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A lot of African leaders say Mugabe is being demonised needlessly. Why does he still enjoy considerable support from Zimbabweans, why many see him as a symbol of African resistance to neo colonialism. I may be right but I personally think some of the issues below make it very unfair on this veteran leader.
Mr Tsvangirai, who leads the main opposition party in Zimbabwe, is funded by the United Kingdom and the United States. I can’t even imagine the thought of having the Conservative party in UK being funded by the Russians or The Democrats in USA being funded by the Chinese government. The liberal democrats being funded by North Korea.
However, the west sees no problem in funding and removing governments willy-nilly. Tony Blair, the former British prime mister has been quoted several times confirming that the British government is funding Zimbabwe opposition.
While Mugabe called for national healing and reconciliation and pardoned the white minority government which had allegedly performed human rights abuses at Zimbabwe independence in 1980, the US and UK; and the so called Allies never forgave the Nazis and there are currently still operations to hunt down some of the escapees Nazis allegedly involved with human right abuses.
Where in the world can foreigners own 90 percent of local resources and the government does nothing except in Africa. In Zimbabwe about 70 percent of the nation’s arable land was under the control of about 4500 farmers that were almost exclusively white Zimbabweans in a country with a population of about 13 million.
Mugabe who was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1994 by the Queen of England was the western world’s favourite African leader till he introduced the land distribution programme to black Zimbabweans that was appropriated from white farmers in the year after the knighthood.
That very same year Mugabe introduced the land programme, a year after knighthood, Mugabe was considered a villain. How can you explain that someone knighted by the Queen one year and the next year considered a leader of an axis of evil state. Robert Mugabe stated that his land reform policies were to address land ownership patterns that had not changed since black Zimbabweans were not legally allowed to purchase most land during the days of apartheid-style minority governance before Zimbabwe.
While in Western society we celebrate the length of the queen of England’s reign and treat the royal family with dignity and do not question their reign, the same cannot be said when it comes to African political structures. I once studied African history and politics and my understanding is that African political structure is a mixture of royalty and western governance — that’s why most leaders act in several capacities as “kings”, “head of states”, etc. I think the west should respect that instead of imposing their own version of governance on other nations.
No matter how many times the media and the west predict his downfall this man still prevails. I personally think Mugabe is one of the greatest politicians ever to walk on earth. Far greater than Barack Obama, Margaret Thatcher, Nelson Mandela etc. In addition Mugabe is probably the most educated political leader ever with seven academic degrees including law and economics and holds more than 10 honorary degrees and doctorates from international universities.
Source: www.squidoo.com
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