Maravi

(TALKZIMBABWE, REUTERS) I'm fit as a fiddle, says President Mugabe

I'm fit as a fiddle, says President Mugabe
By: Nancy Pasipanodya-Reuters
Posted: Thursday, September 9, 2010 2:39 pm

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe has dismissed reports that he is in poor health saying that he is fitter than ever. In a rare interview with Reuters News Agency on Thursday at his official Zimbabwe House offices, President Mugabe said he has died "many times ... but nobody has ever talked about my resurrection".

"I don't know how many times I die but nobody has ever talked about my resurrection," he said at the end of an hour-long interview.

"I suppose they don't want to, because it would mean they would mention my resurrection several times and that would be quite divine, an achievement for an individual who is not divine.

"Jesus died once, and resurrected only once, and poor Mugabe several times," he said, clapping his hands loudly, laughing and rocking in his chair.

President Mugabe laughed off suggestions that he was dying of cancer and had recently suffered a stroke, saying, "I'm fit as a fiddle!"

The president appeared fit and lively and said only God could decide issues of life and death.

"My time will come, but for now, 'no'. I am still fit enough to fight the sanctions and knock out (my opponents)," he said in reference to illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe.

"It is Bush who is out, Blair out, and the others are persons of no consequence any more. They are inheritors of a situation," he said in an interview in which he called for improved relations between Zimbabwe and Western powers.

"These (Bush and Blair) were the major arch enemies, they are the ones who brought this on us."

The US and EU imposed illegal sanctions on Zimbabwe over a bilateral issue between Zimbabwe and the New Labour government of former British prime minister Tony Blair.

New Labour reneged on land reform promises made at Lancaster House in 1979, which paved way for free and fair elections in Zimbabwe, which unseated the racist and evil government of Ian Douglas Smith.

The president added that Zimbabwe wants normal ties with Western powers critical of the country's land reform and indigenisation policies.

He said no pressure from the West will reverse those policies as the liberation war was fought on that basis.

The Government was waiting for positive movement from the United States and European Union to mend ties soured over the last decade because of the redistribution of white-owned farms to landless blacks.

"We never refuse to talk to anybody," he said when asked whether he was prepared to talk to Washington and Brussels.

"But what I don't understand about the Europeans and the Americans is the negative attitude.

"How do they expect the kind of cold war they decided to wage on us, how do they intend it to end?"

President Mugabe said: "They have imposed unjustified and illegal sanctions on us. The sanctions are comparable to the military aggression in Iraq".

The president said some Western countries had hoped that sanctions on Zimbabwe would help push him out of power; but that did not happen.

The veteran leader added that Zimbabwe would continue to do its best even with sanctions in place.

"God is there. He showers his blessings on us. We continue to discover a number of resources, platinum, diamonds and gold and uranium.

"Those are recent ones, perhaps others will be coming, we don't know. So God is not there for one nation, just for the Europeans, God is there for everybody, so God is great," President Mugabe said.

"That kind of regime change is the exclusive right of the people of Zimbabwe ... I am born here and if my people want me to go, I go."

President Mugabe said he hoped US President Barack Obama and new British Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy Nick Clegg would move to mend ties between Harare and the West.

"We are waiting to see what Cameron and Clegg will do and Obama also will do in regard to our situation and our relations," President Mugabe said.

"If they decide the relations should remain what they are, then we will know that they too are aggressors and not different from their predecessors, but we are giving them a chance."

President Mugabe also said the inclusive Government would proceed with the indigenisation and economic empowerment plan for blacks to acquire 51 percent shares in foreign-owned firms, including mines and banks.

"It has always been our aim to have control of our resources ... and I don't think the private sectors of the Western countries would, in toto, decide to stay away," he said.

The President says Zanu-PF policies are meant to correct colonial injustices and he dismissed fears that the local ownership drive would be implemented haphazardly.

He expressed frustration with Zimbabwean middle class blacks who criticise his empowerment plans to give them a stake in an economy in which the majority are workers and managers.

"We are saying to them you are like an eagle brought up among chickens, an eagle that doesn't know that it can do more than chickens and fly," he said.

President Mugabe indicated that he may run for office again at the next election, if Zanu-PF wants him to.

No date has been set for the poll, but many expect the unity government to last to 2012.

Labels: INTERVIEW, ROBERT MUGABE

posted by MrK @ 4:32 PM