Compare/Contrast

December 16, 2008 at 9:04 am | Posted in Asylum, British Politics | Leave a comment
Tags: Priviledge Thulambo, Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe

Sorry to keep banging this drum, but just for the record:

One of Robert Mugabe’s closest political allies is living in luxury in London while being allowed to fly to and from Zimbabwe, despite her close links to the dictator’s feared Zanu-PF party.

[…]

Florence Chitauro, one of Mugabe’s loudest cheerleaders, who during her time as a Zanu-PF minister was responsible for suppressing strikes against his regime, lives in a plush town house in west London with her husband, James, a former senior civil servant in Zimbabwe who played a key role in advising the Mugabe administration. Their son and daughter also live in the UK.

When confronted by The Observer, Chitauro said she was a ‘private citizen at the moment’ and declined to comment further. Asked whether she now denounced the Mugabe regime, she replied: ‘No, I’m not going to say that.’

Meanwhile:

A Zimbabwean woman and her two daughters who fled the Mugabe regime are to be deported from Britain despite promises by the Government to protect the country’s citizens.

Priviledge Thulambo, 39, whose husband was murdered by Robert Mugabe’s men, and her children are being detained in a controversial immigration centre after being seized by immigration officers on Friday.

[…]

Mrs Thulambo and her daughters Valerie, 20, and Lorraine, 18, have spent eight years in the UK. Mrs Thulambo’s Cambridge-educated husband, Macca, was killed for his links to opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai. His widow tried to leave Zimbabwe but was arrested at the airport, and later tortured and raped.

She and her daughters fled to neighbouring Malawi, where they obtained passports because of her late husband’s dual nationality. Immigration officials seized Mrs Thulambo’s Zimbabwean passport during their arrest at dawn on Friday

So some unapologetic Zanu-PF apparatchik can live a life of luxury and float from London to Zimbabwe unimpeded, despite our government’s promises to restrict the movements of Mugabe’s team of thugs…

But a woman whose husband was executed, and who herself was raped and tortured, will be spending Christmas in a detention centre before being tossed back to that hopeless, starving, cholera-plagued country, despite our government’s promises to take care of Zimbabwean refugees.

Nice to have a system which works, isn’t it?

Update: From the comments on a previous post, there’s a Facebook group about the case, if you’re interested.