blog -->, Pet hates, Human Rights, Politics
Let them eat…..nothing
What the hell is Robert Mugabe doing at the World Food Summit in Rome? This man belongs in jail, not at some international convention. Added to which the irony could hardly be more poignant. He has sytematically starved his people for years. So while he dines in the Via Veneto, his people die of hunger. As one journalist put it, it’s rather like inviting Pol Pot to a human rights convention.
I know a journalise who went to Zim recently. He interviewed a woman who was beaten repeatedly in front of her two children so badly that the Daily Mail judged the pictures too gory to publish. Her crime? Voting for the opposition. I cannot bear to think about the suffering going on there now before the electoral run-off at the end of the month. And yet western leaders welcome this tyrant, this dictator, this despot in Rome. Why didn’t Berlusconi (who loves attention) refuse to give him a visa? Why doesn’t someone shoot him? Mugabe that is, not Berlusconi. He at least is only starving his people of decent television.
Closer to home there is also worrying news. Today Rupert goes in to hospital to have his knee operated on. It is a simple operation, but any operation is worrying. Although possibly not as worrying as his reaction to shaving said knee in preparation for keyhole surgery.
“I can see what you girls are on,” he said, looking rather pleased with the results. I have left him in the capable hands of a friend who will take him to hospital as I whiz up to Paris for my style guru event. If only the talk were about men I could announce the new shaved knee look. As it is, I will have to come up with something else.
Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008
03 Jun 2008 helena
Ciao Helena!
I am as shocked as you are i’m afraid…I dont have an answer as to why they should invite such a man! i think i will never fully understand politics…and perhaps it is best!! i dont want to know all the agreements our countries have with these men…it really disgusts me that while some people are starving, they will all go eat in Via Veneto, like the summit was some kind of reunion between old friends!! things will never change if we keep going like this anyway…
however, sadly, not always pain-free!! but as the French have it “il faut souffrir pour etre belle”…or beau…
so, have a great trip to Paris and i’m sure Rupert’s operation will go well! glad he likes the new look of his knee…that’s what it is to be a woman, hair-free
Apparently it’s to do with some rule that despite the travel ban on Mugabe, he can attend UN meetings and by the way, shooting Berlusconi is not such a bad idea either or rather condemn him to life in front of his own awful TV channels. Italy is also starved of democratic debate, free press and the food is going up at speed here too.
Helena,
Not to worry, I wager Rupert wouldn’t sit through an entire waxing session!
Hi Helena. Yes, it’s because legally Mugabe can attend UN meetings without any let or hindrance, that he is in Rome. It’s a total disgrace, of course, and I am as incensed as you are. The international law needs to be changed - that’s for sure. People like him should be given no political platform in the western world.
Our useless foreign secretary sat through his ’speech’ when others had walked out. How sad is that?
What should happen to Mugabe, of course, is that he should be arrested for war crimes and carted off to the Hague. But there seems to be no will to do that with Africans - probably something tot do with political correctness. Serbs are alright of course….
Wrote comment - disappeared in black hole?
Hi Jose
I don’t know what happened, sorry - maybe try again? This one worked.
Hx
Mr Mugabe, the marxist, was voted in to power initially by the majority black vote, and the election was supervised largely by the British, using British soldiers.
Alas, Mr Mugabe turned out like so many leaders in Africa and, no doubt elsewhere, to be more interested in himself and keeping power, than in his country. I understand that the amount of aid sent to Africa equals the amount purloined by it’s leaders - a sorry state of affairs.
When Mr Mbeke walks out from a conference hand in hand with Mr M. then it becomes obvious that the majority in Africa, at least it’s leaders, support Mr M.
Every time the white rest of the world rants about Mr M., however justified, it plays straight in to the hands of the man. All he has to say is that this is colonist talk. Better not to interfere and stay absolutely out of Africa’s affairs. It is all, alas, self repeating.
Any talk of going in with force is an allusion. Mr H. Wilson considered it to get rid of Mr Smith but realised it could not be done.
So we wait for Mr M. to die, but it is extremely unlikely that his successor will be any better.
Arthur B.