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Topic: Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff (Read 526 times) |
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Walter Watts
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Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff
« on: 2008-06-22 17:33:09 » |
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I was hoping one of our South Africa experts would give us the CliffsNotes on this President Robert Mugabe dude.
--Walter
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Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff
JOHANNESBURG — Only five days before Zimbabwe’s presidential runoff election, the opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai announced Sunday that he was pulling out of the race because armed forces backing President Robert Mugabe have made it clear that anyone who votes for Mr. Tsvangirai faces a real possibility of being killed.
At a news conference, Mr. Tsvangirai, who leads the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, or M.D.C., said he was unwilling to ask the party’s supporters to go to the polls on Friday “when that vote will cost them their lives.”
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Walter Watts
Tulsa Network Solutions, Inc.
No one gets to see the Wizard! Not nobody! Not no how!
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Hermit
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Prime example of a practically perfect person
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Re:Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff
« Reply #1 on: 2008-06-22 22:08:58 » |
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Mugabe was a (ZANU) "terrorist" back when you could visit Rhodesia to see the Zimbabwe ruins. He was not even slightly a nice man. He has however looked after his cadres very well. They were miraculously converted from "terrorists" to the military and police, without even needing a refresher course, on Mugabe's ascension to power and remain the only people in Zimbabwe aside from Mugabe's political cronies and family to have enough to eat every day.
Somehow the British Government's Lord Carrington and the USA's Kissinger persuaded themselves that the mostly harmless Rev Canaan Banana (who actually had a law railroaded through parliament in an attempt to prevent jokes about his name) would keep ZANU and ZAPU peaceful and the British, known to the French - with reason - as perfidious Albion, guaranteed the future of Rhodesians (mostly nice and extremely competent people (when not whining about how perfect it used to be in Rhodesia, beginning each sentence with "When we were in Rhodesia" rather the way Canadians punctuate each sentence with "Eh." In this way ex-Rhodesians have earned the appellation, "Whenwees")).
Since then the government of Zimbabwe has become a criminal enterprise headed up by Mugabe, whose opponents end up dead or jailed for crimes such as "sodomy" (like Canaan Banana) - and to borrow a line from Monty Python (Meaning of Life), the Rhodesians "battled on, until... as the sun set slowly in the west the outstanding return on their bold business venture became apparent... the once proud financial giants lay in ruins - their assets stripped - their policies in tatters." and the Rhodesians have appealed to the skilled-in-handwashing British government in vain.
What used to be the breadbasket and tobacco pouch of Africa is now a dustbowl. Most whites not murdered have fled and their once magnificent farms lie derilict. Quoting Wikipedia, "The economy of Zimbabwe is collapsing under the weight of economic mismanagement, resulting in 85% unemployment and spiraling hyperinflation. The economy poorly transitioned after Robert Mugabe's leadership, deteriorating from one of Africa's strongest economies to the world's worst. Inflation has surpassed that of all other nations at over 730,000%, with the next highest in Burma at 39.5%[1]. The government has attributed the economy's poor performance to ZDERA, a US congressional act hinging debt relief for Zimbabwe on democratic reform, and freezing the international assets of the ruling class. It currently has the lowest GDP real growth rate in an independent country and 3rd in total (behind Palestinian territories.)"
Recently the "democratically elected" Mugabe, who, let us face it, was still more legitimately elected than Bush, has told his opponents that they will gain power only over his dead body. Meanwhile black Zimbabweans flee to neighboring countries to try to avoid the poverty and violence that has become the hallmark of Mugabe's "enlightened program of Africanization." Interestingly, the farmers driven out of Zimbabwe, like those driven by the massive crimewave against farmers from South Africa, are welcomed in most of the rest of Africa due to their ability to raise crops under impossible situations. The effect of their loss is shown in that both Zimbabwe and South Africa, both once major exporters, have become net food importers.
It is not an exaggeration to say that you can now visit Zimbabwe to see the Rhodesian Ruins. For more just ask.
Kindest Regards
Hermit
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With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg, 1999
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Walter Watts
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Re:Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff
« Reply #2 on: 2008-06-23 19:31:09 » |
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Thanks Hermit.
He sounds like a real peach of a fellow :p
Walter
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Walter Watts
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Blunderov
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Re:Zimbabwe Opposition Leader Pulls Out of Runoff
« Reply #3 on: 2008-06-24 04:32:56 » |
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[Blunderov] Stripped of even the fig leaf respectability of a rigged election, Mugabe is revealed to be the unabashed tyrant that he truly is. He stated quite openly that he would not accept the result of the 'run off' even if he lost. There seems little point in Morgan Tsvangirai continuing especially with people being murdered and horribly abused in Mugabe's cause.
There was a time when, just for a moment, it seemed that Mugabe might be prepared to step down but vested interest seems to have persuaded him to remain. No ordinary vested interests these. Much jail time, and perhaps worse, would await many people if they were to relinquish power now...perhaps a bit like the USA? The Jesuit educated Mugabe has, apparently, delighted in taking plays straight from the Bush game book; inversion of facts being a speciality. For instance Mugabe claims the collapse of agriculture in Zimbabwe is due to the sanctions imposed upon her by the West thus displaying a Bush-like disdain for the rule that causes precede effects. It's all quite amusing in a gallows humour sort of way.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3364778
Britain: Zimbabwe's Mugabe no longer legitimate
By JILL LAWLESS – 2 hours ago
LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Monday that President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe should no longer be recognized as the country's legitimate leader, branding him the head of a regime holding power though violence.
Brown urged the United Nations, the African Union and the Southern African Development Community to convene to resolve the country's difficulties. Britain was the former colonial ruler there.
<snip>
Brown said the European Union will impose travel bans and financial sanctions on the "inner circle of the criminal cabal running the regime."
"The current government, with no parliamentary majority, having lost the first round of the presidential elections and holding power only because of violence and intimidation, is a regime that should not be recognized by anyone," he said.
Read more: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j5bO3sM99-gAtZnnCH2s...
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