Before seeing a copy of your letter relating to the stance taken by Andy Flower and Henry Olonga, I had coincidentally written some ideas of my own. I support Andy and Henry wholeheartedly and wonder why the rest of the team don't follow their example. I am also wearing black in mourning for the lost values of our country.

I am an ordinary Zimbabwean mother, widow, employer, patriot of my country. My husband and daughter lie buried in this land of my birth. I was proud of my country once, the breadbasket of Africa, the jewel of the Continent, a God given gift of Nature.

However, we all cry for our beloved country. Another day dawns in our once happy, productive Zimbabwe, now totally devastated in every way by its leaders. I am one of the many who toss and turn throughout the troubled night, dreading tomorrow. There is not one basic commodity in my kitchen- no bread, no sugar, no oil, no mealie meal for my workers, no money in the bank and my fuel tank is hovering around empty. Every day is the same trauma, but like other Zimbabweans I must queue to survive. It is 4 a.m.--the same routine every day. I am fortunate to be within walking distance of the shops. I trudge down there to join the pensioners' queue for a loaf of bread--most pensioners are in their 70s, 80s, or even 90s, some are balancing on walking sticks--all are trying very hard to "keep smiling".

The ordinary queue is long, already stretching for more than a block--people are so thin that you can't escape feeling a big lump in your throat. Many have been queuing all night, sleeping on the side of the road, in a desperate effort to secure just ONE loaf of bread- or even one roll--if the bread runs out, as it always does. They stand tolerantly, patiently, enduringly (that is perhaps our fault--too tolerant, too patient, too enduring) hour after hour after hour. Gloom and doom hangs over the crowd.

You wouldn't believe the length and depth of the surging mass of people in another queue, all trying to obtain birth certificates, I.D.'s, passports which will take months to process. We have totally given up finding mealie meal or sugar. There is none--or, if the Police Camp is selling dubiously acquired meal, that is another mission for the poor black people.

Personal experience obliges me to relate that I gave my worker the weekend off to source some mealie meal promised by the local policemen. She joined the queue outside the Police Station in the very early hours. What another futile waste of time! No mealie meal again! It was heartbreaking for her to go home once again with nothing for her children. On Mondays she leaves her 3 children with 6 potatoes (Z$l00 plus each) and a small packet of rice for the whole week. At least she leaves something for her children--what about the thousands that can't? These are FACTS--NOT lies of bumper harvests and plenty of fuel over Christmas and New Year as given out by the Government media. Ask those unfortunate people who slept in their cars for 5 or 6 or even 7 nights in queues over the Christmas period where the promised fuel was. Promises! promises! are all wicked lies!

The fuel queue is hell on earth. Men have it slightly easier than we women when Nature calls--and, it often does, after 8 hours in the blazing sun. Some of us oldies take a bedpan hidden discreetly under the car seat. How degrading! How unnecessary! Where has our dignity been forced to vanish? Most times we queue in desperation - the tanker hasn't even arrived, but we wait--one day, two, three, four, eternity! What most countries take for granted--a smooth filling up of the car- is not for us. Then we wonder if we will succeed in obtaining fuel OR will the pump run dry by the time it is our turn? How frustrating it is when you are almost there (after being in the queue for a minimum of 5 or 6 hours)--4 cars, 3, 2 to go and then, "Sorry, the petrol is finished!" Whew! B.........hell! .............!!! Is it really I using such language that I have never used before?

And then

We hear certain leaders, despite all the suffering, starvation, death of their people don't care a jot and become the big, big spenders of electrical goods and imported groceries for their selfish, personal use with OUR valuable foreign currency. How do they sleep at night when thin, old people are eating worms and emaciated children are scarcely surviving on old dried berries and wild fruit--if they are lucky.

A top Government Medical Aid Society recently celebrated a belated Christmas party costing an unbelievably exorbitant amount. From reliable sources it was disclosed that about 60 officials consumed vast quantities of drink, snacks, a main lunch meal and THEN had an evening braai- and they find it difficult to pay our legitimate claims for members (many pensioners) who have been contributing funds for nearly a lifetime. Some doctors make their patients pay cash "up front" as this Medical Aid Society is very unreliable in their payments which are also sometimes non existent. Consequently, it is a known fact, that many ailing patients, in desperate need of medical help, are unable to visit the doctor--while we hear that their Society is celebrating in grand style. Aren't you guys ashamed of your extravagance? Or are you beyond that because you are so sickeningly greedy?

I can relate to Andy Flower and Henry Olonga. I love the awesome colours of the Zimbabwe bush, I find the sudden "fresh" smell of imminent rainfall exciting, I have stood up for the National Anthem on what could be a proudly patriotic sporting occasion BUT all is ruined, wrecked, full of a dreadful sadness, as, at the back of my mind is the tragic picture of crying, hungry children, mothers searching frantically for food which doesn't exist--because the autocratic leaders have wickedly stolen the land of the largely efficient and capable, experienced and hard working commercial farmers. It has been forcibly taken for their private use and that of their greedy relatives and friends--while they try to present a picture (totally false) of prosperity, which is too hypocritical for anyone to accept and is an insult to the average intelligence. The reality of starving, poverty stricken, dying people is nearer the truth. My heart aches for my beloved country, now devastated by greed and the lust for power of tyrants.

We keep praying for a return to sanity--and we salute those who are courageousenough to stand for their beliefs.

This is from, Cyn.