Africa"s Next Great War

Original Post Date: 2002-09-08  Posted By: Jan

From the News Archives of: WWW.AfricanCrisis.Org
Date & Time Posted: 9/8/2002 11:33:53 PM
Africa"s Next Great War

I happened to be privvy to a most interesting news conference held in Rosebank, Johannesburg, on Friday, 6th September. It was an interesting exercise in how the truth is kept from people here in South Africa. More of that, further down.

It was a very active week on the political front here in South Africa. The World Summit on Sustainable Development, which is best described as a travelling circus, finally came to an end – thank God! I was getting sick and tired of hearing how America’s industry is responsible for Global Warming – as if I believe that.

The really weird stuff happened with Robert Mugabe and Colin Powell. When Colin Powell gave a speech, he was booed until he could not be heard and had to stop. But Robert Mugabe on the other hand was never booed once, in fact, he was given quite an applause which came mostly from African delegates! President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa never once mentioned
the Zimbabwe crisis during all his speeches at the summit. To top it all, he gave Robert Mugabe twice the allowed speaking time which he gave all the other delegates! These are but a few of a number of highly ominous signs. If folks think that Africa has hit rock bottom – think again – Africa is about to head into a new era which will make its recent
history look like the “Good old days”, and which will make Colonialism look like a long lost Utopia! If you think Africa is hell on Earth – wait – the worst is yet to come.

Robert Mugabe’s propaganda exercise started the minute he landed here. There are millions of black Zimbabweans living in South Africa and they all hate Mugabe. So imagine my surprise when there was a massive pro-Mugabe demonstration at the summit. I wondered if “Rent-a-Crowd” had been hired for the occasion. Someone in Zimbabwe emailed me to say they had information that the CIO [Central Intelligence Organisation] was behind the pro-Mugabe demonstration. The political opposition parties in South Africa are highly opposed to Robert Mugabe. The DP [Democratic Party], which is the official opposition in parliament, actually suggested that Robert Mugabe be arrested in South Africa on human rights violations (apparently our law allows for this). Of course it never happened.

Mugabe gave a speech at the World Summit on Sustainable Development which was nothing more than a propaganda exercise filled with blatant lies. He said he was not forcing anyone off their farms! He said each white farmer gets to keep at least one farm! That is a total, blatant lie which anyone with half a brain can see through. Consider Mugabe’s own statistics.
They say that 2,900 farmers will be removed from 4,500 farms. But hold on, if each farmer gets to keep one farm, then surely there will be 2,900 farms left in white hands? According to JAG [Justice for Agriculture], the total land area which Mugabe wants is 97% of all farmland. Furthermore, 75% of the farms were bought by white farmers AFTER Mugabe came to power! These are not “remnants of colonialism”. So Mugabe told one lie on top of another, and got a huge applause. He mocked Tony Blair, and made a melodramatic statement about how he had never asked for a part of Europe and how Blair can keep “his England”, while Mugabe kept “my Zimbabwe”.
Some people noted that he said “my Zimbabwe” as if it were his personal possession – which I am sure he believes it is.

Mugabe claimed there were some farmers with 35 farms. Well, judging once more by statistics such as those above, there can’t be too many farmers with multiple farms. Obviously there are a few. As has been reported, time and again, those being thrown off are often elderly, and the farm is not only their home, but also their only source of income! That is why these
people are struggling so desperately to hang on to it because it constitutes their only source of livelihood. According to JAG [Justice for Agriculture], in Zimbabwe, there was one farmer who owned 20 farms. But he gave up 19 of them willingly to Mugabe’s government and kept one for himself to live on. Then some of Mugabe’s thugs came, and set his farm
house on fire in the middle of the night with him and his wife inside. He was badly burned but managed to survive. According to JAG, most of the farmers with multiple farms have given their farms back to Mugabe already.

The thing which has been on my mind for the last 2 years, and which is why I started my website and also wrote my book, Government by Deception, is that it seems as if the Socialists in Africa have decided to finally get rid of all Western influences in Africa for once and for all. It is not just about driving white farmers off their land in Zimbabwe. It is much bigger. It includes the destruction of industry, the take-over of
mining, and finally, the removal of all whites from the continent. We could be on the edge of the greatest humanitarian disaster which southern Africa has ever known…

There were a number of indications that this is something serious, and something big, and that Mugabe is in reality leading the charge with most of Africa behind him.

Firstly, people must understand that Mugabe is not some “nobody” in the African context. Mugabe is a recognised figure, an “elder statesman” if you will, of the same “rank” as Mandela. Mugabe is about 10 years younger than Mandela. He is no yuppie. Guys like President Thabo Mbeki look up to him. Mugabe regards himself as an intellectual, and many black leaders respect this guy – and also fear him. Mugabe has always had an aura of ruthlessness around him which may not be evident to those in the rest of the world. But if you live in Zimbabwe, as I did, you will know this man means business, and anyone who crosses his path gets their butts kicked. He has a reputation, and everyone in Africa knows this.

During Mugabe’s speech, wherein he liberally insulted Blair and England, he said that Zimbabwe was “ready to shed blood” in defence of its independance. Mugabe said that neighbouring states must not interfere in Zimbabwe’s internal affairs. President Thabo Mbeki had also said the same thing in recent weeks. When Mugabe says he is prepared to shed blood, you had better believe he is serious.

Here in South Africa, we live in a Liberal state of wishful thinking and total denial. The subject of “land reform” does come up quite regularly. There is a process in place whereby blacks can go and claim back land which belonged to their ancestors. It is a process fraught with problems since it is based on word of mouth. But there is a system in place to deal with all land claims and even with evictions harking back to Apartheid.
There is a court where blacks can go and present their case. Land Reform here is based on the “willing buyer, willing seller” principle. Land is paid for at market rates. This is of course how things started in Zimbabwe too – more than 20 years ago. It is orderly, and it is slow. And before long, government runs out of money. Although, I must say, most of the money used to drive the process is actually donated by Western nations.
So there are many people in South Africa who believe that land reform is orderly and will never become like the situation in Zimbabwe. Most whites in South Africa are of the opinion that the lawlessness up there can never be repeated here. They are living in a state of self-denial – which I have seen before.

The topic of land reform is something which is downplayed quite a bit here, and when it is mentioned, they do so, sometimes in a cryptic fashion. For example, Presdent Mbeki, and even the highly respected former ANC leader, Cyril Ramaphosa, have both said that if whites do not learn to “share” then a Zimbabwe situation may repeat itself here! They
tackle the problem from a pseudo-logical point of view. They say that white Zimbabweans did not “share” and that is why the “landless” are invading them. This is of course nonsense. The landless did not invade them. Mugabe deliberately drove the entire process by hiring
the “War Vets” and using the Army and the CIO [Central Intelligence Organisation] to manage the entire process. This has been thoroughly established by the independant journalists who reported on the process.

This has nothing to do with “sharing”. It has to do with a political move to violate our constitutional rights. Let me remind people, that Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa, all have proper constitutions which were hammered out with international approval and which are recognised and which drive these countries. These constitutions allow for organised
land reform as I have described. These constitutions recognise private ownership of property. Nobody can just come and take your land. It is against the law – period. Most of what is happening in Zimbabwe is completely against the constitutional rights of the whites there.

So people here in South Africa hope the law and the constitution will protect us. But I have heard a number of ominous remarks which make me think this will not be so. A few months ago, a friend of mine told me of an interview in Cape Town, on talk radio of a prominent black journalist in Zimbabwe who happened to get a farm from Mugabe. I later obtained a copy
of the interview. The interviewer was grilling this guy, asking him why he was getting a farm when clearly he was not “landless” and when he had a good career and a senior position. The journalist struggled to answer the questions. Eventually, in exasperation, he lashed out and said something along these lines “You South Africans think that this will not happen to
you. But I know that land reform is highly topical in South Africa whether you South Africans like it or not.”

This week, Patrick Chinamasa, Zimbabwe’s Minister of Justice, was interviewed on South African TV. He said “If you think that in South Africa you will be freed from what is happening in Zimbabwe and you don’t anticipate these changes, I feel sorry for you because as things are, South African blacks are in a worse situation than Zimbabweans.”

Then Minister Chinamasa did the pseudo-logical bit, like our President, and he said “My advice to South Africa is start now, don’t wait until the pressures are too overwhelming.”

My view is that following his advice will not change the final outcome. Whether we hand over land willingly or not, it will not cause the Marxists here to change their plans. In the end, they are after everything we have. Let me quote from my book, Government by Deception:-
“Remember that they want what is yours. What is theirs is not up for sale. But everything that belongs to you is what they want. So you have two choices. Either you give it to them or they will come and fight you for it. If you give to them you must keep on giving until they have everything. The minute you stop they will attack you to take the remainder of what you did not give.”

Minister Chinamasa’s remarks only made the front page of one newspaper here in South Africa. As important as these remarks are, it was largely ignored.

On Thursday I received a message that JAG [Justice for Agriculture], would hold a Press Conference in Rosebank, near where I live. So I decided to attend. It turned out to be highly informative and also gave me a small insight into how the journalists can manipulate the news. I was determined not to miss it, so I arrived there first! I watched as people arrived. Even though it started late, there were only about 6 journalists there, and only two from organisations of any standing. The one was a major talk radio station and the other was from the Farmers Weekly.

They showed a most interesting piece of film footage shot clandestinely in Zimbabwe from a microlight aircraft. The film was entitled “A Wet Drought”. It showed farms in the Marondera district of Zimbabwe. It showed a canal full of irrigation water and dams everywhere which were 75% full even though this is the end of winter. Winter in southern Africa is
always dry. So when you see footage of a “drought” in southern Africa, remember, our rains stopped in April, and that is why it is dry now. But the rains were good, and the dams are mostly full. One could see farm after farm with green fields. But sometimes, next to a beautiful green field you would see a ruined one – which was parched and had no crops. It turned out, these were the fields which the new “settlers” or “War Vets”
had taken over.

Even though the rains were on time, Mugabe’s government was slow in handing out seed, etc and so most of the new “settlers” were not able to plant last year when the first rains came. That is why a lot of those fields had no crops even though the blacks had them during the entire rainy season (as we call our summers).

As the presentation continued, the spokesperson for JAG said that it is important that people not repeat Mugabe’s propaganda that white farmers own 70% of the country. 70% of the country is actually state land. i.e. Tribal Trust lands (for blacks), Game Reserves, etc. Only 30% of the country is privately owned. The commercial farmersonly control about 50% of that 30% (in other words somewhere round about 15% of the entire land area of the country). That is what I understood from the many facts
and statistics presented. (I must admit a lot of journalists asked questions showing that they did not fully understand all the numbers themselves).

While maize (corn) is the staple food of the blacks, there is also a lot of wheat grown there. But wheat is grown in southern Africa during the winter (dry) months. In Zimbabwe, wheat can only be grown under irrigation. The settlers were not using the irrigation and so the wheat crop had fallen drastically. The wheat situation is so bad that many bakeries cannot produce bread because of a lack of flour.

At the JAG news conference we were told that there really are 6 million people starving. Some are too weak to walk to the queues where they can get food aid. It was announced on the South African conservation TV program, 50/50, on 8th August, that 60% of Zimbabwe’s wildlife has been wiped out in the past two years despite Mugabe’s assurances that it
would not happen! Zimbabwe once had some of the finest wildlife and game reserves on the African continent. There are millions of blacks from Zimbabwe in South Africa. They live and work here because they cannot get their families admitted into South Africa. So instead they buy food here and pay people to take it up to their families in Zimbabwe. It is measures like this which no doubt keep many alive. But what will happen when there is no more wildlife or farmer’s cattle to kill and eat? What then?

The JAG spokesperson, Jenni Williams, said that agricultural production in Zimbabwe has dropped by 66-70% in the last two years.

As the presentation continued, more and more journalists finally arrived. By the time the conference ended, the room was packed. Various journalists asked questions. The man from Reuters asked several good questions, and a French journalist asked many as well. The representative from the Sunday Times (UK), also asked intelligent questions.

There were not many black journalists in the room, but the few that were asked nothing. They were totally silent.

Then one journalist, I can’t remember if it was the guy from Reuters, said that he had heard that Mugabe would not stop with the farmers alone. He had heard that Mugabe would go after “Filling stations and businesses”. Jenni Williams from JAG told him that they had been hearing lots of stories and rumours about this in Zimbabwe for a long time. The general feeling there was that Mugabe was going to go after all businesses once
he was finished with the farming sector. She cited new laws which made it very difficult for certain businesses to function.

During the presentation Jenni said she hoped that “Zimbabwe’s hindsight could become South Africa’s foresight”. She then spoke about the perception they have in Zimbabwe, that this is going to be a much bigger thing in Africa. She warned that the crisis in Zimbabwe could extend into all of Africa. Countries which are likely to be affected the most are Namibia (where President Sam Nujoma defends Mugabe to the hilt), and of course, South Africa.

It was Jenni’s mention that this could spread more widely across Africa, which struck me as being a key observation. Yet, I wondered how many of those journalists present would report on this.

I spoke to one journalist from DIE BEELD, which is an Afrikaans newspaper in South Africa. I told him of my book and my own views that this is going to be a bigger story than just Zimbabwe. He looked at me and just said “I hope it doesn’t happen here…” It showed total denial on his part, which is a common South African trait.

There was a TV crew from South African Broadcasting Corporation’s TV News department – which controls national TV. They were shooting film footage. I thought that the story was big enough for it to make national news on Friday night. More especially because Jenni explained that she was cutting short her trip to South Africa to fly back IMMEDIATELY because JAG had heard a serious rumour that the Police HQ in Harare had sent out a signal to all Police across the country to arrest the remaining farmers this weekend.

Jenni had told us that many farmers were in hiding. Sometimes, the Police arrested a farmer’s wife if they could not find the farmer. She said that during the last mass arrests, 250 farmers had been arrested, and another 250 had willingly reported to Police stations. Thus the new orders were for them to get hold of the remaining 2,400 farmers. I thought this was all newsworthy enough to make TV news on Friday night.

Would you believe there was not one word of this mentioned on South African TV News on friday night! Not one word. The first news report I heard was on radio on saturday morning. The first TV news of the new move only happened on sunday night after it had started. Not one word of the JAG press conference, or any of the facts in it, got on to national TV news!

Jenni ended by saying that JAG was not asking for sympathy, nor pity, but just for the truth to be reported. I hope that the foreign journalists there did a better job than what I saw coming from the South African journalists.

I always remind people that the last chapter in the so-called “Liberation of Africa”, has not yet been written. But that last chapter is going to be written, and we are seeing it in Zimbabwe. Let me leave you with the final words in the introduction to my book.

I wrote these words in March, 2001:-
“In 1994, the world thought that South Africa’s race and poverty problems had finally been solved. Some even hinted that Africa’s problems were going to be solved since the last pesky white men had been put in their place. Personally, I’m not so sure. There are quite a few of us who believe that the problems have in fact just started. The Marxists here will simply take the old problems and make them worse. There are some
of us here in Africa who believe the worst is yet to come.”

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