Today I noticed a HUGE increase in the number of pages visits to my main blog “The Bearded Man” and this was precipitated by a REDDIT tag for a posting I did absolutely years ago on some quotes by Robert Gabriel Mugabe.

It was suggested to me that this may be a ‘slashdot‘ run on my blog in an attempt to kill it.

For ease of convenience, just in case it is not an attempt to strangle “The Bearded Man”, I also publish these quotes here, so that we can all digest the madness that has encompassed his rule in Zimbabwe:

1980 “If you were my enemy, you are now my friend. If you hated me, you cannot avoid the love that binds me to you and you to me.”

Zimbabwe Independence, (ZBC TV coverage).

1980 “It could never be a correct justification that, because the whites oppressed us yesterday when they had power, that the blacks must oppress them today because they have power.”

Zimbabwe Independence, (ZBC TV coverage).

1980 “If yesterday I fought you as an enemy, today you have become a friend and an ally with the same national interest, loyalty, rights, and duties as myself.”

Zimbabwe Independence, (ZBC TV coverage).

“Cricket civilises people and creates good gentlemen. I want everyone to play cricket in Zimbabwe; I want ours to be a nation of gentlemen.”

1993 “What an abomination, a rottenness of culture, real decadence of culture. [Homosexuals are] repugnant to my human conscience... immoral and repulsive... Lower than pigs and dogs... Animals in the jungle are better than these people because at least they know that this is a man or a woman... I do not believe they have any rights at all.”

At the Zimbabwe International Bookfair.

1998 April: “But if they have come as individuals to enhance their moral entity as human beings, and to cure them from their diseased way of life, then they have come to the right place, [...] This is the church, this is the organisation that can purge them.”

Speaking after addressing the 8th Assembly of the World Council of Churches.

1999 “The judiciary has no right to give instructions to the President on any matter as the four judges have purported to do. In those circumstances, the one and only honourable course open to [the judges] is quitting the Bench.”

In response to a letter written to him by four supreme court judges seeking clarification on torture charges raised by two journalists (Ray Choto and Mark Chavunduka).

1999 November: “They are even using gangster gays on us ... And each time I pass through London you get people milling around, trailing. You see, that is the gangster regime of Blair.”

Claiming that Tony Blair deliberately sets “gay gangsters” on him.

1999 April: “Let that monstrous creature get out of our way. Unless I am prevailed upon to see things otherwise [...] I will lead my government in the direction where we dismiss the IMF as an institution that we can relate to, and that is coming very soon.”

In response to the IMF denying balance-of-payment support because of lack of transparency in Zimbabwean policies.

2000 March: “Those who try to cause disunity among our people must watch out because death will befall them...”
Speaking at the opening of the Pungwe-Mutare pipeline.

2000 May: “They have expressed their concern. What concern? We just want our land and will take it the way we know how. What can they do?”

Responding to Commonwealth concerns about the use of violence to seize land.

2000 “The Commonwealth is a mere club, but it has become like an “Animal Farm” where some members are more equal than others. How can Blair claim to regulate and direct events and still say all of us are equals?”

2000 “Our present state of mind is that you [white commercial farmers] are now our enemies because you really have behaved as enemies of Zimbabwe.”

Speech on Independence Day.

2000 June: “Morgan Tsvangirai is an ambitious frog... as long as Morgan will be used by the British he will be a frog.”

At an election rally.

2000 June: “The whites can be citizens in our country, or residents, but not our cousins. They are the greatest racists in the world.”

At an election rally.

“A white man masquerading as a black” and “A tea boy for his white boss.”

Typical references to Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition.

“He is arrogant - he thinks by virtue of his being white, by virtue of his being the prime minister of Great Britain, he can dictate to us.”

Referring to Tony Blair, the British Prime Minister.

“ZANU PF has degrees in violence.”

2001 “Violence is not just happening, it in fact has been deliberately hatched at the center of the MDC and by its patrons and principals overseas... This is a real physical fight and we have to prepare for it.”

In a televised speech.

2001 February: “I would like to [retire], sure. As long as I am assured that those we fought yesterday are thoroughly beaten and that the carpet they now stand on, the economic carpet, has been removed from their feet and it has become our carpet.”

In an interview marking his 77th birthday.

2001 August: “They will not be treated like special creatures. Why should they be treated as if they are next to God? If anything, they are next to he who commands evil and resides in [the] inferno.”

Talking about middle aged white farmers arrested for refusing to move from their farms.

2002 “We belong to this continent. We do not mind having and bearing sanctions banning us from Europe. We are not Europeans. We have not asked for any inch of Europe or any square inch of that territory. Blair, keep your England and let me keep my Zimbabwe.”

At the Earth Summit in Johannesburg.

2002 “I have people who are married in my cabinet. He has homosexuals, and they make John marry Joseph and let Mary get married to Rosemary. We are saying they do not know biology because even dogs and pigs know biology.”

Referring to British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

2002 February: “We are in a war to defend our rights and the interests of our people. The British have decided to take us on through the MDC.”

At a campaign rally.

2002 March: “All of you gathered here can see that whites want us to be their slaves and they are now closing shops and factories to throw you blacks into the streets so that you can turn against the government.”

At a campaign rally.

2002 March: “We will make them run. If they have not run before we will make them run now…. We will not pander to them any longer. That is gone. It is finished. We are now entering a new chapter, and there will be firm government, very firm government….”

In a speech celebrating his re-inauguration and clarifying his policy towards the opposition MDC.

2002 July: “There is no law which says the judge is superior to any individual. We are all the same.”

2002 July: “When I said gays are worse than dogs and pigs, I really meant it because pigs and dogs do not do unnatural things.”

2002 December: “The more they [Western countries] work against us... the more negative we shall become to their kith and kin here.”

At the annual conference of his ruling party, ZANU PF.

2002 December: “We saw who they were, what they were and we realised we had nurtured enemies among us, so we started treating them as enemies, enemies of our government, enemies of our party, enemies of our people.”

Referring to white commercial farmers who resisted his land reform scheme - at the annual conference of his ruling party, ZANU PF.

2003 March: “This Hitler has only one objective: justice for his people, sovereignty for his people, recognition of the independence of his people and their rights over their resources… If that is Hitler, then let me be a Hitler tenfold.”

In a speech at funeral of Dr Swithun Mombeshora.

2003 June: “Let the MDC and its leadership be warned that those who play with fire will not only be burnt, but consumed by that fire.”

At a rally in Nyamandlovu, Matabeleland.

2003 June: “The role of the police in this context is not to be an obstacle against the impetus for economic development, but to be the bedrock of this governments drive to mould a citizenry which is mentally, economically and politically liberated in the new millennium.”

At a pass-out parade of police officers.

2003 July: “If he is coming to dictate to us to how we should run our countries, then we will say “Go back. Go home Yankee... We do not have oil or weapons of mass destruction.”
In anticipation of a visit by George Bush to South Africa later that month.

2003 August: “Those who seek unity must not be our enemies. No, we say no to them, they must first repent… They must first be together with us, speak the same language with us, act like us, walk alike and dream alike.”

Referring to the MDC and the possibility of dialogue between MDC and ZANU PF.

2003 November: “The (black market) is run and supported by a mercenary breed of wily and selfish merchants, a breed that neither sows nor sweats, but harvests millions from base speculative activities that have spawned so much grief and ruin for honest citizens.”

2003 November: “They tell me he is one of those genetically modified because of the criminal ancestry he derives from.”

Referring to John Howard, the Australian Prime Minister.

2003 December: “If they (the MDC) want to violate the laws of the country, we can unleash legal force and legal violence, which we are permitted to do. [...] Some measures of force must be used to restrain them.”

At the ZANU PF annual conference.

2004 February: “We cannot discuss with allies of the West. The devil is the devil and we have no idea of supping with the devil.”

On his 80th birthday, referring to the possibility of talks between MDC and ZANU PF.

2004 May: “I do not think I will miss a successor [...] Out of 30 million people, there must be a capable person to take over after me and he will be the chosen one.”

Speaking about the challenges of finding a successor, in an interview with Sky TV.

2004 May: “Why foist this food upon us? We do not want to be choked, we have enough.”

Talking about efforts by international food agencies to get food to his starving population, in an interview with Sky TV.

2004 May: “He is an angry, evil and embittered little bishop.”

Referring to Archbishop Desmond Tutu (Nobel peace prize winner), in an interview with Sky TV.

2004 May: “That is another Tutu, the bishop, an unholy man. He thinks he is holy and telling lies all the day, every day.”

Referring to Archbishop Pius Ncube, a Zimbabwean peace activist, in an interview with Sky TV.

2004 August: “We band you together with them, damn you together with them, and do not blame us when we do that.”

In response to church leaders across Zimbabwe banding together to talk to Western leaders about human rights violations in Zimbabwe.

These quotes were origanially available on the front page of the Sokwanele site.

Robb WJ Ellis
The Bearded Man