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Friday, March 1, 2013

International Nervous Conditions

Posted by Charles Mudede on Fri, Mar 1, 2013 at 8:31 AM

Exactly why did 4000 Zimbabweans lose their lives to cholera? Al Jazeera reports:

The UN dispute tribunal in Nairobi, Kenya, in effect found that UN bosses did not want to upset the government of Robert Mugabe, and did not act on warnings by a senior member of its staff. One hundred thousand people caught the disease.

Months before the outbreak of the cholera epidemic in 2008, which coincided with a time of heightened political tensions in Zimbabwe, Georges Tadonki, the then head of the UN humanitarian office in Zimbabwe, warned his superiors of the severe risks, but no action was taken.

Tadonki claims that he was fired in January 2009, partly because he sounded the alarm about the cholera crisis.

“Mr Tadonke pressed the issue, and this tribunal has heard that he was hounded out of his job, and his lawyers said he suffered a nervous breakdown as a result.” Al Jazeera’s Diplomatic Editor James Bays said.

That nervous breakdown is the story of Zimbabwe's post-independence black intelligentsia in a nutshell. No good mind could survive in that overwhelming atmosphere of rural stupidity.

The title of this post references this excellent book.

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Comments (7) RSS

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ain't much "intelligentsia" left in Zimbabwe.

Posted by Max Solomon on March 1, 2013 at 8:39 AM

charles, agreed: nervous conditions is a most excellent book.

Posted by gracey on March 1, 2013 at 9:18 AM

Who cares about Zimbabwe'?

We are rapidly devolving into a similar situation here if we don't get this printing money-thing under control.

Also waiting for the regime to collectivize our farms, giving them to minorities as penance for some fantasy wrongdoing...

Posted by GeneStoner on March 1, 2013 at 9:55 AM

Speaking about Zimbabwe is giving it too much attention.

Posted by ExitOnly on March 1, 2013 at 10:08 AM

@3: amazing that you can dismiss the legacy of slavery and racism as "fantasy wrongdoing". not that we're going to collectivize our farms - after all, so many are owned by corporations.

perhaps you should return to fretting about Agenda 21.

Posted by Max Solomon on March 1, 2013 at 10:30 AM

3, sorry, your word-salad outrage comes in woefully behind this piece of brilliance:
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archive…

Next time, mention a few demons.

Posted by Some Old Nobodaddy Logged In on March 1, 2013 at 12:33 PM

It's not "rural stupidity", Charles, it's the threat of suffering real and tangible harm if you piss off Robert Mugabe that makes Zimbabwean intellectuals stupid. Authoritarian dictatorships always do that. It is in their very oppressive, selfish nature.

Posted by I have always been... east coaster on March 1, 2013 at 6:27 PM