POLICE SHOOT STRIKERS AND KILL 34, THEN STATE CHARGES STRIKERS WITH MURDER!

Imagine that you a miner in a platinum mine in South Africa.  You engage in a labor dispute with the mining company that pays you bare existence wages.  You strike and hold a rally.  The police come.  They open fire with live bullets.  Thirty four strikers die at the hands of a rogue police.  Then a week later, the state prosecutor charges 270 of your fellow workers with murder!

This is what is happening in South Africa.

The decision to prosecute the striking miners for what the police did in shooting the protesters is outrageous.  I blame Jacob Zuma, head of the ANC and president of South Africa.

The miners are blameless in the killing of their comrades, shot down by the police in cold blood.

NOW IS THE TIME FOR FINGER-POINTING IN SOUTH AFRICA

The police in South Africa, in cahoots with the ANC, open fire with live ammunition against striking miners.  Some 34 are killed, and another 70 wounded.

Linda Polgreen reports in today's The New York Times that South Africa's police commissioner, Riah Phiyega, is defending and justifying the massacre.

This is an outrage.

Who ordered the police to fire real bullets at the strikers?  Was it Phiyega?  Was it Jacob Zuma, South Africa's president?

What ever happened to the principle that police should not use lethal force unless absolutely necessary?

Contrary to Jacob Zuma's self-serving statement, this is a time for finger-pointing.  My first  move, fire the police chief and ask federal prosecutors to begin an investigation of a horrific crime scene, even if it leads to Zuma and Phiyega.