6 December 2008
Cape Town, Washington DC — As governance in Zimbabwe continues to crumble and the United Nations reports nearly 14,000 suspected cholera cases, Western powers have stepped up their rhetoric against President Robert Mugabe and are lobbying African nations to call on him to step down.
European foreign ministers will decide on Monday whether to intensify sanctions on the Mugabe government.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown issued a statement in London on Saturday describing the situation in Zimbabwe as “an international rather than a national emergency” and called on the world community “to say firmly to Mugabe that enough is enough.”
He said the emergency was “international” because “disease crosses borders… because the systems of government in Zimbabwe are now broken. There is no state capable or willing of protecting its people.”
Brown said he was pressing African leaders to take “stronger action to give the Zimbabwean people the government they deserve.”
His remarks came after United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice used her strongest language yet to condemn Mugabe’s government. She told reporters in Copenhagen on Friday that “it’s well past time for Robert Mugabe to leave."
She joined Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Desmond Tutu, the former Archbishop of Cape Town and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who both called this week for Mugabe’s resignation.
Zimbabwe's government declared a national emergency during the week in response the cholera outbreak. Estimates have put the death toll at nearly 600, and aid agencies warn that the situation is worsening quickly.
Power-sharing talks with the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) – which has a parliamentary majority – have stalled, and Mugabe has hinted that he might soon form a cabinet without the MDC.
Rice said it was "obvious" that Mugabe had to go, calling both the June election and subsequent talks a "sham." She was speaking to reporters at a press conference after following a meeting with Denmark's Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen.
She too put pressure on African governments, saying “the southern African states should be responsible at this point because they have the most at risk." She said she hoped her comments would "spur the states of the region to stronger action."
Russell Feingold (Democrat-Wisconsin), the chair of United States Senate committee on Africa, praised Rice: “The political turmoil, for which Mugabe is largely responsible, is the biggest impediment to getting people the assistance they need," Feingold said in a statement.
Also on Friday, Rice’s British counterpart, Foreign Secretary David Miliband, called Mugabe's administration a "rogue government." He said European Union foreign ministers would decide on Monday whether to extend what he called “targeted measures against key figures in the Zimbabwean regime.”
“The economy is in free-fall,” he added. “Education and health systems have failed. Public infrastructure is in terminal decline and the government is unwilling and unable to look after its own people... Now the country has been hit by a cholera epidemic... This is a direct result of the abuse, neglect and corruption of a Mugabe regime which long ago lost respect and in March's elections lost its legitimacy."
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As Mugabe likes to remind us, under Ian Smith, whites ate steak while blacks ate sazda.
What he does not like to see mentioned is that, under Mugabe, Mugabe eats steak, the other "war heroes" eat sazda, and everyone else in Zimbabwe eats dirt.
anD AS FAR AS I AM CONCERNED THERE WAS FOOD ON THE TABLE FOR EVERYONE NO ONE STARVED AND HOSPITALS WERE NOT CLOSED WHILE IN NEIGHBOURING ZAMBIA THERE WAS A SHORTAGE OF FOOD WHEN THE BORDER BETWEEN ZAMBIA AND RHODESIA CLOSED AND ALL WE HAD WAS BASHED UP CANS OF CHINESE FOOD AND BUTCHERS WERE EMPTY
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and until then, Mugabe's thug will rape and pillage the nations coffers, and the poor will suffer. There's a reason why Zimbabwe is the 14th most corrupt in the world.
what we "Africans" MUST realized is that there's greed up in the Air by some of this racist and neocolonist who don't want to see any good leaders for Africa. Let's take one, the rescent president of South Africa in which the true behind his dismisser as president was NEVER told. Africans should STOP playing with fire and face their reality or else that countinent "Africa" will Never develop. And if you ask me why; that's just how they racist and neocolonists of the western world want it to be. They want Africa to be their bread basket and… [Read Full Text]
The talk about Ian Smith and his Rhodesia subjects does nothing to Zimbabwe nor it's future. Few people in Zimbabwe can relate to Ian Smith and his regime. Most people who were in their twenties or less during his regime either do not care who he is or view him as an oppressor. Hey, "Rhodes" I hear you, but I really do not care about Smith. Smith claimed once that entire villages would attend his funeral, that usual wishful thing! Alas, Smith died a lonely man in a nursing home in SA. With Smith, the question of race, land,… [Read Full Text]
Even Field Marshall Idi Amin had "professors" defending him to his last days as the Life President of Uganda, all in the midst of decay and death. Whatever these people profess, it must be sick and grotesque stuff.
There is decay and death all over the world.
And your point is?
Professors have been heavily involved in giving economic advice to the President in the USA and the PM in UK. Result: The current worst financial meltdown in USA since the World War 2.
We have western and Asian economies now in recession - widely believed to be a depression.
Do you suggest that village idiots were advising President Bush - so a to avert economic disaster?
Well. Maybe you have a different take on things: Whoever - professor or not - that advised Al Hajji Idi Amin… [Read Full Text]
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