Let's talk about Zimbabwe

[Surlethe]

I think that may be a bad comparison, as pagan does actually mean anything that is not Christian.

Pardon me, but I thought "pagan" meant exclusively the polytheistic pre-Christian cults? Fellow Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Islam) are not pagan.

"Pagan" is used enough in the US as "non-Christian" that adding that definition is not beyond the realm of credibility.

[Shroom Man 777]

I am impressed that while the CNN has to rely on other journalists in Zimbabwe, the Beeb actually has correspondents in the place and how they mentioned on TV that they cannot disclose the location of their guys for security purposes. Man, journalism.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Probably because the BBC is banned from the nation under pain of death by lynching. The breaking news over this deal is interesting, though I half expected them to announce Mugabe had won as part of April Fools.

[Broomstick]

I am impressed that while the CNN has to rely on other journalists in Zimbabwe

I suspect that has more to due with an extremely low life expectancy for any employee of a US corporation in Zimbabwe than a lack of journalistic lust for news in dangerous places. If CNN could get people there on the ground they would, but at a certain point you either can't order people in or they won't go even if you do.

[Dartzap]

It didn't stop one of the most famous BBC journalists, a balding, old and fairly large white bloke walking around the place looking shifty a few months ago...

Don't forget folks, even after nearly 30 years, Britain = The DEVIL!!!!!!

[Shroom Man 777]

I know, I'm just saying that those Beeb guys have balls, man.

I wonder if a Beeb correspondent will jump on Mugabe and bury him with a rucksack

So... if the opposition declares victory, will Mugabe beat them with stick and tell them to go out of airport?

[Zixinus]

So... if the opposition declares victory, will Mugabe beat them with stick and tell them to go out of airport?

Not likely. People like him do not go down without a fight. That's what is happening now.

[Coyote]

MUGABE CONSIDERS STEPPING DOWN?

MSNBC News Services
updated 2 hours, 38 minutes ago

HARARE, Zimbabwe - Advisers of President Robert Mugabe and his chief rival are discussing the possibility of Zimbabwe’s longtime leader relinquishing power, a businessman close to the electoral commission and a lawyer close to the opposition told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The businessman said Mugabe has been told he is far behind Morgan Tsvangirai in preliminary results of Saturday’s presidential elections and that there could be an uprising if Mugabe were declared the winner. The lawyer said advisers to both men were discussing a “transitional arrangement.”

Both spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.


John Makumbe, a political scientist at the University of Zimbabwe, said he had learned from military sources that they would honor the results of the elections. The security chiefs last week warned they would not serve anybody but Mugabe and would not tolerate an opposition victory.

Tsvangirai on Tuesday postponed his first public statement since the elections until later in the day. His spokesman George Shibotshiwe said that was because the opposition party had received “a tremendous breakthrough in the numbers coming in” from the elections. Independent observers say trends indicate Tsvangirai won the most votes in the presidential race, but not enough to avoid a runoff — a prospect that could be humiliating to the 84-year-old president, who has been in power for 28 years.

More at the link.

This might be an interesting development, if true. Mugabe denies it.

Let me ask this-- would it be worth it for the USA to offer Mugabe a place to live in exile, since at this point it would be worth it to harbor a known tyrant psychopath if it means letting the Zimbabwe people to live free and start getting their act together after decades of abuse?

[K. A. Pital]

Mugabe will find a place for exile i'm sure. Most Third World juntists have accounts in Kayman Bank and a nice villa somewhere in island-o-paradise place.

[Broomstick]

Let me ask this-- would it be worth it for the USA to offer Mugabe a place to live in exile, since at this point it would be worth it to harbor a known tyrant psychopath if it means letting the Zimbabwe people to live free and start getting their act together after decades of abuse?

Why the fuck would we take Mugabe? We've never taken any other tinpot dictators in retirement. Let the other African nutjobs who supported him feed and house the asshole. Isn't that what happened with Idi Amin? These guys don't go to the US, they go to other shithole countries that haven't melted down yet.

[Coyote]

Let me ask this-- would it be worth it for the USA to offer Mugabe a place to live in exile, since at this point it would be worth it to harbor a known tyrant psychopath if it means letting the Zimbabwe people to live free and start getting their act together after decades of abuse?

Why the fuck would we take Mugabe? We've never taken any other tinpot dictators in retirement. Let the other African nutjobs who supported him feed and house the asshole. Isn't that what happened with Idi Amin? These guys don't go to the US, they go to other shithole countries that haven't melted down yet.

More as a hypothetical. Mugabe is backed into a corner; everyone who used to court him now washes their hand sof him. They don't want him, perhaps because they see revolution potential in harboring him.

So with nowhere to bolt to, Mugabe decides he'd rather stay where he's at, where he ffels he has some control over the situation.

So the US gov't considers giving him a place, for example, just to get him the hell out of the country. Basically, if he stays, the country continues to go to hell. If he has a place to go, hes willing to leave and Zimbabwe can start recovering. Sure, the USA will get a black eye in public relations, but we can weather it-- meanwhile, Mugabe's stranglehold on his people is broken.

Really, this could be for any dictator, but Mugabe's the bug under the microscope for now.

BTW-- Idi Amin lived out his years in exile in Saudi Arabia.

[Darth Wong]

Let me ask this-- would it be worth it for the USA to offer Mugabe a place to live in exile, since at this point it would be worth it to harbor a known tyrant psychopath if it means letting the Zimbabwe people to live free and start getting their act together after decades of abuse?

Why the fuck would we take Mugabe? We've never taken any other tinpot dictators in retirement. Let the other African nutjobs who supported him feed and house the asshole. Isn't that what happened with Idi Amin? These guys don't go to the US, they go to other shithole countries that haven't melted down yet.

From an ethics standpoint, if you need to give a ruthless dictator an "out" so that he will willingly leave without causing even more chaos than he did before, then it makes sense to do so. It may not be particularly pleasing, and it certainly won't sate our thirst for justice, but at the end of the day, if less people suffer, then it makes ethical sense.

A failure to take this kind of dispassionate equation into account led to the developed world's brick-wall approach to negotiating with Saddam Hussein. And then we wondered why he wouldn't surrender, when we basically told him beforehand that we intended to arrest him, put him on trial for war crimes, and execute him. Gee, I wonder why he decided to fight to the end and instruct his troops to create as much post-war chaos as possible.

[Admiral Valdemar]

From an ethics standpoint, if you need to give a ruthless dictator an "out" so that he will willingly leave without causing even more chaos than he did before, then it makes sense to do so. It may not be particularly pleasing, and it certainly won't sate our thirst for justice, but at the end of the day, if less people suffer, then it makes ethical sense.

A failure to take this kind of dispassionate equation into account led to the developed world's brick-wall approach to negotiating with Saddam Hussein. And then we wondered why he wouldn't surrender, when we basically told him beforehand that we intended to arrest him, put him on trial for war crimes, and execute him. Gee, I wonder why he decided to fight to the end and instruct his troops to create as much post-war chaos as possible.

I see it as being analogous to the presidential pardons often used in the show 24, whereby a terrorist apprehended is given clemency in exchange for information on the plot. Considering the show is criticised for the wanktastic torture scenes, I find this method should be focused on more. It appears to be the case in real-life, at least.

[Battlehymn Republic]

Has anyone read Samantha Power's 2005 article for The Atlantic? How to Kill a Country.

[Spin Echo]

According to CNN breaking news, the opposition party has won and Mugabe's party has lost control of parliament. Certainly going to make things... interesting.

[Jade Falcon]

The question is of course whether Mugabe will acknowledge the victory and step down of course.

[Zixinus]

And whether the next person will be better or worse. There is still room in the gutter.

[Dartzap]

The Beeb seem to have given up on the idea on them being banned again. John Simpson, the Liberator Of Kabul, was there yet again last night. And C4 has someone in there as well.....

And yet again, more rumours of Mugabe doing a press conference soon.

[fusion]

On a typical workday, Lovemore Vambe will make dozens of clandestine phone calls that lead to a handful of illegal transactions. He'll conspire with colleagues, sidestep police or bribe them if necessary, and come home in the evening with a few dollars in his pocket.

That's enough to make the rent and keep his eldest child in boarding school. In Zimbabwe's free-falling economy, the slight, mustachioed 31-year-old holds a rare steady job: He's a money dealer on Harare's thriving black market, helping Zimbabweans trade foreign currency for their increasingly worthless local cash.

With inflation estimated at 200,000 percent - easily the highest in the world - Zimbabwe's currency is barely worth the paper it's printed on. (The largest Zimbabwean note, 10 million dollars, can't buy more than a couple of sodas.) Foreign currency runs this economy now, mainly the U.S. dollar and the South African rand, nearly all of it traded on the black market.

The government of longtime President Robert Mugabe, who faces a critical re-election test on Saturday, has pegged the exchange rate at $1 to 30,000 Zimbabwean dollars. But the currency is losing value at such head-spinning speed that on the streets of Harare, one U.S. greenback will soon fetch about 2,000 times that.

Since no one can afford to do business at the official rate, Vambe says the thousands of informal dealers have become Zimbabwe's lifeline.

"If you want Zim dollars, you have to buy it on the parallel market," said Vambe, seated on an overstuffed sofa in the comfortable suburban home he shares with his wife and three children.

"The banks don't allow you to pull out more than 500 a day," he said, meaning 500 million Zimbabwean dollars, the six zeroes on the end being essentially meaningless in a figure that equates to less than $10. "And that is when they have cash. Me, I can always find cash for a customer."

But he has to hustle. Even though the police regularly crack down on the illegal trade, in a country where nine in 10 people don't hold regular jobs, money-dealing is a rare chance to make a buck and is therefore highly competitive. In a good week, Vambe can make $100 in commissions, more than enough to cover the month's rent.

Zimbabwe's economy began failing a decade ago after Mugabe launched a politically motivated land reform scheme that bankrupted the farm sector, the country's main source of income. Now, remittances from Zimbabweans living overseas drive the economy, pumping as much as $1 billion in foreign currency into the country each year, nearly all of it coming through the black market.

"There is absolutely no way that the economy could function without the inflows of money via the black market," said Tony Hawkins, a leading independent economist in Harare.

Finding money on the streets is easy, Hawkins said, because the government prints so much of it. With Mugabe facing a close election race, Hawkins believes that the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has dumped more than 1.5 quadrillion dollars onto the market over the past month, "to buy votes for the ruling party in one way or another," he said.

Link
Crap, that is very bad...
200,000% inflation! Though that is not the worst, that is bad. Just bad.

Lets hope the mess can be cleaned up...

[Jadeite]

I wonder if anyone has converted a few USD into Zimbabwean dollars just so they could roll around in their pile of it. I know I would if I got the chance.

[Spin Echo]

Crap, that is very bad...
200,000% inflation! Though that is not the worst, that is bad. Just bad.

Lets hope the mess can be cleaned up...

Yeah, I have second cousins (Or is it second cousins once removed?) in Zimbabwe. We used to get photos from their farm now and then, but after the land grab they haven't been allowed to work the land. It pretty much made the entire village unemployed and rather hungry. I haven't from them in a while now. Last I heard they were sending their children to Canada and Oz, though they'll probably die there because the farm is the only life they've ever known.

Would've been nice to visit at one time. Not now.

[Sidewinder]

The question is of course whether Mugabe will acknowledge the victory and step down of course.

That depends on whether or not he has the military's backing. If the soldiers have enough USD/Euros to buy food and pay the rent, yes, and the opposition must either say, "You win," or be lined up in front of a firing squad. If the soldiers don't have enough USD/Euros, they'll support the opposition or even launch a coup in the hopes that Mugabe's replacement will give them what they want-- and they WILL get what they want, because the military is VERY IMPORTANT to the security of a third-world government and its members.

[Darth Wong]

Has anyone read Samantha Power's 2005 article for The Atlantic? How to Kill a Country.

Not a bad article, but it suffers from TopTenList-itis. When people make an article and break it into logical subgroups, and then realize that they don't quite have a round number of subgroups, they mutilate it so they'll get a nice round number, like ten. She could have easily contracted that list and it would have been a better article; many of the items on her ten-point list of Mugabe's sins were actually redundant.

[The Yosemite Bear]

doesn't Zimbabwe have like psycho killer wildlife too?

[Vohu Manah]

Raids target Zimbabwe opposition party (last updated 90 minutes ago as of this posting)

HARARE, Zimbabwe (CNN) -- Zimbabwean government forces Thursday began cracking down on the main opposition party, raising fears of a political crisis, according to witnesses and an opposition spokesman.

The forces raided at least two hotels in the capital, including one that houses foreign journalists, a witness said.

Four journalists unaccredited by the Zimbabwean government were taken away, he said.

New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller confirmed that Barry Bearak, a Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent based in Johannesburg, South Africa, was taken into custody.

"He was apparently one of a number of Americans and other foreign nationals rounded up today," Keller said. "An American consular official who visited him at the central police station reported that he was being held for 'violation of the journalism laws.'

"We are making every effort to assure that he is well treated, and to secure his prompt release," Keller said.

The identities of the other journalists seized in the raid were not immediately known.

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the United States is calling for the immediate release of Americans seized by Zimbabwe authorities. "We are concerned about the taking into custody of several American citizens," Casey said. "There is no reason for that. We want to see them released as soon as possible."

State Department officials said they were bound by privacy constraints and couldn't say how many American reporters were taken.

Tendai Biti, secretary-general for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, said his party's offices -- in another Harare hotel -- were also raided by Zimbabwean forces.

Some of the rooms were ransacked, The Associated Press reported.

"There's a definite crackdown," Biti said. No one was detained in that raid, he added.

The action targeted "certain people ... including myself," Biti told the AP.

"It is quite clear he has unleashed a war," he said, referring to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe.

The crackdown came hours after the government announced another delay in releasing some of last weekend's election results, raising fears that Mugabe is trying to come up with a plan to remain in power. Many are predicting a runoff election.

In spite of this, on Wednesday the MDC declared Tsvangirai the outright winner, saying he took 50.3 percent of the almost 2.4 million votes.

The state-run newspaper reported Wednesday that Mugabe and Tsvangirai will compete in a presidential runoff because neither candidate garnered more than 50 percent of the vote.

But even some in Mugabe's own party believe he should step down. A ZANU-PF member, who did not want to be named for security reasons, reported a deep schism in the party Thursday, saying some members believe Mugabe should gracefully cede power.

"The top guys have been given a rude awakening," said the lawmaker, adding that the party's brass is "shell-shocked" by the results and had not expected the apparent defeat.

The lawmaker, who lost his seat to an opposition challenger, further said a presidential runoff "will be a suicide mission" and should be a "last resort" for the ruling party.

"Mugabe is finished," he added.

"We cannot win, so why go for it?" he said. "Once people have tasted victory, you don't take it away from them."

But Zimbabwean Deputy Information Minister Bright Matonga said he did not expect Mugabe to step down.

"I don't see that at all," he said. "And why should he? We have to go all the way. That is what the law says."

According to the state-run newspaper, The Herald, the elections for parliament's lower house came down to a "photo finish," with MDC taking 99 seats and ZANU-PF 97.

Eleven posts in the 210-seat body went to an independent and members of a smaller opposition party. Three seats will have to be decided in a later election because the opposition candidates have died, the paper reported.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission said Thursday it has postponed releasing results from elections for the Senate, parliament's upper house.

The government blames the delays in announcing results on logistics, noting that four elections were held simultaneously. Matonga has said the law gives the government until Friday to release the results.

Mugabe, who was prime minister before taking the presidential post in 1987, has been in power since Zimbabwe's independence from Britain 28 years ago. The election represents the toughest challenge to power he has ever faced.

A year after the last presidential election -- which the MDC alleges was stolen -- the government charged Tsvangirai with treason. He was acquitted. The MDC accused Mugabe of trying to eliminate him as a challenger.

Zimbabwe faced international sanctions after the 2002 election, including travel restrictions on Zimbabwean officials.

A hero of the country's civil war against the white Rhodesian government, Mugabe became the country's first black leader in 1980. Nearly three decades later, he has consolidated his rule over all aspects of Zimbabwean life.

Once revered for providing some of the best education and health care in Africa, Zimbabwe now has one of the lowest life expectancies in the world. Schooling is a luxury. Once known as the breadbasket of southern Africa, now it is difficult to get basic food supplies. Inflation has skyrocketed to more than 100,000 percent, while food production and agricultural exports have dropped drastically.

Journalist Eunice Mafundikwa in Atlanta, Georgia, contributed to this report.