Let us turn our attention to the solstice chart for December 2008. Unlike the rest of astrologers in the world, I maintain and always will that the solstice represents the midpoint of the period over which the ingress chart has jurisdiction. The Capricorn ingress therefore rules the 6 odd weeks prior to the solstice and the 6 weeks after - ie. from around 7th November to 3rd or 4th February. (Traditionally, the Capricorn ingress chart would rule the period between the December solstice and March equinox, ie. from 21 Dec to 20 March.)
The Capricorn ingress for 2008 has a very interesting feature: a Pluto-Sun conjunction ... not unexpected since slow moving Pluto entered the sign of Capricorn scant weeks ago.
The Sun in a mundane chart represents the ruling political authority, cabinet ministers, and the president in particular. When the Sun conjoins Pluto, the planet of power and transformation, in a sensitive degree (solstice point) which is 90 degrees to the vernal point fiducial (0 Aries), in the sign of Capricorn - the zodiacal segment with jurisdiction over government and political authority - THEN we are looking at some pretty powerful political forces at work. The phrase "regime change" comes to mind.
Pluto's modus operandi takes many forms. Leaders can drop dead. Or they can be deposed. Or they can resign. Or they can be voted out. Whatever the case, the old one departs and a new one takes his place.
The question is, where in the world will these regime changes take place? A more appropriate question is: where in the world will incumbent leaders and administrations experience enormous pressures from the currents of destiny that prompt them to get the hell out?
The Pluto-Sun complex in the solstice chart will make itself felt in locations where it interacts with an angle. ESPECIALLY those locations where Pluto-Sun is aspecting both axes. Astromapping makes it a simple matter to identify affected countries: Canada, Ukraine and ... not surprisingly, Zimbabwe.
Canada is a vast landmass and has three different locations which meet the criterion of interaction between the Pluto-Sun conjunction and both axes simultaneously. However, none of these locations fall anywhere near major political centres such as Ottowa. Still, it is interesting to note that the conservative Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper avoided losing a no-confidence vote by suspending parliament until 27 January. The liberal-progressive forces are howling in indignation. Can he keep his minority government intact, come the new year? Time will tell. But these moves to get rid of him and his administration are typical of an active Pluto-Sun conjunction. It is quite possible that a no-confidence motion will be tabled and passed before the expiry of the Capricorn ingress jurisdiction in first week Feb.
The other case in the news at the moment is President Yushchenko in Kiev. As of today, the Ukranians have put together a new coalition government after a deadlock of some months. The emergence of the new government is also typical of the kind of political transformations wrought by the Pluto-Sun conjunction. One wonders whether the coalition will survive the balance of the ingress jurisdiction, given that powerful "regime change" forces remain operational in the region.
The most glaring activity of the Pluto-Sun complex appears in the ingress chart erected for Harare, Zimbabwe. Click images below to enlarge chart and astromap. The Pluto-Moon contact trines the Asc, inconjuncts IC. This is a text book case of a country ripe for regime change. Indeed, you will note that the cholera crisis entered the international headspace in the 2nd week of November, precisely when the Capricorn ingress chart kicked off its jurisdiction. It is this same cholera outbreak which is fomenting unprecedented challenges to the Mugabe regime. In the Harare chart, note how the Pluto-Sun complex is hugging the 9th house cusp - inter alia significating churches and legal environments. In this context, we observe that some of Mugabe's most strident critics of late have been church leaders. There are also moves afoot to have Mugabe indicted by the ICC in the Hague.
If ever there was a time to unseat Mugabe this is it. Once the Aries 2009 ingress assumes jurisdiction around first week in Feb 2009, the regime change momentum tails off and Mugabe regains his foothold. Any intervention to turf out Mugabe, whether foreign or internal, will be harmonising with natural cycles and should enjoy a high level of success. This is a window of opportunity during which Mugabe has never been weaker or more compromised.
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Reported in the Guardian today (10 Dec 08):
United States President George Bush on Tuesday called for an end to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's regime amid allegations from the Zimbabwean government that the West is pouncing on a cholera epidemic to plan an invasion.
Bush joined an increasingly large group of leaders calling on Mugabe (84) to step down. French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday also called for Mugabe's resignation, as have British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, European Commission foreign policy chief Javier Solana, Kenya's Prime Minister Raila Odinga and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, among others.
"We urge others from the region to step up and join the growing chorus of voices calling for an end to Mugabe's tyranny," Bush said, adding it was "time for Robert Mugabe to go" and pledging US support to help rebuild the country once he's gone.
Zimbabwe is in the throes of a cholera epidemic caused by the collapse of health, water and sewerage systems. Hard-pressed Zimbabweans, half of whom (over five million) already require food aid, are succumbing at an alarming rate to what is normally an easily treatable disease.
The United Nations World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Tuesday that at least 589 people had died and over 13 960 people been infected so far in a cholera outbreak that began in sewage-drenched poor urban townships in August. The real death toll is thought to be much higher, because many people die at home and their deaths are never reported.
A group of senior United Nations officials arrived in Zimbabwe on Monday to help coordinate the government and aid agencies' response to the epidemic.
Last week, the regime finally gave in to local and international pressure and appealed for international help to contain the epidemic.
But by Tuesday, the government was accusing Western governments of using the epidemic as a front for intervention by the UN Security Council.
"They are dead set on ensuring that there is an invasion of Zimbabwe," George Charamba, Mugabe's spokesperson, was quoted as saying by state media on Tuesday.
He would not be surprised, he said, if the British and Americans tried to "spring a mission" involving the UN.
The cholera outbreak is but one manifestation of a wholesale breakdown in state infrastructure caused by a severe economic crisis generally blamed on poor government policies.
As taps dry up, Zimbabweans have been forced to scrounge water from unprotected sources, including rivers and shallow wells contaminated by sewage.
The health crisis is compounded by the closure of state hospitals because of a medics' strike. Hyperinflation of at least 231-million percent has made their pay worthless.
The Red Cross said in Geneva it was feeding health workers in some clinics to keep them on the job. The UN and the Red Cross also said they were working to tank in clean water and dig wells.
Zimbabwe's African neighbours are still pushing a government of national unity, in which Mugabe's Zanu-PF and Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) would share power, as the best solution to the crisis.
A South African government delegation has been in Zimbabwe since Monday to try to nudge the two parties towards a final agreement on the unity government and assess the humanitarian crisis.
The British Foreign Office minister responsible for Africa, Mark Malloch-Brown, will also travel to South Africa later this week to discuss the crisis in Zimbabwe, the government in London said on Tuesday.
Abduction
The diplomatic push comes amid a renewed campaign of state repression against the MDC and civil society.
MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai's spokesperson George Sibotshiwe said suspected state agents hijacked and abducted an MDC official, Gandhi Mudzingwa, on Monday while he was driving in Harare.
The reported abduction brings to at least 19 the number of MDC supporters and civil society activists to have been whisked away in recent weeks by unidentified armed agents.
The MDC suspects his abductors were from the feared Central Intelligence Organisation, which is also suspected of the abduction on Wednesday last week of Jestina Mukoko, director of the Zimbabwe Peace Project non-governmental organisation.
A High Court judge on Tuesday ordered police to search all areas within their jurisdiction for Mukoko, whose whereabouts are still unknown. The police have said they know nothing of her abduction.
Some analysts believe that Mugabe may again be trying to "soften up" the opposition in advance of possible fresh elections.
Mugabe, who placed second to Tsvangirai in the last credible presidential elections in March and later smashed his way to an uncontested victory in a violent run-off, last week told a group of supporters to "be ready" for new elections.
AP report 12-12-08:
Brussels - Britain's Foreign Secretary on Friday blamed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe for causing "death and destruction on a grand scale" and rejected his claim that the country's deadly cholera outbreak was over.
"There is a tragedy in Zimbabwe and it's a manmade tragedy and the man whose made it is the head of the government, and he's immiserated his own people, he's caused death and destruction on a grand scale," David Miliband told Associated Press Television News.
"It's evident to anyone who hears the tales of people in Zimbabwe that cholera remains a very significant problem," Miliband added. "I wish it had been curtailed or curbed, but I think that the public health situation in Zimbabwe is very, very grave indeed."
Speaking on the sidelines of a European Union summit in Brussels, Miliband said Mugabe's "rogue government" was getting in the way of international efforts to provide humanitarian aid for the country to fight the cholera outbreak.
On Thursday, Mugabe declared there is "no cholera" in Zimbabwe and the country's health crisis was over, even as the United Nations raised the death toll from the epidemic to 783.
Cholera has spread rapidly in the southern African nation because of the country's crumbling health care system and the lack of clean water.
Mugabe has ruled his country since its 1980 independence from Britain and has refused to leave office following disputed elections in March.
U.S. President George W Bush, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have called recently for the 84-year-old leader to step down.
- AP
Reuters 12-12-08
Washington - Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe could be forced to step down if South Africa and other neighbours take the bold step of sealing their borders with the landlocked country, a senior US official said on Thursday.
The United States has been pushing African states, particularly the 15-nation Southern African Development Community, to take firmer action on Zimbabwe, where the economy and infrastructure have collapsed, spawning food shortages and a cholera epidemic that has killed nearly 800 people so far.
Zimbabwe's neighbours are divided over what approach to take, with Mugabe still viewed by many as a hero for liberating the country from white minority rule. This week the African Union rejected tougher action in favour of more dialogue.
"There is a continued outcry from African nations that this is an African problem and it needs an African solution. But so far they have been unwilling to step up and show us what that African solution is," the senior US official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
"That African solution is very simple - get rid of Mugabe."
Once hailed as a model African democrat, Mugabe has clung to power for years, despite the worsening economic crisis that critics blame on his policies. After losing parliamentary elections in March, he reached a power sharing deal with the opposition, but talks on implementing it have stalled.
The US official said a popular uprising to oust Mugabe was unlikely as the "real risk-takers" had already fled to neighbouring countries to seek work there.
"Somebody from the outside is going to have do this. ... At the end of the day South Africa," he said, referring to the continent's biggest power which has borne the brunt of Zimbabwe's refugee crisis.
"It takes something as simple as closing the borders. Zimbabwe is a landlocked country. The closure of the border, literally in a week would bring this country to its knees," he said.
"There is still a formal economy in Zimbabwe - $2bn still flows into this country through various means, and even a lot more in the informal economy. A lot of that money flows across the borders, illegally or legally, with South Africa."
He said the US government, which has urged Mugabe to step down, was working behind the scenes with South Africa "to do what they think is in their best interests". South Africa has so far favoured dialogue over confrontation with Mugabe.
South Africa declared a stretch of its border with Zimbabwe a disaster zone on Thursday because of the increase in cholera cases but did not appear to have sealed it.
State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack said on Thursday he expected Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who has urged Mugabe to step down, to raise the Zimbabwean crisis with her colleagues during a visit to the United Nations next week.
At a separate news conference in Washington, the US ambassador to Zimbabwe, James McGee, said Zimbabwe was rapidly becoming a failed state. He also blamed the cholera crisis on the government's mismanagement, saying it was "man-made".
At the same briefing, Henrietta Fore, the administrator of the United States aid agency USAID, said the epidemic was worsening, contradicting Mugabe's assertion in a televised speech earlier in the day that it had been contained.
She said USAID was providing an additional $6.2m toward health, water and sanitation programs and had deployed. This was on top of the $4.6m it was already spending.
Another USAID official, Ky Luu, said the agency was bracing for the epidemic to spread with the onset of summer rains, which would contaminate wells, and the annual Christmas migration of urban residents to their rural family homes.
Guardian 12-12-08
Zanu-PF leader Robert Mugabe's government backpedalled Friday on his claim that Zimbabwe had defeated cholera, after the remarks sparked an international outcry, including comparisons with Hitler.
In a nationally broadcast speech, Mugabe claimed on Thursday that "there is no cholera", even as the United Nations announced the death toll was nearing 800.
"I am happy to say our doctors have been assisted by others, and WHO [the World Health Organisation] and they have now arrested cholera," Mugabe said.
His spokesperson, George Charamba, said in the state newspaper the Herald that the president had spoken with "sarcasm", and accused Western media of distorting his speech.
The WHO said on Friday that Zimbabwe's cholera epidemic is not under control and the death toll has risen to 792.
"I don't think that the cholera outbreak is under control as of now," WHO spokesperson Fadela Chaib said.
The spokesperson said the number of reported deaths had risen to 792 from 783 on Thursday with 16 700 cases reported.
Mugabe's remarks drew swift condemnation from around the world, with one South African Anglican bishop likening him to Hitler.
"Mugabe must be viewed as the 21st-century Hitler because of the deaths and suffering of Zimbabweans under his rule," Bishop Joe Seoka said in the Times, calling for the 84-year-old to face war-crimes charges.
Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) said that "either Mr Mugabe is mischievous or genuinely out of touch with reality".
"Instead of conveying a message of condolence, Mr Mugabe was busy politicking," spokesperson Nelson Chamisa said.
The cholera epidemic is only the latest grim symptom of Zimbabwe's collapse.
The economy has crumbled under the world's highest inflation rate, last estimated in July at 231-million percent but now believed to be much higher.
A new Z$500-million note, worth US$10, was introduced on Friday. The central bank cannot print money fast enough to keep pace with prices that rise several times a day.
Due to currency shortages, cash can only be withdrawn once a week from banks, and then people are allowed to take only Z$500-million, which is not enough to see them through the day.
Hospitals have no drugs, no equipment and no staff left to treat the cholera epidemic, which has spread as sewage and water lines have broken down, contaminating the drinking supply.
A political stalemate between Mugabe and MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai has deepened the crisis after disputed elections earlier this year.
The two signed a power-sharing deal three months ago but have so far failed to agree on how to form a unity government.
The United States called on Thursday for South Africa to close its border with Zimbabwe to cut off deliveries to the country.
"This is a landlocked country. And its formal and informal economies would suffer. Within a week, it would bring the economy on its knees," a senior US official said in Washington on condition of anonymity.
Britain's Africa Minister, Mark Malloch-Brown, also denounced Mugabe's remarks, saying the veteran leader's government had failed to deliver aid to his people.
"Confronted with that failure of his government the best he can claim is what cholera? My question to Mr Mugabe is where are you? Are you really in Zimbabwe?" Malloch-Brown said during a visit to South Africa on Thursday.
France's Foreign Ministry also rejected Mugabe's statement, saying Zimbabwe's people are in desperate need of international aid.
"For the sake of the people, it is crucial that international aid be delivered quickly to Zimbabwe," deputy spokesperson Frederic Desagneaux said.
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