"Perhaps, looking long term, the Zimbabwian people have in Mugabe the lesser of two evils." - Akenaton

As breath-takingly an idiotic statement as one might expect to uttered by, "oor wee Heilan' Anarchist".

You canvas the population of Zimbabwe today who were old enough to have exeperienced Smith's rule (a bit hard as average life expectancy in the paradise Akenaton claims is Mugabe's Zimbabwe is only 37 years, damn sight less if you happen to support any other party than ZANU-PF) and I am sure that you would find that they long for the good old days with:

- Housing;
- Food;
- Paid employment;
- Wages that were actually worth something;
- A free health service;
- A functioning system of education available to all;
- Roughly 20,000 to 30,000 more Matabele than there were before Mugabe took over;
- Rule of Law & Order.

No doubt Akenaton can list what bounties are now available under the philanthropic rule of "Black" Bob and I am referring to his soul, not his skin colour.

Guest lox, you never did get back to me on the non-existant links that I was supposed to have heeded before putting my foot in my mouth.

Couple of things from your post:

"It's people are no longer on the list of saleable resources, and it's governments have the same skin colour as their subjects"

Well Guest lox hate to disillusion you but what you describe above was the status quo at the height of the "Slave Trade", although the "Government" was the Tribal Chief and his Councillors.

"Bit bitter that the Kaffirs have taken over eh?"

Any idea where that word "Kaffir" comes from Guest lox? I bet that you think it is Afrikaans, but its not, it belongs to the language of those, all those Tribal Chiefs of similar skin colour to their wares, sold their slaves to - Arabic, kâfir meaning unbeliever, infidel.

Presented with a prosperous, functioning country in 1980, the populace voted in Robert Mugabe who within three decades converted the place to a basket case shambles. I can hear Ian Smith mutter, "I bloody well told you so". Well Ake, Guest Lox, you are right it is not the UK's problem, it is not the "big-bad-West's" problem - It is Zimbabwe's problem, let 'em get on with it.

Maybe Ake and Guest Lox should muster their butts down there to help, I cannot for the life of me see how things could get worse, but I am sure the pair of them would manage it somehow.