Free Republic

Zimbabwe's preening socialist strongman, Robert Mugabe, a man who left his once prosperous country a hellhole, is gone, and his end didn't come soon enough.  He went out as one of the world's worst curses against humanity. Here's the New York Times announcement: Robert Mugabe, the first prime minister and later president of independent Zimbabwe, who traded the mantle of liberator for the armor of a tyrant and presided over the decline of one of Africa's most prosperous lands, died on Friday. He was 95. The death was announced by his successor, President Emmerson Mnangagwa. "It is with the utmost sadness that I...

Robert Mugabe, the longtime leader of Zimbabwe who was forced to resign in 2017 after a military takeover, has died. His successor Emmerson Mnangagwa confirmed Mugabe’s death in a tweet Friday, mourning him as an “icon of liberation.” Mugabe was a former guerrilla chief who took power after the end of white minority rule in 1980 and presided over a country whose early promise was eroded by economic turmoil and human rights violations.

...life without water is a daily nightmare endured in Zimbabwe's capital city, Harare, where more than two million people only have running water once a week, according to the New York Times. The water shortage there means residents ration bathroom trips and stand in interminable lines to fill buckets and cans at communal boreholes. One mother profiled by the New York Times got in line at 3 a.m. By the afternoon, she was still standing in line. The boreholes are a problem too since they are so polluted. "Water-borne diseases linked to these boreholes are on the rise, but people...

HARARA, May 13 (Reuters) - Zimbabwe has started rolling power cuts lasting up to eight hours that will also hit mines, a schedule from the state power utility showed on Monday, after reduced output at both the largest hydro plant and ageing coal-fired generators. The power cuts will add to mounting public anger against President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government as Zimbabweans grapple with an economic crisis that has seen shortages of U.S. dollars, fuel, food and medicines as well as soaring inflation that is eroding earnings and savings.

Zimbabwe is to start paying compensation this year to thousands of white farmers who lost land under former president Robert Mugabe’s land reform nearly two decades ago, the government said, as it seeks to bring closure to a highly divisive issue. Two decades ago Mugabe’s government carried out at times violent evictions of 4,500 white farmers and redistributed the land to around 300,000 black families, arguing it was redressing imbalances from the colonial era. But land reform still divides public opinion as opponents see it as a partisan process that left the country struggling to feed itself. President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s...

More than 1,000 people were feared dead in Mozambique four days after a cyclone slammed into the country, submerging entire villages and leaving bodies floating in the floodwaters, the nation's president said. "It is a real disaster of great proportions," President Filipe Nyusi said. Cyclone Idai could prove to be the deadliest storm in generations to hit the impoverished southeast African country of 30 million people. It struck Beira, an Indian Ocean port city of a half-million people, late Thursday and then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi with strong winds and heavy rain. But it took days for the...

To the casual moralist you don’t slap sanctions on a country on its knees minding its own business. Never mind the country has a government of looters who campaign on a ticket of lies about Israel and fete Hamas terror leaders and a plane highjacker on home soil. South Africa is not neighbouring Zimbabwe, on which President Trump already slapped sanctions, although the Cato Institute warned him that South Africa is on the Zimbabwean road to hell. (Hyperlink needed). For now the country remains afloat. The problem (call it the exemplar effect) is somewhat different.. .....

Jemitias Denhere shakes his head as he explains why, despite being a specialist in soil management and crop production, he specializes in beef livestock. The district agronomist -- plants specialist -- owns 27 hectares of land in the Mwenezi area of southern Zimbabwe, a particularly arid location. Here, farmers endure extreme weather challenges such as drought and flash flooding -- and, thus, some of the highest food shortages. His cattle can exist on the little grass that remains during dry times, but to produce crops without irrigation is risky -- so he decided against it. "One year, you win; one...

I’d seen the black and white photos of German children using bundles of money as building blocks during the Weimar Republic. I’d read about the skyrocketing price of bread in Zimbabwe, and how people were carrying their cash in wheelbarrows. But nothing you read can prepare you for life with hyperinflation. In the Weimar Republic hyperinflation was largely the result of reparation: payments imposed on Germany after World War I. In Zimbabwe it was the result of Robert Mugabe’s land reform policy and the drop in food production and foreign investment that followed. But in Venezuela it has been the...

The opposition takes to the streets of Venezuela today, the anniversary of the overthrow of a dictator in 1958, with the backing of the United States as expressed by Vice-President Mike Pence who said yesterday via Twitter: "@POTUS & the US stand w/ the Venezuelan people as they seek to regain their liberty from dictator Nicolas Maduro.... "The resistance will not allow our people's blood to be used as fuel in the election campaign in Israel, and it has the tools to defend the people" That is the message from the Hamas terror organization that runs the Gaza Strip following...

Good Morning.... Israel on the attack in Syria, first a mid-day strike on a southeastern Damascus airport.... The next installment of Qatari Arab cash is on its way to Gaza...... Israeli politics and a Likud party member Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely challenging one of the leaders of the "New Right" Party Education Minister Naftali Bennett...... The womens marches of Yellow Vests in France Sunday.... In the African nation of Zimbabwe last week widespread street demonstrations against the high price of fuel said to be the highest in all of Africa lead to a government crackdown with live ammunition.... Meanwhile...

The deplorable economic situation in Zimbabwe is getting even more critical by the day. Stack poverty now stares the majority of the people on the face. At some point, the country had a vibrant economy, when agricultural investors where not arm twisted, their land taken away forcefully by the former regime in a bid to Redistribute land. The truth about Zimbabwe is that it has regressed, back to that ancient poverty which has been the historical lot of mankind. As I’ve pointed out before: The problem with this description is that it is actually accurate. Zimbabwe simply doesn’t have anything...

"A catastrophic failure of leadership @Theresa May. If she has any sense of honor she will resign" That is the tweet of "Mr. Brexit" Nigel Farage in face of Prime Minister Theresa May's huge defeat in the House of Commons..... Al-Shabab Islamic terrorists based in Somalia say they are behind the attack on a luxury hotel complex in Nairobi, Kenya that killed at least 24 people including one US citizen.... In the African nation of Zimbabwe opposition Pastor Evan Mwarire is under arrest following three days of protest against rising fuel prices..... The Russian Interfax News Agency quotes its sources...

Three people have appeared in court in Zimbabwe, accused of stealing a suitcase containing $150,000 (£117,600) of cash from the country's ousted president, Robert Mugabe.Three people have appeared in court in Zimbabwe, accused of stealing a suitcase containing $150,000 (£117,600) of cash from the country's ousted president, Robert Mugabe.

South Africa: Black South Africans Unleash Campaign of Savagery and Predation on Local Whites Video at the link.

Eskom’s warning that the country was threatened by months of rotating blackouts became a reality in less than 24 hours. The state-owned company, which produces most of South Africa’s power, said on Wednesday that controlled blackouts could return and last throughout the year. Even more concerning is that the company expects energy availability of the system will keep declining into early next year and probably only recover to current levels in six months. By Thursday, Eskom announced it was cutting 1GW from the grid. It doubled that amount on Friday in an outage that’s scheduled to last 13 hours. For...

About 500 people are killed in hippopotamus attacks each year. On Saturday, Kristen Yaldor was almost one of them. The 37-year-old American woman was on a river safari tour with her husband, Ryan, when she was suddenly attacked by a hippo that was said to be protecting her calf. The couple was on a guided canoe safari on Zimbabwe’s Zambezi River. Led by tour operator Wild Horizons, the safari group had three guests and two guides. While canoeing down the river, one of the guides spotted the hippo on the river’s right bank. He reportedly instructed the group to paddle...

Zimbabwe's former President Mugabe, 94, is unable to walk because of ill health, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has said...

SOUTH Africa’s white farmers could face land seizures after the country’s parliament recommended controversial reforms which put their future in doubt. The proposals would see the introduction of laws allowing the state to expropriate land without compensation “in the national interest”. White South African farmers still own around 73 percent of the country’s commercial agricultural land despite making up just nine percent of the population. And supporters of sweeping land reform insist the state must step in to transfer ownership of some of the land to black farmers more than two decades after the end of apartheid.

...Mnangagwa struck a conciliatory tone in the months leading up to the election. Declaring that Zimbabwe was “open for business,” he amended a law requiring local ownership of diamond and platinum mines. He signaled his intent to end farm seizures and vowed to sell off failing state enterprises. He even wrote a New York Times op-ed calling for democracy and equal rights for all citizens. But Mnangagwa is tied to numerous human rights abuses, including overseeing a series of government-ordered massacres between 1982 and 1986 known as the “Gukurahundi.” An estimated 20,000 civilians from Zimbabwe’s Ndebele ethnic group were killed....