It is now frequently asked from corners of the Western world “When does Zimbabwe return to normal?”
Zimbabwe has returned to normal. From time immemorial Zimbabwe was a Stone Age culture, without a written language, without wheel or shoe. Social order was by primitive law, a melange of practicality, mystic, pragmatism and witchcraft. Maternal mortality was 1:6.
The sole factor, which changed Zimbabwe, was the arrival of white colonists. These colonists alone created a culture which allowed an agricultural and creative productivity supremely beneficial to all the inhabitants. That productivity increased progressively as the number of white colonists increased.
Many who claim knowledge ability respond with “But Zimbabwe is a modern country – look at the high-rise cities, look at the sophisticated population which dresses well, drives expensive vehicles, travel internationally, have their children in top schools”. What these “authorities” fail to comprehend is that what they see now is no more than a relic of a lost past. If an earthquake destroyed the built environment there would be no possibility of the natives rebuilding it. Zimbabweans would return to seeking shelter in grass and mud huts, surviving with a primitive agriculture. The natives cannot even maintain the current infrastructure which decays progressively month by month. The foundation of all past civilisations, which is the provision of clean water and sanitation, has proved beyond the capability of the Zimbabwean government, which has caused thousands upon thousands of deaths from cholera, enteritis and many other water borne epidemics. Not only do the obvious material constructs like roads and railways decay, but so also are the less obvious technical constructs like the aviation and health infrastructures are in downward decay - mostly there is no air-traffic control over Zimbabwe. Almost all hospitals have closed. Law is varied to suit the whim of the headmen.
What about the grand who flaunt their wealth? These are no more than the asset strippers temporarily preening the residua of a failed civilisation. There is not the productivity to support this charade indefinitely and the facade continues to abrade away. Like the teen who steals father’s Lamborghini to impress a girl, so these people continue to try to seduce the West into giving aid and making investment on the basis of claiming ownership of a “civilisation”. But there is no prospect of re-building this nation, unless a form of colonisation returns, of course.
These claims will be difficult to get into the intellects of those who wish not to hear. Some will continue to deny this failure of a race, denying both cause and effect.
One technique of establishing cause and effect phenomena is to remove the hypothetical causative agent and measure response.
In Zimbabwe the colonists were forced to leave and as their numbers lessened so the constructive capability of the nation degraded in parallel. There was an absolute cause and effect relationship. Once a critical threshold of whites had left, agricultural production plummeted and mining in many arenas ceased. In 2008 the school year was “closed”, i.e. literacy ceased being taught. The hospitals closed one after the other and maternal mortality is returning to one death in every six pregnancies. Malaria, polio, typhoid, typhus, plague, meningitis and measles are all returning to pre-colonial levels. Starvation is endemic. Life expectancy is returning to 37 years for males, 34 for females. The statistics of the Stone Age have returned.
For any logician, the cause and effect relationship between the presence of the colonists and the productivity of the country should be indisputable. There are sufficient grounds to reach that conclusion.
However, analytical science requires that any hypothesis of cause and effect be reproducible. How can we reproduce this model? It is fairly simple.
David Bullard was a popular columnist with the Johannesburg Sunday Times, who had been praised by the editor for his objective insight. However, he made the mistake of speculating, in print, what South Africa would have been like had the colonists not arrived. He believed that it would have remained a hunter-gatherer Stone Age society. Needless to say he was dismissed from the Johannesburg Sunday Times. The reasons were not that his logic was at fault but that the black editor denied this logic, denied history and denied reality.
Was Bullard correct? What if there were areas of Africa which had never been colonized? This was exactly the case in parts of Northern Nigeria. These areas had never been colonised and remained as they had been since time immemorial: thick bush, malaria, insufferable temperatures and no productivity. The only trace of the 21st century was the extermination of many wild animals by fire-armed native poachers.
Let us take the experimental model further. What would happen if you put colonists into this Stone Age environment? Exactly that occurred when individuals of white colonist stock, who had been expelled from their farms in Zimbabwe, were invited to begin “developing” this wild bush land. Effectively they had been asked to “colonize”.
What was the outcome? In five years these white farming colonists had turned wild, impenetrable, unpleasant and dangerous bush into productive farms. Sorghum and many other products were now produced in large quantities. Water had been obtained for irrigation, mechanical infrastructure had been introduced and malaria and other diseases were being controlled.
This example, together with the invitation to whites to re-colonise Moçambique and Sudan (and the recent invitation to whites to re-colonize by the Congolese) proves that the white colonists were a sufficient ingredient to create productive civilizations and were the necessary component in sustaining agriculture in these areas. Without them productive civilisation fails.
That Bullard may well have been correct is illustrated by these sequences of events which substantiate the hypothesis that white colonists are necessary if Africa is to thrive. If the country is to return to its past achievements the only practical way is to invite a re-colonization by the erstwhile white Zimbabweans. However they will require a return of the foundations of Western civilisation, such as an enforceable and fair system if justice, reinstatement of their Zimbabwean nationality, and security of ownership.
The cynics will now say that once these colonists have created an infrastructure in any of these black-governed lands the native asset strippers will get active again, destroying exactly as they did in Zimbabwe. Will black Africa again reap without sowing?
Time will execute this experiment also…
Zimbabwe has returned to normal. From time immemorial Zimbabwe was a Stone Age culture, without a written language, without wheel or shoe. Social order was by primitive law, a melange of practicality, mystic, pragmatism and witchcraft. Maternal mortality was 1:6.
The sole factor, which changed Zimbabwe, was the arrival of white colonists. These colonists alone created a culture which allowed an agricultural and creative productivity supremely beneficial to all the inhabitants. That productivity increased progressively as the number of white colonists increased.
Many who claim knowledge ability respond with “But Zimbabwe is a modern country – look at the high-rise cities, look at the sophisticated population which dresses well, drives expensive vehicles, travel internationally, have their children in top schools”. What these “authorities” fail to comprehend is that what they see now is no more than a relic of a lost past. If an earthquake destroyed the built environment there would be no possibility of the natives rebuilding it. Zimbabweans would return to seeking shelter in grass and mud huts, surviving with a primitive agriculture. The natives cannot even maintain the current infrastructure which decays progressively month by month. The foundation of all past civilisations, which is the provision of clean water and sanitation, has proved beyond the capability of the Zimbabwean government, which has caused thousands upon thousands of deaths from cholera, enteritis and many other water borne epidemics. Not only do the obvious material constructs like roads and railways decay, but so also are the less obvious technical constructs like the aviation and health infrastructures are in downward decay - mostly there is no air-traffic control over Zimbabwe. Almost all hospitals have closed. Law is varied to suit the whim of the headmen.
What about the grand who flaunt their wealth? These are no more than the asset strippers temporarily preening the residua of a failed civilisation. There is not the productivity to support this charade indefinitely and the facade continues to abrade away. Like the teen who steals father’s Lamborghini to impress a girl, so these people continue to try to seduce the West into giving aid and making investment on the basis of claiming ownership of a “civilisation”. But there is no prospect of re-building this nation, unless a form of colonisation returns, of course.
These claims will be difficult to get into the intellects of those who wish not to hear. Some will continue to deny this failure of a race, denying both cause and effect.
One technique of establishing cause and effect phenomena is to remove the hypothetical causative agent and measure response.
In Zimbabwe the colonists were forced to leave and as their numbers lessened so the constructive capability of the nation degraded in parallel. There was an absolute cause and effect relationship. Once a critical threshold of whites had left, agricultural production plummeted and mining in many arenas ceased. In 2008 the school year was “closed”, i.e. literacy ceased being taught. The hospitals closed one after the other and maternal mortality is returning to one death in every six pregnancies. Malaria, polio, typhoid, typhus, plague, meningitis and measles are all returning to pre-colonial levels. Starvation is endemic. Life expectancy is returning to 37 years for males, 34 for females. The statistics of the Stone Age have returned.
For any logician, the cause and effect relationship between the presence of the colonists and the productivity of the country should be indisputable. There are sufficient grounds to reach that conclusion.
However, analytical science requires that any hypothesis of cause and effect be reproducible. How can we reproduce this model? It is fairly simple.
David Bullard was a popular columnist with the Johannesburg Sunday Times, who had been praised by the editor for his objective insight. However, he made the mistake of speculating, in print, what South Africa would have been like had the colonists not arrived. He believed that it would have remained a hunter-gatherer Stone Age society. Needless to say he was dismissed from the Johannesburg Sunday Times. The reasons were not that his logic was at fault but that the black editor denied this logic, denied history and denied reality.
Was Bullard correct? What if there were areas of Africa which had never been colonized? This was exactly the case in parts of Northern Nigeria. These areas had never been colonised and remained as they had been since time immemorial: thick bush, malaria, insufferable temperatures and no productivity. The only trace of the 21st century was the extermination of many wild animals by fire-armed native poachers.
Let us take the experimental model further. What would happen if you put colonists into this Stone Age environment? Exactly that occurred when individuals of white colonist stock, who had been expelled from their farms in Zimbabwe, were invited to begin “developing” this wild bush land. Effectively they had been asked to “colonize”.
What was the outcome? In five years these white farming colonists had turned wild, impenetrable, unpleasant and dangerous bush into productive farms. Sorghum and many other products were now produced in large quantities. Water had been obtained for irrigation, mechanical infrastructure had been introduced and malaria and other diseases were being controlled.
This example, together with the invitation to whites to re-colonise Moçambique and Sudan (and the recent invitation to whites to re-colonize by the Congolese) proves that the white colonists were a sufficient ingredient to create productive civilizations and were the necessary component in sustaining agriculture in these areas. Without them productive civilisation fails.
That Bullard may well have been correct is illustrated by these sequences of events which substantiate the hypothesis that white colonists are necessary if Africa is to thrive. If the country is to return to its past achievements the only practical way is to invite a re-colonization by the erstwhile white Zimbabweans. However they will require a return of the foundations of Western civilisation, such as an enforceable and fair system if justice, reinstatement of their Zimbabwean nationality, and security of ownership.
The cynics will now say that once these colonists have created an infrastructure in any of these black-governed lands the native asset strippers will get active again, destroying exactly as they did in Zimbabwe. Will black Africa again reap without sowing?
Time will execute this experiment also…
4 comments:
Quite interesting, Robin. I have to say, I cannot imagine any white man willing to go to Zimbabwe now. It just does not make sense to me. How could you trust these people? They are, as you have said, people from the Stone Age, and keeping agreements as we understand them is not a part of that. They have demonstrated that to us once in spades; why would anyone want to have a repeat of that demonstration?
Very well stated Robin. I've been trying to make this point about Africa for a long time but have never been able to put it in quiet such an articulate manner.
I lived a number of years in Zambia in the 80s and saw it degrade from its pre independence state of a well developed economy, into a basket case economy, in a similar manner as Zimbabwe but not quiet so devastating. They have recovered somewhat but only with major aid from the West and the IMF.
The same is likely to happen in South Africa in the future, as more and more of our young and talented western manpower deserts our rapidly Africanising society for the more western orientated societies of North America and the Antipodes.
All that will be left here soon of the western population will be the older retired and retiring population and some younger but less qualified Europeans. My one hope is that it does not happen in what remains of my lifetime.
Very well said Madam.I believe Rhodesia issued a Something trillion dollar bill.Mugabe is of course in bed with China.I would quire frankly prefer to be visceral but of course because of mixed company I must be civil.How goes the back the removal of Boer farmer?Are there any left?"Hitler Hunzvi the alleged veteran?Forgive me I cannot be civil any further.
I write this in Johannesburg, South Africa as an expatriate Englishman/South African (by choice) who left England in 1975 - and never felt the need to return!
That the high-rise buildings - in fact any brick buildings - in Zimbabwe are the 'relics of a lost civilisation" is absolutely correct - blacks neither conceptualised nor designed nor possessed the skills to build one of them!
It is something that people in the West refuse to acknowledge, preferring to believe that Africa's blacks would be "just like me' if given the same education etc.
Wrong - there is a massive gulf created by at least 1000 years of 'genetic memory' of civilisation which separates Africans from Westerners.
Rudyard Kipling on a visit to Angola in the mid 19th century wrote "The men spend their days in idleness. Not a cloth do they have to cover themselves, nor a button to fasten it. By their sloth and folly all is brought to nought"
When Cecil Rhodes took his column to Rhodesia in 1890, he found, by a rough census that there were about 850 000 blacks there - they had increased to that number after thousands of years of their own 'civilisation' - within the next 100 years, purely as a result of white influence in stopping tribal wars and provision of health care, their numbers has swelled to 8.5 million!
It is clear to me by now that the African believes he has no fundamental desire nor need for what are accepted in Europe as the essentials of Western society and it's technology etc - this is proven time and time again by the likes of Mugabe and many others. Perhaps they actually believe the Kwanza myth of an idyllic pastoral life of peace and harmony, observance of human-rights, benign government and so on, before the white man arrived!
The white man has much to answer for in Africa - and almost all of it has resulted in benefit for African populations.
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