Fond memories of country now blighted by poverty and disease
I refer to the University of Hong Kong's stand on Bona Mugabe studying in the city ('Mugabe's daughter studying at HKU under alias', January 25). Whilst this young lass' education may be above politics it is funded by political gain; the political gains of a regime that has left others penniless and unable to afford to eat, let alone learn.
My father went to then Rhodesia and Nyasaland in 1955 as an eager young printer's apprentice and came to be a director of the firms he worked for in Zimbabwe. While one may argue there were many things one can point fingers at during the British and Ian Smith eras, abject poverty, corruption, economic crises and deadly epidemics were not among them. I was brought up by my parents to be respectful of all people and to work hard and give back to our community
My father left Zimbabwe two years ago, penniless and heartbroken, like many white Zimbabweans who had spent more than 50 years in a country where they gave back and worked on farms side by side with their African compatriots. These were people who were often in direct danger for their lives for standing up for the common man. The home our family lived in and the money my father made are now worthless because of Robert Mugabe's ruinous corruption and economic mismanagement. At the age of 80, my father does not have the luxury of even the British government to take care of him and relies on his family for care.
Because of Robert Mugabe, many ex-Zimbabweans have nowhere to return. He took our homes and our world from us, yet we are the lucky ones who escaped the cholera and the torture. Our parents now reside around the world in a broken old age while the daughter of the leader who took everything from them attends a university on their retirement funds. Her father has more than blood on his hands. He embezzled the funds of all the people who helped to build up this once-glorious country to live a life of grandeur and pave the way for his children's future.
Dawnna Wayburne, Discovery Bay
Send her back home to Zimbabwe
