Mugabe: No crisis, UN envoy lying/Mugabe King of the Losers

President Robert Mugabe has accused the United Nations' most senior aid official of lying about the severity of Zimbabwe's humanitarian crisis and said many other African countries were worse off than his.

This is the most funny thing I think I have heard an African leader say. Yes, at least my country is not as bad as other despot ruled countries. But it is hard to beat this:

Zimbabwe police and recruits used bulldozers and sledgehammers to demolish shacks, homes, market stalls and small business in poor areas across the country during what was dubbed Operation Murambatsvina, or Drive Out Trash.

The operation that began in May and was declared over in July left more than 700,000 homeless or without livelihoods, or both, according to UN estimates, that the government has rejected as an exaggeration.

Now after destroying peasants homes what will he allow relief organizations to do to solve the problems he created:

During talks with Egeland, Mugabe refused a UN aid offer of tents to shelter the hundreds of thousands of victims of the urban demolition campaign, saying he would only accept assistance to build permanent housing.

Now what shall the UN do for the situation...

Egeland ended his mission to Harare and Bulawayo on Wednesday warning that "the humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe is very serious".

"The prospects are worrying. The need for international assistance is big and growing. The people of Zimbabwe are suffering under several big problems," he told a news conference in Johannesburg.

But unless the aide is channeled directly to the people in need through NGO's and not the Zimbabwe government we should not send relief. This is because in the end it will only hurt the people we want to help.

And I can never understand the opposition. If they think they are safe from this tyrant they are dreaming. If Mugabe is willing to destroy the houses of 700,000 people that opposed him, what else do you think he would do if given the chance. I personally would flee the country just as the boat people did.

Links of note:
How the Loss of Property Rights Caused Zimbabwe's Collapse

Above link went bad, probably GlobalisationInstitute changed their website so old links do not work now, but the following two links (2nd PDF) were what they were linking to:
How the Loss of Property Rights Caused Zimbabwe's Collapse by Craig Richardson

Report as PDF