cope?” I’m talking just pure, simple math. How is it possible to sustain such a huge percentage for month after month after month?

They’ve been going through this for years. By now a loaf of bread should cost about $1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Seriously. How is that possible?

[quote=“Mother Theresa”]

They’ve been going through this for years. By now a loaf of bread should cost about $1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Seriously. How is that possible?[/quote]

I was thinking about this a couple of months ago and can’t understand how anything can function there. Then I realized that nothing does work there.
Every few months they just lop a dozen zeroes off. Cash that paycheck the second you get it. If you wait an hour it will be worthless.

Jesus, just when it seems it can’t get any worse.

[quote] Zimbabwe authorities on Wednesday restored water to most parts of the capital Harare after a cut more than 48 hours ago amid a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 500, a minister said.

“As of last night, pumping capacity has been increased to 80 percent and the greater part of the central business district (in Harare) and most high density suburbs are receiving normal supplies,” water resources deputy minister Walter Mzembi told AFP.

Taps in Harare ran dry on Saturday after the state-run water company, ZINWA, ran short of aluminium sulphate, a chemical used to purify water.

The water cuts compounded fears over the spread of cholera. The death toll from the outbreak has now risen to 565, with 12,546 cases of the acute intestinal disease reported nationwide, according to the United Nations on Wednesday.

The water shortage had resulted in people digging shallow wells, while some made brisk business in selling water.

An AFP correspondent reported that although water had been restored in Harare’s central business district and other residential areas, some areas only receive water in the evenings[/quote]
google.com/hostednews/afp/ar … FtR0EDIGhA

[quote]A state-run newspaper says Zimbabwe has declared a national emergency because of a cholera epidemic and the collapse of its health system.

The Herald says Health Minister David Parirenyatwa appealed to aid agencies Wednesday for drugs, food, equipment and money to pay doctors and nurses at hospitals.

Zimbabwe’s economic crisis has hit health care hard. The United Nations says a cholera outbreak blamed on collapsing water infrastructure has killed more than 500 people.

The newspaper on Thursday quotes Parirenyatwa as saying Zimbabwe’s main hospitals “are literally not functioning.”[/quote]
google.com/hostednews/ap/art … AD94RPISG1

Soldiers were rioting and looting the other day, for lack of pay, until the police started shooting at them, and a couple of generals were trotted out to make them go away.

the end is nigh, i hope. unfortunately a lot more people are going to die.

In other news, a regional court ruled that 78 white farmers should have their farms given back to them, on the grounds that their removal was unconstitutional, and that they were being discriminated against, but Mugabe said “Stuff the court’s decision, we’re not going to undo the work of the people”.