Africa
Namibia wants to learn from Zim. The speed with which Zimbabweans took back their land from white farmers is "commendable" and Namibia wants to do the same, the deputy land minister has said.
The speed with which Zimbabweans took back their land from white farmers is "commendable" and Namibia wants to do the same, Namibia's deputy land minister was quoted as saying on Tuesday.

"We feel that the speed they took the land is commendable and we would like to see how they did it," said Isak Katali. Katali is on a five-day official visit to Zimbabwe, according to the state-owned Herald newspaper.

Zimbabwe, a former British colony, launched its controversial land-reform programme in 2000, and now most of the country's 4 000 or so formerly white-owned farms are in the hands of black farmers.

The programme has sparked Western criticism but won Zimbabwe the praise and admiration of other countries in southern Africa.

Namibia, once a German colony, has also decided to use an "expropriation policy" together with a willing-buyer-willing-seller programme, Katali was quoted as saying.

"Land reform is important to Namibia and we feel that the same colonisers are the same people who colonised Zimbabwe," Katali said.

"We also feel that if Zimbabwe did this we can do it in the same manner," he added.

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe blames the sharp fall in agricultural production in his country over the last five years on successive droughts. - Sapa-dpa

Like I have told friends-If you want to hunt Africa, do it now. It is all going to be gone in 10 years.

Amen, Tembo.

If we listen to some of the (clowns in this world) the two main problems facing us are Drought and George W Bush ...

The old addage that the best way to deflect critism is to (blame someone else) is still alive and well worldwide ...... when the real problem can be found by these CLOWNS just looking in the MIRROR

Cheers ... Peter

It is laughable to blame the fact that Zim's Ag production is going down the tubes on drought, GWB on the other hand.....

Nambians do you want to go the way of Zim??? Where your money is only good for toilet paper....

Mike

Any of you who follow regional politics even remotely will know that this is old news.

There have been these silly comments since about 2000, even 1999. Remember, given the sensitive nature (and rightly so) of this issue it only takes only gov't employee to voice their opinion and then its hailed by media as a new 'government policy'...Imminent chaos. Land claims and reform do not = Zim either.

I would wait and see what follows from this before getting any knickers in a knot. Personally, no, I don't think so or they would have walked that road.

Namibian farmers concerned about Zim praise

May 24 2006 at 05:53PM

Windhoek - Farmers in Namibia expressed concern Wednesday over comments by the country's deputy land affairs minister commending the speed of land reform in Zimbabwe.

The deputy minister in question, Isak Katali, currently on a five-day state visit to Zimbabwe, was quoted as saying: "We feel that the speed they (Zimbabwe) took the land is commendable and we would like to see how they did it."

Katali also noted that land reform was "important to Namibia and we feel that the same colonisers are the same people who colonised Zimbabwe".

"We also feel that if Zimbabwe did this we can do it in the same manner," he was further quoted.


Zimbabwe gained independence from Britain in 1980 while Namibia, a former German colony and later under South African rule, became independent in 1990.

In a statement, the Namibian Agricultural Union (NAU) president Raimer von Hase said: "We see the stated remarks by deputy minister Katali as standing in direct conflict to the spirit of the cabinet resolution."

The comments also contradicted repeated assurances from Namibian President Hifikipunye Pohamba that land reform in Namibia would only take place within the framework of the constitution and existing laws.

The NAU also noted that in order to reduce poverty in the vast but sparsely populated country, an economic growth rate of at least seven per cent was needed over the next two decades.

As agriculture would be one of the factors driving economic growth, the NAU warned that only "an orderly transformation can lead to successful land reform."


"One has to ask oneself if the model of Zimbabwe with an inflation of 1 042 percent, an economy that has shrunk by 40 percent over the last six years and an unemployment rate of 80 percent could really be seen as an example for Namibia," the union said.

Zimbabwe launched its controversial land-reform programme in 2000, and now most of the country's 4 000 or so formerly white-owned farms are in the hands of black farmers.

The programme has sparked Western criticism but won Zimbabwe the praise and admiration of other countries in southern Africa.

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe blames the sharp fall in agricultural production in his country over the last five years on successive droughts. - Sapa-dpa

At the current rate of ethnic cleansing, declining agriculture production due to white farm thefts, and AIDS, the Selous could possibly extend across the whole of sub-Sahara Africa within 100 years.

This is true tragedy.

Or you will have one big eco-tourism park...with no hunting allowed, but rampant poaching, and governments in place with no hope of reviving hunting. (Kenya, anyone?)

On a lighter note ... a friend sent me this.

A brief Introduction to the Zimbabwe Theory of Quantum Mathematics

The day is very hot and you are passing the Keg and Sable in Borrowdale, so naturally you go in for a nice cold beer. The barman informs you that One beer now costs 150 000 Zimbabwe dollars

You can pay with three crisp new $50 000 notes, still damp from the printing press. Or, if you are feeling a bit bloody-minded, and if you can still source the coins ( remember those things : they were still quite common a few years ago ) you can sit back and enjoy a beer while the barman counts out 15 000 000 Zimbabwe one cent coins

But hold it ! We have a problem. Each Zim one cent coin weighs 3 grams So this little lot weighs in at 45 000 000 grams or 45 000 kgs or
45 Tonnes

After humping 45 tonnes of coins into the pub you are going to need a helluva lot more than one beer to cool down. But don`to panic - we have a plan. Like all brilliant ideas this one relies entirely on its simplicity.


Plan B : We sell the metal and drink the proceeds

There is a small legal question about smelting coin of the realm and exporting the resulting brass ingots. However we'll let the buyer worry about that one.

There doesn't seem to be an international price for brass. Its main ingredient, copper, has recently been selling for an all-time high of US $ 5 200 a tonne on the London Metal Exchange, but we won't be greedy. For a quick sale let's discount it to U S $ 2 600 a tonne

We are now the proud owners of US$ 117 000

But we still can't buy that beer as the Keg is only allowed to accept Zimbabwe currency. We must resist the temptation to change our money on the lucrative but illegal black market ( only the Governor of the Reserve Bank and Cabinet Ministers are allowed to do that ) So we change at the prevailing interbank mid rate which is U S $ 1 : Zim $ 99 201,58

Our heap of U S green-backs now miraculously becomes a mountain of Zim$ 11 606 584 860

For the uninitiated the billions start at the tenth figure, counting from the right.
So if the price of beer has not increased while we were doing this calculation you can now walk back into the Keg and order 77 377 beers !

Bahati,
Copper price today is US$8300.00 per ton.

quote:

Mozambique & SA - I wake up in Africa every day

Bahati, rub it in why don't you!!!!

I just read that although the Mugabe gov. admits to an inflation rate of 1042% the actual number is more like 1800%. Also the average lifespan in Zim has dropped from 55 to 34 in the last 20 years. Wow, those are some lofty goals to aim for!