This BBC has rightly earned the world’s trust as a media
house that has produced outstanding quality programmes but like all good things
in this world it takes only one bad apple and the whole bushel will be spoilt. Roy
Agyemang’s Our World: Mugabe at 90 on BBC was one such rotten apple.
For anyone who has never followed the tragic story of Zimbabwe
in the last 34 years they would come out with the impression that Mugabe is a
great national hero much loved by the people of Zimbabwe, admired by his fellow
black African leaders but misunderstood by the West.
“Rule Britannia, Britannia rules the world. Which world!”
Mugabe said in the programme with obvious satisfaction. Roy Agyemang too must have enjoyed that bit
because he showed it twice in the programme! If anything, the line epitomizes
what is wrong with Mugabe and the shallowness of those who admire him.
The war of independence was not fought to end British
colonial rule, that was merely a unavoidable bye product; the same as breaking
the egg is an unavoidable bye product if you want an egg omelette. The war was fought so that we; the oppressed,
exploited and discriminated black majority; can at last end the oppression and
enjoy freedom, liberty and human dignity. We have waited for the last 34 years and we
are yet to enjoy any of these things. We know the egg have been broken but
where is the omelette?
Roy Agyemang asked Mugabe about the rampant corruption – this
has been given so wide coverage in Zimbabwe and the world that it was
impossible for anyone to miss – to which the tyrant reply that his government
was carrying out investigations. Any self-respecting journalist much more one carrying
BBC’s reputation on his shoulders would have asked why corruption have been
allowed to go on for 34 years with the disastrous consequences to the nation.
In Zimbabwe, life expectancy; the definitive qualitative
and quantitative measure of a country’s economic progress or regress; has
dropped to from 68 years in 1980 when Mugabe came into power to a misery 34
years today! This did not happen in the last two months but has been going on
for decades.
Gross mismanagement and rampant corruption have been at
the very heart of Zimbabwe’s economic melt-down. It is therefore wilfully
inadequate for Mugabe to say he is investigating corruption after all these
years of doing nothing about it. It is smacks of professional impotency for any
journalist to let the tyrant off the hook so easily.
Roy Agyemang must be the only one who does not know that
Mugabe blatantly rigged the 2013 elections or else, like Mugabe, he too does
not believe blacks have a right to a meaningful say in the governance of the country.
Indeed the BBC reporter does not believe blacks have the right to life itself! Over
30 000 Zimbabweans have been murdered by Mugabe and his thugs since
independence and the report talked of political violence but not even one
death!
The whole report was a chance for Mugabe to once again crow
from the rooftop about the demise of the British Empire, something the British
have themselves accepted as a historic fact and have moved on. Meanwhile the
Mugabe has continued to deny us Zimbabweans our basic human rights and dignity and
the report seem to endorse the tyrant’s view that we should forget our
suffering and misery and join him in celebrating the demise of the British
Empire. What an insult!
(Roy Agyemang’s Our World: Mugabe at 90 is available on
BBC News iplayer.)
13 comments:
"BBC News is reputed to be a propaganda organ for the British government!"
Would you say the BBC News' reputation as "propaganda organ" of the British Government is comparable to that ZBC as a propaganda organ f the Zanu PF government?
In the programme Roy might just as well have used Roben Barwe's notes for the BBC was doing such a great job spreading Zanu PF propaganda!
@ Nofool
Make up your mind you useless piece of s***t. Has Mugabe taken back all the land or not?
For the last ten years the country has had to depend on food aid because it has failed to pro-duce enough to feed its own people much less export as had been the case before the land seizures. Mugabe seized all the former white owned farms but has failed to put it into produc-tive use - that is the matter at issue on the land question you moron!
The unjust seizure of the land from the blacks by the colonialists was an issue for which blacks fought for. The way Mugabe has seized the land back from the white to give to his cronies whose are now seating on this key national resource is a matter that will be addressed once this tyrannical regime is forced out of power. You think you can hide behind the stupid argument that it does not matter that the nation is starving since it is the blacks who now own the land – corrupt and useless, they are still black! Well think again; because that is the kind of nonsense that will be addressed head-on!
@ Tengenenge
British puppet or not Mugabe rigged the election, murdered over 30 000 innocent Zimbabwe-ans, etc. Those are the issues that are important to millions of Zimbabweans out there right now.
You are a paid CIO agent doing your best to draw attention away from the economic melt-down and the eminent collapse of the Zanu PF dictatorship. That will work with simpletons like Tsvangirai but not everyone! People like me are not so easily bamboozled or threaten! You will have to try a lot harder than that!
@Nofool
Mugabe and his gang of thugs do not constitute a legitimate regime but a gang of village bul-lies who have ruined the nation through their insatiable greed and have denied the people their basic rights and dignity including a meaningful voice in the governance of the country and even the right to life itself. Rigging elections and murdering innocent people for selfish political gain are very serious crimes, high treason, and this is one area where Mugabe and his thugs will not have the final say!
Zimbabwe is not the first or will it be the last nation to be ruled by a tyrant; this tyrant will fall just as surely as all the other tyrants have done. The Zimbabwe economy is suffering a total melt-down and it is dragging the Zanu PF dictatorship with it. The challenge here is make sure Mugabe does not drag the nation into the abyss with him and, more significantly, that the nation is spared the torment of being ruled by another tyrannical regime ever gain.
As for morons like you, Nofool, you too will have to earn an honest living and not be paid good money for denying the suffering and deaths of innocent Zimbabweans!
@ Ruwa
Stop talking nonsense. What has Philip Chiyangwa, Ignatius Chombo, Cuthert Dube, Mai Mujuru or even Mugabe himself done to deserve the millions of dollars or Blue Roof mansion they own? Yes in the West most millionaire have earned their fortunes but not so in Zimbabwe!
Having earned a fortune from looting; people like you, Ruwa, are now scared of the eminent collapse of the Zanu PF dictatorship because that from that moment on you know you too will have to earn an honest living!
The Zanu PF dictatorship is doomed and there is nothing you or Mugabe can do to stop the collapse! And good riddance too!
@ Ruwa
Zimbabweans are a proud people and they would have much preferred to earn their own keep and not have to rely on hand out from anyone. They have been forced to accept hand out because 34 years of gross mismanagement and rampant corruption have left the destitute. And you are the moron who have been defending the corrupt and oppressive Zanu PF dictatorship on this forum.
@ Inno
You clearly did not listen to the interview otherwise you would not be saying it the British government that authorised in any way the programme. Mugabe was only too glad to use the programme to stick his two fingers at the British and repeat his usual anti-British rhetoric and lies. How can that be in the British government and people's interest?
In any case I looked at the programme from the long suffering and voiceless black Zimbabweans' point of view, the British people have a voice they do not need me to help them fight their corner. Indeed they are smart enough to know these are the rumblings of an idiot; a mere fly to an elephant. Sadly the same cannot be said about Mugabe's influence in Zimbabwe and its people.
The tyrant has destroyed the nation’s economy through mismanagement, corruption and looting, denied us our basic human rights and dignity and has poisoned the water we drink and the air we breathe! For him to be allowed to crow about ending British rule as though that was all we ever aspired for is therefore an insult.
Why are you obsessed about the British and never ever talk about the Zimbabweans; are they not human being too with the same rights and human dignity as everyone else? After Mugabe rigged the 2013 elections he boasted to teaching the British a lesson; it was the ordinary Zimbabweans that he had cheated but of course they do not count! Well Zimbabweans are human being worthy of all the rights and dignities; they do count, a lot!
@ Guest
Mugabe thought that after rigging the 2013 he could seat back and re-lax and now he is learning that unless he can rig the economic recovery it is going to crash and take him with it! The tyrant is running around like a headless chicken telling would be investors his indigenisation policy is "nonsense" - which is true - but of course no one believes he is not stupid enough to implement it. They know he has been implementing it for years and a lot other stupid policies too. He has send Chinamasa to China and USA several times already and still the ZimAsset begging is empty - not even a penny, it is now mocking him!
Mugabe and the Zanu PF dictatorship are finished the whole world is watching the whole regime sink in its own mess. Meanwhile Mugabe keeps up the pretence that he can solve the problem and even boast about his resourcefulness. It is not in the nature of tyrants to admit failure and so they always sink with the ship. Mugabe is sinking fast!
When the end comes, it will be swift. The regime will collapse and Zimbabweans will be keen to dispatch the tyrant the same the Libyans dis-patched Mugabe’s late mentor, Gaddafi!
@ Tendai Marima
Mugabe rigged the July 2013 elections to stay in power but unless he can rig the economic recovery as well he will not serve his full five years!
The Zimbabwe economy has taken a serious nose dive since Mugabe and Zanu PF took office in August last year. The economy has never recovered from the chaotic land seizure that destroyed the country’s agricultural sector. But it was Mugabe’s own reckless spending to fund the vote rigging schemes plus the rampant corruption that have broken the camel’s back.
After years of denying there was no corruption the chickens have come home to roost. There has been one story after another of how the Zanu PF appointed managers have made millions from paying themselves ridiculously high salaries and allowances or from corrupt deals. The stories were over and above these of the Zanu PF big wigs’ own corrupt activities like Mugabe’s $1 million birthday party followed by the $5 million wedding of his daughter. All these criminal waste of the nation’s resources has left the country reeling and desperate for outside economic help.
Mugabe proposed a $27 billion ZimAsset recovery plan in his July 2013 elections manifesto. Sadly to this day no one has contributed, not even his old friend the Chinese have paid a single Yuan! Meanwhile even more companies have since closed down sending thousands of workers on the street. Mugabe cannot rig economic recovery and the Zimbabwe economy is heading for a catastrophic crash and it will take the regime with it!
Mugabe may have chosen the long winded "Zimbabwe at 34: Defending Our Sovereignty and Providing an Enabling Environment for Sustainable Economic Empowerment and Social Transformation," as the theme for this year’s independence-day. The only transformation that the nation will be witnessing in the coming months is the final demise of a tyrant and his tyrannical regime!
Mugabe was able to bamboozle Tsvangirai and the MDC idiots into doing nothing about the democratic reforms and so tyrant was able to rig the elections and stay in power. Well now he is facing another challenge; how to stop the economic collapse. Lets see if he can rig that!
The Zimbabwe economy has taken an alarming nose-dive in the last eight months and is heading for a catastrophic crash and it is taking the tyrant and his corrupt regime with it! If you think the military JUNTA will somehow survive the crash then you clearly have not comprehended the reality at play here.
The crash is already happening and you will finally admit it when you see the tyrant hunted down like a rat as happened to Libya's Gaddafi!
The photograph of old women covered in dust and grit digging diamonds in Marange encapsulated the dangers, - the sides could cave in and bury all those in the pit alive - the poverty and the hopelessness of the people - it is self-evident these are desperately poor people who were paid pit-tance for each diamond that would go on to sell for hundreds of thou-sands of dollars.
Yes, but for the love of God; there labours my aunt and my own mother.
It is crime again man and a sin against God that anyone should be forced to live without hope in a country so richly endowed!
@ Financial Exile
In short, Roy sold out for a chance to hobnob with the tyrant! After all the "right" of the tyrant to plunder, rig elections and even murder is now more important than those of his victims whose lives he continues to de-stroy at will!
Your "health dose of cynicism" is doing nothing to end the heart breaking suffering millions of Zimbabweans are facing every day and things are set to get even worse. What they need is for Mugabe to be seen as the corrupt and murderous tyrant he is and not black nationalist hero who out witted the British.
The country attained its independence 34 years ago his fights against the British are a smoke screen to hide his corruption and brutal repression.
Mugabe has seven university degrees
Six of Mugabe’s university degrees were actually earned while he was doing distance learning in pris-on. They cover a broad range of topics including education, economics, administration, and law. De-grees include a Bachelor of Laws and Master’s of Laws from the University of London’s external pro-gram, earned during his stint in a Salisbury prison
For a man with seven University Degrees Mugabe has proven to be a very stupid man with a mind totally impermeable to reason. I would have been happier if Mugabe did nothing beyond being able to read and write and had some common sense. Maybe it was the bookworm mentality that completely pushed out any common sense the tyrant had!
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