I could not believe my eyes when I saw the leadership of the Southern African Development Community giving President Robert Mugabe a round of applause at the summit in Lusaka, Zambia, last week.

I could not believe my eyes when I saw the leadership of the Southern African Development Community giving President Robert Mugabe a round of applause at the summit in Lusaka, Zambia, last week.

How on earth could our leaders praise that dictator when everyone can see there are gross human rights violations in his country? As if that was not enough, they said that the situation in Zimbabwe is exaggerated by the West and the media. Shame on you SADC.

You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that the economic situation in Zimbabwe is even worse than it is in Sierra Leon. How can SADC leaders say that Zimbabwe is just going through difficult times?

If there is exaggeration from certain quarters, why do we see thousands of Zimbabweans running away from their home every day and crossing into South Africa?

Zimbabweans are desperate to survive, yet the leaders in our region cannot see how bad the situation is in that country.

Perhaps SADC chairman President Levy Mwanawasa and his buddies will realise how terrible the situation in Zimbabwe is when people in that country resort to cannibalism to survive.

Kedibone Sekhwela, Tembisa