Children of the streets feel wrath of Mugabe

[ms]

Children of the streets feel wrath of Mugabe
By David Blair in Johannesburg
(Filed: 16/05/2006)



President Robert Mugabe began a new onslaught on Zimbabwe's poor yesterday when his regime announced that more than 10,000 street children and vagrants had been "rounded up" in Harare.

Police described their latest assault on the capital's poverty-stricken street dwellers, codenamed Operation Round Up, as a crime-fighting measure.

Last year they bulldozed thousands of "illegal structures" in the poorest townships, leaving 700,000 people without homes or livelihoods.

The new operation appears aimed at those cast on to the streets by the earlier demolitions.

A total of 10,244 "vagrants, street kids, touts and other disorderly elements" have been detained, according to The Herald, the country's official daily newspaper.

Assistant Commissioner Munyaradzi Musariri said they would be "relocated" to their "homes" in rural areas. "As police, we will not rest until there is sanity in the streets and the operation is continuing," he said.

He said nothing about what would become of street children with no rural homes to go to.

In the past, Mr Mugabe's regime has swept people off the pavements, forcibly loading them on to lorries, before dumping them in remote areas with no support. Police officers routinely assault and rob detainees.

Many of those caught by the swoop will be victims of the spiralling economic crisis. Inflation is at 1,043 per cent - the highest rate in the world - and one third of the economy has been wiped out in the past six years.

Harare and the second city, Bulawayo, are the strongholds of Zimbabwe's opposition and 82-year-old Mr Mugabe views urban dwellers with deep suspicion.

Clearing the townships and relocating their inhabitants to rural areas, where the ruling Zanu-PF party is dominant, are central goals of his regime.

This week marks the first anniversary of the onset of the township demolitions, which the regime codenamed Operation Drive Out the Rubbish.

Mr Mugabe publicly turned down an offer of tents from the United Nations, thereby condemning countless families to sleeping in the open air.

Today the victims of this purge are clustered on the fringes of townships across Harare and every other city.

The regime pledged to build new houses to replace those it had demolished. But this promise has been broken and few new homes completed.

The authorities kept no record of those who were left destitute by the demolitions. There is therefore no way of identifying the right people to be given new houses - even if enough were built.

Economic collapse is rapidly impoverishing every strata of society, save for the corrupt elite around Mr Mugabe. Critics say police operations targeted on the urban poor make the crisis even worse.

[DWTim]

I note the relative silence of most of the American press, human rights organizations, the Democrat Party, and child welfare proponents... Compared to the ****storm they raised about Gitmo.

Cowards.

[FWiedner]

Zimbabwe is a sovereign nation.

We ain't the worlds cop, and what that maniac does to his own people is no one's business but their's.

If they didn't live for genocide, purges, death-squads, firing squads torture or prison they'd act to put an end to it.

Our national past-time of butting into other country's business is why the rest of the world, with good reason, hates us.

I say we hate 'em right back.  All of 'em.

Screw 'em.

[victorcharlie]

Zimbabwe is a sovereign nation.

We ain't the worlds cop, and what that maniac does to his own people is no one's business but their's.

If they didn't live for genocide, purges, death-squads, firing squads torture or prison they'd act to put an end to it.

Our national past-time of butting into other country's business is why the rest of the world, with good reason, hates us.

I say we hate 'em right back.  All of 'em.

Screw 'em.

You've put most of them in the X ring........

except for hate...........but your right.......we are prone to butt into others affairs arn't we?  And, that's why we're viewed as imperlist and hated....but hey.....let's call a spade a spade and a heart a heart....right?

[DWTim]

To clarify: I didn't ask any of the aforementioned groups to invade Mugabestan, I was just making a point about the self-characterized magnanimous elite, and their selectivity.

EDIT: I also note that there's no fawning over Mugabe, either. I guess he'd have to announce that he's building a communist regime to get that kind of attention.

[urrlord]

just about the only thing you hear about zimbabwe is famine due to drought.well there is famine,but the drought they are experiencing is of farmers.the last few years mugabe had the white owned farms and ranches broken up and parceled out to his followers.the whites were given the choice leave or die.the blacks who lived and worked on these farms were given the same options,as they were not politically reliable to stay there.so most of the experienced farmers are  gone and the new squatters don't have any idea of what to do.so the country that once fed most of the region is now  starving due to the racist policies of mugabe.but you won't hear it on the  nightly news.

[ironglow]

  It sure is interesting many of how those African states ( Formerly Rhodesia, Belgian Congo etc) were at one time, slowly emerging from tribalism and had the roots of modern, commercial societies..
   Then certain folks within the population seeing an opportunity for "Emperorship" joined in with liberal voices around the globe and clamored for their complete "independence".
   
  Today, they have independence as a nation, but the individual has lost all his independence..and any chance at earning an honest living for his family.
 
     Which I wonder is better: Being treated badly by a leader of another color or ethnicity but still being somewhat free and able to earn a living..or
 
     Being led by a person of your own color/ethnicity..and have no freedom and perhaps risking starvation or  elimination by death squads

    Perhaps they were a bit hasty in joining the liberals in demanding immediate independence..after all, the former colonial leaders predicted that such would happen..but the world leftists wouldn't hear it ..

[Syncerus]

The American press will not criticize Black rule in any way, shape or form. They are terrified of being branded racist. In America today, there is no greater crime than racism.

It's just sad, as far as I'm concerned. The world hates us and then they let things like this and worse happen everywhere. Why should we care what they think about anything? What have they shown us in their character that would make their opinion important to us?

This should make any decent human being angry.

[ggeilman]

This country doesn't really care much about Africa, especially after Mogadishu in 93. I don't think it is racism, but more not wanting to get involved or feeling like there is nothing they can do. No one wants to send troops there and it probably wouldn't help it we did. Yes, when people see it happening it makes them angry, but doing something about is a different story.

[ironglow]

   Perhaps it is more like when any disaster, insurrection, plague or brutal dictatorship need correction, the rest of the world, including the far east, middle east and "old" Europe all look to good old "Uncle Sugar" for help ...   They beg, cajole and threaten us with ostracism...remember the Indonesian sunami, when some folks from Scandanavia whined about how "little" the US had given, when we outgave almost all other nations put together !
   
...Then when we do show up to help, we get lambasted, criticized and called all sorts of names for having done so !

[hardertr]

They don't have 1) oil 2) diamonds or anything else of monetary value that would benefit out politicians or 3) much to offer as far as a strategic military location so we can invade other countries in search or numbers 1 or 2 above.

Of course we won't get involved.

[ironglow]

  Nigeria is afloat in oil..and we are not interfereing in their present difficulties...

  South Africa has diamonds and the situation there is pretty poor..yet noone's horning in there either.

   Grenada didn't have anything to offer, but we liberated them from Communism.

  South Korea has no special resources, but we preserved them from the Communist yoke..

...And what great natural resources does Afghanistan possess that we should throw the Taliban off their backs ?

         I know it may be a difficult coincept for some particularly cynical folks to grasp, but often the good 'ol USA...does things...just because it's the "right thing" to do...