'Strike fear in the heart of the white man': Mugabe

President Robert Mugabe is blaming a "racist" minority for Zimbabwe's growing economic crisis, and is urging blacks to unite against whites.

"Our party must continue to strike fear in the heart of the white man, our real enemy," Mugabe shouted to about 7,000 cheering supporters at a meeting of his governing ZANU-PF party.

"They think because they are white, they have a divine right to our resources," he said on Thursday, waving his fist. "Not here. Never again."

Mugabe, 76, did not address issues of whether his two decades of leadership should continue and how to rescue Zimbabwe's economy.

Mugabe accused the country's one per cent white minority of sabotaging the economy in an effort to destroy his party, in power since independence from Britain in 1980.

He said Zimbabwe's 12 million blacks were not in control of the country's resources, and he vowed to continue seizing white-owned farmland.

Mugabe advocates redistributing the property to landless blacks as a way to economic recovery, even though courts have twice declared the land grab illegal.

"This country is our country and this land is our land," he said. "The white man is not indigenous to Africa. Africa is for Africans. Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans."

Observers said Mugabe's provocative speech was an attempt to revive sagging support for his party.

ZANU-PF lost a referendum on a draft constitution in February and narrowly won parliamentary elections in June.

Analysts warned that if Western countries don't resume support which was cut over Mugabe's controversial policies life will get worse for many Zimbabweans.

Food prices have jumped by 60 per cent since last year and chronic fuel shortages prevent people from going to work. Many employees fear their jobs will be gone by next year.

Mugabe's speech came two days after white farmer Henry Elsworth was killed in an ambush near his farm. He was the seventh white farmer to die violently this year.