No, they don't but I'd rather see them in control of that land. Reason being that they put that land to much better use than it being put to now. Part of the reason that Zimbabwe was one of Africa's success stories was due to it's agricultural prowess. Now, that idiot of a president has given away the one thing that makes Zimbabwe a force to be reckoned with because of his own hate for white people. They aren't going to use it to better the nation. They aren't even going to use it to better themselves... most of the people that Bob has given the land to are so poor that buying seed and fertilisers is beyond their ability so the land will lie farrow. So who wins in the end? The country is a complete wreck. People resort to eating tree bark and leaves because of a severe shortage of food.

If anything, I would rather have seen that land be divided between the farmers and the Zimbabwean people. Because the farmers were Zimbabwean by virtue of birth and because they farmed in effect for the nation (though making a tidy profit as well; but hey, that's just a part of life...) I would have liked to have seen them keep at least SOME of the land to continue doing so and with the remainder of the land given back to the people, work with them to help them better themselves and in time, the nation. Looking at the present situation, true you have the land given to its rightful owners, but what now?

MrBanks,

Thosewere somebrilliant points you raised! clp)Especially regarding how peeps are just going to sit and wait for more handouts from either their own rotting, corruption-infested government or the West. Which is kinda funny, considering that one of the fundamental "lessons" you can pick up anywherein Africa is that if you want something, you better damn well work for it. With no benefits system, if you have nothing, you literally have nothing...

Being given this land is a gift unlike any other. But I think it was very badly thought out. It's like a Bush election campaign. "I need the people to think I'm the best thing that ever happened to them... the people in the cities KNOW I'm a senile, corrupt philandering *******, but the people in the rural areas haven't a clue. I know, I'll give them something to keep them dumb like that. Hmmm... what do they REALLY want??" Okay, that's a somewhat cynical approach, but he actually did give people the land to keep them believing in him, that much is true.



Hesaid,

How long have you been waiting to let that one out? No pun intended.

The situation in Zim is a tragedy,the people for the most part are hardworking and educated.The education was driven by Mugabe,one of his better ideas.

There cannot be any doubt thatwhites came by the land by theft and deception originally and had no rights to own it...but as Zimbabwe has been Independent for 20 odd years it would have been better to have sorted the problem out back then,just after independence and not leave it until comparatively recently when it became an opportunists way of hanging on to populist power.

The farmershave the legal deeds for the lands they farm given to them by the present government after independance..There are obviously some racial overtones with a wealthy elite farming community being predominately white,but over the previous 20 years surely a program picking off farms up for resale to be managed by africans working alongside the acquired knowledge ofwhite farmers would have kept a continuity of food supply for the country.

Irrigation schemes along side the established farms,enlarging the farming area available and then establishing african owned farms.Isreal has createdproductive land from nothing...with a lot of money pumped in...Zimbabwe could do the same..over time.I dont want to start a Zionist debate here about the amount of aid Isreal recieved...yes I know it was hugely funded from the west.

I seem to recall from my days at school, that the english had an agricultural system that meant everybody inherited land from their fathers,and over time the land was split into smaller and smaller tracks of land wasting the use because of the divisions between and the distances between land owned by one man,even America's farm land was held by many people until it was clear that large farms were more practical to produce food economically.So Zimbabwe's move is a step in the wrong direction....Lets hope it can be resolved before too many people die.

Geoff

It’s worth noting that you use the example of Israel in your argument, which is another case of stolen land, and western imperialism. We Afrikans have been under attack for over 400 years, so what are 20? The same white farmers that you make reference to, have not been feeding Afrikans, but instead have been growing fat of the land (CASH CROPS), though it is true not all white framers are rich, but that is their way. It is for Afrikan people to resolve their own problems, on their own land – in their own way. To suggest that others know best, is nothing new, we’ve heard that before, but Europe’s solutions had never served anybody else, but Europeans.

@All. The issue in Zimbabwe is very straight forward, but confused by the white media and white sponsored internal opposition. The issue of land transfer was at the heart of the Lancaster House Treaty in 1982 ,but in order for its smooth transition required subsequent British Governments to honoured the clear agreements they made.

Part of this agreement, required Britain to provide financial renumeration to the Mugabe government to pay back white Zimbabweans; who of course inflated the cost of the land which they got for next to nothing.

People who blame Mugabe, I suggest no little about what has taken place, and in effect is a distraction and part of the enemy strategy. What progressive African leader has not face this. For example, the great Nkrumah experienced every thing Mugabe is facing right now; with the help of people like Paul Boateng's father promoted the enemy's and their own cause by screaming corruption to the Western press, who were and are always amenable to those kind of stories.

The mistakes which Mugabe has made, or has been purported to have made are marginal, as what leaders do not excerice poor judgement even when not African leaders opearting in such contexts. The greatest people cannot see the future and make honourable but poor judgement on many occassions.

The rights of white Zimbabweans as MB cites are secondary and quite frankly irrelevent. My family has land on both sides back home in the Caribbean. Does MB believe because some white folks take over our island, and are foolish enough to take our land; and have their children on my property that wills save them from wholesale slaughter ,my boy is joking; and I suggest any African who owns land will not get side tracked from what the fundamentals of this issue is about. If you don't have land and attachment to it and that kind attachment and understanding that comes with it, may miss the essential point...

The only decision whites in that position have to make, is to leave our country and property or die there. The choice is theirs, because I cannot see my people under similar circumstances sitting there finding fault with the PM, when the PM or government did not give us our land; and we aquired it via hard work and sacrifice after slavery..

No dicussion really.....ower

I had a feeling someone was going to come along and say something like that...

Fred,

The situations you cited in your own motherland are somewhat different from those taking place in Zimbabwe. Granted, the British do have an obligation to pay some form of compensation to the Zimbabwean people - something I, surprisingly forgot to mention in earlier posts - but that does not mean that his actions are right, or just. You seem bent on supporting him BECAUSE he is a black man in power and because he's stuck two fingers to the British government. But that doesn't mean he's right. Trust me, he has - and I must emphasize this - f.ucked things up for his own people. I cannot respecta man like that, nor condone his activities. I believe you are in Birmingham; apologies if I'm wrong. I believe there is a substantial Zimbabwean population out there. If you have the time or inclination, speak to some and gather their opinions. I'll almost guarantee you will find a lot of people justifiably against his oppression.Can you really see a man who instigated ethnic cleansing of his own people (though technically not as they were a different "tribe") resulting in the deaths and disappearance of hundreds of thousands.

Melodramatic as this is - and I'll be the first to admit it is a bit melodramatic - it's almost as if you'd say "bravo" to Saddam for (as Mugabe has done) being an indigenous leader of his own people and telling the West where they can shove their policies. Before you react, allow me tojustify my metaphor. Both leaders have risen from the ashes to "lead" (by saying lead, I obviously mean control)their people. Both have been entirely self-interested and have done their utmost to remain in power. Both have been involved in ethnic cleansing. Both have told the US and UK where to shove it (though Iraq bought weapons from the West where Zimbabwe bought them from the East- China and other socialist states). I think, apart from theobvious, the only difference that lies between the two is that Mugabe styled his look on Hitler and Saddam on Magnum PI.

Untitled thanks for your response. First, I argue what I know not what I don't. The fundamentals to the issue concerning the land issue in Zimbabwe is as I stated and that is a FACT, as I was party to the pre Lancaster House briefing given by Mugabe and others on the issue in 1981, and know what the points of contention were then, and how it structured everything else.

So if we are talking about the land issue, those are the fundamentals right there. So is the issue of how western governments demonise non compliant African leaders, while turning a blind eye, to others who are destroying their countries. So please do not attempt to put words into my mouth, to suggest simply because Mugabe is a black man, he will get my support, which is presumptious and offensive.

I know why I support Mugabe, and why I stay silent on other leaders, who I know little about. I also know a bit about the systems and strategies used to demonise African and Caribbean leaders; which is CLEARLY at play in this instance and if the whites and thier friends were not so quick to demonise black/African leaders, we would perhaps be in a better position to seperate reality from myth and propaganda. Where there is doubt as an intelligent black man, I defend my own in the absence of good informatiaon and evidence.

No I do not come from Birmingham, god forbid ,but let me stop you there Guest. In every scenario where there is a change of regime, or those fighting or seeking to undermine a regime, there will be exiles in foreign countries saying all kinds of things. Some true, partially true and some damn fictious. So simply being a Zimbabwean does not in my eyes provide anyone with legitmacy or authority in the things they claim, as being a Ghanian exile during the time of Nkrumah, or any important African leader or Caribbean leader eg Bishop.

The US had their apologists running around the whole Eastern Caribbean spreading propaganda saying how Bishop was communist[and what], anti god, anti a small man owning his own litle wooden shack and a whole heap of shit[but were strangely silent when Gairy was destroying the total infrastrucure of the island, filling his pockets and reducing the women in the island to whores having to sleep with anybody for work in menial positions and I can go on].

More questions have to be asked before we grant these anti Mugabe voices with legitmacy. Same as Nigeria. If god willing there is a radical change in the status quo, and the majority remove this cancerous predator on the civic and political and social system. Bet you any money, many of them will be in England, and the US, saying similar things.

So not dissing you bro, just been around a while to have seen these things before; and was also invovled once in supporting the wrong side during the civil war in Angola. So experience teacheth wisdom.

I respect Robert Mugabe as a leader and radical. If evidence is found that genuinely descredits him, then he must face his fate. These are the principles I live and fall by. But by the same token, we do not take the enemies propaganda, or those from within the country, whose motives and authtenticity we are unable to confirm and side with our enemies against one of our own. Never, ever.

Back in the day, Sekou Toure in Guinea was a hero of the African radical movment worldwide. But as he aged and spent too long in power, he begun to attack and undermine the same democratic and radical principles which he stood at the forefront.

Once this information begun to spread in radical and internationalist African/Black circles, from authentic and legitmate sources, the Pan African world, took a step back and begun to view Toure in a different way and withdrew our support for him. Simple things bro. I would not condemn you on the word of the "Evening Standard", or "Daily Mail", or any white media; or because some one who happens to be black starts to run their mouth.

These are fundamental first principles where I come from. Treat others how you would with them to treat you; especially where the hand of the wazungu can clearly be seen.

We had a sister on the old black Forum,[ Shing] who was Zimbabwean, went there often; and whose perception of events were not as you are suggesting and more in line with what I heard from people I trust and have earned it.

Now if you are telling me, Mugabe has carried out ethnic cleansing then brother you will have to provide me evidence of that; because as somebody who follows developments in that part of the world carefully, that is the first time I have heard of what you are claiming. Not saying it is not true, but I would want to ask many many questions first.

For example are these ZAPU people who are making these claims. ZAPU did little for the liberation stuggle and undermined the armed struggle and helped Britain and the whites there and world wide impose a set of conditions on the African majority,which constrained and cripppled Mugabe et al from day one.

So more information please and from good sources.blktype

And by the way bro. To compare Mugabe with Saddamm Hussaine is frankly silly and descredits any serious discussion you want to come with and raises questions about your motive. That is not even a reasonable comparison, to a fool. So who is prejudiced or has an uncritcal commitment......? In fact that comment, sounds like it came straight from the Daily Mail and anyone with serious understanding of this issue will know about the Daily Mails finacial and other interests in Zimbabwe and why it wants Mugabe removed by any means.smoking-devil

TO MR-BANKS,

U wrote: First of all, I think that whites BORN in Zimbabwe technically DO have the right to own land simply because they WERE born there.

They do not deserve to hold onto land in Zimbabwe cos their forefathers invaded and occupied that country......stealing lands belonging to african indigenous people


Look, regardless of the crimes that there parents commited the people BORN in that land really do have just as much right to the land as any one else.
I'm only being fair and righteous in my observation.
If you say they should be put out the land because they're white...who's to say that us blacks and whites in Europe and America shouldn't be put out also and sent back to Africa?


U sound so dumb at ur age....who said anything about putting them out cos they are white. Secondly, black people in Europe work hard to get what they possess .......they did not steal their houses......their businesses unlike the whites in Zimbabwe. If the whites wanted land so bad.....they should work hard for it just like blacks in europe work like donkeys. thats fair enough.....may be not to ya cos u sound like an uncle tom.


Most black people feel the way I do deep down (I said MOST...not all) but the only problem is that we know that the whites have historically passed these vast amounts of land down generation after generation but got the land unfairly.
So we wanna take it all back.

The land should be taken back from these white barbarians.


I think that when Zimbabwe got her independance the land should have either ALL went to the government under socialism or it should have been divided evenly among all the adults.

Then the government should have launched massive educational projects to teach blacks the skills and sciences of agriculture and ecology so that we would be just as qualified as whites in maintaining the land and producing food and cotton and other goods.
Instead, too many of us became lazy and shiftless under the yolk of colonization like we did in slavery.

Speak for urself only......if u r lazy....so be it.....many of us are lazy?......thats bollocks to my ear.....blacks in the diaspora work diligently to get where they are.....while whites in south africa......zimbabwe stole land and distribute them to their descendants and u expect us not to react to it.....u r just another uncle tom...real black people are fed up with people like ya.

Instead of LEARNING how to work, too many wanna snatch the land way from the whites...then sit on it grinning and smoking funny herbs doing nothing.
Some sit on a bucket in the middle of a field wiggling their toes in the soil expecting shit to start growing on it's own.


u r chatting bollocks still


Or wait for the West to drop packages of oatmeal from the sky when we're living in a tropical paradise that can grow damn near anything.

just cos u as a person is waiting for handout does not mean other blacks are waiting for handouts.

There's NO REASON what so f*cking ever that deserts should be growning in Central and Southern Africa!

The problem is the attitude of the people.
Now that colonism is "officially" over...no one wants to be a worker that produces and cultivates, everyone wants to be a leader or soldier who takes by force.

u r not making sense.


How many Zimbabs are trying to be farmers and plantation workers now?

How many do u know moron.....get ur facts right b4 u stereotype....uncle tom.


Mugabe should reconstruct the educational system and make farming and agricultural work honorable and respectable again instead of giving all these men guns to play with.

Mugabe may be a tyrant.....unlike u, he is no uncle tom....







Yeah yeah I know......

It sounded cool to me too!

In the beginning when Mugabe was taking the land back and redistributing it...
Him and his military gets together and run the devils out the land and return it to it's former glory....it all sounds wonderful.

But after while reality sets in.
My worse nightmares were confirmed.

I was hoping that these negros wouldn't force whites off the land and out of the government only to end up f*cking everything up and having to come back to another white man on their knees.

Whites DID steal land in Africa and the Americas but they got their asses out in the field and WORKED to cultivate the soil. They didn't just kill off the natives and use up the land until they had nothing left......then starved to death.


black slaves worked the land in north america ok......could u tell me what u do for a living? u sound so naive....u suffer from inferiority complex

MB I did not see this until I read Oba85's post,when you said:"Look, regardless of the crimes that there parents commited the people BORN in that land really do have just as much right to the land as any one else.
I'm only being fair and righteous in my observation.

If you say they should be put out the land because they're white...who's to say that us blacks and whites in Europe and America shouldn't be put out also and sent back to Africa?"

I see you are a promoter of "squatters rights" and the charter of thieves and murderers..

ARE YOU CRAZY......? Fortuantely Obal85 has dealt with the issue. My parents and people built this country, as I do; in a way which is disrportionate to our rewards. How you can compare us with these murders and thieves is beyone me..confused2

No, white Zimbabweans should be allowed to have rights. I agree, but behind the Zebras and Girraffes who are Africans; and in my view have more rights than them, and will always have .....I a black man is going to fight for a country, my country; where a white man has, or can have the same rights as me in my soil,[ and place of origin] and our land. That is mighty Christian of you, but if they want those rights stay in their country, or place of origin. We cannot give them what they deny us in their place of origin.

What black people idiots and inferior for real......?