Zimbabwe's Last White Hopes

Whittle another notch for police-state socialism. Zimbabwe's last white landowners will soon be history.

Scores of white farmers, the last survivors of President Robert Mugabe's land grab, and thousands of their black workers are going through similar agonies.

They now face the final deadline. As from today, any white farmer still on his land will be deemed to be trespassing on state property.

All agricultural land was officially nationalised last year -- with the seizure to take effect from Oct 1 this year.

In advance of this deadline, Zimbabwe's army and the Central Intelligence Organisation have been tormenting the last handful of white farmers and their workers.

About 50 have been summoned to appear at magistrates' courts. Some have surrendered their farms and homes in despair in the last few weeks.

Soldiers with automatic weapons are performing the evictions.

Meanwhile, the UN estimates that four million Zimbabweans will go hungry next year, a turnaround from the pre-Mugabe days when Zimbabwe exported food.

Across the ocean, keep an eye on Hugo Chavez as he uses the proven Mugabe (and others) methods to turn Venezuela into a police-state socialist s**thole.

Companion post at The Jawa Report.