News Briefs

South African longshoremen refuse to unload weapons bound for Zimbabwe

May 8, 2008 4:12 PM

Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe used to be a hero, a liberation fighter and a symbol of freedom worldwide. No more. Leader of the ZANU African National Union-Patriotic Front that overthrew the white-supremacist government of what was then Southern Rhodesia, the 1970s Mugabe morphed into a dictator presiding over a nation staggered by 1,650 percent inflation and with more than four out of five workers unemployed. In a country where women suffer from the world’s lowest life expectancy [34 years], Mugabe hangs on to power through vote fraud, along with force of arms, chiefly imported from China.

A sign things are changing came in Durban, South Africa, where unionized dock workers aided by the police union refused to unload arms from China destined for Zimbabwe over land.

The dockers, members of the 82,000-member South African Transport and Allied Workers Union, defied South African President Thabo Mbeki and his African National Congress government, who said the 77 tons of weapons for the Mugabe government — including more than 3 million rounds of AK-47 rifle ammunition, 1,500 rocket-propelled grenades and more than 3,000 mortar rounds and launchers — was legal cargo and gave customs clearance for the weapons.

Scottish Sunday Herald, April 20