The ZIMBABWE Situation | Our
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At first sight the soldiers
and police patrolling the wide, sunny
thoroughfares of Bulawayo - Zimbabwe's
second city - seemed slightly
comical.
Their uniform hasn't
really changed since the country won independence
23 years ago so they were
wearing the same baggy serge trousers and itchy
"woolly pullies" used in
Britain in the era of National Service.
To my eye they
looked like extras in a rather amateur period drama.
But I can
assure you there was nothing comical about their tactics.
Encouraged by President Robert Mugabe's increasingly despotic regime,
the
security forces in Zimbabwe now treat any street gathering as a
potential
protest march.
Any time the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) even
hints at calling a general strike, the response of the
authorities is
brutal.
Swish go the sjamboks, their heavy
animal-hide whips, as the police
beat anyone who get in their way, and hiss
go the tear gas canisters.
Under the draconian Public Order and
Security Act recently passed by
the regime - much tougher than similar
legislation enforced by the white,
minority-rule government in the days when
the country was known as
Rhodesia - a gathering of three people is not just a
crowd, but a
potentially political event that needs explicit police
authority.
Now in a city the size of Bulawayo, an old market town
built in the
colonial era, groups of three or more are quite common. So the
police are
kept constantly busy.
They beat people queuing at the
main bus terminus in Lobengula Street;
they chase people away from the nearby
Catholic cathedral whenever a funeral
is held; even a car crash outside
Haddon & Sly, Bulawayo's oldest but now
emptiest department store, is
enough to cause police Land Rovers to screech
up in attendance.
Rubberneckers soon become sore neckers as onlookers are manhandled
and
beaten. But the really striking thing about recent political skirmishing
was
that I could not see a single white person involved.
'Great
lie'
For three years of increasing chaos in Zimbabwe, Mr Mugabe has
been
repeating ad nauseam his great lie - that it is all about white farmers
and
land. If only the greedy white farmers would hand over land stolen
from
black Zimbabweans during colonial times, all would be well.
The real story of Zimbabwe is of a brutal, unpopular elite clinging to
power
at the expense of the majority. And to fall for the lie about
white-owned
farms is to miss the point completely.
Out in the townships
to the west of Bulawayo, the true victims of the
crisis are to be
found.
Thousands of black, semi-urban Zimbabweans, who went to
school, got
degrees and saved their wages have seen their quality of life
destroyed by
Mr Mugabe's economic mismanagement.
People like
Nkosi Kunene, a 21-year-old carpenter from Tshabalala
township, have simply
been left behind economically.
His salary used to be enough to live
off. He had to work hard five
days a week - including a daily two-hour trudge
to save on the bus
allowance - but he could afford regular food, new clothes
every so often,
and he could save enough to dream of paying the lobola bride
price that
would allow him to marry his long-term girlfriend.
He
told me this over a meal of grilled chicken in a fast food
restaurant. It was
his first full meal in a month, and when the bill came I
saw
why.
Inflation and exchange rate collapse meant a modest meal for
two cost
me 13,000 Zimbabwean dollars - a little more, Nkosi said, than he
earns in a
month. Somehow the food did not taste quite so good after he told
me that.
Unlikely hustlers
Out on Bulawayo's avenues -
specially designed by the early colonists
to be wide enough for a span of
eight oxen drawing a wagon to turn round - a
strange game of cat and mouse
was being played by the police and illegal
money
changers.
Everyone knows the army and the police are the
greatest
profiteers from black market currency trading
Zimbabwean money changer
Now I had always believed money changing
was in some way underhand,
but in Bulawayo the black market for exchanging
money has been cornered by
female members of the Zionist Christian
Church.
Clearly the ZCC is pretty light on usury because hundreds
of its
female congregation were at it. They were easy to identify in their
white
turbans and gowns, carrying unfeasibly large bags needed to hold bricks
of
increasingly valueless Zimbabwean dollars.
Every so often the
women would melt away into the crowd as the police
staged another
swoop.
"They have to have the occasional crackdown," said one of
the money
changers in impeccable English.
"But it is only really
for form's sake. Everyone knows the army and
the police are the greatest
profiteers from black market currency trading."
And with that she
was gone, leaving me to wonder whether the police
would arrest me if I dared
to queue behind two other people to buy the local
newspaper.
From The Times (UK), 28 June
Mugabe risks humiliation to restore Libya fuel deal
From Jan Raath in Harare
Robert Mugabe won
a vague pledge from the Libyan leader Colonel Muammar
Gaddafi last night to
restore some of the $360 million fuel supply deal to
combat Zimbabwe's
worsening shortages. The Zimbabwean President had flown to
Libya for
negotiations on the deal that ended last September after Harare
failed to
meet payments. Mr Mugabe's decision to risk humiliation again,
seven months
after being rebuffed in his last attempt to persuade Colonel
Gaddafi to
relent, is a measure of his desperation. Fuel supplies in Harare
are in
chaos. The international oil companies that distribute fuel to
petrol
stations have not received deliveries for more than a month from
the
National Oil Company of Zimbabwe (Noczim), the state-owned fuel company
with
a monopoly on importation. Noczim is bankrupt after nearly two decades
of a
policy, directed by Mr Mugabe, of selling fuel for a fraction of
its
international market price. Thanks to the black market there is no
visible
reduction in the volume of traffic on the capital's streets. The
Government
tried to shut down the black market this week by banning motorists
from
carrying fuel in containers.
Expectations were not high that
Mr Mugabe would succeed in Tripoli, and the
statement issued at the end of
last night's talk left the extent of Libyan
"co-operation" deliberately
vague. Amos Midzi, Zimbabwe's Energy Minister,
recently announced that Noczim
owed Tamoil, Libya's state-owned oil company,
$65 million, and was paying off
the debt at the rate of $5 million a month.
"The Libyans are not going to be
impressed," John Robertson, an economist,
said. "On the strength of that, are
they now going to give us credit for the
$30 million worth of fuel we will
want every month?" Zimbabwe's state press
has said that Mr Mugabe is offering
to pay Libya with tobacco, cattle and
tea. But with the mass expropriation of
white-owned farms, the Zimbabwe
tobacco industry has fallen from being the
world's biggest exporter to
producing only a third of its normal output this
year. Mr Mugabe's scourge
of commercial agriculture has also decimated the
beef industry. Sources said
that a Libyan refrigerated aircraft arrived in
Harare this month to collect
a consignment of beef carcasses but left empty
after two days. Libya began
supplying Zimbabwe with fuel in 2001. Payment was
made partly with an
unspecified shareholding in Zimbabwe's fuel pipeline
system, storage
facilities and petrol stations, only some of which are
state-owned. Mr
Mugabe has also offered a selection of white-owned farms
seized by the
government.
From Business Day (SA), 28 June
SA betting on French counter to US power
Jonathan Katzenellenbogen, International Affairs editor
French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, who ends his
three-day visit
to SA today, is likely not to say anything in public that is
critical of
Zimbabwe. De Villepin rose to prominence for mounting a hard but
futile
diplomatic effort to prevent US military action in Iraq and he is not
about
to stick out his neck on "regime change" in Harare. The talks with his
SA
counterpart, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, covered "everything", according to
a
French diplomat, a clear sign that this visit was about placing down
broad
political markers. His visit followed that of UK Foreign Secretary
Jack
Straw and preceded a visit by US President George Bush. While they
pledged
co-operation in Africa, Franco-British jostling continues and gave
the trip
a greater urgency after Straw's recent visit. Of all the world
powers,
France has demonstrated a consistent, high-level focus on the
continent, and
there is no sign that this is wavering. It is intent on making
diplomatic
and commercial headway into the Anglophone countries. And for SA
that alone
is important, although SA as a regional power will from time to
time have to
seek to rival French influence.
The absence of a
tough public line on Zimbabwe will place SA officials at
ease with De
Villepin. By not highlighting the issue, France is able to get
closer to
African governments and potentially provide an alternative channel
for
dialogue. But this sort of opportunism has its risks and costs. A
future
government in Zimbabwe may want to have little to do with the French.
The
French manoeuvred the European Union into allowing a temporary lifting of
a
travel ban to allow President Robert Mugabe to attend the
Franco-African
Summit. Clearly France was unprepared to have the event
scuttled by African
leaders refusing to attend because Mugabe was barred.
Considering that
France supplied the apartheid government with fighter
aircraft and
submarines, the ruling African National Congress is particularly
well
disposed towards Paris. In some ways that shows the adeptness of
France's
Africa policy and its standing on the continent.
But the
world outlook against a superpower-dominated world also helps. SA
took the
French line towards the Iraq war, in insisting on more time for
the
inspectors and opposing military action. Over and again France has shown
a
heavy commitment to supporting and intervening in its old colonies. When
the
peacekeeping force put together from the Economic Community of West
African
States was delayed, France stepped in and arguably averted a civil
war in
Ivory Coast. And, more recently, France intervened to try to prevent
further
bloodletting in the Democratic Republic of Congo. However, in the
case of
Rwanda in 1994, France came under criticism after claims that it
continued
to support the Hutu-led government even after the genocide of a
half-million
Tutsis began in April 1994. SA and France have had their
differences over
the Congo. France has always supported the Kabila
government, but SA is
widely perceived to have leaned towards Uganda and
Rwanda. However, with the
signing of the Congo peace accord, SA and France do
not have significant
differences on the issue now. While SA may be pleased
that French interests
can balance those of the UK and the US, it may find
that French interests
are deeply entrenched and difficult to handle.
Mail & Guardian (SA), 28 June
Zim police try to search opposition offices
Harare - Zimbabwe police on Friday attempted to search the
offices of the
main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party for
"subversive
materials", an MDC official said. The official, who asked not to
be named,
said six police officers led by a detective inspector, came to the
MDC's
offices in central Harare armed with a search warrant. "The search
warrant
said they were looking for subversive materials," said the official,
but
noted that the police only wanted to search one office - that of the
party's
financial director. They left 45 minutes later, as the financial
director
was out and his office locked. "We suspect they think we're keeping
lots of
money in the offices," the MDC official said. He said the police also
left a
list of nine MDC activists whom they wanted to interview. The
government
recently accused the MDC of causing cash shortages by hoarding
scarce bank
notes to pay activists. The opposition party denies the
charges.
The Scotsman
MP gets post in Zimbabwe action group
EDINBURGH
MP John Barrett has been elected secretary of the influential new
cross-party
parliamentary group on Zimbabwe.
The group, which is made up of MPs from
all the major political parties,
will attempt to raise the awareness of
Zimbabwe both inside and outside
Westminster.
Mr Barrett, the Liberal
Democrat MP for Edinburgh West and a member of the
all-party Commons
International Development Committee, said: "Thanks to
Robert Mugabe and his
regime, Zimbabwe remains one of the great tragedies
in
Africa.
"Zimbabwe is not only caught in the stranglehold of
Aids/HIV disease, with
33 per cent of its population infected, but over one
in ten children now die
before reaching their fifth birthday.
"Whilst
Zimbabwe has traditionally been a net food exporter to its
country
neighbours, the land reforms pursued by Mugabe have left his country
with
the highest food aid requirement of any country in southern
Africa.
"The Department for International Development now estimates that
despite the
Zimbabwean harvest, some one million metric tonnes of maize will
still be
required in aid for that country alone.
"Zimbabwe is a broken
country containing suffering which the international
community cannot shy
away from."
He added: "Hopefully, this new parliamentary group can put
further pressure
on the Government to take decisive action."
Sunday Times (SA)
More to Zimbabwe than meets the
eye
Analysis
Even as opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai
languished in jail, talks
between his party and the ruling Zanu-PF continued,
writes Ranjeni
Munusamy
Something
rather inexplicable is said to have happened during Movement for
Democratic
Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai's recent detention in Harare on a
second
treason charge.
Zimbabwe's Minister of State Security, Nicholas Goche,
went to the Harare
Remand Prison to visit him, but was turned away. The
prison authorities told
him that the commissioner of prisons had instructed
that no one, not even
the minister, should see Tsvangirai.
It
seems absurd that Goche, head of the police ministry, would want to visit
the
government's arch-enemy. Even stranger that he was not allowed
into
Tsvangirai's cell.
The incident illustrates that there's much
more going on in Zimbabwe than
meets the eye.
The MDC's five-day
mass action and stayaway campaign earlier this month
forced the hand of
hardliners in the ruling Zanu-PF.
The country and its economy have
ground to a halt and, in order to show that
the government still wields
ultimate power and control, Tsvangirai was
arrested and kept in prison for
two weeks.
He was already on trial for treason, along with MDC
secretary-general
Welshman Ncube and another opposition official, Renson
Gasela, this for
allegedly plotting with Canadian-based consultant Ari Ben
Menashe to
assassinate President Robert Mugabe.
Tsvangirai's
defence team is seeking a discharge, saying the state has not
presented
sufficient evidence to make a case against the accused.
The treason
case was raised during a visit to Harare in May by SA President
Thabo Mbeki,
Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo and Malawi's Bakili Muluzi when
they tried to
coax Mugabe and Tsvangirai toward talks.
Obasanjo apparently told
Mugabe that the trial was an impediment to
progress, making it difficult for
the African leaders to plead Zimbabwe's
case to the international
community.
Mugabe is said to have responded that he was aware the
case was not going
anywhere and would possibly flop or be withdrawn along the
way. However, it
was a way of dealing with Tsvangirai's arrogance, he
said.
The second treason charge is a similar demonstration of who's
in charge, but
also appears to be crumbling quite
spectacularly.
Judge Susan Mavangira neatly set out the flimsiness of
the allegations in
her ruling when she granted Tsvangirai bail last
Friday.
The state set out to prove that Tsvangirai had tried to
provoke a violent
overthrow of the government, and had advocated mayhem
during the stayaway
campaign.
Mavangira said of the state's
allegations: "There is not a single statement
in which the applicant's
[Tsvangirai's] precise words are used."
"Bits of newspaper reportage
relied on by the state were not fact but a
matter of editorial deduction that
the applicant meant that there must be a
revolt, violent conduct or breakdown
of law and order," she said.
On the contrary, stated the judge,
Tsvangirai's defence team submitted into
evidence pamphlets and
advertisements distributed during the stayaway
campaign, urging those taking
part to be "peaceful, disciplined, vigilant
and courageous".
The
state produced a pamphlet that read: "Jesus is coming, the signs are
here.
Action for national survival."
That, according to the state, was
evidence that the opposition was
advocating Armageddon. Mavangira delivered a
little reality check -
stayaways are not unlawful in Zimbabwe. Therefore, the
pamphlet did not
support any allegation of criminal wrongdoing by
Tsvangirai.
She went on to say that the use of the word "revolt" in
an affidavit by the
Minister of Home Affairs, Kembo Mohadi - in which he
claimed that this is
what the MDC leadership urged through its mass action -
was a "thumbsuck".
And all this came from a member of the Zimbabwean
judiciary, allegedly
firmly under the thumb of the Zanu-PF
government.
But in the context of the economic implosion, a worsening
fuel crisis, acute
poverty, food and currency shortages and joblessness,
Zimbabweans from all
walks of life - even, it appears, Mugabe's disciples -
are being forced to
choose.
The choice is not a political one,
between Zanu-PF and the MDC; it is now a
matter of survival - finding a way
to exist within the status quo, or
forcing something to happen that can
change the course of history.
Despite Mbeki and Obasanjo's unfailing
faith in him, Mugabe is not about to
make a noble exit any time soon. He
professes to want to appoint a successor
in Zanu-PF who will hold the centre
in the party.
Zanu-PF is due to elect a new leader only in 2005. With
the party being
pulled in different directions by factions, it does not
appear to be in any
position to reach consensus on a successor within the
next year.
This realisation has dawned on key players, on both sides
of the political
divide, who are trying to push the process
along.
For this reason, Tsvangirai's incarceration - even his
humiliating court
appearance in leg irons - did not have the effect of
scuttling talks between
the MDC and Zanu-PF. Contact between senior members
continued during
Tsvangirai's detention.
While the talks are
played down, and even denied, they grind on secretly and
against the
odds.
The central objective is to arrive at a mutually acceptable
strategy that
will see Mugabe relinquish power.
It is not clear
how much Mugabe knows about the discussions. He is adamant
that unless the
MDC acknowledges him as the legitimate president, he is not
prepared to bring
his party to the negotiating table.
The MDC argues that if the talks
bear fruit, it would be a moot point
whether last year's presidential
election was credible , as Mugabe would
have to surrender the rei ns to a
power-sharing interim government.
In such an eventuality, the MDC
leadership is ready to accept a Zanu-PF
leader to head a transitional
authority, as long as an election - run by a
credible, independent electoral
body - is in sight.
The preliminary discussions involve members of
the national executive of
both parties, and aim to set up negotiating
committees - responsible for
thrashing out different aspects of the
transitional arrangement - and a
timetable for the process leading up to an
election.
Ncube - who ran the party while Tsvangirai was in prison -
is leading the
talks for his party. Next to Tsvangirai, he is the
highest-profile member of
the opposition, and its intellectual and strategic
authority.
But it is the Zanu-PF representation that is amazing.
Justice Minister
Patrick Chinamasa, who last year was responsible for
rubbishing the first
round of negotiations after the elections , and who led
Zanu-PF's walkout,
is a leading member of the delegation. Goche is
another.
The mysterious attempt to visit Tsvangirai during his
detention could
therefore have been a display of goodwill, or an effort to
reassure the
opposition leader that, despite the new complication, their
delegation's
bona fides were intact.
But the process from here on
will be rugged, as the MDC has vowed to keep up
the pressure through mass
action. The state will have to reciprocate with
force.
But behind the scenes, the delicate process of horse trading will prevail.
The
MDC demands a judicial termination of the treason trial. Zimbabwe's
prison
cells are teeming with MDC supporters facing flimsy charges. They do
not have
the money to apply or pay for bail, and t he opposition wants them
released
as a display of goodwill from the state.
MDC insiders say there is a
realisation that it would not be in the
country's interest for Mugabe to go
into exile or to be prosecuted for human
rights abuses. No settlement would
be possible if the MDC harboured such
ambitions.
There now seems
to be general consensus that a key element of the settlement
would be an
amnesty provision for Mugabe.
But as long as the talks are secret the
process remains complicated.
Ordinary Zimbabweans queuing for food, fuel and
money need to see a ray of
hope to prevent the uprising that now seems
inevitable.
Mugabe must be bound to the process and its timetable.
However ominous this
week's call from US Secretary of State Colin Powell for
the region's leaders
to pressure Mugabe into dialogue may have been, it is
really the only way
forward.
It is surprising how many Zimbabweans
- even those around Mugabe - share
that view.
Sunday Times (SA)
MDC delegation plans to hijack US president's
visit
Ranjeni Munusamy and Dingilizwe Ntuli
Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic
Change is planning to take advantage of
the visit by US President George W
Bush to South Africa to sell its cause to
the world.
The MDC's
management committee decided this week to send a high-profile team
led by
spokesman Paul Themba-Nyathi to Pretoria to gain exposure to the
large media
contingent expected to cover the visit.
About 150 US journalists are
expected to accompany Bush on the visit next
month.
Themba-Nyathi
said his party wanted to disseminate information about the
abuse of state
power in Zimbabwe to increase international pressure on
the
country.
He said another lobby group led by deputy
secretary-general Gift Chimanikire
would attend the African Union summit in
Maputo next month. It aims to put
pressure on Zimbabwean President Robert
Mugabe to commit himself to
dialogue.
MDC leaders have also
requested meetings with the leaders of Senegal,
Botswana and Ghana, who are
respected for their democratic governance,
said
Themba-Nyathi.
Meanwhile, the MDC said this week that 50% of
its revenue is spent on legal
fees in protracted legal battles against the
state.
MDC economic secretary Eddie Cross said the steep bail imposed
on leader
Morgan Tsvangirai last week had severely depleted its coffers. The
party
believes it is part of a calculated move by the government to
financially
cripple the opposition.
Tsvangirai was released on
Z10-million (about R100 000 at the official rate
of around Z100 to the rand)
last week after spending two weeks in prison for
mobilising week-long
anti-government protests.
"We have 25 law firms working for us who
represent every MDC activist
arrested on trumped-up charges almost on a
weekly basis in what we believe
are deliberate attempts by the government to
financially cripple us. It
costs us about Z100-million a month to run the
party and the costs continue
to escalate due to increased inflation and
rising lawsuits against our
members," said Cross.
He said the MDC
also worked with non-governmental organisations and civic
organisations that
pay medical fees for its members injured in
political
violence.
The MDC, he said, has no major financier,
hence its appeal to sympathisers
to help raise the amount set for the release
of Tsvangirai, who was charged
with treason.
The opposition
leader, who is accused in another treason trial of plotting
to assassinate
Mugabe, was also ordered to lodge title deeds of property
worth Z100-million
with the court as part of the bail.
The MDC paid the bail money and
lodged the title deeds of its eight-storey
Harvest House headquarters in
central Harare.
Cross said the MDC's major source of revenue is
membership subscriptions,
which amount to Z40-million a month from its 2
million subscribers, who each
pay Z20.
It also receives
Z100-million annually from the state under the Political
Parties (Finance)
Act, and individuals and the corporate world chip in
generously, Cross
said.
He dismissed insinuations that the MDC was funded by foreign
sources.
"Contrary to the widespread belief that we are a foreign-funded
party, the
MDC has largely survived on the generosity of our members and
private
companies, who have always come to our aid whenever we appeal
for
assistance.
"The largest single foreign donation we ever
received is £50 000 in 2000
from the Westminster Foundation to train our
election personnel . . . that
was the last time we received foreign
assistance.
Cross said the 30 MDC branches in South Africa, Belgium,
New Zealand,
Australia, Britain and the US were financially independent from
the Harare
headquarters.
Telegraph
Kubla Khans of the 21st century
(Filed:
29/06/2003)
The motivations of entrepreneurs are various: they may be
driven to prove
doubters wrong, or gain power, or develop inventions. But a
few successful
money-makers feel compelled to erect stupendous monuments and
use their
riches for bizarre ends.
Perhaps some even imagine
themselves the subject of Coleridge's famous poem:
"In Xanadu did Kubla
Khan/A stately pleasure-dome decree".
Separately but simultaneously in
England and America, two eccentric and
extremely wealthy businessmen have
been constructing private palaces at
stupendous cost. Each surely sees their
edifice as a great achievement. In
both cases, the price seems too high for
all concerned.
Our local empire-builder is Nicholas van Hoogstraten, now
serving 10 years
in prison for the manslaughter of a business associate. The
sinister
property developer has spent years building what he describes as
his
"mausoleum" in Framfield, East Sussex.
The property is reputed to
be the most expensive private house built in
Britain for a century. It
remains unfinished, despite a budget of £40m and a
greater expanse than
Buckingham Palace.
The millionaire van Hoogstraten is, in his own words,
"ruthless and
violent". He was jailed in the 1960s for hiring a thug to throw
a grenade at
a rival and was described by the trial judge as an "emissary of
Beelzebub".
He has since accumulated a considerable fortune through the
ownership of
tenanted houses and flats and also acquired a reputation as an
unsavoury
landlord. Ten years ago, five people died in a mysterious blaze in
one of
his properties.
Van Hoogstraten specialises in offensive
statements and behaviour. He called
the Zimbabwean dictator, Robert Mugabe,
"100 per cent decent and
incorruptible" and did business with him. He stated:
"The only purpose in
creating great wealth like mine is to separate oneself
from the riffraff."
But his dream of making a giant tomb to hold his body for
5,000 years is -
at least temporarily - smashed.
While van Hoogstraten
appeals against his conviction, Hamilton Palace, his
neoclassical mansion,
lies unfinished and windswept. A sequestrator acting
for his victim's family
is trying to seize his assets to honour a £5m civil
claim.
Across the
Atlantic - in this case, a world apart both in geography and
probity - the
American Kubla Khan is called Ira L Rennert. He is creating a
100,000 sq ft
monster house in the Hamptons, Long Island - Manhattan's
swanky beach resort.
It will be the largest home in America, with 29
bedrooms, 40 bathrooms, a
bowling alley and a theatre, on 65 acres of
oceanfront
property.
Rennert is an ex-stockbroker who runs various businesses
through a private
company he owns called Renco. These include steel mills,
coal mining,
magnesium production and the original maker of the Hummer
vehicle, AM
General.
These acquisitions were mostly funded with $1.5bn
of junk bonds, but several
subsidiaries have defaulted and some have gone
bankrupt. Few are profitable
and some are mired in litigation and
environmental prosecutions. But Rennert
himself seems to have done all right:
he extracted more than $500m in
dividends from his various interests before
they went wrong.
Rennert is not a violent convict like van Hoogstraten:
he is deeply
religious, devoted to his family, and a big giver to many Jewish
causes. But
his apparent greed is disturbing; he said to a friend that all he
wanted
when he retired was "a billion dollars in cash - and the
companies".
Yet his firms are notorious polluters - according to the
Environmental
Protection Agency, the 10th worst in the US. Moreover, his
financial
manoeuvres have cost bond holders $700m of
losses.
Meanwhile, the vast construction of Fairfield, Rennert's new
home, continues
into its sixth year. It has even inspired a novel called The
House That Ate
the Hamptons. Rennert is almost 70, and may not enjoy the
place for long by
the time it is eventually finished.
When studying
characters like the two above, it is hard not to agree with
the title of the
Roxy Music song, In Every Dream Home a Heartache. What on
earth drives people
to such mad ambitions? Who could possibly want to live
in a house with 40
bathrooms? To quote Coleridge again, "And all should cry,
Beware!
Beware!"
• Luke Johnson is chairman of Signature Restaurants