DANIEL: These are the images of a nation self-destructing. In Zimbabwe hundreds of thousands have had their homes destroyed. Millions have lost their livelihoods. A country has been traumatised. It’s all part of a bizarre national clean-up campaign centred on demolishing Zimbabwe’s vast slums. And this is the man who sent in the bulldozers – Zimbabwe’s President, Robert Mugabe. Once lauded as a freedom fighter, to many he’s now a tyrant. And he’s smashing his country to pieces to secure his political future by destroying the powerbase of his opponents here in the slums.
ROBERT MUGABE: Yes there is discomfort now, but discomfort in order to get comfort later.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: My name is Jay Jay Sibanda and I’m an exile, a Zimbabwean exile in South Africa. I left my family in 2001. I was a political activist.
DANIEL: Jay Jay Sibanda is heading home. He’s decided to risk his life to tell the world about his country’s plight.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They might take me in, arrest me and perhaps detain me without even charges or alternatively they might even murder me. They will torture me definitely but I’m prepared for that. There’s always going to be some sacrifice for us to regain our freedom and as Nelson Mandela said before – freedom does not come easy.
JAY JAY SIBANDA [Kneeling and praying before he sets off]: I’m embarking on a serious journey home. I’m going to meet my parents, I’m going to meet my family. Guide me Lord, bless them and bless me. The success and the failure of my mission rests in your hands.
DANIEL: Jay Jay is one of at least two million Zimbabweans who fled to South Africa. Like many exiles, he’s a member of an underground network working to topple Mugabe and he’s agreed to take a camera across the border for us to record what’s happening.
[Showing Jay Jay how to use the camera]
So you open it here and you push that out fully and then this will pop up. You need to push that.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Something has got to be done and someone has to do it. But who is the question. People are scared to move into Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: It’s midnight and we’re in a township near Musina. This is where the exiles come when they need help crossing the border and tonight we’re here to see if Jay Jay can cross safely tomorrow. He’s a marked man in Zimbabwe and will have to cross the border illegally. It’s a high risk strategy. Jay Jay’s been caught before and tortured. So he needs to buy some reliable friends to bypass the border guards and the barbed wire.
Musina is the closest South African town to the border and it’s here that Zimbabweans come to escape the demolition gangs and to pick up supplies that they can’t get in their own country. It’s also here that Jay Jay will start his dangerous journey. But along with the risks, there are rewards. A rare opportunity to see his family on the other side of the wire.
So you’re feeling nervous but are you looking forward to seeing your family now?
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Well obviously, especially my young daughter, the 7 year old one, you know we are in love and I know she really misses me.
DANIEL: With the right people paid off, Jay Jay climbs the fence and enters Zimbabwe.
This is Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare. Once one of the most prosperous cities in Africa. It’s the starting point for New Zealand’s controversial cricket tour, underway against the wishes of the New Zealand government. So while Jay Jay is entering the country secretly, I’ve come the official route as a sports journalist ostensibly to cover the cricket. This is the image of Zimbabwe that Robert Mugabe wants the world to see and journalists are closely watched so that they keep their cameras on the game. But it’s a surreal scene – when just a few blocks away, downtown Harare has been flattened by bulldozers.
WOMAN: Along this block they destroyed everything that belonged to us. We are now staying out in the open. We have kids. It’s now two months, sleeping right here where you can see.
MAN: To tell the truth, what this government did is bad. This is my new home. I wake up here and go to work. My children are sleeping on the floor right here.
DANIEL: And having entered the country safely, Jay Jay’s walked right into the middle of Mugabe’s “Operation Restore Order”. Since May, its official purpose has been to remove illegal structures and to crack down on crime. But it might be better named “Operation Wreak Havoc”. It’s left millions without homes.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I think the situation is getting worse by the day. Zimbabweans are living like refugees in their own land and it’s pathetic the international community has watched this for too long and there’s nothing in sight that this crisis is going to come to an end.
DANIEL: In Zimbabwe filming secretly like this can get you gaoled for up to two years. The government has also just passed a new law with a 20 year gaol sentence for critical media coverage. But a team of underground film makers has sprung up to get pictures like these out to the world and Jay Jay has joined their ranks.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: There we go, this is the camp as you can see and this is Mbare in Harare. These people had their homes destroyed.
DANIEL: Jay Jay’s footage shows the bitter aftermath of “Operation Restore Order”.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This man is already preparing to cook. He’s got his bed outside and there he’s made some fire. The man is now preparing supper for his family.
DANIEL: Mugabe’s clean-up campaign has made a mess of his people’s lives.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This camp, small as it is, hosts about 250 people sleeping in these shacks out in the cold, in the very chilly winters of Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: It’s the same all over Zimbabwe. People who once had homes now have only what they salvaged from the bulldozers. Many no longer have a roof over their heads, most are still dazed, confused and afraid.
MAN 1: We’re just sitting here like this, struggling.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Why are you sitting here?
MAN 1: We’ve got nowhere to go.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: What do you mean you’ve got nowhere to go? What happened to where you were staying?
MAN 1: The local government, and the government, they demolished our places so now, we haven’t found an alternative place.
MAN 2: They just came, they didn’t give us a warning.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: How has it affected your family?
MAN 2: It affected a lot because now we don’t have sources to get money, can’t get money any more.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They’re now pushing their carts for almost a distance of 30 kilometres.
DANIEL: “Operation Restore Order” is interpreted by critics like Jay Jay as a bid to stave off rebellion.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: The focal point is to destabilise the opposition strongholds. They are trying to get rid of the electorate in the cities into the rural areas where it is easy to manipulate or even abuse them and they will be fed with propaganda.
DANIEL: Apart from the cricket, this is my only opportunity to film openly - propaganda parading as patriotism.
This is Zimbabwe’s Heroes Day to commemorate those killed in the struggle for independence, and as you can see thousands have turned out to mark the occasion including the President.
Sikhumbuzo Mguni’s husband was kidnapped and killed four years ago and yet she’s here today thanking the government for supporting her family since his death.
SIKHUMBUZO MGUNI: It’s a bit difficult but the government chips in. The government is a great help. I’ve got allowances and school fees for the children and uniform allowances every year. That’s what helps me.
WOMAN IN CROWD: Someone’s telling lies outside. I like Mugabe. I like Mugabe. He’s my President.
DANIEL: But if you look closely at this crowd, you’ll see that it’s mostly made up of soldiers and police and it’s likely that any others came out of fear.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: If you don’t go with crowd, they’ll call you a traitor and once you are labelled a traitor in Heroes Day or at a function like that you’ll be beaten up and they will deal with you, maybe by the time the police come you’ll be a finished person.
DANIEL: Lately Robert Mugabe has introduced a new method of crowd control. Zimbabweans are being corralled into camps like this one. Jay Jay has taken a huge gamble to film here.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This is a new camp, which is called Hopley Farm. It is said that they get only one meal day at exactly 3 o’clock. It seems as if they are in a remand prison.
DANIEL: This camp near Harare was built to hide people from international media attention. Jay Jay describes it as a concentration camp.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Inside the camps there’s fear in the faces of the people. They’re even scared to talk to their own brothers. Fear has been instilled into these people and they’re helpless.
DANIEL: Sanitation here is appalling and the people are at serious risk of disease.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: The people don’t even have clean drinking water. They are actually sharing that water with animals, domestic animals like cattle and they all come to the same dam. That’s where they bath, that’s where they do their laundry. It’s pathetic.
DANIEL: People living here are not allowed to leave and they claim they’re being starved.
MAN: We are not getting any food. They say that we’re going to get food from the social welfare but so far in the three weeks that we’ve been here none has been delivered.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: So are you saying they won’t allow food into the camp?
MAN: No. They won’t allow food into the camp.
DANIEL: At the heart of Zimbabwe’s problem, is its drift towards economic collapse and that’s something that Robert Mugabe seems incapable of controlling.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: You can see the queue is stretching for almost 500 metres up to now. I don’t know how much it will stretch.
DANIEL: There’s almost no foreign currency in the country. Foreign investment has collapsed. Exports are in decline. As Jay Jay’s images show, Zimbabwe is simply grinding to a halt.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: For how long have you been in this petrol queue?
MAN: I got here four days ago, on the queue, no petrol. We have started, this is a business car but without petrol there’s no business.
DANIEL: Across Zimbabwe people spend their days queuing for food.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: With the serious shortage of basic commodities in Zimbabwe due to the economic meltdown, organisations like OK Supermarkets have got nothing in stock.
DANIEL: Drought, the seizure of productive white farms by the government and the lack of foreign currency mean food can’t be grown and it can’t be bought. The people have become desperate.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: We see a whole lot of people in a queue there and let’s try and find out why these people are in the queue.
MAN: I joined this queue yesterday at 7pm.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: So you’ve been here since last night?
MAN: Since last night. The police came and harassed and assaulted us.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: These policemen are keeping a watchful eye.
DANIEL: In today’s Zimbabwe, the police and the military get priority.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: And there is a policeman carrying a bag, he has never been onto the queue but he’s got a bag. As reported by some members of the people who were in the queue, they say it is the police who get first priority and the soldiers.
DANIEL: Jay Jay takes great risks to film undercover. Some days it’s just luck that stands between him and a prison cell.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: As you can see, this is where they stock bread and there’s nothing, absolutely nothing so it’s being distributed directly from the bakery and they are limiting to a loaf a person.
DANIEL: After all, this is the story the Zimbabwean government doesn’t want you to see. And seconds after filming this, Jay Jay’s luck runs out. Arrested at the supermarket, he’s taken to the police station and interrogated.
Back in the centre of Harare, the cricket continues in splendid isolation. And I get word of Jay Jay’s arrest. Despite numerous calls, there’s nothing I can do to help him.
[Daniel talking on phone] Apparently they caught him filming in a supermarket, I don’t know what he was doing there.
After a few tense hours, Jay Jay talked his way free. The police demanded his tapes and camera but luckily he passed them to a friend.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They searched me, stripped me, I had to take off my clothes, it was so humiliating. And they threatened to beat me up, to take me to the central intelligence organisation and so on but I just remained cool and calm because I knew without any evidence there was no case. You always get your heart thumping because you don’t know what’s going to happen next, especially when you have got the camera out. If it’s hidden somewhere, it’s not a problem, but once you’ve got it out then anything can happen.
DANIEL: It’s time to journey back into exile but before he leaves Jay Jay risks just one more stop. Jay Jay has not seen his children in almost a year. Last time he came home he was caught and tortured for being a political activist and had to flee. This time the torture will be leaving in the knowledge that he may never come back to see his babies, especially his 7 year old daughter.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I really had a good experience with my kids, it was nice meeting them again. The attachment was very easy. A few hours with them, they caught up and in the end, this is Dad, they would mingle around me with their bicycles. When I was leaving, I mean it’s sad, I mean she cried and she really wanted to come with me. She keeps on saying Dad why don’t we just go and stay together in South Africa.
DANIEL: As Jay Jay begins his final journey out of Zimbabwe, I start to make my own way south to meet him at the border. I’ve been able to do some clandestine filming as well. And along the way I make one final stop in Zimbabwe’s second city of Bulawayo to secretly interview families relocated by the upheaval.
TSITSI: I don’t have money to do a house for my baby.
DANIEL: Tsitsi has been moved a number of times since her home was demolished. Now pregnant and hungry, she sleeps here with her children and the crawling bugs.
They’re all over you when you’re sleeping?
TSITSI: Yeah I don’t sleep.
DANIEL: And the plight of those like her is being deliberately hidden by a government determined to keep the media out.
Jay Jay and I are now reaching the end of our parallel journeys. Jay Jay gets back after crossing a crocodile infested river emerging from the gloom into South Africa.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: It was very tough to leave, definitely, it was hard. I mean home is always best despite the sadness in my country I still love it.
DANIEL: And he’s realistic enough to know that he may never be able to return.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I’ve already received an anonymous phone call which simply said to me “Jay Jay, don’t ever come back to this country until it’s suitable for you to come back”. So at the moment, I would never dare to go back to Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: Hey?
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Ah Zoe. You’re back in one piece. What did you see?
DANIEL: It’s hard.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: It’s tough huh?
DANIEL: Yeah and it’s stressful.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Very stressful.
DANIEL: It went straight to my heart.
But at least we’ve been able to escape the madness of Robert Mugabe’s regime. For the ordinary Zimbabweans we leave behind, there’s a stark choice – exile if they leave or if they stay the prospect of starvation as they watch their homes reduced to rubble.
ROBERT MUGABE: Yes there is discomfort now, but discomfort in order to get comfort later.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: My name is Jay Jay Sibanda and I’m an exile, a Zimbabwean exile in South Africa. I left my family in 2001. I was a political activist.
DANIEL: Jay Jay Sibanda is heading home. He’s decided to risk his life to tell the world about his country’s plight.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They might take me in, arrest me and perhaps detain me without even charges or alternatively they might even murder me. They will torture me definitely but I’m prepared for that. There’s always going to be some sacrifice for us to regain our freedom and as Nelson Mandela said before – freedom does not come easy.
JAY JAY SIBANDA [Kneeling and praying before he sets off]: I’m embarking on a serious journey home. I’m going to meet my parents, I’m going to meet my family. Guide me Lord, bless them and bless me. The success and the failure of my mission rests in your hands.
DANIEL: Jay Jay is one of at least two million Zimbabweans who fled to South Africa. Like many exiles, he’s a member of an underground network working to topple Mugabe and he’s agreed to take a camera across the border for us to record what’s happening.
[Showing Jay Jay how to use the camera]
So you open it here and you push that out fully and then this will pop up. You need to push that.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Something has got to be done and someone has to do it. But who is the question. People are scared to move into Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: It’s midnight and we’re in a township near Musina. This is where the exiles come when they need help crossing the border and tonight we’re here to see if Jay Jay can cross safely tomorrow. He’s a marked man in Zimbabwe and will have to cross the border illegally. It’s a high risk strategy. Jay Jay’s been caught before and tortured. So he needs to buy some reliable friends to bypass the border guards and the barbed wire.
Musina is the closest South African town to the border and it’s here that Zimbabweans come to escape the demolition gangs and to pick up supplies that they can’t get in their own country. It’s also here that Jay Jay will start his dangerous journey. But along with the risks, there are rewards. A rare opportunity to see his family on the other side of the wire.
So you’re feeling nervous but are you looking forward to seeing your family now?
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Well obviously, especially my young daughter, the 7 year old one, you know we are in love and I know she really misses me.
DANIEL: With the right people paid off, Jay Jay climbs the fence and enters Zimbabwe.
This is Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare. Once one of the most prosperous cities in Africa. It’s the starting point for New Zealand’s controversial cricket tour, underway against the wishes of the New Zealand government. So while Jay Jay is entering the country secretly, I’ve come the official route as a sports journalist ostensibly to cover the cricket. This is the image of Zimbabwe that Robert Mugabe wants the world to see and journalists are closely watched so that they keep their cameras on the game. But it’s a surreal scene – when just a few blocks away, downtown Harare has been flattened by bulldozers.
WOMAN: Along this block they destroyed everything that belonged to us. We are now staying out in the open. We have kids. It’s now two months, sleeping right here where you can see.
MAN: To tell the truth, what this government did is bad. This is my new home. I wake up here and go to work. My children are sleeping on the floor right here.
DANIEL: And having entered the country safely, Jay Jay’s walked right into the middle of Mugabe’s “Operation Restore Order”. Since May, its official purpose has been to remove illegal structures and to crack down on crime. But it might be better named “Operation Wreak Havoc”. It’s left millions without homes.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I think the situation is getting worse by the day. Zimbabweans are living like refugees in their own land and it’s pathetic the international community has watched this for too long and there’s nothing in sight that this crisis is going to come to an end.
DANIEL: In Zimbabwe filming secretly like this can get you gaoled for up to two years. The government has also just passed a new law with a 20 year gaol sentence for critical media coverage. But a team of underground film makers has sprung up to get pictures like these out to the world and Jay Jay has joined their ranks.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: There we go, this is the camp as you can see and this is Mbare in Harare. These people had their homes destroyed.
DANIEL: Jay Jay’s footage shows the bitter aftermath of “Operation Restore Order”.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This man is already preparing to cook. He’s got his bed outside and there he’s made some fire. The man is now preparing supper for his family.
DANIEL: Mugabe’s clean-up campaign has made a mess of his people’s lives.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This camp, small as it is, hosts about 250 people sleeping in these shacks out in the cold, in the very chilly winters of Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: It’s the same all over Zimbabwe. People who once had homes now have only what they salvaged from the bulldozers. Many no longer have a roof over their heads, most are still dazed, confused and afraid.
MAN 1: We’re just sitting here like this, struggling.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Why are you sitting here?
MAN 1: We’ve got nowhere to go.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: What do you mean you’ve got nowhere to go? What happened to where you were staying?
MAN 1: The local government, and the government, they demolished our places so now, we haven’t found an alternative place.
MAN 2: They just came, they didn’t give us a warning.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: How has it affected your family?
MAN 2: It affected a lot because now we don’t have sources to get money, can’t get money any more.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They’re now pushing their carts for almost a distance of 30 kilometres.
DANIEL: “Operation Restore Order” is interpreted by critics like Jay Jay as a bid to stave off rebellion.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: The focal point is to destabilise the opposition strongholds. They are trying to get rid of the electorate in the cities into the rural areas where it is easy to manipulate or even abuse them and they will be fed with propaganda.
DANIEL: Apart from the cricket, this is my only opportunity to film openly - propaganda parading as patriotism.
This is Zimbabwe’s Heroes Day to commemorate those killed in the struggle for independence, and as you can see thousands have turned out to mark the occasion including the President.
Sikhumbuzo Mguni’s husband was kidnapped and killed four years ago and yet she’s here today thanking the government for supporting her family since his death.
SIKHUMBUZO MGUNI: It’s a bit difficult but the government chips in. The government is a great help. I’ve got allowances and school fees for the children and uniform allowances every year. That’s what helps me.
WOMAN IN CROWD: Someone’s telling lies outside. I like Mugabe. I like Mugabe. He’s my President.
DANIEL: But if you look closely at this crowd, you’ll see that it’s mostly made up of soldiers and police and it’s likely that any others came out of fear.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: If you don’t go with crowd, they’ll call you a traitor and once you are labelled a traitor in Heroes Day or at a function like that you’ll be beaten up and they will deal with you, maybe by the time the police come you’ll be a finished person.
DANIEL: Lately Robert Mugabe has introduced a new method of crowd control. Zimbabweans are being corralled into camps like this one. Jay Jay has taken a huge gamble to film here.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: This is a new camp, which is called Hopley Farm. It is said that they get only one meal day at exactly 3 o’clock. It seems as if they are in a remand prison.
DANIEL: This camp near Harare was built to hide people from international media attention. Jay Jay describes it as a concentration camp.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Inside the camps there’s fear in the faces of the people. They’re even scared to talk to their own brothers. Fear has been instilled into these people and they’re helpless.
DANIEL: Sanitation here is appalling and the people are at serious risk of disease.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: The people don’t even have clean drinking water. They are actually sharing that water with animals, domestic animals like cattle and they all come to the same dam. That’s where they bath, that’s where they do their laundry. It’s pathetic.
DANIEL: People living here are not allowed to leave and they claim they’re being starved.
MAN: We are not getting any food. They say that we’re going to get food from the social welfare but so far in the three weeks that we’ve been here none has been delivered.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: So are you saying they won’t allow food into the camp?
MAN: No. They won’t allow food into the camp.
DANIEL: At the heart of Zimbabwe’s problem, is its drift towards economic collapse and that’s something that Robert Mugabe seems incapable of controlling.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: You can see the queue is stretching for almost 500 metres up to now. I don’t know how much it will stretch.
DANIEL: There’s almost no foreign currency in the country. Foreign investment has collapsed. Exports are in decline. As Jay Jay’s images show, Zimbabwe is simply grinding to a halt.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: For how long have you been in this petrol queue?
MAN: I got here four days ago, on the queue, no petrol. We have started, this is a business car but without petrol there’s no business.
DANIEL: Across Zimbabwe people spend their days queuing for food.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: With the serious shortage of basic commodities in Zimbabwe due to the economic meltdown, organisations like OK Supermarkets have got nothing in stock.
DANIEL: Drought, the seizure of productive white farms by the government and the lack of foreign currency mean food can’t be grown and it can’t be bought. The people have become desperate.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: We see a whole lot of people in a queue there and let’s try and find out why these people are in the queue.
MAN: I joined this queue yesterday at 7pm.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: So you’ve been here since last night?
MAN: Since last night. The police came and harassed and assaulted us.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: These policemen are keeping a watchful eye.
DANIEL: In today’s Zimbabwe, the police and the military get priority.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: And there is a policeman carrying a bag, he has never been onto the queue but he’s got a bag. As reported by some members of the people who were in the queue, they say it is the police who get first priority and the soldiers.
DANIEL: Jay Jay takes great risks to film undercover. Some days it’s just luck that stands between him and a prison cell.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: As you can see, this is where they stock bread and there’s nothing, absolutely nothing so it’s being distributed directly from the bakery and they are limiting to a loaf a person.
DANIEL: After all, this is the story the Zimbabwean government doesn’t want you to see. And seconds after filming this, Jay Jay’s luck runs out. Arrested at the supermarket, he’s taken to the police station and interrogated.
Back in the centre of Harare, the cricket continues in splendid isolation. And I get word of Jay Jay’s arrest. Despite numerous calls, there’s nothing I can do to help him.
[Daniel talking on phone] Apparently they caught him filming in a supermarket, I don’t know what he was doing there.
After a few tense hours, Jay Jay talked his way free. The police demanded his tapes and camera but luckily he passed them to a friend.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: They searched me, stripped me, I had to take off my clothes, it was so humiliating. And they threatened to beat me up, to take me to the central intelligence organisation and so on but I just remained cool and calm because I knew without any evidence there was no case. You always get your heart thumping because you don’t know what’s going to happen next, especially when you have got the camera out. If it’s hidden somewhere, it’s not a problem, but once you’ve got it out then anything can happen.
DANIEL: It’s time to journey back into exile but before he leaves Jay Jay risks just one more stop. Jay Jay has not seen his children in almost a year. Last time he came home he was caught and tortured for being a political activist and had to flee. This time the torture will be leaving in the knowledge that he may never come back to see his babies, especially his 7 year old daughter.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I really had a good experience with my kids, it was nice meeting them again. The attachment was very easy. A few hours with them, they caught up and in the end, this is Dad, they would mingle around me with their bicycles. When I was leaving, I mean it’s sad, I mean she cried and she really wanted to come with me. She keeps on saying Dad why don’t we just go and stay together in South Africa.
DANIEL: As Jay Jay begins his final journey out of Zimbabwe, I start to make my own way south to meet him at the border. I’ve been able to do some clandestine filming as well. And along the way I make one final stop in Zimbabwe’s second city of Bulawayo to secretly interview families relocated by the upheaval.
TSITSI: I don’t have money to do a house for my baby.
DANIEL: Tsitsi has been moved a number of times since her home was demolished. Now pregnant and hungry, she sleeps here with her children and the crawling bugs.
They’re all over you when you’re sleeping?
TSITSI: Yeah I don’t sleep.
DANIEL: And the plight of those like her is being deliberately hidden by a government determined to keep the media out.
Jay Jay and I are now reaching the end of our parallel journeys. Jay Jay gets back after crossing a crocodile infested river emerging from the gloom into South Africa.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: It was very tough to leave, definitely, it was hard. I mean home is always best despite the sadness in my country I still love it.
DANIEL: And he’s realistic enough to know that he may never be able to return.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: I’ve already received an anonymous phone call which simply said to me “Jay Jay, don’t ever come back to this country until it’s suitable for you to come back”. So at the moment, I would never dare to go back to Zimbabwe.
DANIEL: Hey?
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Ah Zoe. You’re back in one piece. What did you see?
DANIEL: It’s hard.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: It’s tough huh?
DANIEL: Yeah and it’s stressful.
JAY JAY SIBANDA: Very stressful.
DANIEL: It went straight to my heart.
But at least we’ve been able to escape the madness of Robert Mugabe’s regime. For the ordinary Zimbabweans we leave behind, there’s a stark choice – exile if they leave or if they stay the prospect of starvation as they watch their homes reduced to rubble.