The US State Department stirred the pot on Zimbabwe again as this issue was being put together. Seems they issued a special Zimbabwe Travel Alert in the run-up to the presidential and parliamentary elections in that southern African country scheduled for March 29. The Travel Alert expires May 1.
The Alert notes that previous elections in Zimabwe were contentious and sparked food, water and fuel shortages, as well as occasional outbreaks of violence. “Given the present, significantly weaker Zimbabwean economy, chronic hyperinflation, and ongoing shortages,” the alert says, “the 2008 election season has the potential to generate widespread instability and violence.”
I have pointed out previously that elections are on the agenda this spring in Zimbabwe, and I have told you they bear close watch. In my view, the new Travel Alert is a prudent, measured warning, as there is indeed a possibility of trouble in Zimbabwe during the upcoming election. The chances of that trouble spreading to the countryside, however, where hunts are conducted, are quite remote. The hunter who is met at the airport by a safari representative and who keeps his head down in urban areas and his mouth shut about politics should be fine.....
