- Dear Family and Friends,
-
- This week shortly after Vice President Simon Muzenda
had been buried at Heroes Acre, President Mugabe, his wife and a large
entourage of Zimbabwean ministers flew to America for a meeting of the
UN General Assembly. Almost the entire entourage are subjected to travel
bans and targeted sanctions and have had their overseas assets frozen but
again they are protected by the United Nations. I could not help but feel
disgusted by the crass insensitivity of Zimbabwe's leaders to the plight
of their own people as they jetted off across the world. Whilst our leaders
arrived at Harare airport in their limousines and walked up aeroplane steps
in their fine suits I wondered when, if ever, ordinary Zimbabweans would
ever be able to do anything even as normal as visiting their families and
relations inside Zimbabwe, let alone in other countries and continents.
-
- We have now not had fuel for such a long time that families
less than a hundred miles apart are going for months and months without
seeing their relations. Recently it was my Mum's birthday and just going
to spend that one special day with her turned into a marathon of planning
and scheming, wheeler dealering and huge expense. It began with finding
enough fuel to get to and from her rural home - begging a few litres here
and there, going everywhere by bicycle to save the little fuel I already
had and looking for a trustworthy black market dealer who hadn't watered
down the petrol and whose prices were not too exorbitant. Finding the actual
bank notes to be able to buy the black market goods is another story all
on its own ! Then there was the problem of the birthday lunch and a birthday
cake. Finding and buying black market flour and then going without ordinary
groceries to be able to afford a few little luxuries to be able to spoil
my Mum with. Then came the problem of the birthday present. I knew that
the nicest things I could actually give my Mum for her birthday was things
she can no longer get or afford herself. This meant chocolate, real coffee
and, the most precious gift, 20 litres of petrol to put in her car which
had stood empty and unmoving for almost two months. One small bar of chocolate
is now almost two thousand dollars. A jar of real coffee is thirty seven
thousand dollars, 20 litres of black market petrol was forty thousand dollars.
As I shopped and schemed, begged and borrowed I could hardly believe that
just two years ago a similar bag of groceries and container of fuel would
have all been bought for less than 10 thousand dollars.
-
- The big day arrived and although we started out early
for the journey to Mum's home, the first visit in 6 months, the sun was
high in the sky before we actually hit the road. This was because we had
been desperately and fruitlessly trying to get someone to stamp a piece
of paper saying that we were legally allowed to carry Mum's 20 litres of
fuel on our 86 kilometre journey. The trip was depressing as we passed
mile after mile of now deserted farms. Farms which had been seized by our
government and supposedly resettled with thousands of peasants now lie
completely derelict and deserted. We saw nothing, no ploughed fields, no
vegetables, no cattle, just derelict wasteland. A part of the journey is
through a communal land and here there were people everywhere, a few scrawny
cattle looking for grass on the roadside, children in rags pushing little
wire toys in the sand and men sitting around a hut drinking beer from
brown plastic bottles. Here too, even in the communal land there was no
sign of land preparation, people cannot afford to plough, there are no
seeds to buy and no one can afford fertilizer either so perhaps the feeling
is, why bother to even try, lets just wait for world food aid. Here, better
than anywhere, was the blatantly clear evidence of the massive propaganda
of this so called land redistribution that out government undertook in
order to stay in power. Miles of deserted farm land and then a squalid
over crowded communal land.
-
- When we neared Mum's home there was a huge police road
block and even though I'm not very religious, the prayers were silently
pouring out. "Please God, don't let them take the fuel from me,"
I begged. God was listening and we arrived to a tumultuous welcome from
a mother who had not been visited by her own daughter for many many months.
Sitting at her kitchen table was a friend who happens to be a genuine veteran
of Zimbabwe's liberation war. He runs a little odd jobbing business and
had just returned from a plumbing job in a former very rich farming area.
He told us disgustedly how others, who call themselves war veterans, were
just sitting there on those once rich and prolific farms. They were just
sitting doing nothing except waiting for yet more government handouts.
They had recently been given very cheap diesel to plough the land with
but hadn't bothered because they made far more money by selling the fuel
on the black market. The day flew past and I cried as we drove away, not
knowing when I would be able to visit again. I cried for the families that
are no longer able to spend normal happy times together, the families who
are spread out over continents, the huge sadness that has engulfed every
man woman and child in this country, regardless of their colour, all because
of political power.
-
- Until next week, love cathy.
-
- Copyright cathy buckle 27th September 2003.
-
- <http://africantears.netfirms.com>http://africantears.netfirms.com
-
- For enquiries about my books on Zimbabwe's turmoil, "African
Tears" and "Beyond Tears", in the UK and Europe contact
my publicist Wiz Bishop: <mailto:handzup_02@hotmail.com>handzup_02@hotmail.com
; in Australia and New Zealand contact: <mailto:johnmreed@johnreedbooks.com>johnmreed@johnreedbooks.com
and in Africa: <http://www.exclusivebooks.com>www.exclusivebooks.com
and <http://www.kalahari.net>www.kalahari.net
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