Picture News

last SG · 2005-07-13T23:59:44+00:00

i like these, they look so ben ben and cute cute

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Income lost

Sarah was among those who had built an outbuilding behind her house. The money that she raised from renting out rooms supplemented her income as a street trader. She used this money to support her unemployed husband, her own two children, and the three children of her sister who died last year after a long illness.

"They told us on Sunday that the demolition would start on Tuesday," Sarah says. "Then it started early on Monday morning so people didn't have time to pack their things."

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Destruction

"I had a three-room cottage destroyed, because they said we had no plans. The police told us to destroy the cottage while they stood there with baton sticks.

"In September the schools are opening I don't know where we'll get the fees from. All five children need fees. My husband doesn't work I used to sell vegetables and drinks but now I can't. The municipal police will stop me from selling if I try again. "We eat only porridge in the morning, and sadza (maize porridge) at night."

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Cramped

The family and their former lodgers are now squeezed into the one small two-bedroom house. President Mugabe's image can be seen on the television.

"I liked him when he got us independence but now he has dumped us," says Sarah's husband, Joshua.

"They are doing this to show their power and authority. In a poor country do you destroy first and then build or first build new houses before you destroy.

"Human beings have failed us - we are looking to our creator."

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Tourism hit

Tourists are trickling back to Victoria Falls, but tourism has not yet recovered from the blow it took when foreigners saw television pictures of white Zimbabwean farmers being evicted by government supporters.

"In the past people saw Vic Falls as a good place to get a job," Sarah says. "Then there was a time when we had almost no visitors for two or three years."

It was the newcomers who were the worst hit by the demolitions, since they now have nowhere else to go.

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Out in the cold

Two months later, people still sleep in the open.

"I had lived here for five years," says Samuel. "We just came here to do a job. I worked for myself, selling fruits, onions and tomatoes. Now they say I am loitering, and if the police see me I have to pay.

"I have a wife and one child in Lupane (300 km away). There you can't even find soap to wash your hands."

What will happen when the rain starts?

"Its going to be hard. Ill go under the trees."

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Hand-outs

Charities are helping out with blankets and clothes for those who lost their homes and possessions.

"Foreigners can help by sending things," Sarah says.

But, more important than hand-outs, she feels she deserves compensation from the government.

"I don't know if we'll get compensation but I don't think so.

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Demolitions hit Victoria Falls

Moving out

"So many of my friends were affected," Sarah says.

"So many left for villages. There they are working for those who own houses. Some used to send money back (to their home villages) but they can no longer do this."

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AFP/DDP - Tue Aug 23, 3:12 PM ET
Two women stand on a street flooded by the Alles river in Murnau, southern Germany. Heavy rains triggered severe flooding in southern Germany overnight and authorities warned that worse was still to come.(AFP/DDP/Joerg Koch)

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AFP - Tue Aug 23, 3:12 PM ET
A firefigher gets protection behind a wall during from a wildfire in Miranda do Corvo, near Coimbra, 200 Km north of Lisbon. Nearly 3,000 firefighters and soldiers backed by aircraft from five European nations on Tuesday battled wildfires which raged in parched Portugal, while police found the charred body an elderly woman near her rural home, emergency services said.(AFP/Francisco Leong)

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AFP/DDP - Tue Aug 23, 3:12 PM ET
A woman stands on a bridge and looks at the floodwaters of the Lech river in Schongau, southern Germany. Heavy rains triggered severe flooding in southern Germany overnight and authorities warned that worse was still to come.(AFP/DDP/Johannes Simon)

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AFP - Tue Aug 23, 3:12 PM ET
A fire-fighting aircraft drops water on a raging fire near the village of Bouleterne, in the Tet valley near Perpignan. Some 1,600 hectates (3,700 acres) of holm oaks and scrubland were already destroyed by the blaze.(AFP/Georges Gobet)

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AFP - Tue Aug 23, 3:26 PM ET
A crowd gather at the site of a collapsed building in Mumbai. At least 11 people were killed and some others believed to be trapped under rubble after a four-storey building in India's flood-hit city of Mumbai collapsed, police said.(AFP/Indranil Mukherjee)

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AFP - Wed Aug 24, 8:03 AM ET
A Portuguese villager uses a garden hose to fight a wildfire in Miranda do Corvo. Record flooding in central Europe claimed more lives and threatened to engulf further regions, as firefighters in Portugal and Spain battled forest blazes.(AFP/Francisco Leong)

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AFP/File - Wed Aug 24, 8:06 AM ET
Romanian villagers watch as a dam collapses after a flash flood of the Siret river in July 2005. Seven people died and eight were reported missing after heavy rains battered central areas of Romania overnight.(AFP/File/Daniel Mihailescu)

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AFP - Wed Aug 24, 8:10 AM ET
A fire-fighting helicopter fills its water tank during a wildfire in Miranda do Corvo. People watched in silence as helicopters and planes dropped water on an advancing wall of flames in Portugal.(AFP/Francisco Leong)

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AFP/File - Wed Aug 24, 8:13 AM ET
Picture dated July 2005 shows Bangladeshi boys pushing a car stuck in floodwaters in Dhaka. A 10-year-old boy was killed and some 35,000 people forced to flee when floods trigged by a tidal surge swamped southern coastal areas of Bangladesh.(AFP/File/Farjana K. Godhuly)

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AFP - Wed Aug 24, 8:16 AM ET
Swiss rescue workers pull a boat through the flooded streets of Bern. Parts of Switzerland hit by heavy flooding and landslides in recent days were mopping up, although several roads and railway lines were still unpassable.(AFP/Bruno Ferrandez)

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AFP/File - Wed Aug 24, 8:19 AM ET
A house stands amid debris after Typhoon Tokage hit Izushi in October 2004. The Japan Meteorological Agency warned that Typhoon Mawar could cause high waves and heavy rain in large areas of the country.(AFP/File/Kazuhiro Nogi)

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AFP - Wed Aug 24, 8:22 AM ET
Austrian rescue workers evacuate villagers from the small Tyrolean village of Pflach. The body of a man was found in a flooded basement in western Austria, raising the death toll from the heavy rains this week to three, with one person missing and 17 reported injuries.(AFP)

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AFP - Wed Aug 24, 8:28 AM ET
Pope Benedict XVI leaves the Paul VI hall at the end of his weekly general audience in the Vatican. The pontiff prayed for the victims of severe weather in Europe, saying he was spiritually close to those facing such 'tragic hardship'.(AFP/Patrick Hertzog)

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