Latest news with #Mugabe
Forbes
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Forbes
Playing Powerhouse England In Test Cricket Has Been Years In The Making For Zimbabwe
When small cricket nation Zimbabwe finally ends a 22-year Test drought against powerhouse England on Thursday, Tavengwa Mukuhlani will be emotional sitting in the terraces at Trent Bridge in Nottingham. He will feel a sense of pride after working tirelessly for a decade as Zimbabwe Cricket's chair to restart bilateral ties with England. 'It's a sense of achievement on the part of Zimbabwe Cricket,' Mukuhlani told me in a phone interview on the eve of the one-off Test running from May 22-26. 'We have worked many years to get this goal fulfilled and it is a dream come true for all of us.' The two countries have not played each other in Tests since 2003, bilaterally since 2004 and not at all since September 2007, when they had met in the inaugural T20 World Cup. The relationship has long proved thorny due to strained political ties during the latter years of the reign of Zimbabwe dictator Robert Mugabe. While Zimbabwe's political situation has changed since Mugabe was ousted from power in 2017, the country's cricket team struggled to unshackle itself from the political interference that started eroding the team in the early 2000s leading to the infamous player revolt in 2004. Zimbabwe in 2019 became the first Full Member cricket nation to be suspended from the International Cricket Council and their funding from the sport's governing body was frozen. But through plenty of work behind the scenes by Mukuhlani and his fellow administrators, and as the political scene became less volatile, Zimbabwe's governing body stabilized leading to a revival of the national team in recent years. However, it's been a battle for Zimbabwe to play Test cricket due to soaring financial costs associated with hosting the five-day format and reluctance from cash cows England, India and Australia to play them. India and Australia have at least played bilateral white-ball series against Zimbabwe in recent years, but resuming ties with England proved tough. After entering the hot seat in 2015, Mukuhlani was keen to engage in discussions but the spectre of Mugabe loomed large. Mugabe's ousting seemed a game-changer, but it still took until the start of this decade for discussions to start progressing before this one-off Test was finally agreed upon. England's cricket board are helping cover some of the tour costs for Zimbabwe, a smaller cricket nation who get significantly less funding from the International Cricket Council than their richer counterpart. England, so too India and Australia, are also armed with a billion dollar domestic broadcast deal compared to Zimbabwe's rather measly $2.5 million per annum from theirs. 'The bigger nations have a big responsibility to take care of the smaller ones to ensure Test cricket flourishes widely,' Mukuhlani said. Zimbabwe are not in the current nine-team World Test Championship and have mostly had to play against the other countries not part of the competition - Ireland and Afghanistan. But Zimbabwe have been determined to become an established Test side and this year will play 11 Tests - the most by any nation along with Australia - that includes a two-Test visit by South Africa next month. Mukuhlani, an influential figure on the ICC board, has been part of a working group focusing on current and future FTP bilateral planning arrangements. Another such committee is in the works looking at cricket's various formats, including Test cricket and perhaps tweaking the WTC. Mukuhlani is against a two division proposal unless it has promotion and relegation, but hopes a fairer structure can be worked out for Test cricket and ironed out in time for the post 2025-27 WTC cycle. 'There have been genuine problems with the FTP structure, but there is a lot of work being done to find solutions because the smaller countries deserve to play Test cricket,' he said. 'We have shown we want to play Test cricket, but it isn't easy hosting matches which costs around $500,000 per Test. So there has to be a way to help with the costs along with setting up domestic structures and A-tour pathways.' There is a lot of momentum for Zimbabwean cricket, with the sport in the landlocked southern African country spreading beyond its white, middle-upper class roots. It has also become a destination for major events, having hosted four international tournaments in recent years. Underlining its increased gravitas among power brokers, Zimbabwe also held the all-important ICC quarterly meetings recently. For so many Zimbabweans, the thought of playing a power nation again in Test cricket appeared a pipedream as the years rolled on. But that long exile finally ends and they are now dreaming big. 'I think the players will pull some surprises and will equip themselves very well on the big stage,' Mukuhlani said. 'It is the start of hopefully an uptick for Zimbabwe's Test team.'
The Sun
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Sun
I was sent death threats and forced to flee country after taking stand at peak of my career.. now I sing on cruise ships
CRICKET legend Henry Olonga's singing career has seen him flee his homeland after death threats and take to the stage on cruise ships. Olonga, 48, represented Zimbabwe at three World Cups and even formed a rivalry with Indian icon Sachin Tendulkar. 2 2 And during his days as one of African cricket 's poster boys in the early 2000s, he released a song titled "Our Zimbabwe". The patriotic ballad came in 2001 at a time of political violence when the nation was ruled by dictator Robert Mugabe. Two years after the release of the single, he wore a black armband at the World Cup to protest at the "death of democracy". Olonga received death threats after his gesture and was forced to flee his country. He has never been back since and has not seen his father who remains in Zimbabwe for 20 years. Olonga still sings to this day as he balances his time with cricket coaching and commentary work in Australia. He even passed the blind audition for The Voice in 2019. But his career did not take off and he recently sung on a cruise ship. Olonga told The Telegraph: "It's not necessarily the peak of music performance being on a cruise ship. "In fact, some people think that singers go to die on cruise ships. "But I don't mind that. I don't have an ego about my music. I sing in little retirement villages, I've sung to school kids, I've sung in little bars in front of three people. I just love singing. I love performing." On his brave protest, Olonga added: "I'm not just wagging a finger at people and that's what the black armband protest was about - we can be better as a country we can be better as politicians, we can be better as citizens. I got slaughtered for it."
Boston Globe
06-05-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
One bad leader can wreck a nation
Advertisement Juan Domingo Perón became president of Argentina in 1946. He created mass movements and, with their support, proceeded to undermine every institution that limited his power. He was overthrown and exiled after a decade but continued to dominate Argentine politics from abroad. In 1973 he returned and reclaimed the presidency. He left behind a deeply divided country that would soon explode into civil war. Get The Gavel A weekly SCOTUS explainer newsletter by columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr. Enter Email Sign Up Rebellion and repression have ended, but Argentina remains caught in the pro-Perónist vs. anti-Perónist paradigm. The country continues to swing wildly. Political warfare is intense. The economy limps along, crippled by lack of investment and periods of extreme inflation. Perón set a robust and dynamic country into a long decline from which it has not recovered. Half a world away from Argentina lies another country that was once thought to have limitless potential. In 1980 the former British colony of Rhodesia became independent, renamed Zimbabwe. It had a stable currency, modern infrastructure, highly productive farms, and a strong manufacturing sector. A former political prisoner named Robert Mugabe was elected president. 'You have inherited a jewel,' the founding father of nearby Tanzania, Julius Nyerere, told him as he assumed power. 'Keep it that way.' Advertisement Mugabe did the opposite. He ordered all foreigners and whites who owned businesses to sell 51 percent of their holdings to Black Zimbabweans. Then he confiscated hundreds of farms and turned them over to veterans of the liberation war, few of whom had any farming experience. Food shortages soon gripped the country. Famine followed. Investors fled. Jobs disappeared. The educated elite emigrated and the remaining middle class dissolved. Mugabe printed so much money that by 2008, prices were doubling every 24 hours and the annual inflation rate reached 7.9 billion percent. The erstwhile 'breadbasket of Africa' was reduced to surviving on food aid. Mugabe was finally deposed in 2017, when he was 93. In 30 years of misrule, A thousand miles north of Zimbabwe lies another example of what one terrible ruler can do to a country: the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After helping to depose the Congo's first post-independence leader, Advertisement Who ruined Iran? By some measures it was Ayatollah Khomeini, who upon seizing power in 1979 imposed strict religious rule on one of the world's most cosmopolitan societies. Looking further back, one could posit that Mohammad Reza Shah, who ruled for 25 years until Khomeini pushed him from power, was truly responsible, because his dictatorship set the stage for the mullahs' regime. In any case, the combination of those two tyrants has reduced Iran, potentially one of the world's leading countries, to an impoverished and unhappy backwater. Some countries revive after periods of rule by catastrophic leaders. Germany, with its long heritage of culture and entrepreneurship, recovered from the Hitler disaster. Spain and Portugal were ruled by fascists for decades but are now stable democracies. The Dominican Republic became a reasonably well-functioning country after emerging from a suffocating 30-year tyranny. Most leaders who have wrecked their countries came to power through elections. Once in control, they methodically used the tools of democracy to destroy democracy. They have written a playbook that all may read. Stephen Kinzer is a senior fellow at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University.
Zawya
18-04-2025
- Business
- Zawya
Zimbabwe farmers' group rejects compensation deal for past land seizures
The group has criticized the compensation that some farmers have accepted as 'token' amounts. There was little sign Wednesday that the government of the southern African nation would reopen talks. It has said the compensation deal represents closure. About 4,000 white farmers lost their homes and swaths of land when the Black-majority country's then-president, Robert Mugabe, launched the redistribution program in 2000. Mugabe pointed to the need to address colonial-era land inequities after the southern African nation gained independence from white minority rule in 1980. Zimbabwe's finance minister, Mthuli Ncube, last week announced that the government had started paying compensation to white farmers who lost land and property during the reforms. He said the government had approved the disbursement of $3.1 million, equivalent to 1% of the total compensation claim of $311 million. According to the deal, the farmers would receive 1% of their claim in cash, with the balance settled through the issuance of treasury bonds over 10 years. A first batch of 378 farmers has already been paid out of 740 farms approved for compensation, a move confirmed by Andrew Pascoe, who represents the beneficiary farmers. He said they were 'extremely grateful.' The dissenting group representing nearly half of the 4,000 commercial farmers asserted that those accepting the payments were doing so out of desperation. 'The limited number of farmers who have accepted the government's revised deal have generally done so because they are destitute and require urgent funds for food, accommodation and healthcare,' representative Deon Theron said. He called the government compensation 'a tiny fraction' of the $3.5 billion to be paid in cash over five years that was agreed under a deal between white farmers and President Emmerson Mnangagwa in 2020. The compensation deal is part of conditions of a debt resolution and international re-engagement strategy by Zimbabwe after years of sanctions and isolation by the United States and other Western countries over alleged rights abuses against perceived critics of the government. A few thousand farmers had owned most of Zimbabwe's prime farmland before the land reform, which saw about 300,000 Black families resettled on the acquired land, according to government Theron said most of the white farmers are now in their 70s and 80s and are unlikely to benefit from the issuance of the treasury bills. 'They are going to their graves without receiving any compensation. They need cash, and it has to be paid while they are still alive,' he said. He added, however, his group would not take legal action. He said efforts by his group to meet government officials have been unsuccessful. Land ownership is an emotive topic in Zimbabwe and neighboring countries such as Namibia and South Africa, a result of colonial land conquests that dispossessed local Blacks. In South Africa, a new land expropriation law has attracted criticism from U.S. President Donald Trump, who views it as a rights violation against a white minority who owned huge swaths of land. South Africa has rejected Trump's claims. © Copyright The Zimbabwean. All rights reserved. Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (
Yahoo
16-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Zimbabwe farmers' group rejects compensation deal for past land seizures
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — A group representing many of the white farmers whose land was seized during Zimbabwe's land reforms over two decades ago has rejected a compensation deal and said it wants to reopen negotiations with the government. The group has criticized the compensation that some farmers have accepted as 'token' amounts. There was little sign Wednesday that the government of the southern African nation would reopen talks. It has said the compensation deal represents closure. About 4,000 white farmers lost their homes and swaths of land when the Black-majority country's then-president, Robert Mugabe, launched the redistribution program in 2000. Mugabe pointed to the need to address colonial-era land inequities after the southern African nation gained independence from white minority rule in 1980. Zimbabwe's finance minister, Mthuli Ncube, last week announced that the government had started paying compensation to white farmers who lost land and property during the reforms. He said the government had approved the disbursement of $3.1 million, equivalent to 1% of the total compensation claim of $311 million. According to the deal, the farmers would receive 1% of their claim in cash, with the balance settled through the issuance of treasury bonds over 10 years. A first batch of 378 farmers has already been paid out of 740 farms approved for compensation, a move confirmed by Andrew Pascoe, who represents the beneficiary farmers. He said they were 'extremely grateful." The dissenting group representing nearly half of the 4,000 commercial farmers asserted that those accepting the payments were doing so out of desperation. 'The limited number of farmers who have accepted the government's revised deal have generally done so because they are destitute and require urgent funds for food, accommodation and healthcare,' representative Deon Theron said. He called the government compensation 'a tiny fraction' of the $3.5 billion to be paid in cash over five years that was agreed under a deal between white farmers and President Emmerson Mnangagwa in 2020. The compensation deal is part of conditions of a debt resolution and international re-engagement strategy by Zimbabwe after years of sanctions and isolation by the United States and other Western countries over alleged rights abuses against perceived critics of the government. A few thousand farmers had owned most of Zimbabwe's prime farmland before the land reform, which saw about 300,000 Black families resettled on the acquired land, according to government figures. Theron said most of the white farmers are now in their 70s and 80s and are unlikely to benefit from the issuance of the treasury bills. 'They are going to their graves without receiving any compensation. They need cash, and it has to be paid while they are still alive,' he said. He added, however, his group would not take legal action. He said efforts by his group to meet government officials have been unsuccessful. Land ownership is an emotive topic in Zimbabwe and neighboring countries such as Namibia and South Africa, a result of colonial land conquests that dispossessed local Blacks. In South Africa, a new land expropriation law has attracted criticism from U.S. President Donald Trump, who views it as a rights violation against a white minority who owned huge swaths of land. South Africa has rejected Trump's claims.
