Mocking Mugabe

Not even crushing inflation and living in fear all these years has wiped away a sense of humor for the suffering people of Zimbabwe.

Good for them. I just pray Robert Mugabe doesn't have the last laugh.

The voice uncannily resembles President Mugabe's. “I gave you maize for my election campaign and you made popcorn out of it,” it drones. “I gave you fertiliser and you made kachasu [bootleg] out of it. I gave you cattle and you sold them to the butcher. My people are a terrible disappointment.”

The listeners, crouched over a mobile telephone, convulse with laughter. The voice belongs to a mimic who satirises the speeches of the 84-year-old leader.

Then there is the new ringtone being sold at markets around the country. To the tune of a well-known “revolutionary” song of the ruling Zanu (PF) party of Robert Mugabe, the singers chant derisively: “And for how long are you going to vote for Zanu(PF)?”

The electronic trinkets are part of an onslaught of mockery of Mr Mugabe and his party as he tries to add five more years to the twenty-eight already in power. Only two months ago political satire such as this would have attracted the attention of the Central Intelligence Organisation. But in the absence of the customary intimidation by the brainwashed youth militia and war veterans, the police and the army that has preceded every election since 2000, the climate of terror that has kept Mr Mugabe in control has lifted.

Says here there's disunity among the opposition, which may bode well for the thug, while others indicate his days are numbered.

In the meantime, he's still issuing threats and--get this--his thugs are forcing opponents to eat posters.

Intelligence officers have forced opponents of Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe to take down their election posters and eat them, a leading human rights group has claimed.

Amnesty International said three supporters of the Movement for Democratic Change were arrested on March 7 for putting up posters and later forced to chew, and swallow the posters in jail.

Just lovely.