Violence in Zimbabwe
Depending on which country a person resides violence can be seen in many different forms. For some it is just a way of protection and for others it is seen as brutally horrible events. Violence is being forceful with the intent to cause physical harm using force or power against oneself or another that could result in injury, death or psychological harm (“Definition and Typology of Violence.” WHO. Web 18 Jan. 2016. world health organization). With many different forms of violence that can be seen from brute force, slavery, totalitarianism or even harassment. People in Western societies do not want to realize the real violence that exists in the world. They see the headlines in the papers of what countries want you to access, but Western societies are not informed on real violent acts that do make the front page news in the paper, or the breaking news segment on the news cast. An example of this violence that is not seen in headlines on a daily basis is that of the Zimbabwe government and President himself, Robert Mugabe.
People in the Western society don’t want to realize the true violence that exists. Often violence is not the reality of people in Western societies but is a struggle for people in the Southern Hemisphere. When seeing something violent on a television they can often just change the channel or turn the TV off to get the images out of their brain. They are also able to go back to living their daily lives without having a major affect of the decision they make the next day. Just one simple flip of the switch the violence can disappear. Unfortunately, it is not like that in the Southern Hemisphere and specifically in Zimbabwe. From my first hand experience, I know exactly what it is like to live with harassment, threats and violence in your day to day life.
The Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe thinks he is doing what is best for the country but in reality he is doing the country no good. He only wants to protect himself and his entourage to try and make the country a better place for the future, when in fact he is tearing a country apart. He kills his own people, when they are just trying to survive, living day to day. He formed a group called the “war vets”, which were the people who would kill and torture innocent people just because the government gave a command to do so.
The white farmers of Zimbabwe are the true people of this story. They were declared the enemy of the state by Robert Mugabe and were the ones who could be shot at any moment for no reason at all. Whoever the war vets saw in plain sight could become the next victim and succumb to the misfortunate event of being shot at any moment and for no reason at all. These shootings took place since it was decided by the government that the country needed to stage an ethnic cleanse to eradicate any white farmers. This was so that the state could take over their land and take back what they thought was rightfully theirs in the first place. It was said that when there was an established farm and the land owners wanted to see they would have to offer all the land to the government first. If the government did not wish to purchase any of the land the owners were able to sell the land to any purchaser wishing to buy. In in the 1990’s is when everything got real messy. The violence shown towards white farmers and all their employees was beyond comprehension. It must be understood that the violence committed against the white farmers and their large workforces was also politically motivated. This is so because it was felt that the farmers, being the employers had an influence over how the employees would vote in the upcoming elections. There was an opposition to the Government that was getting stronger. In order for the Mugabe government to stamp out the opposition they needed to harass and remove the white farmers from the land. There were also black farmers who had large work forces too. They were also affected if it was thought that they were of the opposition. The war vets would pitch tents outside of farmers houses to torture and run the farmers off their land. They would even harass any of the black workers that worked for these white farmers, they would kick them out of the houses that they live in just to threaten the farmers even more than they already were. Government officials would even go as far as burning down farm fields and houses in order to terrorize farmers into leaving. They would also utter death threats, would abduct innocent people and throw them in jail. Some of the death threats would be as simple as you better watch your back and could go as far as “I’ll grind your bones to the ground”.
Even with electric fencing put up around the property the violence in the end was just too much to bare. Fleeing the property and coming back to a country with little to no violence was a relief in itself. With all the death threats, abductions, fires and nonsense, its no wonder so many people choose to just shut off a TV with violent scenes to remove any images from their memory.
References
(“Definition and Typology of Violence.” WHO. Web 18 Jan. 2016. world health organization).
