Zimbabwe declares new public holiday to protest US sanctions

[BBSA]

Zimbabwe has declared a new public holiday to protest US sanctions it says are hurting its economy, and the day comes with a state-sponsored festival.

Anti-Sanctions Day will be commemorated on October 25, acting information minister Amon Murwira said Monday, calling it a chance to "further amplify the importance of this day to the economic emancipation and well-being of Zimbabwe."

Tens of thousands of people are expected to be bused to the capital, Harare, where they will march, watch a soccer match between the country's two biggest teams and attend an all-night concert.

Dozens of Zimbabwean officials, including President Emmerson Mnangagwa, have faced years of US sanctions over alleged human rights violations amid troubled elections and the seizures of white-owned land.

Mnangagwa, who took office after longtime leader Robert Mugabe was forced out in late 2017, at first urged the country to "stop mourning" about the sanctions. But he has since turned them into a rallying cry like his predecessor and blamed them for the collapsing economy as hopes fade that he will revive the country's fortunes.

The US says the sanctions are not against Zimbabwe's government at large and do not affect business between the countries.

Zimbabwe declares new public holiday to protest US sanctions

Zimbabwe has declared a new public holiday to protest US sanctions it says are hurting its economy, and the day comes with a state-sponsored festival.

www.iol.co.za

 

[ponder]

 

[Sean008]

Lol, this sh*t can’t be real , right ??

 

[wbot]

they will watch a soccer match between the country's two biggest teams

oh so that's the actual reason for the holiday...

 

[Temujin]

Christ this sanctions **** again... ffs, stop blaming everyone else for your failures... sanctions are against select criminals, not zimbabwe

 

[Spliffcat]

Give them cake.

 

[tRoN]

Wait. 1 April already ??

 

[Gordon_R]

Address of the President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki at the European Parliament, Strasbourg: 17 November 2004

www.dirco.gov.za

"Pliny the Elder, Roman naturalist and philosopher, wrote in his multivolume "Natural History": "Ex Africa semper aliquid novi," or for those who have forgotten their high-school Latin: "There is always something new out of Africa."

 

[Jopie Fourie]

Too bad for Zimbabwe. South Africa should take note, this will be this country's fate too. Perhaps Trump should come build a wall between Zim and SA and both nations can take up and down to the wall and protest there on both sides straight on the wall.

 

[Jopie Fourie]

Address of the President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki at the European Parliament, Strasbourg: 17 November 2004

www.dirco.gov.za

Mbeki, wasn't it the guy in the ANC who caused the death of 300,000+ South Africans? Wonder if the European parliament also found this "something new"

 

[thestaggy]

Mnangagwa, who took office after longtime leader Robert Mugabe was forced out in late 2017, at first urged the country to "stop mourning" about the sanctions. But he has since turned them into a rallying cry like his predecessor and blamed them for the collapsing economy as hopes fade that he will revive the country's fortunes.

'Member when myBB tried to tell us this was a coup and things would change? I 'member.

Also, you can't make this up. Country in ruins and you decide to have a drunken orgy.

 

[SlowInternet]

unbelievable

 

[ShaneE]

Yay no work for me on Friday- It's pretty ridiculous though. Sanctions haven't stopped the people at the top from buying their new Range Rovers or chartering private jets, but let's let the people believe that this is why they're suffering, and stand in solitude with them.
The best part for me is the name, "Anti-Sanctions Day"

 

[Urist]

There's no Ian Smith and whites left to blame for their failures... time to blame other governments. They might as well just make every day a public holiday in zim

 

[tin4444]

Can’t make this sh*t up. Truth really is stranger than fiction.

 

[Mortymoose]

This is how we roll in Africa!

/Moose wonders if he can petition for a National braai day, Oh! Wait......

 

[Hemps]

The place is stuffed.


Zim 'diesel conjurer' gets 3 years
2010-09-30 22:33

Harare - A Zimbabwean spirit medium has been jailed for more than three years for bamboozling President Robert Mugabe's powerful politburo into believing she could conjure diesel fuel from a rock, reports said on Thursday.

According to reports at the time, Nomatter Tagarira assembled the country's ministers of national intelligence, police and defence and other top-ranking security officials in 2007 for a demonstration of her powers.

At a stroke on a rock, an assistant hidden in bushes above the group would open a tap to a secret fuel bowser and send the fuel gushing down the rock.

The gullible aides believed she had the answer to the country's crippling fuel shortages then and gave her £1.7m, a farm, an armed guard, food and, on one occasion, a 50-vehicle convoy, to carry out her rituals.

On Wednesday, magistrate Ignatius Mugova sentenced her to 39 months in prison for defrauding the government and "supplying false information" to government officials, the independent News Day paper reported.

"The state channelled immense resources towards the 'diesel project'," he said. "Many vehicles and, at times, helicopters were used in a wild goose chase" to secure large volumes of the "magic" fuel, he said.



OR


Zimbabwe plans 'Disneyland in Africa'

Tourism minister outlines scheme to build $300m entertainment complex, with banks and casinos, near Victoria Falls

Victoria Falls: tourism in Zimbabwe was devastated by a decade of conflict and hyperinflation but has recovered in recent years. Photograph: Patrick Ward/Corbis
The formula has worked in California, Florida and Paris. Now officials in Zimbabwe, eager to rebrand a country notorious for economic collapse and political violence, want to build a "Disneyland in Africa".
Walter Mzembi, the tourism and hospitality minister, told New Ziana, the official news agency, that the government was planning a $300m (£193m) theme park near Victoria Falls, the country's top tourist attraction.
Mzembi was quoted as saying the resort would be a "Disneyland in Africa", although he did not appear to suggest that the statue of explorer David Livingstone, which overlooks the falls, would be supplanted by a jobbing actor in a Mickey Mouse costume.
Instead, he outlined plans for shopping malls, banks and exhibition and entertainment facilities such as casinos. "We have reserved 1,200 hectares of land closer to Victoria Falls international airport to do hotels and convention centres," Mzembi told New Ziana on the sidelines of the UN World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) general assembly , which Victoria Falls is co-hosting with the town of Livingstone in neighbouring Zambia.
Mzembi said the project would cost about $300m.

 

[lowriderza]

Will have about as much impact as their day of prayer they had recently...

 

[WaxLyrical]

The Breetish made us do this.

 

[ponder]

panem et circenses (bread and circuses)

This phrase originates from Rome in Satire X of the Roman satirical poet Juvenal (c. AD 100). In context, the Latin panem et circenses (bread and circuses) identifies the only remaining interest of a Roman populace which no longer cares for its historical birthright of political involvement. Here Juvenal displays his contempt for the declining heroism of contemporary Romans, using a range of different themes including lust for power and desire for old age to illustrate his argument.[6] Roman politicians passed laws in 140 BC to keep the votes of poorer citizens, by introducing a grain dole: giving out cheap food and entertainment, "bread and circuses", became the most effective way to rise to power.

... Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.[7]