IN Zimbabwe, a funny little sesquipedalian called George Charamba is the press secretary at the ministry of information, which makes him President Robert Mugabe’s official spokesman. At the state-owned Herald, where he is a columnist, he is known as Nathaniel Manheru. Charamba or Manheru is prolific; he is outrageous, childish, venomous — and totally brilliant at his job.It is thanks largely to him that so many Africans and Scandinavian sympathisers and other useless apologists genuinely believe Mugabe’s land-reform policies of the late 1990s and early 2000s were a legitimate means to the economic emancipation of Zimbabwe. It is thanks to Charamba’s masterful stoking of nationalism, that blind racial solidarity has flourished to the point where it occupies a significant percentage of national identity.Forget about the Chinese "stealing" African women or killing citizens’ dogs to sell to restaurants. Forget about the curious technology used in the elections and the duplicity of wealt...
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