Businessmen fear the signs

For the past few months, business owners have watched with increasing nervousness as foreign firms have been made the scapegoat for Zimbabwe's economic failings, being described as colonial thieves and enemies of the state.

In his speech at the Zanu (PF) election manifesto release, Mugabe targeted white businessmen as "the enemies who despise us". He referred to them as “mabhunu”, a derogatory Shona word akin to calling a black man a “kaffir".

Mugabe said they must tell their governments to remove "sanctions" or risk losing their investments here. The majority of business owners, however, are white Zimbabweans with no connections to foreign governments.

Sitting around a green-baize card table in the Harare Club, an establishment founded in 1893, six high ranking business men said they could find little cause for optimism.

Mike, an industrialist who, like his friends, has lived in Zimbabwe for more than 30 years, was certain about the ultimate intention of Mugabe and his "band of gangsters".

"This is the start of the ethnic cleansing. The white farmers were an easy target because of the land issue, but we will be next. I have lived here for 34 years and never actively considered leaving. Now I am thinking about it for the first time. There will be nothing left for me if they take my firm."

The men discussed their options if Mugabe followed through on his threats, admitting that they were "financial captives" whose savings would amount to almost nothing if they were to emigrate to Britain or South Africa.

Matthew, a textile businessman and engineer, said his family would have a low standard of living if they were to move to Britain.

Charles, who worked with Mugabe's government in the eighties, compared the president to a petulant child who was prepared to destroy the country simply to deny it to others.

"He has turned vicious because all the things he wanted to be, he is not. He wanted to be the leader of a successful African country striding the world stage."

The men agreed that things were close to getting out of control. John said: "I think we all thought Mugabe would go so far and then put a lid on it, but this Kasukuwere chap (the minister of Indigenisation) is grinning his way through Zimbabwe's Kristallnacht. He is going to see to it that the whites get 'what's coming to them'."

While Martin, a former British civil servant who worked for Ian Smith's Rhodesian government, reckoned it was time to send in United Nations peacekeepers, Charles, who was once an admirer of Mugabe, disagreed.

Instead, Zimbabwe's problems must be "sorted out internally" at the next polls. Mugabe has already rejected EU and British observers. Whether Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, who wants an exclusive MDC government, is the man for the job is yet to be seen, but, Charles added: "I wouldn't care if the man had two heads, anything is better than what we have now."