African Tears
The Zimbabwe Land Invasions
by Catherine Buckle
(review written: May 28, 2001 by Kevin D. Hendricks)
Nonfiction
2001
Covos Day Books
243 pages

This is a story of daily life in Zimbabwe that has become anything but daily in the last year. Lawlessness and corruption has ruled in this African country as so-called war veterans from the country's 1980 revolution have invaded white-owned farms across the country. Catherine Buckle recounts the fearful days and nights that turned to months as the country slipped into lawlessness.

The war veterans claim that Zimbabwe's former days under imperialist rule have resulted in an uneven distribution of land between blacks and whites. So they took the situation into their own hands. Unfortunately, it's not that simple. Many of the farms being invaded are owned by blacks or by whites who legally purchased the land from the government since the 1980 revolution. Buckle is a native of Zimbabwe and used all she had to purchase the farm the war veterans so recklessly destroyed.

Meanwhile Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe has supported the war veterans, calling for a land redistribution program. The police have declared it a political issue and refuse to act. The courts have ruled the invasions illegal, but to no avail. Zimbabwe is a country on the edge of anarchy, held together and ripped apart by violence and the threat of violence.

Buckle tells the deeply personal story of the ordeal her family went through, painstakingly retelling each day and each new development. It is not especially well written, but it more than makes up for it with raw passion. This is a woman who has watched everything her and her husband worked so hard to earn be torn away from them. She has watched her seven-year-old child retreat within himself. She has watched her employees and friends be bullied, intimated, and beaten. Now, having been chased off her farm, she offers up this book as a call for justice.

Living in the United States it's hard to imagine this kind of injustice. We only hear about faraway places like Zimbabwe when a news camera captures arresting images of the very height of conflict. African Tears is a not-so-subtle reminder of the world around us--a world we often choose to forget, full of people we often choose to forget. It's a book that leaves you angry. And thankful.