Monday, July 02, 2007

Not Zimbabwe again

A topic I have not touched for a year or more; orginally writing about how the West should be ashamed for not doing something about a country that is constantly getting worse. Well, finally, as the problem has got worse, some other African countries have been forced to do something. Not because they really want to help of course, but because the problem is so bad that at least a third of Zimbabweans have fled their own country, many to South Africa. The migration is having such an impact on South Africa it has been forced to at least acknowledge the problem and started to apply some pressure.

The pressure makes no difference; Western countries ignore the problem; Zimbabwe gets worse. Inflation at 3,000% was bad, now it is above 15,000%. Prices triple every month. Salaries double every 3 months... an imbalance that means poverty is just getting worse and worse -a vicious cycle has taken hold leading to worse health problems and worse educational facilities. How can this cycle be broken? Even if Mugabe falls, even if the transition to a stable leadership could be relatively smooth (which would be a first through out the World), how long will it take to recover? to rebuild, to retraing, to re-attract talent...

But first we need to convince our governments to do something. To get rid of Mugabe and his cronies and try to help Zimbabwe find itself a decent leadership. Then we can think of trying to help. The future is not good. If anything it is, unfortunately, a case of how bad can a dictator mess up a country, before it actually self-implodes? It seems, regrettably, like we might be finding out in the next year. At least something might change soon -but only because the situation is so bad. And what do we do about it?

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