Robert Mugabe
President of Zimbabwe and the leader of the Zimbabwe African National Union or ZANU-PF He was previously the Prime Minister from 1980 to 1987 and a leader of nationalist forces in the Second Chimurenga from 1964 to 1979.
I believe that Mugabe was ... driven into a permanent rage by the adulation heaped internationally on Nelson Mandela, an accolade of praise and recognition that he felt was more properly due to himself. And, harboring this grievance, he decided to denude his own unhappy country of anything that might remind anybody of Mandela's legacy.
Let Mr. Bush read history correctly. Let him realise that both personally and in his representative capacity as the current President of the United States, he stands for this "civilisation" which occupied, which colonised, which incarcerated, which killed. He has much to atone for and very little to lecture us on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. His hands drip with innocent blood of many nationalities.
Stay with us, please remain in this country and constitute a nation based on national unity.
The white man is not indigenous to Africa. Africa is for Africans. Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans.
We have fought for our land, we have fought for our sovereignty, small as we are we have won our independence and we are prepared to shed our blood…. So, Blair keep your England, and let me keep my Zimbabwe.
He is a very disciplined man. He treated people with respect. He wasn't lavish in his lifestyle but he did have clear standards. He dressed well, invariably in a dark suit with a silk tie and matching handkerchief, but without ostentation. He wore a good watch but nothing flashy. You could tell that money and acquisitiveness were not part of his motivation. There was another motive that drove him.
Of the twelve million hectares that the farmers have, we said we needed about half of that for a start. Even then you will say, of course, "Take all of it!" (laughs) Even deep down as we stand by our revolutionary principles, we still recognize that there should be some little measure of charity. No? Well, I will take your message back home.
We are now being coerced to accept and believe that a new political-cum-religious doctrine has arisen, namely that there is but one political God, George W Bush, and Tony Blair is his prophet.
Our votes must go together with our guns. After all, any vote we shall have, shall have been the product of the gun. The gun which produces the vote should remain its security officer – its guarantor. The people's votes and the people's guns are always inseparable twins.
If the choice was made for us, one for us to lose our sovereignty and become a member of the Commonwealth or to remain with our sovereignty and lose membership of the Commonwealth, then I would say, then let the Commonwealth go. What is it to us? Our people are overjoyed, the land is ours. We are now the rulers and owners of Zimbabwe.
Africa must revert to what it was before the imperialists divided it. These are artificial divisions which we, in our pan-African concept will seek to remove.
Mugabe fought and liberated his country from colonists. But I am here as a guest of the Zimbabwe people. I am not a personal guest of Mugabe. And veterans of the liberation struggle are well aware of this fact.
It was from Tito that I drew inspiration while searching for the best road to take and when making crucial decisions during our liberation struggle. I often thought, what would Tito do at that moment?
Our economy is a hundred times better, than the average African economy. Outside South Africa, what country is [as good as] Zimbabwe? … What is lacking now are goods on the shelves—that is all.
What we hate is not the color of their skins but the evil that emanates from them.
He was a very clever bloke and he worked with me for as long as he thought it was going to help him. Once again, it was just to keep himself in power. I give that answer to all questions about Mugabe because that is all there is to it. Everything he has ever done is about keeping himself in power: Dictators and fascists all over the world think like that.
Do you know what Mugabe has done? He's taken people's identity and literally if you don't mind, cut it to pieces. This is what he's actually done, to a lot of – and in the end there's nothing. So as far as I'm concerned from now on I'm not going to wear a dog collar until Mugabe's gone.
When they criticise the government when it tries to prevent violence and punish perpetrators of that violence we take the position that they can go hang.
Let Blair and the British government take note and listen. Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans. Our people are overjoyed. The land is ours. We are now the rulers and owners of Zimbabwe.
Our party must continue to strike fear in the heart of the white man, our real enemy!