Note: As of July 3, 2009, only the RSS feeds on this blog will be updated so I can focus my energies on my 
25.6.08
What to do about Zimbabwe
African nations should push Mugabe to resign provided Western countries offer economic incentives that include making good on land reform, running a free and fair election and restoring basic security. That's the consensus view so far. What do you think?
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I am so angry and depressed over zimbabwe and Mugabe. I don't know what to think. Yesterday on NPR and today on The World there is just person after person talking about how Mugabe has no reason to budge in his mind and his words have evidenced the same. What could motivate him to do the right thing? It sounds as though people think there's nothing - I don't know if that's true but it sure feels that way.
It is these kinds of situations where it is easy to see how a population does not rise up - and I think, who are we to ask them or expect them to do that - but should they?
I don't know. Maybe it is just too individual a question and answer.
I agree with getting the AU and SADC to pressure Mugabe, but it feels as though that won't be enough. That he will only act out more.
What do you think?
I think African nations have to take the lead in order for any settlement in Zimbabwe to have legitimacy. African leadership in Liberia was essential to bringing peace there. At the same time, I think that England, especially, has to live up to its prior pledge to help finance land reform efforts. I've read that former Prime Minister Tony Blair reneged on England's earlier pledge to help with land reform by denying that England had no responsibility to Zimbabwe because of its legacy of colonialism. If that's true, it was a shameful and spineless move that helped create the crisis we face today.
Kim - I confess to not knowing a lot about England's promises but I agree with your logic.
We have friends, a couple, who live in Capetown right now. They are both Jewish, one grew up in Capetown and the other in Zimbabwe. Both white. The Zimbabwean's parents, in their 70s or 80s I believe, were displaced from their farm years ago and as of two years ago, I know they still were in Zimbabwe. Our friend would only tell us that he's tried to persuade his parents to leave, but they haven't wanted to.
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