Cathy Buckle's Weekly Letter From Zimbabwe !

How to catch a chicken!

Saturday 17th May 2008,

Dear Family and Friends,

Early one afternoon this week a small town residential suburb grew suddenly quiet as the sound of 'the youths' filled the neighbourhood. The voices of perhaps thirty young men could be heard as they ran along local streets singing, chanting and repeating the threatening political slogans so familiar to us all. The neighbourhood was silenced, a few barking dogs the only challenge to the running mob. Later we heard one house was burnt down, one man had a broken arm, another was slashed on his head with a panga. Behind walls, fences and hedges the silence affords a tenuous measure of safety for urban Zimbabweans but for people in the rural areas nowhere is safe.

When the big trucks arrive in the villages there is nowhere to hide. A few burly men alight and they call loudly for the male youths to come. Door to door they go, gathering the youngsters who are out of school or waiting for exam results, unemployed young men, teenage boys - all are told to climb onto the vehicles. Those who refuse are immediately marked: accused of supporting the opposition. Their names are recorded on the now dreaded 'lists' - lists which determine who gets food, seed and fertilizer and who should be re-educated or punished for voting 'the wrong way' or supporting the 'wrong party.'

Once on the trucks the youths are transported to other villages, far away from home - to places where they are strangers. Hundreds of reports are now being documented of the events taking place in remote areas when these truck loads of youths arrive: reports of beating, burning, humiliation and threats.

Once the deeds are done the youths are sent back to their villages - they are paid, sometimes with money and sometimes with bags of food, blankets, new shoes.

Having been on the trucks once, the youths are trapped and know they'll be forced to go again. The youths are damned if they go and damned if they don't and for many the only choice is to run, to hide and to pray that they can stay safe until the 27th of June when Zimbabwe yet again goes to a Presidential election.

And will it work, all this violence, brutality and trauma? Will it force people to change the way they voted 2 months ago? One father, desperately trying to keep his teenage son away from the trucks said the way to catch a chicken was to throw grain for it so it comes to you, not to throw stones at it.

Despite all the horrors here in Zimbabwe, we are deeply saddened by the tragedies in China and in Burma this past fortnight and send our condolences.

Until next week, thanks for reading, love cathy.