WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2002-06-10 Posted By: Jan
From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.Org
Date & Time Posted: 6/10/2002 4:51:52 PM
Zim: The Long Dark Night Descends
A doctrinaire Marxist runs anti-press laws; voices of Zimbabwe poets go unheard; and a cricketer-song writer catches the mood of national heartbreak. Michael Hartnack describes how a long dark night seems about to descend on journalistic, artistic and literary expression in Zimbabwe
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At a church concert in Harare on June 1, dread-locked fast bowler Henry Olonga delivered a hat trick of songs in his fine tenor voice. At the pleading of the audience, he concluded with the new unofficial national anthem: “Our Zimbabwe.” The words and tune, written by Olonga and two white friends, may have their fair share of cliches. But in the current explosively emotional atmosphere they have caught the country’s imagination. The family of murdered commercial farmer Terry Ford requested a recording be played at his funeral, women in the congregation weeping openly. For this is a country where a long, dark night seems about to descend on all forms of artistic and literary expression – as on the recording of current events themselves.
Information Minister Jonathan Moyo recently named his long-awaited Media and Information Commission which has power to ban anyone “writing for the mass media.” Those attempting to defy its state-draft code of practice face up to two years in prison under the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act, passed by Parliament in January. The commission chairman is a 60-year-old Marxist, Tafataona Mahoso, whose stated belief is that history needs a total rewrite to show civilisation was from its birth always uniquely black, with whites as barbarians against whom all blacks must continue to fight – putting loyalty to race and community before everything else. As well as Mahoso, a lecturer in international affairs and sociology at the Harare Polytechnic, the panel includes a retired employee of the Information Ministry and two former journalists for government mouthpieces. One has been allocated a farm. Expounding his views in the government-controlled Sunday Mail, Mahoso also described champions of human rights as “rehabilitated architects of South African apartheid and Rhodesian fascism,” and, turning to international affairs, announced that “the Global Village actually means Global Pillage”. Thus speaks the man who heads a commission which says its job is to enable Zimbabweans “to achieve effective ownership and control of mass media services.”
Robert Mugabes first deed after claiming victory in disputed presidential elections in March was to sign into law the draconian press Act. Since then there have been 16 arrests of journalists for “breach of ethics by broadcasting a false report.” And the disinformation campaign by Mugabe and his lieutenants against critics has continued remorselessly with gross fabrications, say human rights lawyers. Under the new Act, journalists who hold valid press cards may practise until December 31 – unless they do something to annoy Mahoso’s commission. Thereafter Mahoso and Moyo have sweeping powers to refuse them the right to continue. Moyo has final say on what academic qualifications may be recognised. And Chief Justice Godfrey Chidyausiku, another Mugabe supporter, has refused to hear, as a matter of urgency, a plea that the Act violates constitutional rights of free expression. A case brought by threatened journalists may not, now, be heard before 2004.
Meanwhile, Olonga, icon of Zimbabwes once-triumphant, racially mixed national cricket team, has caught the mood of heartbreak. “Though born in pain and segregation… now we stand to build our nation,” go the words of “Our Zimbabwe.” The tune is reminiscent of “Shenandoah” and Shirley Bassey’s onetime hit, “What now, my love, now that it’s over?” That is a particularly pertinent question for 13 million Zimbabweans, with the productive economy in ruins. Competing in the charts is a song produced with a Z$ 300 000 state grant, “The only good Blair is a toilet” – a play on the names of the British prime minister and of a standard design of lavatory in Zimbabwes rural areas.
Popular musicians Oliver Mutukudzi and Thomas Mapfumo have based themselves abroad after accusations recent songs imply disrespect for Mugabe. No foreign films have been shot since avant-garde director Christoffe Schlingensieff fired an incompetent local-hire continuity girl who had a brother in the security police. Falsely accused of pornography, Schlingensieff hid his rushes at the German embassy, then took the next flight home. “Flame”, a glorification of the 1972-80 bush war made for African regional audiences, roused threats of violence from ex-guerillas despite the toning-down of sequences suggesting girl recruits sometimes faced sexual abuse. The voices of novelist Charles Mungoshi and of poets Chenjerai Hove and Bonus Zimunya are currently unheard. World-celebrated Shona sculpture has run out of soapstone and inspiration, say critics, with too-frequent recurrence of themes such as “mermaids” and “owls”. And Olonga sings, “Though I may go to distant borders.” For the thousands of Zimbabweans, black and white, who have left or who are now forced to contemplate emigration, “What now, my love?” may seem more in tune.
Source: www.ZWNEWS.com