The Facebook Revolution And Africa

I first got interested in Zimbabwe when I was a student at Tulane University. My first wife and I befriended a man from Zimbabwe named Mutizwa Chirunga who was also a Tulane student. When his son was born, we were the only Europeans invited to the christening ceremony. In 1981 I went to Zimbabwe and spent some days there. In 1984 I became friends with a man named Brian Lawrence when I lived in Perth, West Australia. He was from Zimbabwe. In 1999 I became friends with a dear and special lady from Zimbabwe named Mandy Findlater. In 2004 I opened a retirement account at Imara SP Reid in Johannesburg. It is a company owned by people from Zimbabwe and an excellent investment firm. In 2006 Elena and I were talked into investing in the Zimbabwe share market. Our holdings were worth literally billions of Zimbabwe dollars for a while. (I always kid Elena that it was the only time in her life when she was a billionaire.) I have closely followed the political turmoil there. Each time an election took place there was violence and intimidation on a grand scale to insure that Robert Mugabe stayed in power. In this particular election the opponent, Morgan Tsvangarai, has made great use of Facebook. This seems to have made Mugabe's people more cautious. I have heard no reports of violence or outright intimidation. Instead it appears that Mugabe has resorted to handing out money and other kinder tactics to win votes. To me this is proof of how effective Facebook is to bring transparency to elections and other events. Mark Zuckerbeg you have created a social revolution in ways you may have never imagined!