Pity the Nation
The unfortunate people of Zimbabwe have just discovered that Mugabe will be staying on until 2010, not 2008. He will be 86 by then.
As the Mail & Guardian (South Africa, not some bizarre mutant UK title...) notes, rather restrainedly, "Under Mugabe's charge -- he first came to power at the country's independence from Britain in 1980 -- Zimbabwe has declined from being a model economy to a classical African basket case, weighed down by an economic crisis that has spawned hyperinflation, severe food shortages, record unemployment and poverty".
As the Mail & Guardian (South Africa, not some bizarre mutant UK title...) notes, rather restrainedly, "Under Mugabe's charge -- he first came to power at the country's independence from Britain in 1980 -- Zimbabwe has declined from being a model economy to a classical African basket case, weighed down by an economic crisis that has spawned hyperinflation, severe food shortages, record unemployment and poverty".
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( Basket Case)...and yet India which has few obvious natural resources I am aware of contrives to get on so comparitively well .
I wonder why that is
India is full of rsources. Notably the great river systems of the Indus and Ganges.
Anyway, it does seem from the article that Mugabe and our own Mr Broon have similar economic ends in mind.
I only know a few ex-Zim's who are white. Does anyone know if the more indigeanous folk would welcome back Ian Smith now?
Or indeed its next door neighbour - prosperous, democratic and free Botswana.
I felt the same way when Blair won the election and wrecked Britain. The only thing is, the British were stupid enough to vote for blair, whereas I don't believe the Zimbabweans were given an opportunity to reject Mugabe.
India is not rich in natural resources, City Unslicker and two big rivers are not really a natural resource in that you can't sell them. Even then, there is a water shortage. They've got iron ore, bauxite and some copper. That's about it.
India's biggest natural resource are its highly intelligent people and their energy. They throw themselves into whatever they do. And they are very good at making money. The place is a hotbed of energy.
And if only they had not taken the wrong path in '48 with a command and control economy, heaven knows how rich India (and by extension, the world) would be now.
You're singing my favourite song, Croydonian. The Gandhis were a curse.
First of all Mohanandas Gandhi (no relation to Indira) and his backward views did enormous damage. Rather than concentrate on putting in infrastructure and encouraging a huge cotton industry, he opined day after day that every Indian home should weave its own cotton. What kind of an economic programme is that?
And he went around with his spinning wheel and wove a couple of inches of khadi a day, as an example. Then Nehru cosied up to the foul, vile Soviet Union and essentially made India a client state - all under the umbrella of being "non-aligned", which was simply untrue.
Then Indira succeeded Nehru and she continued her father's programme, causing India to fall further and further behind. I've mentioned before that I once took a push button telephone (they were still using rotaries, the line fixed into the wall) that I'd bought at Woolworth's or somewhere for a senior civil servant as a gift for helping me.
Of course, there were no phone jacks, so he couldn't plug it in, but he had it sitting proudly on his desk, the cord dangling onto the floor. And this was a senior civil servant.
Rajiv opened it up a bit,but the economy didn't really kick in until they got rid of the Gandhis. Sonia should not have run. And God help India if Rajiv's daughter runs. However, I think the more time that passes, the more the (false) luster around that awful family diminishes.
Anyway, they're rocketing ahead now, although there's a long, long way to go. Every day a dozen or so small farmers commit suicide because they cannot pay their debts and cannot feed their families.
But India sizzles with energy. I would be there now, but they don't allow foreigners to buy a house.
Well put. I would say that we are in part responsible for inflicting an Attlee style over-officious civil service etc on Mother India as part of the colonial legacy. Not that I'm going to apologise or don sackcloth and ashes.
The legacy of political dynasties is generally not a happy one - The Nehrus/Gandhis, the Kennedys etc even before we get onto the vile spawn of Kim Il Sung and so forth. The Greatest Ever Englishman did not have offspring that reached his standard, although that is not surprising, frankly.
I agree with you. The ICS was elephantine, moved like treacle in a cold climate and was unbelievably corrupt. For example, why, until the advent of Rajiv, did the entire country of India only have one car - the dreadful Ambassador - top speed 35mph? Obviously, ministers were being paid off not to grant a license to any other car company. No one else but Tata was making trucks and buses. Hmmmm. Those are huge examples, but it was right down the food chain. And billions of petty rules and regulations that people had to pay to get around ... and even then it would take years. I read somewhere that despite modernisation, India has something like 1.5m civil court cases waiting to be heard.
Indeed, there was such a tradition by then of cheating the public, that people stopped buying things because if they went wrong, that was the buyer's tough luck. It is only fairly recently (around 10 years, or perhaps a little more) that big multinationals have been granted licenses and they, of course, offer their customers warrantees. This spurred spending because the consumer could at last have confidence in what he was buying. Until then, people had saved their money in the bank and done without.
When I first went to India, all the upper middle classes had a refrigerator proudly situated in their living rooms. Sometimes it was decorated with plants and so on. Today, such is consumer confidence, everyone has a refrigerator and they are kept in the kitchen, no longer anything to be proud of. Consumer spending has been wonderful for India.
I do think it's a bit rich, though, that despite the diaspora - and most of them thriving property owners - India won't let foreigners buy a house.
The Zimbabweans are completely immobilized!
Shocked!
How can the Liberator turn to such colours!
"Shocked" is the word!
Rev M S Hove.
Refer: www.zimfinalpush.blogspot.com
India these days is certainly a wonder to behold! But I do worry about the future of Anglo-Indian relations when all those call centre workers rise up thru the ranks determined to take revenge for the nightly rudeness they are subjected to at the hands of the great British public ):
Maitiro - I wish the good people of Zim every fortune in being rid of that wicked man.
David - I think you might be on to something there.
They'll band together and buy British multinationals and hire people from Wandsworth to work in call centres. Maureen will have to answer the phone: "Good evening. This is Aruna. How may I help you?"
sorry to be a bore. Verity, the indus and ganges basins were are are the basis for huge agricultural provision which is essential to any large state. Gorwing food is the first basic need of any civilisation.
On the point of the Raj, the Empire did hurt them significantly after 1850 as Great Britain refused to allow their industrialisation on a large scale, fearing the compettition and instead demanding a raw goods economy to feed Blighty.
On call centres, I was in CHina recently, they want to get into this fast growing business. Slight issue being that none of the staff can read, write of speak English. They seemed to think they could get by with just a little spoken english at first; according to the Chinese this is the way the Indians started it!
here is a god link to an ex rhodie
www.africancris.org who now lives in the shambles that is SA
Mugabe isnt really my kind of dictator , he is just evil and corrupt rather than mad.
Like the cut of the jib of the maniac who runs equatorial guinea , a canibal who eats the testes of his enemies.
City Unslicker - The Chinese are nothing if not ambitious. However, even if they spoke beautiful English, they are not cut out culturally or emotionally for call centre work. A race that puts 'face' above anything else is not going to be able to stand up to the virtual punches delivered by demanding Brits with billing mistakes on their credit cards. The Indians are made of sterner stuff and actually are pretty swift at giving as good as they get. Sometimes they're so quick, it's rather disconcerting.
I agree that Britain didn't develop manufacturing or heavy industry in India. But freedom at midnight came in 1946 (I think I'm right about the year), so they've had 60 years to develop. And Nehru and the Gandhis made a dog's breakfast of it. As lefties always do. Look how nimble they have been since Rajiv was assassinated. I pray Prityanka - his daughter - does not stand. I think India needs at least another decade to get over the Nehru/Gandhi stardust.
India does not have vast amounts of water, although of course it has some fertile plains, but farmers are, in the Indian term, "suiciding" in despair. Not just a few, but thousands a year. One keeps one's fingers crossed that the economic trickle-down will save many lives and much terrible, terrible agony.
PHitch - Can you tell us the qualifications required to become your kind of dictator?
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