Subject: Re: Vogting Behaviour
From: John Anderson <panic-AT-semiosix.com>
Date: 04 May 2003 23:37:29 +0200


On Sun, 2003-05-04 at 21:53, Kristopher Barrett wrote:
> > "regime change". The only thing that Zimbabwe has in common with Iraq is
> > that it has a nasty and stupid dictator in charge. It would make great
> > PR - See we didn't do Iraq for the oil / global domination / strategic
> > concerns, we did it because we're big open hearted democrats with the
> > best interests of the poor countries of the world foremost in our minds.
> > See - we liberated Zimbabwe.
> 
> Actually, in Zimbabwe, the current ruler is instituting land reform
> against european colonists.

It's not so much land reform as land-re-grab. As a result of which,
their economy has gone for a ball of shit because (AFAIK) it's mainly
agricultural, and from one rumour I heard they forgot about skills
transfer as a necessary co-requisite of land transfer. Not to mention
the usual crap about rigged votes and economic mismanagement yadda
bullshit. From what I remember (I wasn't really paying attention) the
land "reform" was more driven by a need for votes than by a genuine
redistribution of wealth.

But anyway, "regime change" may be warded off at the last minute:

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=68&art_id=ct20030503002645538P430640&set_id=1

Which I guess is a good thing, relatively speaking. Here's a bunch of
(mainstream media) links:

http://www.iol.co.za/html/news/zimbabwe/index.php

> (sarcasm)
> Now we can't have these dark skinned ingrates taking the land back from
> the decendants of the european colonists who used force to sieze it.
> 
> The former european colonials all have magic pieces of paper that say they
> get to decide who uses these vast tracts of land. These ingrates need to
> be taught to respect these documents, otherwise people in places like Iraq
> might also ignore similar scraps of paper in the future.
> (/sarcasm)

Colonialism caused lots of trouble. Without downplaying the injustice of
it, it can also become an excuse for not moving forward. It's been many
many times I've heard it said that some problem is all because of
Apartheid. Sometimes it is, and often it's used as an excuse for present
incompetence.

My point is that shit happened, and things have been done to address
wrongs where possible. But sometimes it happened too long ago, and the
only thing that makes sense is to move forward. Otherwise you end up in
a Bosnia-Serbia type conflict whose roots go back 800 years.

bye
John