Zimbabwe is about white supremacy

Zimbabwe is about white supremacy

RECENT OPINION ARTICLES

• Western sanctions source of Mugabe's demise

• Mugabe's enforcers building own case

• If bishops were guilty of aligning with Mugabe, ICG goes to the other extreme

• Full text of Tsvangirai's address to foreign correspondents

• Crisis Group report pursuing neo-liberal agenda

• Zimbabwe opposition running out of options

• Mugabe should look at own legitimacy

• Zimbabwe: a majority under pressure

• Destination Zimbabwe

• Martin Luther King's nightmare

• Who are Zimbabwe's enemies?

• Strikes a vote of no confidence in Zanu PF

• Mugabe's 2010 plan may backfire

• Defying Mugabe's laws a moral duty

• Zimbabweans must rise above party divisions

By John Iteshi

RACISM, the worst kind of racism, is the only reason for the British media's obsession with Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe.

Nothing in Zimbabwe equates to one tenth of what happens in each of the 36 states of Nigeria. What the opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai did, by trying to instigate mass uprising, cannot be attempted
successfully by anybody in Nigeria today.

Just dreaming of it aloud will put you in jail in Nigeria, let alone starting it.

Before 2003 general elections key
political opponents of the Federal government and various state governments were assassinated, but they made no real news to BBC and other western media.

Just few months ago in Ebonyi State, one of the poorest States, the governor Sam Egwu locked up two journalists for over three months for publishing articles which accused him of corruption in a local newspaper. What a pity, this fact
did not make any news to the democracy-loving western media!

Currently, opposition forces at all levels are being openly suppressed and systematically excluded from contesting the next elections by the electoral body headed by a government stooge. The vice president of Nigeria is openly humiliated and denied his official privileges just for standing up
against the plot by President Obasanjo to extend his rule through the back door.

One would have expected the democracy-loving white world to stand up against the evil regime of Obasanjo, but nothing like that has happened.

The clear message being sent across Black Africa seems to be that all one needs to succeed as president of his country is to be a friend of the West even at the expense of his people, just like Obasanjo, and not transparency and good
governance. The fact is now clearest that any Black African leader regarded as
good by the West is definitely evil or incompetent.

A case in point is the fate of General Abacha, who was condemned in the West, but left indelible landmarks of great infrastructural development in Nigeria.

For the benefit of those who are unaware of the facts. Abacha ruled Nigeria between November 1993 and June 1998 during which the oil market was not at all booming, but used the meagre resources wisely enough to rehabilitate roads, hospitals, universities and other public amenities through the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF).

Obasanjo's 'democratic government' has ruled Nigeria since may 1999, witnessing unprecedented increase in revenue through an unprecedented oil boom and irresponsible disposals of the most lucrative public corporations in the name of privatisation, but has achieved virtually no definite success in any sector.

Roads are basically still left where Abacha left them in 1998 and I speak as an enlightened Nigerian who knows Nigeria.

I visited Nigeria in October 2005 and travelled by coach round the country to see if there has been any changes. I travelled from Abuja to Abakaliki via Enugu; from Enugu to Onitsha - Benin - Ore - Lagos and from Lagos to Ibadan-Okene-Abuja and was shocked to see that we have wasted eight years of unprecedented economic boom.

There is global drumming about economic reforms and progress in Nigeria, while the reality is that only white rogues collaborating with the government are the real beneficiaries. Destroying fixed phone networks and public pay-phones in order to force every Nigerian to depend on GSM (which enriches mainly white South Africans) is what people call economic progress in Nigeria.

The fact that western media and their governments have continued to praise a government as evil as Obasanjo's despite clear evidence of everything they claim to stand against makes me confident that any government condemned by the West might not be all bad after all. Perhaps, Idi Amin might have not been as bad!

It seems to me that the only reason the white world is against Robert Mugabe is because he expelled white farmers, because genuine concern for the Black race would have meant that Nigeria, being the largest black society, would be given greater focus.

It is now clear to me that BBC and other British media are far worse than the
British National Party (BNP) which is labelled racist. The BNP is not threatening the existence and survival of the Black race while British journalists are.

I am most grateful for the hospitality of the British state for affording me the good life and respect that no Black country can afford its Black citizens. I do not shy away from the hard fact that the most racist white country would treat ordinary Black immigrants better than the best Black country would treat its own citizens.

Therefore, I am grateful to Britain, but at the same time believe that my people must be enlightened about the true location of racism. The real racism is not about local people genuinely resenting to uncontrolled immigration of dubious people into their country. I put myself in the shoes of ordinary white British people who have no other country to run to!

What I call racism at its worst is the one-sided stand of the "white world" on
Zimbabwe.

It is accepted that the take-over of white farms could have been more better planned, but it cannot justify the current scale of global condemnation of Mugabe. What the white supremacists pretending to be messiahs are insinuating is that Zimbabwe cannot survive without white farmers who clearly were not even farming to feed Zimbabweans in the first place.

What is being propagated around the world is that no Black country can survive on its own. What needs to be done by enlightened and decolonised Black people is to rally round and use the Zimbabwean case as an inspiration for building successful societies.

Zimbabwe is by far more democratic and successful than most other Black African countries like Nigeria, Sudan, Uganda, DRC, Tongo, Eritrea, Ethiopia etc., but today it bears the ignoble reputation of being one of the worst places to live in!

The best of the 36 state governors of Nigeria is , yet we are still being fed with lies about Mugabe. It is therefore very clear that Mugabe would have remained a friend of the West if he had not expelled white farmers. Hence, it is purely and squarely about race!

John Iteshi writes from the UK and can be contacted on e-mail: Izhiogoagbo@yahoo.com

JOIN THE DEBATE ON THIS ARTICLE ON THE NEWZIMBABWE.COM FORUMS
debate@newzimbabwe.com