Posted on 12/13/2002 4:41:36 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
President Robert Mugabe threatened retribution against the white population of Zimbabwe on Friday, suggesting they were working with Britain, the former colonial power, to sabotage his government.
Mugabe accused the British of leading an international campaign to isolate Zimbabwe and recruit support for his opponents inside his country.
"The more they work against us, the more they express hostility against us, the more negative we shall become to their kith and kin here," Mugabe said at the opening of his ruling party's annual convention.
The embattled Mugabe, however, did not refer to the nation's deepening economic crisis and a looming famine largely blamed on his party's policies.
In an 80-minute address, Mugabe railed against whites, Britain and its Western allies whom he accused of "nurturing enemies among us" by criticizing his party and supporting the main opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change.
"We are the type of people who, if you step on our foot, we fight back," said Mugabe.
Mugabe wore a baseball cap bearing the slogan "Chave Chimurenga," meaning "It is now war" in the local Shona language.
The white population in Zimbabwe stands at about 30,000 less than 1 percent of the population.
More than double that number lived in the southern African country 2 1/2 years ago, before ruling party militants began a campaign to seize white-owned farms, sparking political and economic unrest.
Most whites are the descendants of colonial era British and South African settlers.
The government has repeatedly accused Western countries and local whites of funding the main opposition that narrowly lost presidential elections in March.
"They are the enemies of the people and our government. We must be on our guard. Our survival is an ongoing war," Mugabe told about 2,000 ruling party loyalists at the convention in the provincial town of Chinhoyi, 70 miles northwest of Harare.
In his one reference to the country's economic woes, he said gasoline shortages that have left most of Zimbabwe's gas stations dry would be discussed in a closed session by delegates.
Delegates cheered and danced as Mugabe walked to the podium, but their response to his address was uncharacteristically muted compared to previous years.
Some laughed when Philip Chiyangwa, ruling party lawmaker for Chinhoyi, welcomed them to "Zimbabwe's bread basket."
Once known as southern Africa's bread basket, Zimbabwe now faces acute food shortages. The World Food Program says at least 6.7 million Zimbabweans, more than half the population, will need emergency food aid in coming months to avert mass starvation.
Mugabe says the food crisis on a drought earlier this year, while most analysts blames political violence and disruptions in the agriculture-based economy during the government's program to confiscate thousands of white-owned commercial farms that now lie virtually idle.
Mugabe on Thursday promised to enforce a widely abused government price freeze on most goods to slow record inflation, officially estimated at 144 percent but seen to be much higher.
Is this by way of saying it was the whites who raised all the food crops?
What would happen if the 30,000 whites armed themselves effectively? with say a few automatic weapons?
You just know Clinton did that intentionally. The fact that we fought on the side of Muslim crimminals against Christians only a few short years ago boggles the mind.
I'm all for bombing the UN on Easter, or any other day for that matter. ....and sending a few cruise missiles into Mugabe's residence isn't a bad idea either.
They don't, but Mugabe wants the suckers to think they are:
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed and hence, clamorous to be led to safety - by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."- H. L. Mencken, In Politics
Then get about 3 AC-130 gunships to drop weapons to the whites. Lets give these honest hardworking folks that have been there for generations a chance!
Never again?
If I were a white farmer there, I'd slash and burn my entire estate, ruin the ground with salt and whatever else would make it non-productive for decades and then hightail it out of there.Perhaps the best thing we could give the whites left in Zimbabwe would be some sort of persistent blight fungus or insects (aphids? locusts?). The best thing we could give Mugabe and his "war veteran" thugs would be delivered by this:
-Eric
You just know Clinton did that intentionally. The fact that we fought on the side of Muslim crimminals against Christians only a few short years ago boggles the mind.
We fought on the side of Muslims against the Soviets too, and the Serbs were conducting themselves like Soviets.
-Eric
Is he a hare-lip?
A Hitler impersonator?
A victim of BSS? (Black Snooster Syndrome)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.