Posted on 10/01/2007 7:08:53 PM PDT by george76
Harare admits land reform has failed as the deadline passes for the last white farmers to leave their land.
Zimbabwe's bakeries have shut and supermarkets have warned there will be no bread for the foreseeable future as the government admitted that wheat production had collapsed following the seizure of white-owned farms.
The agricultural ministry announcement that the wheat harvest is only about a third of what is required, and that imports are held up by lack of hard currency, came as a deadline passed today for the last white farmers to leave their land or face prosecution for trespass.
The maize harvest is expected to be equally dire and price controls to contain hyperinflation have emptied the stores of most other foodstuffs...
Last week, the government said it plans to import 100,000 tonnes of wheat but acknowledged that a shipment of 35,000 tonnes was held up in Mozambique because of a shortage of hard currency to pay for it.
The agriculture minister, Rugare Gumbo, has blamed the food shortages on black farmers who have taken over formerly white-owned land.
"I am painfully aware of the widespread theft of stock, farm produce, irrigation equipment and the general vandalism of infrastructure by our new farmers," ...
"I am disappointed that our new farmers have proved to be failures since the start of the land reform programme in 2000..."
The ministry of agriculture has also blamed electricity shortages...
The power shortages are likely to continue. Mozambique has reduced electricity supplies to Zimbabwe because of a $35m... unpaid bill...
Zimbabwe, once the world's second largest exporter of tobacco, has also seen production of its main cash crop nosedive...
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
LOL, I taught a couple of semesters of Freshman comp.
Zimbabwe runs out of bread
how about blood?
That reminds me of some gallows humor from the WWII concentration camps, “Potato shadow soup.”
suspend a large potato over a pot of boiling water so that it’s shadow falls on the soup. cook and serve
not it is not. They should not have been. The entire world was complicit in that travesty - I call it a crime - and now they are appalled at the consequences of Africa reverting to its kind?
People who have never been to Africa, thats who is appalled.
Who in their right mind would be surprised. You?
Which African nations give a damn? Which ones are those?
“I believe Mr. Gumbo is about to find out he’s in the wrong time and place to be named after a food...” .... If it keeps up, he’ll be Gumbo, without the chicken.
It’s still changes nothing...it’s still Africa’s problem...not ours. They told us loud and clear by taking property of the whites and killing many of them.
Oh, that explains it. I taught art students; they weren't literate at all....
>It still changes nothing...it’s still Africa’s problem
Agreed. We are on the same page here. Thank you for your posts. - bill
africawinsagain...
I hope you do realize that the African nations will not welcome ANY military intervention by western powers. (The UN is worse than useless) It is an African problem that the Africans do not want to solve. Too many are marxist themselves. South Africa is next.
The only whites to blame for Zimbabwe are Peanutd—k and his fellow marxist murderers!
"We ate the Memorial Tree," said Mr. Gumbo...
This from the country which was once known as “The Breadbasket of Africa.”
Tragic.
At what point will these ‘leaders’ wake up and face reality?
(Actually, don’t answer that. I’m afraid that I already know.)
Reap what you have sown.
Can’t blame whitey this time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I agree.
Nothing will change with Mugabe gone.
The poor silly woman is still living in the Godforsaken sh*t-hole. Check out www.cathybuckle.com.
Here is her latest post:
What a way to live
Saturday 29th September 2007
Dear Family and Friends,
Standing outside over yet another smoky fire late one afternoon this week, a Go-Away bird chastised me from a nearby tree. I'm sure this Grey Lourie is as fed up of me intruding into its territory as I am of being there - trying to get a hot meal for supper. For five of the last six days the electricity has gone off before 5 in the morning and only come back 16 or 17 hours later a little before midnight. "Go Away! Go Away!" the Grey Lourie called out repeatedly as my eyes streamed from the smoke and I stirred my little pot. My hair and clothes stink of smoke, fingers are yellow and sooty but this is what we've all been reduced to in Zimbabwe. Our government don't talk about the power cuts anymore and don't even try and feed us with lame excuses about how the power is being used to irrigate non-existent crops. We all know it's not true and the proof is there in the empty fields for all to see.
Something else our government aren't talking about anymore is the nationwide non availability of bread and the empty shops in all our towns and cities. Everywhere you go people are struggling almost beyond description to try and survive and yet the country's MP's, both from the ruling party and the opposition, do nothing to put an end to this time of horror. I have lost count of how many weeks this has been going on for but it must be around three months. None of the basics needed for daily survival are available to buy. There is no flour to bake with, no pasta, rice, lentils, dried beans or canned goods. People everywhere are hungry, not for luxuries like biscuits or snack food but for the staples that fill your stomach. When you ask people nowadays how they are coping, mostly they say that they are not, they say they are hungry, tired and have little energy. This is a national crisis almost beyond description and people say they are alive only because of " the hand of God."
This week as Monks and then ordinary people in Burma took to the streets in their thousands calling out 'Democracy, Democracy' in the face of the police and soldiers, we can't help but wonder why something similar does not happen here. The chant could be shorter and even simpler than in Burma and it could just be: 'Food, food,' but without leadership it seems as elusive as ever.
I end with a story about a man who is epileptic and visited the local government hospital for his regular check-up this week. It took four hours before he was seen by a nurse who scribbled in his book that this was a known case and that the hospital pharmacy should dispense his prescription of 90 phenobarb tablets at no charge - as they usually do. This major provincial government hospital had no phenobarb however so the man went to the biggest and busiest pharmacy in the town. They said the phenobarb would cost 1.2 million dollars - this is ten times more than the man's government stipulated minimum monthly wage. I offered to help and took the prescription to another pharmacy. The exact same tablets cost 250 thousand dollars - nearly five times cheaper. When I gave them to the man, his eyes shone with tears and he thanked me - 'I thought I would have to die' he said.
What a way to live, and to die.
Until next week, thanks for reading, love cathy.
Where and when. ..and how; will this end?
Where is the leadership in the surrounding nations allowing this beast to destroy everything? Mugabe should have overthrown ages ago, with assistance from bordering counties.
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