Posted on 11/30/2004 2:25:27 PM PST by kupia_kummi
ARCHBISHOP Desmond Tutu yesterday fired the latest salvo in a bitter row with South African president Thabo Mbeki that is threatening to divide the country’s black leadership.
The public slanging-match between the two leaders began last week when Mr Tutu accused the president of deepening the country’s poverty and stifling debate among his party.
Mr Mbeki, who led the ANC to a 70 per cent victory in elections in April, hit back, charging the Nobel Peace laureate with speaking out of turn and resorting to "empty rhetoric".
Yesterday, Mr Tutu responded with a sarcasm that will do nothing to defuse the row. "Thank you Mr President for telling me I am a liar with scant regard for the truth and a charlatan posing as a champion of the poor, the hungry, oppressed and voiceless," he said.
Mr Tutu, second only to Nelson Mandela as the face of the struggle for black emancipation from apartheid, added: "I will continue to pray for you and your government by name daily, as I have done and as I did even for the apartheid government. God bless you."
Mr Tutu is becoming as formidable a thorn in the side of Mr Mbeki’s African National Congress government as he was of former white governments.
He has criticised the notoriously thin-skinned Mr Mbeki for his silence on AIDS, which has infected 5.6 million South Africans; his cosy relationship with Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe; the creation of a narrow, super-rich black oligarchy; the stifling of debate; and his prejudices against the whites.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.scotsman.com ...
South Africa = Zimbabwe 10 years ago.
Zimbabwe = South Africa 10 years from now (or sooner).
I remember when South Africa and Rhodesia were thriving and civilized.
What in the world could have happened?
Just interesting in the realm of Anglicana...
It's too bad, but there is a reason that Africa is called the "dark continent".
Hey, seems some people are not getting enough of the pie, so the whining starts.
Tutu is not the only one complaining, the Council of SA Trade Unions are also a bit angry with the Mbeki government. The have traditionally been great supporters of the ANC, but it's not entirely impossible they go it alone as a political party. That will split the ANC vote down the middle, and create more of a voice for opposition parties.
I know I risk a ban (or at the very least getting my post erased) but the issue here is the whites built South Africa and Zimbabwe (fka Rhodesia) to be effective, well-run countries.
The blacks have ruined these countries. They have proven themselves collectively unable or unwilling to make the proper choices for their respective countries.
The tragedy is that both countries have sufficient mineral and agricultural wealth and that advantage (created by whites) is being squandered day by day.
But there's no telling them that. All the more aggravating is the silence of US and European liberals as to what they helped create.
You'll never hear a bad word about Robert Mugabe spoken by an American liberal while he starves and economically rapes his country.
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Kudos to Bishop Tutu, right on brother, keep on the pressure, LOL because Mbeki is an idiot, he's no Nelson Mandela and Mandela's lost some of my respect in the past few years......
Man, what a hypocrit Tutu is. He bears a great deal of resposibility for the state the once great nation of South Africa is in today. I think he might even be more responsible than the ANC, Mandela and Mbeki. It was Tutu's antics here in America that convinced many Americans that South Africa was an evil, despicable place that didn't deserve Amercian trade and commerce. It was he who was the loudest at defaming white South Africans. Well Tutu, you made your bed with the ANC -- now sleep with them!
Well put!
So how else was Apartheid going to end?
You'll never hear a bad word about Robert Mugabe spoken by an American liberal while he starves and economically rapes his country.
Who? Mugabe or the American lieberal.
From a web page on Albert Schweitzer, who knew Africa better than anyone else.
Actually, a few years ago Mugabe was on the outs with the "gays" because he was so outspokenly anti-homosexual. He said that homosexuality was unnatural and would not be coddled in his country the way it has been lately in the West. The homos were up in arms for a while.
But of course, Mugabe is a Third World Communist (ie, a mixture of classical Communism and indigenous nationalism), so apparently the "gays" have decided to forgive him and are now back on board.
Do you think the system that replaced apartheid is better? Apartheid had to end, but there were options other than to accept all of the communist ANC proposals en masse. Minority and property rights should have been entrenched in the constitution, a federal system should have been instituted and the death penalty never abolished. The interim government which was supposed to write the constitution was dominated by the ANC, and the whites capitulated.
Tutu's truth and reconciliation commission was also responsible for indemnifying many of the ANC leaders, without following the rules of the commission. 60 Of the top leaders were not required to even testify, and received amnesty, instead of being prosecuted as stated by the relevant laws. He sure was responsible for letting those guys loose on SA, now he's complaining?
You would not be saying that if it was you under colonial rule. Not everything was a bed of roses for blacks in these countries. Albert was a paternalistic man even when he wouldn't have black African doctors in his employ. Before you go off spouting crap about blacks not being able to employ themselves look at BOTH sides of history not just the what the glorious colonial powers did.
I'm getting sick of discussing these issues in this forum. Most people spout ignorant crap. They should be thankful that they were not educated blacks living in these countries under colonial rule, as third and fourth class citizens.
cyborg, is that Afrikaans? It doesn't look like Dutch (or Vlaams) though it seems close.
Yes it is. Part of the 23rd psalm. I used to know it by heart but only my dog has heard me say it :-)
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