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Zimbabwe Crisis Demands NZ Condemnation

The "crimes against humanity being perpetrated by Zimbabwe's maniacal Marxist Mugabe have reached crisis proportions", the Libertarianz Party said today. Party leader Peter Cresswell called on the government "to back up their pretence at supporting human rights by demanding Zimbabwe's expulsion from the Commonwealth and other world bodies," and for other parties and other New Zealanders to "join in the Libertarianz' condemnation of Mugabe's murderous regime."

"Nearly twenty years ago then-Prime Minister Robert Muldoon publicly condemned Mugabe as nothing more than a thug, famous for "running around the country shooting people." "Nothing has changed in the twenty odd years since," said Cresswell. "In the tradition of Hitler and Milosevic, Mugabe is using the lethal combination of socialism and race hatred to further his political ends. And in the process he is destroying his own country. No wonder rumours continue to abound of him suffering from syphilitic insanity."

In recent days Zimbabwe's Finance Minister Simba Makoni has admitted that Zimbabwe is quickly slipping into complete economic meltdown:

a.. Attacks on productive commercial farmers have resulted in the collapse of the agricultural sector of the economy. b.. Corn production has plummeted by almost 55% c.. Over 200 Zimbabwean manufacturers have closed their doors in the last year and airlines such as Quantas, Lufthansa, KLM, Air France and other have shut down service completely. d.. In the bell-wether construction industry over half of all workers have lost their jobs in the last year. Tourism, a major hard currency earner, has come to a standstill with resorts that are normally fully booked having occupancy rates of only 27%. "Like every dictator of the Left, Mugabe prattles on about caring about the poor but it is exactly the poor who are suffering the most under his policies," said Cresswell. "And it was the poor that his thugs assaulted in his election campaign last year." The Libertarianz leader contends that Mugabe is simply "a desperate, possibly insane, man who is trying to hold the reins of power by any means available so he can continue to live in the lap of luxury."

Cresswell went on to say: "In the last election Mugabe unleashed hordes of criminals and thugs to beat and murder hundreds of thousands of his own people. And during these assaults that he himself unleashed he was callous enough to fly off for another one of his spending sprees at Harrods using money stolen from hundreds and thousands of his won people. He used violence to force the people of Zimbabwe to vote for his ZANU-PF party and in spite of that he barely won a parliamentary majority. The only reason he has parliament firmly in control is that he appoints some 30 members of parliament personally to make sure that he won't lose an election." Cresswell noted that the Helen Suzman Foundation polled voters in Zimbabwe and found incontrovertible evidence that the intimidation forced people to vote for Mugabe against their will.

Following a recent by-election, violence against the growing opposition to Mugabe has escalated as the President begins his re-election campaign. Mugabe has continuously attacked the Justices of the Constitutional Court - several have now said they can no longer endure the intimidation and have announced their resignation. Individuals of the President's choosing will replace them. And 23 white farmers have been held in jail without bail since they tried to help a fellow farmer who was being attacked by Mugabe's so-called "war veterans". "Yet it is the farmers, and not the attackers, who have been charged with "inciting violence." Cresswell said:

"This shows the laughable state of the rule of law under Marxism," he says. "Not long ago Mugabe's Brown Shirts attacked a charity that supplied food to flood victims. They stormed in and started stealing the food intended for those in real need. The Zimbabwe police came along and arrested the aid workers who tried to prevent the theft. The aid workers, and not Mugabe's thugs, were charged with stopping 'the peaceful distribution of food'."

Cresswell said that "not a single cent of foreign aid" should be given to Zimbabwe, and not a single civilised state should give him succour."

Aid has financed Mugabe's autocratic rule, and the succour of otherwise civilised states has given him undeserved standing. Recently, Mugabe's Brown Shirts attacked a peace march in Harare and once again the police stepped in to arrest, not the attackers, but the victims. One of the victims was a cousin of the Queen. In an irony that could not escape the attention of that victim, the police took him aside, beat him up, and then threw him into a police vehicle that had been donated by the British government."

Cresswell argued: "If Phil Goff and Helen Clark had one shred of decency they would be demanding that Mugabe be promptly expelled from the respectable company of the world's nations. Mugabe has already engaged in genocidal campaigns against the Matabele people, and his current tirades about land reform are simply a smokescreen. He has had twenty years to implement 'land reform' but instead he has distributed it to generals, relatives, himself and others in Zimbabwe's vampire elite."

"Why don't Goff and Clark demand Mugabe's expulsion from various world bodies? Are they suddenly so timid because - like her other friends in Beijing and Pyonyang - Mr. Mugabe shares so much of their own ideology? The fact that they don't want to be seen criticising someone who shares so many of their own values should be of concern to every honest and decent person in this country. It's enough, in fact, to make you vote Libertarianz."

ENDS

For more information contact:

Peter Cresswell

LIBERTARIANZ LEADER

Phone: (025) 861 927, organon@ihug.co.nz

www.libertarianz.org.nz

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