Whites Who Bleed - State murder in Zimbabwe - farms taken away from white farmers

So why exactly is Mugabe encouraging the seizures? He was at serious risk of losing the forthcoming election. Zimbabwe's economy is in free fall; its currency is collapsing; per capita wages have sunk 35 percent since the early '90s; and only inflation is rising. The president received a serious warning when he unexpectedly lost a national referendum that would have given him expanded powers in an amended constitution. Farm seizures served two purposes: as an issue they rallied black-African support behind him, and as a tactic they concealed a program of physical violence and intimidation against the political opposition. Only a handful of white farmers are political supporters of the opposition; most stay nervously out of post- independence politics; hence it is black farm workers who suffer most at the hands of Mugabe's roving thugs when they are known to be pro- opposition.

Won't this make him an international pariah? Unfortunately, no. Indeed, the present campaign could make Mugabe a regional trendsetter. In the looking-glass world of post-colonial politics, Mugabe has been able to force neighboring states like South Africa to support his demand that Britain finance land redistribution. In part this is a reflection of the continuing ideological power of "anti-racist" politics. But it also reflects public opinion in neighboring states that even prudent politicians like South Africa's President Mbeki cannot ignore. Polls show that most South African blacks admire Mugabe's actions and would like to see similar expropriations down south. Whites are quoted in reply as considering emigration (as, indeed, many thousands of whites have fled Zimbabwe since independence). In the light of current events, it would be hard to persuade them that they are not just a decade away from similar state- sanctioned pogroms.

Will Britain pay the Danegeld? Mr. Blair's position seems to be that Britain is prepared to help finance land reform provided that it is orderly, peaceful, and legal. But that would hand a dramatic political victory to Mugabe, ensure his victory in the election, further ruin Zimbabwe's agriculture and economy, encourage similar "anti-racist" and economically suicidal policies throughout southern Africa, and provoke similar raids on the British Treasury. Mr. Blair would never get rid of the Dane-or indeed Mugabe, whose removal should be the main aim of Western policy since his government is responsible for the near collapse of the Zimbabwean economy.

It is a pity that neither Whitehall nor Washington has yet acquired the wisdom of an elderly farm worker who was asked by the Wall Street Journal if he favored land reform and replied: "If they can take it away from the whites, they can take it away from me." For as long as property is insecure, Africa will never prosper.

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