Posted on 06/02/2011 7:47:24 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
Zimbabwean farmers attend a meeting of white commercial farmers in capital Harare
Zimbabwe's Supreme Court heard a case on behalf of three farmers who claimed the constitution excluded confiscation of their land because they bought their properties after the colonial era ended with independence in 1980.
The Supreme Court did not agree and quickly dismissed their application.
One of the farmers, Colin Cloete, a former president of the Commercial Farmers’ Union at the height of often violent land invasions seven years ago, was one of the applicants.
He, like many of his colleagues, has been arrested, harassed and appeared in court many times, to try to stay on his farm.
Like most surviving white farmers, the cost of going to court to try to fight his eviction has been unaffordable.
Looking back over the long and difficult years, Cloete, now 58, said his struggle to remain on his farm did not make economic sense.
“Economically we should have moved off then, at the beginning, as we would have been 10 years younger and that much more energetic,” said Cloete.
Cloete said he had begun looking looking for a house in Harare, not least so he could move his possessions to safety.
He said the land invasions launched after Mr. Mugabe lost a referendum in 2000 had hurt him and Zimbabwe’s economy, and no one had benefited from this except the elite in the ZANU-PF Party.
“We are treated like second-class citizens, we are treated like we are still just visitors to this place. My father was born in this country, before Mr. Mugabe, but I am still a visitor,” said Cloete.
(Excerpt) Read more at voanews.com ...
They need to start looking for a place to go.
Zimbabwe should be allowed to starve
If we look at the serious economic breakdown, hyper-inflation, murder rate, and White exodus, we’ll see that the doom and gloom predictions were pretty accurate even if short of Khymer Rouge horror.
That makes a lot of sense. I didn’t get the W-2 reference though.
That event in 1974, the coup d’etat, or whatever the Portuguese version of a golpe is, had many reverberations. Losing Mozambique to communists and terrorists ended the rail link to the Indian Ocean as well as other support for Rhodesia, and things really accelerated downwards from that point. The Rhodesian dollar, even for all the economic war against the country, was worth more than the American dollar at that time, but look at the Zimbabwe dollar now - it’s not even legal tender any more, after printing trillion dollar notes before giving up on it and relying on other countries’ currencies.
They aren’t issued W-2s because they are “undocumented permanent guest workers”; sorry.
It was devastating to Portugal itself as well; the African colonies had a lot more potential (land, resources) than Portugal (in the same way Brazil had), and the return of so many settlers to Portugal at once was economically difficult.
On a side note, John Kerry’s wife was born in Mozambique.
She’s a Portuguese African? Interesting. I met a Jewish doctor from the Belgian Congo a little while ago - lots of people from countries that don’t really exist anymore.
I don’t know the motivation for the coup, but hindsight indicates it was shortsighted, maybe a coup of convenience, if there is such a thing? Those involved in it I think thought they were benefiting Portugal by cutting the colonies loose, since they were taking draft-age men away to sometimes die, and costing Portugal a great deal of money to retain against communist and Black terrorist operations - but in the end, less money than the resources from those colonies, which would also have benefited the former colonies, being managed by people who knew what they were doing, and knew what the resources were, or are, really.
The wars weren’t popular, they went on for years with no end in sight, and the demographics weren’t in their favor; France found that out the hard way in Indochina and especially Algeria (which they considered part of France itself). The odd thing in both Spain and Portugal is how far left they swung in reaction to the overthrow of the military government in Portugal and the nearly-simultaneous death of Franco in Spain; those countries very quickly became unrecognizable to immigrants who left shortly before those incidents. Many in my area still visit family there, and are disgusted (with both countries); to understand the reaction, these people came here from conservative countries, without the English language to acclimate them to the growing leftism here, and found themselves to the right of the popular cultures of both their adopted and home countries.
What do they think of this country now? They sound like they’d be as far-right overall as Americans with memories of pre-Castro Cuba.
I think this is also part of the reason White Zimbabweans were denied residency and citizenship in our country. The Democrats have constantly tried to keep their numbers up by importing them, and these immigrants wouldn’t have voted Democrat. And the Republican Party was only too happy to pretend like it didn’t matter and avoid any controversy.
As a collector of coins, stamps, and banknotes, I have a collection of these from a lot of “extinct” countries, along with other interesting ones. South Vietnam, Japanes-occupied Philippines and Indonesia, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, British East and West Africa, Portuguese India, Timor, Angola, and Mozambique (even a Brazilian one from the mid-1800s, though not in nice shape), Tsarist Russia, Kingdom of Serbia, Biafra, Rhodesia (both the colony and the short-lived independent state), Italian Somaliland, British India, Italian-occupied Albania, Nazi-occupied Greece, Danzig Free State, Poland pre-WWI (a “German-sector” piece and a “Russian-sector” piece; the latter has 2 denominations - rubles and zloty - on 1 coin)...sorry, I’m rambling.
I love history & geography; they explain today’s world.
Not at all. You’re right - it’s a very good way to understand why things are the way they are now.
As far as relatives of mine from Spain, they are horrified by the cultural shift; they are still very insulated from it, and tend to marry within the Spanish/Portuguese/Hispanic demographic. The older generation, which is slowly dying off, never really became assimilated (they don’t speak English, the women don’t drive, etc.); the younger ones can go either way, though tend to be more leftist than the parents.
That’s sad. Ever been to the grand old Hispanic Museum in far uptown Manhattan? I think they cover Lusitanian as well. And there must be some local historians in New Jersey for a population that size.
Had an uncle that worked as a bartender in NYC when I was young; he started me off before I was 10 by bringing me odds & ends that turned up in the register. I started looking for the countries on a map (I actually asked for a globe for Christmas when I was 12), then as I got older started researching the people designs on the stamps/coins/notes. I’ve tried to stimulate an interest in my children, but have had little success with that. It’s odd, when you consider that within a few minutes in any direction from my house you can meet people from dozens of countries, and eat food from doaens of countries; their class roster reads like a UN roll call.
No, I’ve never been, I think NJ will have things like that when those populations have been here as long. As it is, “The Feast” on Ferry Street in Newark is not something to be missed (though I haven’t gone in years); fifteen years ago, they’d block off the street (a main artery), and you could walk down the street with a bottle of nice green wine in your hand without being hassled (that is some kind of wine I believe they make before the grapes are fully ripe; it tastes like a less-bubbly champagne, almost). As Irish people our food has no taste (no spices), so everything you buy there is delicious (with garlic, saffron, etc.).
You can lead a horse to water, but...
This area definitely exposes you to many, many different perspectives on the world, from all over. I think this greater metropolis is classed as an Alpha++ ‘city’, one of only a couple or a few.
Despite the terrible reputation the area gets, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I wish it was more conservative/taxpayer & family -friendly, and I love visiting places that are like that, but there’s something about living in an area that looks like something out of an Indiana Jones set (turbans, hookah-smokers, rabbits on the menu) that really makes it special...
I’ve got an early start tomorrow; it’s been interesting, and I’m glad to have made your acquaintance. Thanks!
Likewise. Good night, good weekend, and I’ll look for you again.
Looking forward to it; be safe.
bfl
I know, I was being facetious.
It’s only racism if its happening to black people.
Now pay your taxes, the Rulers need a raise.
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