With the last national elections in Zimbabwe, the international world caught just a glimpse of the chaos going on there. That was only a glimpse, we weren't even there. In the months since the chaotic events, we've seen repeated attempts to appease the situation, with no avail. Doing my daily news check on a list of my favorite previous and current residences (Zim, Pak, USA, France) I found a list of quotes by the present (and only) president of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugage. “It may be necessary to use methods other than constitutional ones…”
“People are free to campaign and they will be free to vote. There won't be any soldiers, you know, at the queues. Anyone who has the right to vote is free to go and cast his vote anywhere in his own area, in his own constituency…”
“The only white man you can trust is a dead white man…The white man is not indigenous to Africa. Africa is for Africans. Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans…”
“We pride ourselves as being top, really, on the African ladder... We feel that we have actually been advancing rather than going backwards…”
“Our economy is a hundred times better, than the average African economy. Outside South Africa, what country is [as good as] Zimbabwe?...What is lacking now are goods on the shelves - that is all…”
“So, Blair keep your England, and let me keep my Zimbabwe…”
“When they criticise the government when it tries to prevent violence and punish perpetrators of that violence we take the position that they can go hang…”
“We pride ourselves as being top, really, on the African ladder... We feel that we have actually been advancing rather than going backwards…”
“Our economy is a hundred times better, than the average African economy. Outside South Africa, what country is [as good as] Zimbabwe?...What is lacking now are goods on the shelves - that is all…”
“So, Blair keep your England, and let me keep my Zimbabwe…”
“When they criticise the government when it tries to prevent violence and punish perpetrators of that violence we take the position that they can go hang…”
The Zimbabwean government is defiant, obstinate towards and with Western influences, state media openly blames sanctions for their economic deterioration, and they openly call world leaders crass and unkind names. But we're going to pray. That's what the churches in Zimbabwe and others around the world are doing; across denominations and political differences, we're praying for change, and we're praying for hearts to be changed in the horrific mess of the last 8 years. That's what you can do, that's what I do. The possibility of changing the world, truly does exist.
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