Watching Americans celebrate, particularly at Ground Zero, you would think that the death of this one man meant the death of all terrorist organisations, and that they – never mind the rest world in which American embassies and consulates are peppered – are safe forever. One college student is quoted as saying ‘Yeah it was right to kill him. He took down the [Twin] Towers. He was a threat to the security of our nation.” The US homicide rate is among the worst in the industrialised world, surely this is a more pressing matter than killing a man who to all intents and purposes posed a lesser threat to national security?

Bin Laden was summarily executed without trial. American security operatives effectively invaded Pakistan and killed a man. I’m fairly certain that this violates all sorts of international treaties and human rights conventions. Members of former president Bush’s administration say that water boarding, a controversial form of torture, was crucial in extracting information on Bin Laden’s whereabouts. I know for certain that this is a direct violation of the Geneva Convention. But these inconvenient rules and laws don’t really apply to the United States do they? While the former president Musharraf of Pakistan has raised his objections regarding the operation, the sitting president is doing his best to kiss America’s ass. His country needs aid.

Unlike the case of Saddam Hussein, images of whose dead body were mercilessly displayed all over the international media, there is a frightening absence of any actual evidence that bin Laden is dead. It’s difficult to understand how this can be so when the operatives who killed him were able to record the entire event for the benefit of Barack Obama. Are we really supposed to believe that after he was killed, not one single man or woman involved in ‘Operation Geronimo’ took a photograph? It is no wonder then that terrorist organisations are refusing to take Obama’s word for it. I wouldn’t either.

It’s ironic that bin Laden was code named Geronimo, after an Apache leader who fought against the United States and Mexico for pretty much the same reasons and bin Laden waged his war against the United States. I’m sure the American government at the time called him a terrorist too. In view of the lack of evidence for bin Laden’s demise, it is interesting that when Geronimo was eventually tracked down by American authorities he managed to live to old age as a prisoner of war.

So now that bin Laden is dead is the world really a safer place? Not really. And exactly what significance does bin Laden’s death have on the Muslim minority of extremists fighting a jihad? Will this single act stop them dead in their tracks and force them to realise that their cause is a lost one? Or will it just add more fuel to the fire? Possibly. It’s just another example of American imperialism. America has shown the same disregard for the sanctity of human life, sovereignty, and the international conventions that that she accuses third world dictators of having. And quite frankly, I’ll take Mugabe or Chavez over American hypocrisy any day.

Newsday today reports that:

A ten-year-old Harare schoolgirl made good use of technology – video recording a rapist related to her as he attempted to rape her.

The girls uncle first raped her two years ago, then made another attempt three months later. But this time the girl recorded him as he uttered sexually explicit words.

The article goes on:

Regional magistrate Simon Rogers Kachambwa said the girl had struck the court as a credible witness who volunteered to spill the beans and told her mother what ordeal she went through.

“She did not tell her mother when you (Chikwanda) fondled her, even later on another day when you had sexual intercourse with her,” Kachambwa said.

“She felt it was too much when you asked her to do it again and she decided to record you on her phone as you spoke. “It was very fortunate that she did not like what you had earlier done to her and you did not know that you were dealing with an exceptionally intelligent niece.”

The last remarks by the magistrate are worrying. If she had liked it then what? Would he have walked free to do it again? Or would her family then have married her to her uncle?

My understanding is that sexual intercourse with a minor, whether they like it or not is a crime that is subject to imprisonment. The jail term of nine years the perpetrator received from the magistrate is disappointing.

Regardless, I say good for her.

The annual ZIBF for 2011 has been set for the 28th to the 30th of July in the Harare Gardens. Running under the theme “Books for Africa’s Development”, the fair hopes to regain its rank of being the best in Africa. A two-day Young Person’s Indaba on the 25th and 26th of July will pave way for the Book Fair. Read more form the Herald website.

This event promotes the love of books, reading and writing. It is a well-known fact that when there were no televisions or computers, reading was the principal leisure activity. Thus Africans possess a strong traditional orientation to oral and cultural forms of education, communication and entertainment. Information transmitted through song, dance and storytelling is more widely embraced.

Book Fairs across Africa aim to encourage cross-border trade in books and create a reading culture in the region. They do so by bringing together the book chain functions; authorship, publishing, distribution and readership. ZIBF by virtue of taking an international stance accommodates writers, publishers, booksellers, reading clubs and libraries from Africa and the developed world.

We hope to see the stature of ZIBF grow to enable it to be considered as the one of the top International Book Fairs in the world. Thus librarians, documentalists and publishers, authors, writers should all come together to make this a success. Exhibitors can choose a display option that best fits their needs from a single or double dedicated space devoted exclusively to them.

On their Facebook page ZIBF wrote:

“The ZIBF was the biggest and best book fair in Africa during the 1990s. Sadly, it’s now gone the way of many other things in Zimbabwe.”

Exhibitors please rekindle the experience by emailing information [at] zibfa [dot] org [dot] zw or events [at] zibfa [dot] org [dot] zw to receive an Exhibition Stand Application Form. Early application is advised to avoid disappointment.

The Kentucky Derby (pronounced “Darby”) arrived in Harare! We raided my daughter’s dressing up box for hats for everyone, and the kids managed to keep them on for most of the day! I had a huge purple striped hippy hat, which kept flopping into my face at the front, forcing me to peer at people out the side, with one eye. The only thing stopping the crowds of single men (already an exaggeration) must’ve been my progeny, clamouring for “uppy”, imprinting my legs and dress with sticky fingers and offering half mouthfuls from the buffet. I get to finish off everything tasted but not enjoyed, with a dash of slobber, sometimes a generous sprinkling of grass where it has been dropped and hastily recovered – if you’re not paying attention, you don’t even have time to clean these bits off as it gets shoved into your mouth mid-conversation. I blame it on the kids, but, well, it could’ve been the hat. And I’m not entirely sure there were many singles there – I was focused on my hat (naturally, being foremost in my vision) and the horses, and keeping the kids out of the flowerbed. But only when you are at a diplomat’s house! Did I mention the time they took wax crayons to a newly painted house? Austrian diplomats. Graham spent much of lunch that day with a scrubber and Handy Andy discreetly purloined from the staff in the kitchen while I distracted everyone with tales of poisonous spiders and prolific snakes – the dangers of living in the “bush”.

After several mint juleps (a Southern cocktail with spearmint, bourbon, sugar and water), I removed my high heels, flinging all decorum to the wind, or the flowerbed if we’re going to be accurate. The heels had bothered me much of the afternoon, sinking into the luscious lawn several times, culminating with me almost smacking myself in the face with my knee. My daughter wore them thereafter, although I still say the exchange was hardly fair – I couldn’t get my big toe into her sandals!

Anyway I left, far too late and many multiple juleps later, clutching my winnings, forgetting my hat on the table and my red high heels jutting out of the flowerbed (where my son had been using them in construction), but very jolly after an afternoon in the sun, at the races, pampered by Southern hospitality.

Why would one assume that others are gossiping about him/her just because they happen to be speaking amongst themselves in a language he/she doesn’t understand?  I often get that when a group of us are speaking SiNdebele around non-speakers.  Forget that we simply derive pleasure from conversing in our own tongue.  The reason SiNdebele is spoken is to gossip about other people because we really have nothing better to talk about.  It’s very irritating!

I suppose there is something in all of us that makes us regard with suspicion people who are different from ourselves.  And the differentiator needn’t be on major grounds, like being of another tribe, race or religion.  These days even a girl who doesn’t wear weaves in her hair is an oddity to be questioned, “What is wrong with her?”

The problem is when one isn’t open to accepting people’s differences distrust often results.  We then keep away from the object of suspicion and unwittingly become fertile ground for perpetuating prejudices.  So because I have limited interaction with Ndebeles, albinos and women with cropped hair, I then see these groups as being violent, practising witch craft and being lesbian.  Sadly, no matter how far-fetched or ridiculous the notion, lack of knowledge makes it all true.

It gets worse.  Stereotyping leads to intolerance which in turn breeds fear and hate.  And we wonder why society is plagued by discrimination, oppression and hate-crimes. Most people feel insulted and angered when they are exposed to politicians attempts to manipulate them. “What do they take us for?!” we hiss at rhetoric and blatant falsifications of the truth.

Well, let it be known that given the right circumstances – our own existing ignorance and suspicion of anyone different – politicians can and do successfully get the populace to think and act exactly how they want.  All it takes is for us to have the right conditions within ourselves; distrust, fear, hatred and prejudice.  For as long as we are unwilling to embrace peoples’ differences then the history of mankind will continue to be coloured red with genocides because we cannot accept that people look, dress, talk, worship and live differently.

In our fertile soils, each one of us can passively stand by or actively participate in forced evictions, Xenophobic attacks, ethnic cleansing, world wars etc, etc … the possibilities are endless.

Author and historian Blessing-Miles Tendi shared with Kubatana his response to Peter Godwin’s recent opinion piece in the New York Times:

Peter Godwin wrote an article entitled “Making Mugabe Laugh” in the International Herald Tribune on 20 April 2011. In the article Godwin claimed that the Ivory Coast under its recently ousted President Laurent Gbagbo and Zimbabwe, led by President Robert Mugabe, have some “striking parallels”. Godwin argues that both countries, led by highly educated presidents or intellectual-politicians who were liberators from repressive regimes, were once viewed as success stories in their respective regions. These parallels are true but they are hardly striking.

Africa has and continues to be led by many other intellectual-politicians who are also viewed as “liberators” of some sort. President Paul Kagame of Rwanda, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia, former South Africa President Thabo Mbeki and Malawi President Bingu wa Mutharika are only a few examples. Similarly Godwin’s narrative of a “success” story gone wrong can be applied to several African countries. Moreover, when Godwin likens Gbagbo and Mugabe by arguing that they resorted to “racist vestments of extreme nativism” he simplifies the deeply complex and different motives for both leaders’ actions.

Godwin also invents similarities in order to bolster his straw man argument that the Ivory Coast and Zimbabwe bear some “striking similarities”. For instance he asserts that the “two countries have also been similarly plagued by north-south conflicts”. This is an irresponsible distortion of history. Indeed the Ivory Coast has been deeply divided by a north-south conflict centring on religion, among other important factors. However, Zimbabwe has never experienced a north-south conflict in its history.

Where the Ivory Coast and Zimbabwe “crucially diverge”, Godwin argues, is that whereas West Africa’s leading power Nigeria refused to recognize Gbagbo after he lost the 2010 presidential election to Alassane Ouattara, Southern Africa’s leading state South Africa helped Mugabe stay in power after he lost the 2008 election. According to Godwin former South African president Mbeki “bullied” opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai into a power-sharing government led by Mugabe. Such a conclusion can only be reached by someone who has never taken the time to interview all the political actors involved in Zimbabwe’s 2008 power-sharing negotiations. Had Godwin done this, he would know that Tsvangirai was not bullied into a power-sharing arrangement. Negotiators to the power-sharing agreement, including Mbeki, have all recounted to me in interviews that sharing power was at the time the only viable solution to the 2008 political deadlock in Zimbabwe. The terms of the power-sharing agreement were crafted and agreed on by Zimbabwe’s rival political parties – not Mbeki as Godwin seems to believe.

I share Godwin’s criticism that power-sharing is a “democracy-defying model”. The spread of the model in recent years is a cause for concern. But it is clear that the question of how to resolve conflict in Africa remains extremely complex, and there may be good reasons for thinking that in some cases the benefits outweigh the costs. After all, power-sharing is usually justified principally in terms of the number of lives it is likely to save in the short term. However, in order to make accurate decisions as to when these benefits outweigh the costs, it is essential to fully recognise the barriers that power-sharing may create to genuine reform. Even if power-sharing arrangements do deliver greater peace and stability in the short term, their flaws suggest that it should only be used as a last resort.

Godwin is wrong when he writes that “Zimbabwe’s democratic opposition has been rewarded by the international community by being largely ignored”. By international community I presume that Godwin means the West. Here in Britain, where I reside, Zimbabwe features in the media frequently and it is discussed in parliament more than any other African state. There are even combined American and European Union targeted sanctions against Zimbabwe – something more undemocratic and human rights violating states such as Angola, Swaziland, Equatorial Guinea, Pakistan and Middle East states are not subject to.

The problem with the West is that double standards on global human rights and democracy promotion have helped Mugabe to cast and reject Western interference as imperialism. Western double standards have become undemocratic regimes’ fall guy for their unwillingness to introduce genuine, indigenous, workable and sovereign institutions for human rights promotion and protection. Consequently, Godwin’s call for America to support democracy and human rights movements in Zimbabwe is misguided. America and the West are part of the problem – not the solution – in Zimbabwe’s problems.