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| Africa: Subsaharan | ||
| US firm strikes secret tobacco-for-maize deal in Bob-land | ||
| 2004-05-16 | ||
A US financial firm has emerged as central to a secret multi-million dollar plan by Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe to bail the country out of a food shortage and prepare the way for his election victory later this year. Last week Mugabe forced the UN's World Food Programme crop assessment team to leave the country fearing that it would expose the dire harvest. Such a disaster would fly in the face of Mugabe's claims of a bumper harvest and prove that his controversial land reforms have failed. There has been a huge drop in production caused by land seizures from white farmers with much of the land lying fallow. Sources claim that Mugabe has struck the secret deal with a group of US firms to provide thousands of tonnes of grain in exchange for tobacco and minerals. Insiders allege one of the US companies involved is Sentry Financial International in Salt Lake City, Utah. Details of hugely profitable tobacco-for-maize swaps, leaked to The Observer, involve Sentry and the state-controlled Grain Marketing Board. Last year Sentry was involved in a deal to exchange 300,000 tonnes of maize and wheat for tobacco and minerals. Sources claim some 70,000 tonnes of grain will arrive in Zimbabwe this month under an agreement shrouded in secrecy because of its political sensitivity. Sentry's vice-president Kirk Heaton said his company was doing business in Zimbabwe but 'the details are confidential'.
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| Posted by:Steve White |
| #5 What drivel! Zimbabwe is selling stuff to buy food, and suddenly its a conspiracy involving an evil American corporation. And the Left wonders why people don't take them seriously. Even Mike Moron could do better than this. |
| Posted by: Phil B 2004-05-16 8:18:56 PM |
| #4 Has Bob only targetted the maise farms for redistribution and left other crops and industries untouched? |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-05-16 4:43:20 PM |
| #3 Er, um, mistah, so who exactly is going to produce a bumper crop of tobacco, and dig for chrome and rubies when the whole place is becoming a desert, with a work-force more than decimated by AIDS. Big change coming down there at some stage, let's hope. The deal's probs connected to ANC, Mbeki goof-balls and their recent great showings at majority votings. I'm off to try googling "ANC+Sentry Financial Int". |
| Posted by: rhodesiafever 2004-05-16 3:19:00 PM |
| #2 Gonna bring the maize in via black heliocopters. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-05-16 10:19:28 AM |
| #1 If it's true, Sentry will deserve the backlash that it gets. |
| Posted by: B 2004-05-16 2:11:58 AM |