Posted on 05/15/2006 6:14:10 PM PDT by blam
Children of the streets feel wrath of Mugabe
By David Blair in Johannesburg
(Filed: 16/05/2006)
President Robert Mugabe began a new onslaught on Zimbabwe's poor yesterday when his regime announced that more than 10,000 street children and vagrants had been "rounded up" in Harare.
Police described their latest assault on the capital's poverty-stricken street dwellers, codenamed Operation Round Up, as a crime-fighting measure.
Last year they bulldozed thousands of "illegal structures" in the poorest townships, leaving 700,000 people without homes or livelihoods.
The new operation appears aimed at those cast on to the streets by the earlier demolitions.
A total of 10,244 "vagrants, street kids, touts and other disorderly elements" have been detained, according to The Herald, the country's official daily newspaper.
Assistant Commissioner Munyaradzi Musariri said they would be "relocated" to their "homes" in rural areas. "As police, we will not rest until there is sanity in the streets and the operation is continuing," he said.
He said nothing about what would become of street children with no rural homes to go to.
In the past, Mr Mugabe's regime has swept people off the pavements, forcibly loading them on to lorries, before dumping them in remote areas with no support. Police officers routinely assault and rob detainees.
Many of those caught by the swoop will be victims of the spiralling economic crisis. Inflation is at 1,043 per cent - the highest rate in the world - and one third of the economy has been wiped out in the past six years.
Harare and the second city, Bulawayo, are the strongholds of Zimbabwe's opposition and 82-year-old Mr Mugabe views urban dwellers with deep suspicion.
Clearing the townships and relocating their inhabitants to rural areas, where the ruling Zanu-PF party is dominant, are central goals of his regime.
This week marks the first anniversary of the onset of the township demolitions, which the regime codenamed Operation Drive Out the Rubbish.
Mr Mugabe publicly turned down an offer of tents from the United Nations, thereby condemning countless families to sleeping in the open air.
Today the victims of this purge are clustered on the fringes of townships across Harare and every other city.
The regime pledged to build new houses to replace those it had demolished. But this promise has been broken and few new homes completed.
The authorities kept no record of those who were left destitute by the demolitions. There is therefore no way of identifying the right people to be given new houses - even if enough were built.
Economic collapse is rapidly impoverishing every strata of society, save for the corrupt elite around Mr Mugabe. Critics say police operations targeted on the urban poor make the crisis even worse.
Ping.
That will give Chavez some ideas.
And this is a person Oprah likes and all those other celebs. I hope they feel very proud.
When did Oprah say that she liked Mugabe? I'd really like to get a source for that .... if one actually exists. Thanks.
They have found President Mugabe particularly inspiring. In fact, Zimbabe Law and the very ideas of President Mugabe himself inspired their monumental Eminent Domain Decision.
These "Justices" just cannot admire him enough.
Somebody send 'em a copy of this article. They'll get a kick out of it.
I've been ranting and raving about this Stalinist SOB for 25 years.
If all these stories out of there were true, everyone would be dead long ago. I'm starting to take this all with a grain of salt ...
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What a hell hole. It's amazing to see a once properous country turn to crap.
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