‘Bush and Blair must come to Zimbabwe’

In this part of the world a gardener is a good substitute for the ubiquitous taxi driver as a foreign correspondents’ source. Taxi drivers in South Africa tend to be refugees from Eastern Europe and as such too busy mulling over past injustices to have much time to gather their thoughts about their adopted homeland and its neighbours.

Gardeners on the other hand, are always black, usually Zimbabwean and have plenty of time for thoughts while absent-mindedly watering the oleandor, or bougainvillea. And so it was that, in passing, I asked our part-time gardener, George Moyo, how things were back home in Zimbabwe. The watering was quite forgotten as he fixed me with glittering eye.

”Zimbabwe is not good anymore. Things are going bad, very bad. People are still disappearing — Matabeles, like myself, and MDC supporters. It’s a horrible situation there.

”Like the food. Food is short in Zimbabwe, but it is coming in from donors. But this food is not going around the country; it goes only to Mugabe supporters. All Zimbabweans now have Zanu-PF cards, just to try to get food. But, because they know this area and in this area Zanu-PF didn’t get the votes — places like Plumtree and Tsholotsho, places where there are plenty of MDC supporters — they don’t get food. Zanu-PF supporters are the only people who get food.

”Like in Gwanda, on the Beit Bridge road, there are some old gold mines. They throw people down the mines. Alive. They torture you until you are paralysed and then they throw you there. There is another place there, near Gwanda, a grave where they dig a canyon, and bury them together. Everybody in Zimbabwe knows about it. But nobody will talk about it. Because in Zimbabwe you can’t talk politics. If they see you carrying a camera, you are a spy. Just like that.

”The South African government knows everything about it. But they are not concerned. They always say, no, things will come alright with Mugabe’s government.

”They want the MDC to be united with Zanu-PF. The MDC say, look what happened to Zapu! They disappeared. Some just vanished. Some were given slow poison. Joshua Nkomo’s younger brother Steven Nkomo just died. There were rumours that he was a double agent and in the MDC. We heard the CIO, Central Intelligence, went to his house and told him to watch out. Then we heard he was in hospital.

”Plenty have disappeared. People I know myself — they were our families, our tribe, our relatives.

”They say that the farmers are not being attacked anymore. It is not true. They are still attacking the farmers. Recently there were some strikes. Everyone was in the strikes. What the police and the troops did, they went to the farms for the MDC. They were torturing people. Some they were raped in front of their kids. It is true.

”Now everybody is thinking about Ian Smith. His government practised discrimination, they say. Smith was fighting the so-called freedom-fighters. But there was freedom — plenty of work and the food was cheap.

”You would have thought the country would have peace after Lancaster House. Things were still ok in Zim. The country still had loads of whites. The country would be governed by a majority and things would be like here in South Africa. But that didn’t happen. Because Zanu-PF came to power and they tried to kill our tribe, the Matabele. The so-called 5th brigade, trained by the Koreans.

”Now, between Botswana and Zimbabwe, there are plenty of troops patrolling the border. They believe that, since it happened in Iraq, that Bush will invade Zimbabwe, coming through Botswana. Botswana and Zimbabwe are no longer friends. Everybody is praying that the same thing will happen as happened in Iraq. Bush and Blair must come to Zimbabwe. Tony Blair and Bush will come through Botswana.”

Coleridge had it much better, of course:

Under the water it rumbled on

Still louder and more dread

It reached the ship, it split the bay

The ship went down like lead

I was freed from my mariner’s clutch by the preposterous idea of that thinly-populated country going to war against a neighbour under the leadership of President Festus Mogae. Making my excuses I left him to the garden.

Later I idly punched ”Botswana” into Google. There is, of course, that giant US military base in Botswana. Nobody could understand why they built it when they built it. It seems the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw will be meeting Walter Kansteiner, the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, in Botswana in 10 days time. Kansteiner is said to have been given the job of getting rid of Mugabe, although Botswana and South Africa say they know nothing about it.

I gazed out into the garden. ”Not too much water”, I called out crossly.