Re: [A-List] Zimbabwe: disintegration continues

["bon moun" <sherrynstan@xxxxxxx>]

We must be extremely skeptical about this kind of lurid anecdote, dripping
as it were, not with cannibalism and blood, but with the post-colonial
racism that relishes these (highly suspect) images of "black deviance".

----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>
To: <a-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, October 25, 2002 2:54 AM
Subject: [A-List] Zimbabwe: disintegration continues


> Meanwhile, out of range of most radar, the saga of Zimbabwe continues.
We've
> tried to keep tabs on it periodically, but it would be most useful if Pat
> Bond and/or John Enyang could tell us more about what's happening there.
>
>
> Mugabe men 'shot white farmer and drank his blood'
> By Basildon Peta Southern Africa Correspondent
> The Independent, 25 October 2002
>
> Rampaging war veterans killed a white farmer, David Stevens, and drank
his
> blood mixed with alcohol, the Zimbabwe High Court has been told. The
> accusation was made by a witness testifying against four militants from
the
> ruling Zanu-PF party, charged with the murder in April 2000 of Mr
Stevens, a
> farmer and opposition political activist.
>
> The militants are the first to face trial over the deaths of 12 white
> farmers - and 200 black activists - at the hands of President Robert
> Mugabe's supporters after the Zimbabwe government unleashed a violent
> campaign to seize and occupy white farms.
>
> The High Court heard that war veterans occupying Mr Stevens' Arizona
Farm,
> in Macheke, 100 miles east of the capital, Harare, frogmarched him to
their
> office in the nearby Murehwa district. He was beaten and then dragged to
a
> burial shrine for heroes of the 1970s independence war, where he was
shot.
>
> "One of them knelt over Stevens' body and brought a container filled with
> blood, which they mixed with alcohol and shared among themselves," the
> witness, who cannot be named for his own protection, told the High Court
> judge, Benjamin Paradza.
>
> The four accused - Richard Svisviro, Muyengwa Munyuki, Charles Matanda
and
> Douglas Chitekuteku - were arrested and remanded shortly after the
murder. A
> fifth suspect, Banda Katsvamudanga, has disappeared.
>
> This month, Jocyline Chiwenga, the wife of Zimbabwe's army commander,
> threatened to kill a white farmer, saying she had not "tasted white
blood"
> for a long time. The farmer is taking legal step to recover money for his
> produce, which was soldafter Mrs Chiwenga forcibly evicted him.
>
> In a separate development Geoffrey Nyarota, editor of the Daily News,
> Zimbabwe's only independent newspaper, has been charged with "undermining
> confidence" in the police by publishing claims of police torture made in
> court by an opposition activist.
>
>
>
>