Only mountains never meet
After a morning class on AIDS prevention and awareness (which could also have been an example class on ‘how to lie with statistics’), we had an afternoon class on original African relgions.
The class, hosted by a Kenian finished off with a typical Pokot (as he claimed) saying: Only mountains never meet.
Yesterday evening, we had a meeting with Mr. B. Vashee (Google), a real Zimbabwean. He turned out to be a third generation Indian, but he would only visit India for the first time ever next year.
As part of ZAPU, he had been imprisoned by the ever so kind Mr. Smith during the early seventies and had helped build the first independent government of Zimbabwe in 1980. Mugabe, focussed on creating a one party state, Mugabe minimilized the number of ZAPU ministers, resulting in Mr. Vashee never getting a ministerial post. In 1983, he left the country.
Although Mr. Vashee didn’t tell us much we didn’t know, he was quite certain that Mugabe would step down somewhere during 2004, probably mid-2004. His only real argument was that mid-2004, Zimbabwe would enter it’s third year of shortages, where Mugabe had promised only one. He was expecting either an internal power shift or, possibly even, fair and free elections. Mr. Vashee was already preparing a three month stay in Zimbabwe starting August 2004, in preparation for his return to Zimbabwe.
Another interesting point he made was that of the 4500 white farmers in Zimbabwe, some 1200 are left untouched. These are farmers, supporting Mr. Mugabe and ZANU-PF.
Meanwhile, I watched a documentary on the telly last nite on white farmers in Zimbabwe. It was called ‘the last Dutchman’ and simply followed the dealings of what appeared to be the four last Dutch farmers in Zimbabwe. The documentary ended with the remark that only last week, the last Dutch farmer left Zimbabwe.
Does that mean Betsy and I will be the only Duchees in Zim?