Mugabe, Tsvangirai to attend independence celebrations

http://www.zimonline.co.za/

by Nokuthula Sibanda Wednesday 15 April 2009

HARARE - Members of Zimbabwe's inclusive government will on Saturday attend
celebrations to mark 29 years of independence from Britain, a government
minister announced on Tuesday.

President Robert Mugabe will give the keynote address at the ceremony to be
held at the National Sports stadium west of Harare city center.

It will be the first time since the formation of the then opposition
Movement for Democratic Change  (MDC) in September 1999 that the party -- 
which last February joined a power-sharing government with Mugabe's ZANU PF
party -- will be represented at independence celebrations.

"The celebrations should also be a time to celebrate the new governmental
arrangement we have put in place," Ignatius Chombo, local government
minister announced at a press conference at his offices.

 "The country had every reason to be optimistic with the new dispensation.
All members of the inclusive government will be in attendance and President
Robert Mugabe will deliver the keynote address," he said.

The MDC delegation is set to be led by party leader and Prime Minister in
the unity government Morgan Tsvangirai.

A regional breadbasket at independence, Zimbabwe has dramatically
deteriorated over the years to become a caricature African basket case with
the world's fastest shrinking economy, acute shortages of essential
commodities and deepening poverty, amid a cholera epidemic that has infected
more than 90 000 people and killed more than 4 000 others.

The unity government between Mugabe, Tsvangirai and Deputy Prime Minister
Arthur Mutambara has raised hopes Zimbabwe could finally emerge from its
crisis but reluctance of Western nations to provide financial support to the
Harare government has sparked fears it could fail.

Western nations - that continue to give humanitarian aid - insist they want
Zimbabwe's unity government to submit a credible economic recovery
programme, implement genuine and comprehensive political and economic
reforms before they can lift sanctions on Mugabe and top ZANU PF officials
as well as provide direct financial support to Harare. - ZimOnline.

Violence intensifies on Zim farms

http://www.zimonline.co.za/

by Andrew Moyo Wednesday 15 April 2009

HARARE - Violence intensified on farms across Zimbabwe over the Easter
holidays, with farm invaders attacking workers and owners, while more than
US$2 million worth of produce could go to waste after invaders stopped
harvesting operations on at least at two farms.

At Nancy Carmel farm near the town of Chegutu, a farm labourer was severely
burnt after a mob of farm invaders assaulted him and threw him into a fire,
a farmer, Ben Freath, told ZimOnline.

The invaders have also been stealing mangoes at the farm, according to
Freath, who is part of a group of white farmers who successfully challenged
the legality of the government's land reform programme at the regional SADC
Tribunal.

"About US$50 000 worth of mango has been affected and 150 workers are not
allowed to work. One of them was thrown into the fire .. they beat him up
and he suffered a broken scull," Freath said.

At Stokedale farm, also near Chegutu, invaders forced operations to a halt
and oranges worth US$2 million could go to waste as a result, according to
Justice for Agriculture (JAG), a pressure group for white farmers.

A group of invaders stormed Wolghamton farm in Chipinge in the east of the
country over the holidays and attempted to stop owner Trevor Gifford from
harvesting timber at the farm.

Gifford, who is also president of the Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) that is
the main representative body for the country's white farmers, said invaders
showed him a "fraudulent court order" that he should stop harvesting the
timber.

"They had a fraudulent court document in which the beneficiary wanted to get
the police to stop me from harvesting saying he had obtained a court order
to do so," said Gifford.

Freath said farmers had written to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai who
formed a power-sharing government with President Robert Mugabe last February
and has called for the arrest and prosecution of farm invaders.

"We have made reports but the Joint Operations Command (JOC) is controlling
the situation. We have written to the Prime Minister (Morgan Tsvangirai)
regarding what is happening but at this stage it is being allowed to
continue and it is difficult for the PM or anyone else to stop it," said
Freath.

The JOC, a committee of top securocrats and powerful politicians, is said to
be behind the mobs of Mugabe's ZANU PF supporters, war veterans and state
security agents that began invading farms almost immediately after formation
of an inclusive government in February between Tsvangirai, President Robert
Mugabe and Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara.

The JOC that includes the commanders of the police and army - and should
have been defunct by now in terms of the power-sharing agreement between
Zimbabwe's political parties -- is said to be opposed to the new government
and is seen as blocking calls by Tsvangirai last month on the police to
arrest farm invaders.

Commercial farmers' organisations say invaders have since February raided at
least 100 of the about 300 remaining white-owned commercial farms, a
development that has intensified doubts over whether the unity government
will withstand attempts by ZANU PF hardliners to sabotage it.

The International Monetary Fund and Western countries have - on top of other
conditions - made it clear that hey would not consider giving aid to the
Harare government while farm invasion continue.

Zimbabwe, also grappling with its worst ever economic crisis, has since 2000
when land reforms began, relied on food imports and handouts from
international food agencies mainly due to failure by resettled black
peasants to maintain production on former white farms.

Poor performance in the mainstay agricultural sector has also had far
reaching consequences as hundreds of thousands of people have lost jobs
while the manufacturing sector, starved of inputs from the sector, is
operating below 30 percent of capacity.

The SADC Tribunal has ruled that Mugabe's controversial programme to seize
white-owned land from whites for redistribution to landless blacks was
racist, discriminatory and illegal under the SADC Treaty to which Zimbabwe
is signatory.

Mugabe, who has in the past rejected the few rulings by Zimbabwean courts
against his land reforms, rejected the regional Tribunal ruling and vowed to
press on with farm seizures.  - ZimOnline

JAG - farm situations communique - dated 14th  April 2009

Email: jag@mango.zw : justiceforagriculture@zol.co.zw

JAG Hotlines: +263 (011) 610 073, +263 (04) 799410.  If you are in
trouble or need advice, please don't hesitate to contact us - we're here
to help!

To subscribe/unsubscribe to the JAG mailing list, please email:
jag@mango.zw with subject line "subscribe" or
"unsubscribe".

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. Murder on Stockdale

2. Report on Activities by Edna Madzongwe

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MURDER ON STOCKDALE FARM

ON SUNDAY THE 12 APRIL 2009 A MALE WAS CAUGHT STEALING (ETHEREDGES)
ORANGES BY EDNA MADZONGWES FARM GUARDS AT APPROXIMATELY 16:00.MADZONGWE
HAS BEEN RESIDENT ON THE FARM SINCE 5Th MARCH 2009.SHE WAS IN RESIDENCE
WHEN THIS MURDER TOOK PLACE

THIS GENTLEMAN WAS TAKEN TO THE CITRUS PACKSHED WHERE HE WAS TORTURED FOR
MOST OF THE NIGHT; AT AROUND 05:00 ON THE 13th MARCH 2009 THIS MAN WAS
RELEASED BY THE GUARDS (NO POLICE REPORT WAS MADE OF THE THEFT)

THIS GENLEMANS BODY WAS FOUND NEAR THE ENTRANCE TO THE FARM .A REPORT WAS
MADE TO THE CHEGUTU POLICE STATION AT AROUND 06:00; HOWEVER THE POLICE
ONLY GOT TO THE FARM AT 09:30

3 OF THE MADZONGWE GUARDS AND 2 OF STOCKDALES FORMER EMPLOYEES WERE
PICKED UP BY THE POLICE AND TAKEN TO THE POLICE STATION .HOWEVER TO DATE
NO ARRESTS HAVE BEEN MADE

AT AROUND 12:00 30 PEOPLE ARRIVED AT STOCKDALE FARM ANGRY ABOUT THE DEATH
OF THERE FRIEND AND AFTER THE CID INVESTIGATION PICKED UP THE BODY AND
TOOK IT TO CHEGUTU

THE 30 PLUS GROUP OF PEOPLE THEN WENT ONTO THE FARM AND HAVE CHASED AWAY
THE MADZONGWE GUARDS. THESE PEOPLE THEN STARTED SHOUTING AT MADZONGWE AND
HER 2 GROWN UP CHILDREN, WHO WERE IN THE COTTAGE THAT SHE HAD BROKEN INTO
ON THE 5Th MARCH.THE GROUP SHOUTED AT HER CALLING HER A MURDER AND A
THIEF, AS SHE HAS DISTROYED MANY FARMS IN THE CHEGUTU DISTRICT .THESE
PEOPLE STAYED ON THE FARM TILL ABOUT 23:30 AND RETURNED BACK TO CHEGUTU
.2 POLICE OFFICERS WERE DEPLOYED ON STOCKDALE DURING THE NIGHT

THE 30 PLUS PEOPLE HAVE TOLD MADZONGWE THAT SHE MUST GO AND THAT AFTER
THE FUNERAL ON 14th APRIL THEY WILL BE BACK

EDNA MADZONGWE LEFT AT AROUND 24:00 ON FOOT THROUGH THE FENCE TO THE MAIN
CHEGUTU/CHINOYI TARR ROAD WHERE SHE WAS PICKED UP FEARING FOR HER OWN
LIFE.!

I AM A LAW MAKER NOT A LAW BREAKER

SENATOR CHAIRPERSON EDNA MADZONGWE ON STOCKDALE FARM

·         EDNA MADZONGWE BORN 11 JULY 1943 ZIMBABWE ID No 63-748119H-H-32

·         RESIDENT AT 14 SLATER RD GUNHILL .HARARE.ZIMBABWE

·         23 APRIL 2007: MADZONGWE ARRIVED AT STOCKDALE CITRUS ESTATE
WITH KUNONGA (DISTRICT LANDS OFFICER) AND AN OFFER LETTER DATED 6TH
MARCH, 2007 SIGNED BY MUTASA (OFFER LETTER HAD EXPIRED). MADZONGWE WAS
INFORMED BY MR. RICHARD ETHEREDGE THAT HE WAS ONLY PREPARED TO DEAL WITH
THIS VIA THE LEGAL ROUTE.

·         STOCKDALE HAD NOT BEEN GAZETTED.  NO AUDIT HAS BEEN CARRIED OUT
TO THIS DAY (13TH APPRIL 2009) ON EITHER THE LAND, THE ORCHARDS OR THE
EQUIPMENT, BY THE MINISTRY OF LANDS.

·         12TH MAY 2007: MADZONGWE STARTED CLEARING LAND FOR CATTLE AND
DEMANDED ONE OF THE OCCUPIED HOUSES FOR HER STAFF AND HERSELF.

·         15TH JUNE 2007 STOCKDALE GIVEN LETTER TO TEMPORARY  EXTENSION
TO STAY ON FARM TO WIND UP BUSINESS.

·         22ND JUNE 2007:MADZONGWE WAS ISSUED A COURT APPLICATION..  SHE
TOLD THE ETHEREDGES THAT SHE IS NOT A LAW BREAKER BUT A LAW MAKER (THIS
HAS BEEN RECORDED ON DICTAPHONE). NEVERTHELESS SHE THREW THE SUMMONS ON
THE GROUND.

·         28TH JUNE 2007: HIGH COURT INTERDICT. MADZONGWE INSTRUCTED TO
REMOVE ALL EQUIPMENT AND STAFF FROM STOCKDALE BY 30TH JUNE

·         30TH JUNE 2007: STOCKDALE FARM GAZETTED. FOR THE FIRST TIME NOT
IN CONS0NANCE  WITH TRANSPARENT OR WITH JUSTIFIABLE PROCEDURE AND FACT.

·         9TH JULY 2007: MADZONGWE GIVEN NEW OFFER LETTER COMPLETED BY
HAND AND STAMPED BY THE Z.R.P. PARLIAMENT. THE LAID DOWN PROCEDURES TO A
VALID OFFER LETTER WERE NOT FOLLOWED.

·         12TH JULY 2007: STOCKDALE GIVEN LETTER TO TEMPORARY EXTENTION
OF STAY (OFF BY 30TH AUGUST 07)

·         31st AUGUST 2007: MADZONGWE/KUNONGA AND OTHERS DIRECTED THE
ETHEREDGES TO GET OFF THE FARM. THEY WERE PRESENTED  WITH A PRIOR HIGH
COURT ORDER AUTHORISING THE ETHEREDGES TO REMAIN IN OCCUPATION UNTIL
LAWFULLY ORDERED BY A COURT TO VACATE.

·         1ST OCTOBER 2007: 9 CHEGUTU FARMERS APPEAR IN COURT FOR
ILLEGALLY STAYING ON THEIR FARMS PLEADS OF NOT GUILTY WERE ENTERED. THE
SUBSTANTIVE PROSECUTION WAS NOT COMMENCED BECAUSE THE PROSECUTORS AND
MAGISTRATES WENT ON STRIKE.

·         7TH OCTOBER 2007: JAMBANJA  MADZONGWE AND KANONGA ARRIVE WITH
LOCAL YOUTH SINGING AND CHANTING ALL NIGHT IN MR JAMES ETHEREDGES'
GARDEN, HAVING BEEN SUPPLIED WITH DRUGS AND ALCOHOL BY HER.

·         8TH OCTOBER 2007:  POLICE  MOVED YOUTH TO PACKSHED

·         10TH- 5th NOVEMBER 2007. MADZONGWE MOVED PEOPLE ON THE FARM
DESPITE HIGH COURT ORDER

·         29TH FEBRUARY 2008:  THE CASES AGAINST THE 9 FARMERS WERE
WITHDRAWN AFTER PLEA OF WITHDRAWAL.

·         6TH APRIL 2008: RICHARD ETHEREDGE WAS SUMMONED TO APPEAR IN
COURT ON THE SAME CHARGE TO WHICH HE HAD PLEADED NOT GUILTY AND WHICH WAS
WITHDRAWN BY THE STATE AFTER PLEA.

·         19TH APRIL 2008: MR RICHARD ETHEREDGE PLEADED NOT GUILTY AGAIN
FOR THE SAME CHARGE BY THE STATE AFTER PLEA AND CHALLENGED THE FRESH
CHARGE AS NOT BEING COMPETENT AT LAW AS THIS CONSTITUTED "DOUBLE
JEOPARDY".  THE MATTER WAS REFERED TO THE HIGH COURT WHO GAVE A
FINAL ORDER THAT HE COULD NOT BE TRIED AGAIN FOR THE SAME OFFENCE.

·         17TH JUNE 2008: HIGH COURT CONSEQUENT TO A COURT APPLICATION TO
INVALIDATE THE FRESH CHARGE FIND ETHEREDGE AND 8 OTHER CHEGUTU FARMERS
NOT GUILTY FOR CONTRIVINING SECTION 3(3) OF THE LANDS ACT

        17TH JUNE 2008: GILBERT MOYO PLUS 40 OTHERS,  PURPORTEDLY UNDER
THE INSTRUCTION OF MADZONGWE,        VIOLENTLY EVICTED PETER AND JAMES
ETHEREDGES' FAMILIES. HOUSES AND THE FARM YARD WERE LOOTED OF
PROPERTY AND EQUIPMENT VALUED AT US$1,000,000. 00.

THERE ARE SWORN AFFIDAVITS AVAILABLE FROM GILBERT MOYO AND OTHERS THAT
THEY WERE WORKING SOLELY ON THE INSTRUCTIONS OF MADZONGWE. " I AM A
LAWMAKER NOT A LAWBREAKER."

VIDEO FOOTAGE, PHOTOGRAPHS AND TRANSCRIPTS ARE AVAILABLE OF THE LOOTING
AND DAMAGE TO PROPERTY THAT TOOK PLACE AT THAT TIME.  A CASE HAS BEEN
FILED AGAINST MADZONGWE, THE POLICE AND OTHERS FOR DAMAGES AND THEFT
INCURRED. MADZONGWE HAS PUBLICALLY STATED THAT SHE HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH
THE JAMBANJA SAYING THAT THE LOOTERS WERE JUST THUGS AND CRIMINALS. (IF
THIS WERE THE CASE THEN THE QUESTION IS WHY DID THE POLICE NOT REACT AND
WHY DID THEY SAY THAT "IT WAS A POLITICAL MATTER.") THIS IS
DESPITE THE FACT THAT THERE ARE WRITTEN AFFIDAVITS FROM GILBERT MOYO AND
OTHERS IMPLICATING MADZONGWE, DIRECTLY CONTRARY TO MADZONGWES'
ASSERTION.  THE POLICE ARE BEING HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR THE LACK OF
PROTECTION - THEY STOOD BY AND WATCHED THE LOOTING AND THE BEATINGS
THAT OCCURRED TO TWO MEMBERS OF THE FAMILY (KERRY ETHEREDGE AND JAMES
ETHEREDGE) AND FAILED IN THEIR DUTY TO UPHOLD LAW AND ORDER AND CONFORM
TO THE RULE OF LAW.

·         BETWEEN THE 17TH JUNE - 4JULY 2008:  MADZONGWE WAS SEEN
ON THE FARM NEARLY EVERY NIGHT FEEDING GILBERT MOYO AND HIS GANG
ESTABLISHING ACTIVE CONDUCT OR ASSOCIATION WITH THE LAWLESSNESS.  SADC
PROTECTION ON AN INTERIM BASIS WAS GRANTED IN FAVOUR OF THE ETHEREDGE
FAMILY WAS ACHIEVED THROUGH A TRIBUNAL ORDER RENDERED ON 28TH MARCH
2008.  LATER ON 28TH NOVEMBER 2008 A FINAL ORDER TO STOP THE LAWLESS
EVICTION BY GOVERNMENT OF THE ETHEREDGE FAMILY WAS ACHIEVED.

·         21ST FEBRUARY 2009:  MADZONGWE SENDS 10 YOUTHS TO THE FARM
FAILING TO FOLLOW DUE PROCESS TO VACANT POSSESSION IN SPITE OF THE FACT
THAT STOCKDALE IS PROTECTED BY FINAL COURT ORDERS AND SADC TRIBUNAL
RULING.

·         5TH MARCH 2009:  MADZONGWE ARRIVES IN PERSON WITH MOB AND STOPS
ALL WORK

·         14TH MARCH 2009:   FOUR SO-CALLED ZFTU MEMBERS, WHO SAID THEY
WERE UNDER MADZONGWES DIRECTIONS, VERBALLY ATTACK JAMES AND PETER
ETHEREDGE DEMANDING RETRENCHMENT PACKAGES FOR LABOR AND ISSUED PHYSICAL
THREATS

·         15TH MARCH 2009: MADZONGWE BREAKS DOWN DOOR OF HOUSE BY THE
PACKSHED IN THE PRESENSE OF THE CHEGUTU POLICE AND ORDERS ALL FURNITURE
TO BE REMOVED IN ORDER THAT SHE CAN MOVE IN.

·         16TH MARCH 2009: JAMES AND PETER ETHEREDGE GET OFF THE FARM
WITH THEIR FAMILIES FEARING FOR THEIR OWN SAFETY.

GOVERNMENT IN THE INTERIM PUBLICALLY ANNOUNCES THAT IT WILL NOT ABIDE BY
THE SADC RULING HAVING BEEN ENDORSED BY JUSTICE MALABA OF THE SUPREME
COURT BEFORE ANY HEARING ON WHETHER THE RULING AND JUDGEMENT IS BINDING
ON ZIMBABWE. PRIOR TO THE FINAL JUDGEMENT, GOVERNMENT THROUGH ITS LAWYERS
HAD PUBLICALLY NOTED IT WOULD ABIDE BY THE TRIBUNAL DECISION RE THE
SIGNING OF THE MEMBER STATES OF SADC TREATY ETC.

·         CONCLUSION

·         ABOUT 50 REPORTS TO THE POLICE HAVE BEEN MADE WITH NO REACTION

·         MADZONGWE HAS DEFIED 4 HIGH COURT ORDERS

·         MADZONGWE HAS IGNORED THE SADC RULING

·         MADZONGWE HAS OCCUPIED AND DESTROYED 8 FARMS HERSELF IN A
SIMILAR  MANNER

·         MADZONGWES' OTHER FARM (AITAPE), WHICH IS OCCUPIED BY
HER,  IS CLOSE TO STOCKDALE.   IT IS UNDERSTOOD THAT THERE IS NO ACTIVE
FARMING ON AITAPE BY MADZONGWE  IN SPITE OF IT BEING A VERY PRODUCTIVE
FARM IN THE PAST.

·         ALTHOUGH MADZONGWE WON THE SENATE SEAT FOR CHEGUTU SHE ONLY GOT
30 VOTES IN CHEGUTU TOWN ITS SELF

·          MADZONGWE IS A BENEFICARY OF THE FARM EQUIPMENT PROGRAMME AND
HAS A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF EQUIPMENT PARKED ON STOCKDALE AND ON HER OTHER
FARMS, REYDEN FARM, BOURNE FARM AND MPOFU FARM

·         IS  MADZONGWE  A  LAW MAKER?

·         IT IS INTERESTING TO NOTE THAT MADZONGWE AND HER ENTOURAGE
ARRIVE AT STOCKDALE FARM EACH TIME THE CITRUS EXPORT CROP IS READY TO
REAP, DEMANDING THAT THE ETHEREDGES VACATE THE FARM.

War vets want Zanu-PF out of GNU

http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=15133

April 15, 2009

MASVINGO - Zimbabwe's former Liberation war fighters have asked President
Robert Mugabe to immediately review their monthly pensions or else his
Zanu-PF party should pull out of the government of national unity.

They claim the new government is not addressing their needs adequately.

The war veterans received monthly pensions of US$40 dollars each last month.
They say this is too little to meet their daily needs in an economy that has
been wholly dollarized.

In a strongly worded letter addressed to their patron President Mugabe on
April 8 the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans' Association (ZNLWVA)
said they wanted to be paid monthly pensions that are sustainable. If that
failed they would demand that the leadership of Zanu-PF pull out of the
inclusive government.

"We can not survive on US$40 a month," reads the letter which The Zimbabwe
Times obtained a copy of.

"We liberated this country hence no government should look down upon us. We
demand that the issue of our pensions be addressed urgently otherwise we
believe you have to pull out of the inclusive government because our needs
are not being adequately catered for.

"We were better off when our party Zanu-PF was in control and our suffering
has now worsened following this inclusive government".

Although no official comment could be obtained from Jabulani Sibanda the
national chairman of the war veteran organisation, Tranos Huruva, the
Masvingo provincial chairman said the war veterans were not happy with the
money being paid as pension to war veterans.

"I can not comment on the contents of that letter but we are not happy with
the money we are getting," said Huruva.

"We have to make sure that our members are not neglected and that they live
decent lives like anyone (else) that is why we are appealing to the
President to address our issue."

Sources within the inclusive government yesterday said the former freedom
fighters were riled by Mugabe's remarks that they should engage Prime
Minister Morgan Tsvangirai on the issue of their pensions.

"The war veterans were openly told by Mugabe that they should engage the
Prime Minister over the issue of their pensions," said a source.

"This did not go down well with most of them. That is why they are saying
pulling out of the inclusive government might be an option if their pensions
and allowances are not increased."

Zimbabwe is currently undergoing a serious economic crisis and the two-month
old inclusive government is battling to restore economic stability.

The inclusive government is also struggling to pay its bloated civil
service. School teachers have already warned that they will not go back to
work when the second term begins on May 5 unless their allowances are
increased.

Members of the entire civil service are currently receiving a uniform
allowance of US$100 a month each, regardless of position held.

Although some western countries have pledged to work with the inclusive
government, big donor countries such as the United States of America and
Britain have made it clear that they will only make a contribution after
they are satisfied that there is a real power sharing between the three
parties in the inclusive government.

The West also wants Harare to restore the rule of law and ensure that
property and human rights are respected.

However, fresh farm invasions which have swept across the country over the
past month have dented Harare's prospects of getting meaningful financial
assistance from the West.

Using similar scare tactics and threats in 1997 the war veterans arm-twisted
the government into granting them millions of dollars in unbudgeted-for
gratuity payments. Analysts blame this action for triggering off Zimbabwe's
current economic crisis.

Three years later, in 2002, the ex-combatants spearheaded the government's
controversial land reform programme. The haphazard and lawless seizure of
commercial farms by the ex-combatants as well as by Zanu-PF aligned
politicians and businessmen contributed significantly to the collapse of the
backbone of Zimbabwe's economy, agriculture, and further aggravated the
economic downturn.

Monitoring Organization Says Zimbabwean State Media Remains Biased

http://www.voanews.com/

      By Sithandekile Mhlanga
      Washington
      14 April 2009

The Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe said Tuesday that the country's
state-controlled media continue to weigh their coverage in favor of
President Robert Mugabe and the former ruling ZANU-PF party despite the
formation in February of a unity government.

The MMPZ said ZANU-PF members of the government are given more ink and
airtime than their counterparts in the Movement for Democratic Change, whose
dominant formation is led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. It said
private media have been more even-handed.

Media Monitoring Project Advocacy Coordinator Dzikamai Machingura told
reporter Sithandekile Mhlanga that state media coverage of an address to
parliament last week by the Reserve Bank governor, Gideon Gono, proved that
coverage remains biased.

Funding Pledges Scarce for Zimbabwe From Its Southern African Neighbors

http://www.voanews.com/

     

      By Blessing Zulu
      Washington
      14 April 2009

A two week deadline set by the Southern African Development Community for
members of the regional grouping to make pledges to help rebuild Zimbabwe
ran out Tuesday with only South Africa having announced a specific amount
that it would provide Harare.

At a summit in late March SADC members declared their support for Zimbabwe's
efforts to raise the projected US$8.3 billion the country needs to carry out
its so-called Short-Term Economic Recovery Program over the next two years.

South Africa said upon the summit's close that it will contribute 800
million rand or around US$90 million to support the operation of the
national unity government that was installed in Zimbabwe in mid-February and
to provide credits to the commercial sector.

Government sources in Botswana, Mozambique, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia and
Angola told VOA they are still engaged in internal consultations, but
acknowledged it could be difficult for them to mobilize cash for Zimbabwe
amidst the general global economic downturn.

SADC sources said Zimbabwe's best hope now lies with the European Union and
the United States despite declarations from both that they will will not
provide development aid until there is clear evidence of reform in Harare on
human rights and governance in particular.

South African Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said SADC has
dispatched teams of ministers to lobby for reconstruction funding and the
lifting of Western sanctions targeting President Robert Mugabe, officials of
his ZANU-PF party and associates.

Zambian Information Minister Ronnie Shikapwasha told reporter Blessing Zulu
of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that Lusaka is keen to help but it needs more
time to consult.

Pretoria-based political analyst Peter Kagwanja said the SADC countries -
some of which are still in post-conflict mode - don't have deep enough
pockets to bail out Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe Constitutional Revision Process Stirs Multi-Sided Controversy

http://www.voanews.com

     

      By Gibbs Dube and Jonga Kandemiiri
      Washington
      14 April 2009

Lines are being drawn among Zimbabwe's civic organizations and between some
civil society groups and parliament over how to draft the country's new
constitution.

Some non-governmental organizations have lined up behind the National
Constitutional Assembly, whose main focus is constitutional reform and has
challenged the parliament's plans to take the lead in rewriting the
country's basic document.

But there is far from unanimity among NGOs on the question.

Other non-governmental organizations such as the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human
Rights, the Zimbabwe National Students Union and the Crisis in Zimbabwe
Coalition are expected to meet this week to decide where they stand.

Backing the NCA are the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, the Progressive
Teachers Union of Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwe National Students Union. But the
Christian Alliance and the Students Solidarity Trust support the process now
unfolding in parliament.

Spokesman Fambai Ngirande of the National Association of Non-Governmental
Organizations told reporter Gibbs Dube of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that
the NCA and the government should work together to ensure that the process
is "people-driven," as the NCA desires.

Despite the opposition expressed by some in civil society, the government
said the process is all-inclusive because lawmakers represent the people.

But a senior official of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions said that if
the government is in charge of the process, the new constitution will differ
little from the existing one.

Constitutional Affairs Minister Eric Matinenga told reporter Jonga
Kandemiiri that the select committee is representing all Zimbabweans
regardless of their affiliations.

Madhuku calls MDC leaders opportunists

http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=15112

April 15, 2009

By Our Correspondent

THE National Constitutional Assembly (NCA) says it will rally the people of
Zimbabwe against the constitutional reform process which is being put into
motion by Parliament.

It believes the entire process is likely to be flawed, hence it would also
produce a flawed Constitution.

NCA chairman, Lovemore Madhuku, has no kind words for Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) leaders, Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara,
either.

He called them opportunists.

Speaking in an interview, Madhuku told The Zimbabwe Times: "As the NCA, we
have rejected the committee that was put in place by Parliament to start the
process of re-writing the Constitution.

"We have demanded that the process should be people-driven and we believe
that parliamentarians should not be part of this process but they should let
the people of Zimbabwe decide what kind of Constitution they want without
undue influence and interference by Parliament."

At the weekend, Speaker of Parliament, Lovemore Moyo announced a committee
that will preside over the entire consultation process of the new
constitution.

The committee includes representatives of Zanu-PF and the two MDC parties.

Madhuku said by putting in place the constitutional committee which is made
up of parliamentarians, Parliament had closed doors to having a constitution
that reflected the wishes of the people.

"The reason why we are saying we are rejecting that constitutional making
process is because it is now heavy with the influence of parliamentarians.
This means that Parliament has closed its doors on very effective
participation of the citizens of this country because people are aware that
the process is going to produce a predictable outcome," said Madhuku.

He said at the moment, it was clear the parliamentary committee would take
into account what it saw as issues that would protect the interests of
President Robert Mugabe, Tsvangirai and Mutambara, with "a little bit of
disguise of what people want".

"That process is already defective as we speak. It is going to produce a
flawed outcome. We will mobilize people against taking part in the entire
process.

"We are quite aware that this process simply wants to ensure that it comes
up with a constitution that will seek to protect the opportunists who are
there and also the President (Mugabe)," lambasted Madhuku.

He added that the NCA was working hard at the moment to spread the
anti-parliament constitution consultation meetings messages as parliament
gears itself to embark on the consultation process.

"We are campaigning for a no vote. We will repeat what happened in 1999. We
are saying no to a defective Constitution that is born out of a defective
process altogether.

"If they decide to proceed, we will tell the people not to attend these
meetings and see where they are going to get the input they want from,"
Madhuku said.

Parliament is expected to soon convene an all-stakeholders conference to
discuss the Constitution. The process is expected to kick off after the
consultation teams would have completed their groundwork of gathering people's
views on the new constitution.

Already, 19 amendments have been made to Zimbabwe's Constitution, a
situation that has forced the inclusive government to put in motion, a
process that will lead to the drafting of a completely new constitution

Govt institutions urged to fully utilise farms

http://www.herald.co.zw

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Herald Reporters

GOVERNMENT institutions should fully use farms allocated to them under land
reform to enhance self-reliance and alleviate poverty, Harare Metropolitan
Governor and Resident Minister David Karimanzira has said.

Speaking at a field day at Harare Central Prison Farm, Governor Karimanzira
said State institutions such as universities, colleges and hospitals must
make use of their farms rather than to wait for food handouts from
Government.

"Government policy is that if you want to eat you have to produce instead of
waiting for Government handouts.

"It is important to bear in mind that . . . prisons have not been spared
from the devastating economic restrictions imposed on the country by its
detractors.

"Prisons indeed mirror the impact of sanctions and feeding the inmates has
become a mammoth challenge," he said.

Governor Karimanzira, however commended the Harare Central Prison for
growing 22 hectares of maize which should go a long way in reducing hunger
in prisons.

He also urge Government institutions with vast tracts of land at their
disposal to avail this for agriculture.

"I would like to call upon similar Government institutions with land to
avail this for agricultural production and help the country restore its
bread basket status," said Governor Karimanzira.

For irrigation purposes, Governor Karimanzira, however called upon
well-wishers to assist in rehabilitating the prison's two boreholes that are
not functioning and which farm manager Ms Clementine Zvidzai had earlier
said were a major setback.

Commissioner of Prisons Retired Major General Paradzai Zimondi indicated
that there are 27 prison farms around the country that are into cattle
ranching, piggery, maize and wheat production.

"All in all we have 27 prison farms scattered around the country with total
arable land of 3 482 hectares which we believe shall go a long way towards
self-sustenance and thus, reducing Government expenditure.

"We failed to get enough inputs such as seed and fertilizers which means
that we failed to plant the targeted hectarage, thus our yield is going to
be well below our requirement for the year," he said.

Rtd Maj Gen Zimondi said the challenges facing Zimbabweans could be solved
through food production.

"I am quite sure that the only answer to overcome most of our challenges is
production.

"Therefore, I urge all our prison farms to ensure maximum utilisation of
resources at our disposal in an effort to increase production," he said.

New Zimbabwe land policy to 'clarify' farm ownership

http://www.businessday.co.za

BRIAN LATHAM

Harare

ZIMBABWE's government would create a land policy within the next three
months that "clarifies" farm ownership, Commerce and Industry Minister
Welshman Ncube said yesterday.

The policy was being devised amid "an urgent need" to address security of
tenure on farms, Ncube said.

"The question of farm and land ownership has been left hanging for quite
some time," Ncube said. "In two to three months we will have come up with
common position on commercial farmland."

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's supporters began the often-violent
seizure of white-owned farms in 2000, accusing farmers of backing Morgan
Tsvangirai's opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

The takeovers sparked a collapse in agricultural production that nine years
later has left 6,9-million Zimbabweans needing food aid to survive. The
policy has been instrumental in destroying the country's economy. Mugabe
told his Zanu (PF) central committee last Wednesday that "land reform" would
continue. His remarks were seen by many as tacit support for the continuing
farm takeovers.

Commentators said recent TV and internet footage of farm invasions would
make the Southern African Development Community's task of raising $8,5bn for
the country even more challenging. Bloomberg, Staff Writer

Zimbabwe victims and perpetrators begin to reconcile

http://www.monstersandcritics.com

Africa Features
By Jan Raath Apr 15, 2009, 2:08 GMT

Chitungwiza, Zimbabwe - Pikai sometimes drops in at Clay's home round the
corner for a bite to eat and a chat, and Pikai returns the favour by letting
his neighbour collect water from his tap that seldom runs dry.

The odd thing about this neighbourly sharing is that 10 months ago Pikai -
not his real name - was among a mob of vigilantes of President Robert
Mugabe's ZANU(PF) party flailing with sticks and heavy electric cables at
Clay's back, because he was a supporter of the then opposition Movement for
Democratic Change.

It was near the end of a blood-drenched campaign for the second round of
presidential elections in which Clay was one of many thousands tortured by
Mugabe's youth militias, soldiers and police.

In the end, 200 MDC supporters were murdered and the party's leader, Morgan
Tsvangirai, withdrew because of the scale of the violence, leaving the
85-year-old Mugabe to have himself declared president after a one-man race.

Clay said he had to sleep on his stomach for weeks to allow the wounds to
heal. Today he cannot walk much further than a few hundred metres without
enduring excruciating pain. But, he says, all he wants is for Pikai and his
fellows to be prosecuted and for justice to be done. 'I don't want to
revenge.'

The reconciliation between the two took place earlier this year after the
Catholic church's Commission for Justice and Peace took the first steps
toward trying to heal the deep psychological and spiritual trauma inflicted
in the murderous three-month election campaign.

They gathered 16 victims of violence in Chitungwiza, to listen, talk and
share experiences in group therapy sessions over two days.

Pikai and six other ZANU(PF) perpetrators were coaxed into separate
workshops with the CCJP, along the lines of traditional cleansing rituals.

Only two of them were willing to admit involvement in the violence. When
they started, Pikai was sweating and shaking uncontrollably as he talked of
his brutality, said CCJP coordinator Joel Nkunsane.

'He said what he did was evil, that he caused death, and people to suffer.
He wanted to look in the eyes of his neighbours, to go back and talk it
out,' he said.

The realisation of the need for reconciliation and healing came in October
last year when Nkunsane and two colleagues were doing hundreds of interviews
with torture victims, to prepare a detailed record.

'It was horrible, horrible,' he said. 'There were people so badly beaten
they had to have a whole box of cotton wool stuffed in the hole in their
buttocks. Women who had logs forced up their vaginas. People had their eyes
gouged out. I couldn't take it. We had to go for counselling.

'But we saw that we were reopening their wounds four months after they had
brutalised. We heard them, and then left, without aiding them and leaving
them in their pain. Victims need not just blankets and food, they need
spiritual healing as well.'

Perhaps the most important factor was 'the loss of human dignity, and their
sense of worthlessness' after their ordeals, he said. 'We helped to
transform their pain.'

However, violence, torture and murder have been visited repeatedly on
Zimbabweans by Mugabe since he came to power 29 years ago. In the mid-1980s,
about 20 000 civilians of the Ndebele tribe of western Zimbabwe were
massacred by his security forces.

'The nation is still bleeding,' Nkunsane said. 'The stories of what happened
are still coming, people in (the western city of) Bulawayo are talking about
them as if they just happened.

'The real process is when the offender says to the offended, 'I'm sorry','
he said. 'The victims also feel that justice must prevail.' Zimbabwe's new
coalition government between Mugabe and MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, its
prime minister, have staged rallies where ZANU(PF) and MDC supporters join
hands, and a cabinet committee on healing has been set up. But this is
mostly rhetoric,' said Nkunsane.

'I fear they may go for a process of blanket amnesty,' he said, 'that it
happened 'in a time of madness, let's move on, let bygones be bygones.' That
will leave people lying there, hurting in their wounds,' he said.

If that happens, 'there is never going to be a time that people are going to
respect each other's opinions,' he said. 'At any other election, there will
be bloodshed again.

Mugabe guard roughs up Riksdag member

http://www.thelocal.se/18852/20090415/

Published: 15 Apr 09 06:59 CET

A Swedish parliamentarian's decision to snap a couple of pictures of
Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe did not sit well with the president's
bodyguards.

Riksdag member Fredrik Schulte of the Moderate Party was visiting a
bookstore in Singapore when Mugabe's entourage entered the shop.

The 27-year-old Swedish politician managed to take two pictures from a
distance of about five metres before a woman near Mugabe reacted.

Someone who Schulte believed to be one of Mugabe's bodyguards threw the
Swede up against a bookshelf and forced him to erase the pictures.

Upon returning to Sweden on Tuesday, Schulte turned over his camera's memory
card to Riksdag IT-support staff for examination.

As he didn't take any more pictures following the incident, the images can
most likely be recovered.

When reached by the TT news agency, Schulte was at a loss to explain why he
decided to take a picture of a man considered to be one of Africa's most
brutal dictators.

"I really don't know why [I photographed him]. It's just one of those things
that happens," Schulte said.

"When you realize you're standing next to the Hitler of our time, the camera
comes out."

Schulte added that he would "bet his life" that the man he photographed was
Mugabe.

The 85-year-old president of Zimbabwe leads a country suffering from a
severe economic crisis. Nevertheless, last winter it became known that
Mugabe had purchased a luxury home in Hong Kong for around 50 million kronor
($6 million).

He owns several expensive homes throughout Asia and his wife Grace has taken
a number of shopping trips to the region in recent years, including visits
to Hong Kong and Bangkok.

Tsvangirai must answer some questions

Something sinister brewing in Mugabe's mind

http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=15125

April 15, 2009

By Tendai Dumbutshena

IT IS no secret that the one major issue that ruptured relations between
Robert Mugabe's government and the West was the invasion and expropriation
of white-owned farms in Zimbabwe which began in 2000.

Mugabe, with the support of many in Zimbabwe, the SADC region and the rest
of Africa, argued that this was a long-overdue redress of an historic
injustice. Land had to be restored to its rightful owners. He maintained
that his government neither had the responsibility nor the resources to pay
compensation for the land.

The British as the colonial power had that responsibility. All his
government undertook to do was to pay compensation for improvements on the
land.

Western countries and others even inside Zimbabwe saw it differently. They
argued that the expropriations were done in a violent and chaotic manner
bound to lead to the destruction of the agricultural sector and ultimately
the economy itself.

The land acquired was mainly given to Mugabe's cronies while its stated
beneficiaries, landless blacks, continued to live in poverty and squalor.
They also maintained that compensation had to be paid for expropriated land.
Western nations are capitalistic. The essence of capitalism is the sanctity
of private property whose expropriation where required in the national
interest must be met with fair compensation.

Images on television of white farmers being assaulted and driven off farms
only served to harden attitudes in the West particularly in Great Britain.
Mugabe's violence and manipulation of elections in 2002 gave the European
Union and United States an opportunity to take punitive measures against his
regime.

It is impossible for the two conflicting views on the land issue in Zimbabwe
to be reconciled. What is clear, however, is that the new inclusive
government in Harare is bankrupt. It cannot even pay its own ministers,
legislators, civil servants, teachers, police and defence forces.

It has appealed for US$8.5 billion to fund economic recovery. What is also
clear is that SADC leaders who put enormous pressure on the MDC to be part
of this inclusive government have no money to give to Zimbabwe. All Mugabe's
government got in concrete terms at the last SADC summit held in Swaziland
precisely to discuss financial assistance for Zimbabwe was a paltry US$30
million from South Africa.

Predictably SADC leaders expect the money to come from the West which Mugabe
routinely vilifies as an article of faith. When this finally dawned on the
Harare government its leaders including Mugabe met at Victoria Falls and
resolved to urgently improve relations with the West to get the money. The
West's conditions for such assistance are well known. In response the
Victoria Falls meeting resolved to address these concerns within 100 days.

A number of questions are worth asking? The Global Political Agreement (GPA)
was signed on 15 September, 2008 - seven months ago. All issues pertaining
to political reforms and human rights were contained in the GPA and
Memorandum of Understanding that preceded it. Why do these issues remain
outstanding after such a long time?

What is so difficult about repealing repressive legislation such as POSA and
AIPPA? Why the delay in allowing the media to operate freely? Why does the
government need an extra 100 days to, for example, lift the ban on
international networks such as CNN, BBC, SKY and South Africa's eTV. The
above list of banned foreign media is by no means exhaustive.

Why do some MDC and civil society members still face charges for crimes that
were not committed while those who actually murdered and tortured people
have not been brought to justice? Where are the seven missing MDC members?

When will Roy Bennett be sworn in as deputy Minister of Agriculture? Will it
also be done within the next 100 days? When will the endless talking stop
and actual deeds begin?

Whether Mugabe likes it or not the issue of property rights is very
important to the West and entire business community. In fact it lies at the
heart of the West's reluctance to embrace the inclusive government. The
continuation of land invasions - whether these are new or old is
immaterial - confirms that property rights in Zimbabwe are not honoured.

A ruling by the SADC tribunal in favour of white farmers in Zimbabwe was
contemptuously rejected by Mugabe and others in his government. Court orders
not acceptable to Mugabe are ignored. The issue of property rights was
raised by a delegation of South African businessmen and women last week in
Harare.

These were not white Westerners. Business persons from any part of the world
including Mugabe's beloved China want property rights and investments
protected. They want to operate in a country where agreements are honoured
and court rulings enforced. Until farm invasions and the prosecution of some
white farmers stop, the Zimbabwe government cannot expect much more than the
dribs and drabs it is getting now just to keep soul and body together.

This much they were reminded yet again by the German Ambassador to Zimbabwe,
Dr Albrecht Conze and his American counterpart James McGhee in separate
addresses in Harare last week.

Whatever one may think of Mugabe he is certainly not stupid or naïve. He
knows that the West will not move an inch in terms of rendering substantial
developmental aid if farm invasions continue. Attitudes in major Western
capitals harden each time Mugabe cocks a snook at them by reaffirming his
support for land invasions. He did so emphatically at his 85th birthday bash
last February.

Last week he said the same to the Zanu-PF party faithful. Over two weeks ago
in the presence of a visiting Norwegian minister he told the West to "go
hang" over its demands for political and economic reforms.

An obvious question to ask is why Mugabe continues to utter statements that
he knows undermine efforts to get Western assistance for his country. What
is the point of meeting at Victoria Falls and issuing a communiqué whose
central message Mugabe soon undermines? Is he playing a game of deception?
Is he stringing the MDC leadership along while he plots something sinister
with the men of violence who surround him? Has he calculated that it is not
in his interests for this inclusive government to succeed hence the need to
undermine it?

Or is it the case that a faction within Zanu-PF opposed to the inclusive
government is behind the ongoing land invasions? Is Mugabe secretly working
in cahoots with this faction reportedly supported by service chiefs? If not,
is this faction now outside his control? Does he feel the need to
periodically attack the West and support land invasions in order to placate
this faction? Why the mixed messages?

Whatever it is the end-result is the same. Western nations and others will
not use their taxpayers' money to support a government led by a man not
committed to the changes that are required. They know that Mugabe still
calls the shots in the inclusive government despite problems he obviously
has within his party.

Assurances from Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and his ministers count for
nothing. In a major speech about three weeks ago the MDC leader threatened
to arrest those who continued to invade farms and disrupt production. The
mayhem continues and not a single person has been arrested. It is his people
who languish in jail. The people who enforce law and order have disdain for
Tsvangirai.

The MDC leadership must get real. It is excited beyond measure by the new
titles, cars and other trappings of office. Its view of this inclusive
government is defined by the material benefits it has yielded to those in
government. Others are in the queue waiting for Mugabe to change his mind
over governorships and other cushy jobs currently reserved for Zanu-PF
members only. Such self-interest blinds the MDC leadership to what is
actually going on.

Tsvangirai and his colleagues must wake up from their comfort-induced
slumber.

Serious people never allow themselves to be victims of naiveté or blinkered
optimism. There is something sinister brewing in Mugabe's mind. There is
something sinister being hatched within Zanu-PF. If the MDC continues to act
as if it has a genuine partner in this charade called an inclusive
government a terrible fate awaits it.

Know Your Ministers: Welshman Ncube

City Council Closes Down Errant Shops

http://www.herald.co.zw/

14 April 2009

Harare - Several fast food outlets and shops in Harare have been closed for
failing to pay annual operating fees of US$500 while some had made illegal
subdivisions to their properties.

Last week the owners and operators were crying foul against Harare City
Council accusing the authorities of fleecing them through unjustified
licence fees and forcing them to close shop at short notice.

Elsewhere across the city residents were refusing to pay rates and refuse
collection charges arguing that they could not pay for non-existent
services.

Last week several residents queueing to pay their rates refused to pay
refuse collection charges saying council was not collecting their refuse.
The residents justified their actions saying it was tantamount to paying
consultation fees for a doctor who does not come to see a patient.

"This is cheating. We are being robbed," said one Mainway resident.

Garbage has not been collected in many suburbs for some time now forcing
residents to dump refuse in open spaces thereby posing a health hazard.

In the city, the shop owners are arguing that the city fathers are forcing
them to pay unapproved licence fees following a Government directive that
all fees, rates and charges should be slashed by half until the State had
approved them.

Although the city has gone out to the residents and ratepayers to get their
input into the budget proposals, the objections -- which closed last week -- 
have not yet been considered implying that no changes have been made so far.

Reliable sources have indicated that residents and ratepayers made their own
proposals based on their ability to pay and it now remains for the city to
include the proposals in the revised budget, which is expected soon.

Mr Olben Mushambi, who operates Neeyador Takeaway along Kaguvi Street,
recently visited The Herald offices to lodge a complaint against the city
council.

He said city workers who were accompanied by officers from the Municipal
Police ordered him to close his shop because he did not pay the US$500
annual operating licence fees.

The problem, he said, was that the city wanted the amount at once yet the
operators had indicated they could pay in monthly instalments.

Other operators declined to be identified for fear of victimisation.

In a related matter investigations by this paper show that the city has
discovered some businesses that had not paid licence fees for the past five
years and some shops that have been subdivided without approval.

It is such shops that the authorities are also closing down until the owners
apply for subdivisions and pay operating licence fees.

Meanwhile, the city has refused to issue licences to five shops without
business premises, or the buildings in which they purported to work from had
been registered for other businesses or had no equipment at all.

These are Fiorecom Investments, Favourite Kitchen, Shury's Enterprises,
Teltbill Enterprises and Three Nyaletata Enterprises.

Asked for comment, Harare spokesman Mr Leslie Gwindi said the city was only
collecting half the proposed fees in line with the Government directive. He,
however, confirmed the crackdown on illegal shops.

Zimbabwe's toll roads are a bad idea

http://www.zimtelegraph.com

By EDDIE CROSS
Published: Wednesday, April 15, 2009

The proposal to introduce tolls on the national roads is a silly, ill
considered idea. It should be abandoned.

Already the "road access fee" at the border posts is riddled with
corruption, half the time it is not being collected and when it is, the
proceeds are not going to the fiscus. Tales of this are rife at all border
posts.
Now we are to introduce tolls on the main roads by the 20th April This is
bizarre.

First no facilities exist at the toll sites - what are the authorities going
to do?

Set up a table next to the road with a policeman to stop the traffic while
someone collects the toll and writes out a receipt!

You can imagine the chaos, On Monday between Harare and Bulawayo there were
14 Police road blocks - what they were doing is anyone's guess, the bus
drivers must be furious with this constant interference. Now toll stops!

Secondly they are all miles out of town - they have to be, so three times a
day a bus is going to have to travel to and from the sites to drop off the
staff. Night and day, 365 days a year.

Once there there is no shelter, no security for the money collected and no
power for lighting. Are they going to run generators at all sites?

Then there is the fact that we have no idea what the volume of traffic is
likely to be - or what kinds of vehicles - under these conditions we can
expect all officials on the tolls to become wealthy overnight and very
little revenue to go to the State.

There is absolutely no way you can control cash at these points without an
elaborate system similar to that in South Africa where the system is only
justified when you have hundreds of vehicles an hour passing through.

Last time the authorities attempted this there were a number of serious
accidents - in one case the collection office built in the middle of the
road was wiped out by a truck at night.

This happened three times and then the builders abandoned the site and
removed the construction materials.

A simple levy on fuel is much better - it can be collected at source, we
have full control and it costs next to nothing to collect. Please, sanity
must prevail.

Eddie Cross

Immigration unearths scam

http://www.herald.co.zw

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Herald Reporter

THE Department of Immigration has unearthed a scam involving some officers
and immigration consultants making applicants pay double or more and as a
result has banned agents and consultants.

Under the old arrangement, immigration officers would connive with the
immigration consultants or agents - who are former immigration officers
themselves - and make it difficult for applicants to access the department's
services.

The immigration officers would then refer the applicants to the consultants
or agents who charge high fees. Part of the proceeds were allegedly paid to
the immigration officers.

This has prompted the Department of Immigration to ban applications for
immigration services through consultants or agents. The department processes
applications for work permits, residence permits, business permits, study
permits, among others.

"With immediate effect, no applications for immigration services will be
entertained through a third party - whether agent or consultant.

"It has come to our attention that these so called 'agents or consultants'
are charging exorbitant consultancy fees usually more than the cost of the
immigration service being sought by the client," Principal Chief Immigration
Officer Mr Clemence Masango said yesterday.

He said, for instance, people were being made to pay US$1 000 as consultancy
fees for "assistance" to apply for a temporary employment permit that costs
US$500 at immigration offices.

"As immigration, we are saying, if you want a service come to immigration
offices and you will get it," said Mr Masango.

He said the so-called consultants were giving a false impression that
immigration services in Zimbabwe were inaccessible unless you go through
them and that they were expensive.

Mr Masango said fees for all immigration services were prescribed in
Statutory Instrument Number 126 of 2005 which is a public document and can
be obtained from Government Publications.

"We do not believe that anyone should be made to pay anything more than the
prescribed fees.

"As a public office, we cannot allow our office and name to be tarnished in
this manner by persons, who are obviously greedy and insensitive," he said.

As a result, Mr Masango said, they expected people, especially foreigners
who constitute the bulk of their clientele, to appreciate what they were
trying to achieve.

Police probe Tsvangirai campaign BMW

http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=15119

April 15, 2009

By Our Correspondent

BULAWAYO - Police in Lupane say they are anxious to interview a South
African businessman, identified as Adrian Espag, in connection with the
importation of a luxury vehicle that MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai used on
his election campaign last year before the police impounded it.

The police allege that Espag breached the Customs and Excise Act.

Tsvangirai, now Prime Minister, used the BMW X5 luxury SUV, said to be
bullet-proof, during his tour of the Matabeleland North province in the
run-up to the June 27 presidential run-off election. He later pulled out of
the race citing harassment and violence against his supporters.

The vehicle was impounded by the police in Matabeleland North as Tsvangirai
and his entourage were making their way to Lupane to attend a campaign
rally.

Espag's lawyer Job Sibanda of Job Sibanda and Associates in Bulawayo told
The Zimbabwe Times the police in Lupane now wanted to question his client
for allegedly contravening customs regulations.

Sibanda said he had communicated with Espag who is South African. Espag had
asked the lawyer to make arrangements for the trip.

"The police have indicated they are proceeding with the case," said Sibanda.
"They have asked me to contact Espag and advise him to present himself in
Lupane so that the case can be taken forward.

"The charge is basically that of contravening sections of the Customs and
Excise Act."

Sibanda said the charge related to Espag's importation of the BMW through
Beitbridge. According to the law he was supposed to have taken the vehicle
out of Zimbabwe through the same port of entry when he returned to South
Africa.

"However, Espag decided to leave the BMW X5, in somebody's possession," said
Sibanda. "The police say this somebody was not authorized to be in
possession of the vehicle and that is where the charges are coming from."

Sibanda said the police were challenging the fact that Espag had donated the
vehicle to Tsvangirai through his close aid and confidante Jameson Timba,
now the deputy Minister of Information.

"They are trying also to establish the circumstances in which the car was
handed over to someone while in actual fact it was supposed to be in Espag's
possession," Sibanda said.

Sources in the police revealed there was a ploy by the state to take the
vehicle into its possession as happened with a helicopter seized from South
African pilot Brent Smyth on allegations that he contravened aviation laws.

Smyth was arrested in March last year for alleged fraud and immigration
transgressions as he was preparing to fly Tsvangirai to election rallies. He
was, however, acquitted.

Last year, the state also seized a vehicle used by some foreign journalists.
The minibus is now being used by the Zimbabwe Prison Services to ferry
prisoners from prison to the courts.

"It is quite clear the state is interested in this BMW and that is why they
are trying to make it difficult for the owner to claim it," said a police
source "The state wants to charge him and then forfeit the vehicle to the
state."

But Sibanda says they will wrestle the vehicle from the state.

He said: "It is quite clear that they are trying by all means possible to
ensure that the vehicle remains state property.

"As the defence counsel, I can state that we have indicated to the state,
through the police, that the state will have to release the vehicle to our
possession.

"There are no questions on that."

Defending 'Mugabe's gulags' immoral

http://www.newzimbabwe.com

By Francois Maimona
Posted to the web: 15/04/2009 00:08:03
THE article by Henry Makowa 'Media Freedom and Zimbabwean prisons film'
makes certain assertions that I feel cannot go unchallenged.

I will start with the elementary precepts underpinning a viable and
functioning democracy with special regard to freedom of the press and its
role as a watchdog. Open and accountable government, as Beetham [1994]
(Defining and Measuring Democracy [pp 25-30]) has formulated, is achieved
through popular control which requires, besides elections, the continuous
accountability of government: directly, to the electorate, through the
public justification for its policies; indirectly, to agents acting on the
people's behalf.

It is a given that accountability depends upon public knowledge of what
government is up to, from sources that are independent of its own public
relations machine. A media landscape free of government control is obviously
a prerequisite. Popular control over state institutions is underpinned by
guaranteed civil and political liberties.

However, these freedoms relate to free citizens. Prisoners, despite the fact
that they have forfeited their liberty, retain certain basic rights, which
survive despite imprisonment. The rights of access to the courts and of
respect for one's bodily integrity - that is, not to be assaulted - are such
fundamental rights.

Under what passes for the penal system in Zimbabwe right at this moment,
prisoners are lucky to finish their sentences in one piece - they are dying
like flies, at least 20 prisoner deaths a day, according to human rights
groups.

Broadly speaking, the State is allowed to place limits on prisoners' rights
if it is considered necessary for the prevention of crime, for prison
security or to protect the safety of the prisoner or others. Any limitations
placed upon such rights must be proportionate to the aim that the
authorities are seeking to achieve.

Freedom of the press as encapsulated in the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights states: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression;
this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference, and
impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers", is
something that has been absent in Zimbabwe. It has taken a foreign
broadcaster, namely SABC 3 to show the evils that are going on behind the
death factories that the penal system in Zimbabwe has become.

It is a sad indictment of the health of press freedom in Zimbabwe itself if
it takes an external broadcaster to expose such shortcomings. However, it
has not been ordinary journalistic practice in Zimbabwe to expose such
failures of state institutions. Makowa's justification for such a state of
affairs is that the media in Zimbabwe cannot be trusted to exercise its
function as a watchdog because anybody in Zimbabwe can practice journalism
after acquiring "just a three or six month diploma or certificate training".
Presumably the author never ventures to give us names of institutions
peddling such diplomas, inside or outside Zimbabwe.

For the best part of the past 28 or so years, Zanu PF has maintained an iron
grip on all aspects of the media in Zimbabwe. Naturally, it comes as a shock
to someone not accustomed to the workings of a free press when the failure
of such an important state institution as the penal system in Zimbabwe is
exposed warts and all for the world to see.

The press is a necessity in order to hold those responsible for prisoners'
welfare to account. It is such fortune-cookie philosophising masquerading as
intellectualising that enables the State to victimise those courageous
enough to stand for truth and justice. What we witness is a state that
violates and visits untold indignities on the weakest members of if society.

It is misplaced patriotic pride that motivates analysts of Makowa's ilk when
they uphold the repressive machinery that Zanu PF has kept in place for the
past generation simply to keep the prying eyes of ordinary citizens from
seeing for themselves what the state is up to.

The purpose of any penal system is the rehabilitation of offenders. But what
is now patently evident is that one is lucky if at all they cone out alive
in what is becoming the Zimbabwean equivalent of Stalin's gulags. Are we
then to simply sweep such infringements of fundamental freedoms under the
carpet simply because it goes contra to the 'laws of Zimbabwe?'

Unjust pieces of legislation that violate fundamental precepts of all
civilised society have no place in a democracy. Remarkably, Makowa does not
bother to tell us which enactments have been violated. In the event, an
article in a newspaper column is not the right forum to protest or even to
expose the flouting of what the author calls 'laws of Zimbabwe'.

It is an abuse of poetic licence when one equates the media's right to
inform citizens of what is going on behind prison walls to imperialism. This
smacks of hypocrisy of the highest magnitude. Nor does it to do any good to
invoke tenets of democracy such as the rule of law and then one goes on to
defend a morally bankrupt regime through the thin veneer of legality.

In the court of public opinion, SABC 3 is a champion of fundamental
freedoms. When people who should be rehabilitated by the state are dying
like flies, this makes nonsense of the very basic notions of dignity that is
owed to all of us by virtue of our very own humanity.

A system that lays waste to human life on such a scale cannot be defended by
any sane human being. It is repugnant and irreprehensible.

Francois Maimona is a trainee lawyer based in Leeds. E-mail:
fmaimona@googlemail.com

The presidential stranglehold on Zimbabwe

http://members4.boardhost.com/acnaus/msg/1239748067.html

Posted by Information Report on 15/4/2009, 8:27 am
Board Administrator

      The presidential stranglehold on Zimbabwe

      "We are now losing the last shreds of normality. Three tomatoes now
sell for one US dollar on the streets, and two fish cost US$5". The words
are those of Bishop Dieter B. Scholz of Chinhoyi in Zimbabwe. He is
describing the continuing bitter plight of the people in this ravaged
country, as of February this year. Zimbabwe may have temporarily slipped
from the headlines, but the catastrophic political and economic plight of
this country under the dictatorial rule of President Robert Mugabe has not
changed.

      One former ally of Mugabe, the journalist Wilf Mbanga, who now lives
in exile in Britain, described the attitude of the president in an interview
in 2008. "28 years as ruler have made him drunk with power, and the fear of
possibly losing this power has made him as dangerous as a wounded beast. At
the moment he is capable of anything, including genocide".

      In practice he has long passed this point. Zimbabwe, once seen as the
bread basket of Africa on account of its rich harvests, now faces the
prospect of starvation. Bishop Dieter writes: "The anger wells up in me when
I hear that the government officials of the ruling party are still trying to
intimidate our parish priests and prevent them from helping people who have
been reduced to living off tree bark, grass seed and wild fruits. But we
will not let them take away our right to share our bread with the hungry".

      Bishop Scholz, a Jesuit, has lived and worked in Zimbabwe for over 40
years and since 2006 he has been bishop of the diocese of Chinhoyi in the
northeast of the country. Among the agencies that regularly support his work
is the international Catholic pastoral charity Aid to the Church in Need
(ACN).

      Originally from Berlin, the bishop worked for many years in Silveira
House, a Jesuit formation centre founded in 1964 about 12 miles (20 km) east
of the capital Harare. To this day this pastoral and social development
centre is striving to strengthen the surrounding communities, offering
courses in such diverse fields as healthcare, agriculture, democracy and
human rights, and also in the local cultures and languages. Its goal is to
help the Zimbabwean people to help themselves.

      However, in the current profound crisis these courses no longer find
many takers. Conditions of life for the ordinary people are pitiful, their
poverty indescribable. Schools have been closed, and even hospitals. The
local economy has long since collapsed and the currency become worthless.
Everyone is desperate to get hold of hard currencies in order to survive,
but many do not succeed. They face starvation, flee with their remaining
strength to neighbouring countries, or simply die. Hunger is everywhere,
this brutal plague that can seize upon entire families and wipe them out -
as one observer put it, "like an endless, silent tsunami".

      Since August 2008 this grave food shortage has gone hand-in-hand with
a cholera epidemic. And while the number of new cases has now fallen
sharply, according to the World Health Organisation in Geneva, this
dangerous disease has not been defeated and could easily break out again at
any time, as the WHO reported at the end of March. According to its data, in
February 2009 around 8,000 new cases were being registered each week,
whereas by the second week of March this had fallen to 2,000. The death rate
among those affected has also fallen, from almost 6% in January to 2.3% by
mid-March. All in all, since the outbreak of the epidemic, over 91,000
people have been infected with the cholera virus, and of these some 4,000
have died so far, according to the WHO figures.

      Against this background Bishop Scholz told a representative of ACN,
"We must bring back the humanity that we have lost". And the bishop, who
visited his home country in January and February this year to seek help for
the people of Zimbabwe, insisted that he will not allow his diocesan staff
to be deterred from distributing food to the starving population, despite
the fact that his priests have repeatedly been threatened and summoned
before the district authorities. Bishop Scholz has protested energetically
against these actions.

      For further information please contact the Australian office of ACN on
(02) 9679-1929. e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org or write to Aid to the Church
in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148. Web: www.aidtochurch.org

Massacre of the innocents: How starving families slaughter Zimbabwe's wild animals just to put food in their mouths

By Sue Lloyd Roberts
Last updated at 12:46 AM on 15th April 2009

 

The skin of a giraffe lies discarded like an old coat on the ground. Alongside it lie a few bones. Isaac, a game warden of some 30 years' experience, points at the remains of the once elegant animal. 'This is what we are up against,' he tells me. 'How can we protect the animals when people are so hungry?'

A country that is battling with starvation, cholera and 90 per cent unemployment now faces an extra challenge. Zimbabwe's starving millions are targeting wildlife in the country's famous game parks as a source of food and income.

There have always been poachers who have no qualms about killing elephants and rhinos for their tusks, mainly for the Chinese market, where they are bought for their supposed aphrodisiac and medicinal powers. But now the anti-poaching units who patrol hundreds of square miles of Zimbabwe's game parks are reporting that hungry locals are targeting the animals for their meat.

New threat: Elephants and rhinos, traditionally hunted for their tusks, are now targeted by the starving millions

'The hungry are chasing and killing all the animals - elephant, zebra, giraffe,' Isaac tells me, as he invites me to join his anti-poaching team as they patrol a stretch in the northwest of the country. 'It's because there is no meat in the shops. There's no meat anywhere.'

Wearing flip-flops and carrying mere batons, the team, who are poorly paid by the poverty-stricken safari parks, are ill-equipped for the task.

In fact, they are doing a dangerous thing even by speaking to me. I cannot reveal where I met them, and I have had to change names because all 'negative reporting' is forbidden in the country. Anyone telling the truth to an outsider - especially to a journalist - is punished.

Regardless of the threat he could face, Isaac bravely tells me more.

'The people lay their traps on the paths that lead to the animals' watering holes,' he explains. He shows me how the trees and bushes are festooned with crude loops of wire torn from telephone lines and fashioned into cruel snares which catch and cripple the animal.

Isaac shakes his head in despair. 'It can take days for the animal to die before the poacher returns to cut off the meat,' he says.

Nearby, we see another set of remains - this time, a buffalo. Nearly every morsel of the animal has been removed. 'They can get 800 kilos of meat from that one,' Isaac says.

In truth, the idea of a buffalo being slaughtered for its meat does not affect me that much. But when I trip over the pelvic bone of a once-graceful giraffe, I feel rather differently. Its long and shapely bones are strewn over the bush, mixed up with the remains of an impala, the iconic honey-coloured deer of southern Africa.

It was the elephant orphanage that first alerted the anti-poaching unit to the scale of the problem.

In the southern African region, elephants are routinely culled. This is because they can pose a threat to local agriculture if there are too many of them.

Game wardens inspect the carcass of an elephant killed by poachers in Zimbabwe

Best practice dictates that entire herds of elephants are killed at once. It sounds brutal, but because elephants live in closely knit families, with strong bonds of affection, it is considered kinder to take out the entire family rather than the odd member.

However, the anti-poaching team were finding many lone elephants in the wild - a clear sign that something was wrong.

'When we found baby elephants and young adults wandering alone in the bush, we realised that they had lost family members.

'They were traumatised and disorientated, and we brought them into the orphanage for care and treatment,' Isaac told me, as he administered a huge syringe of antibiotics to a young female elephant called Jessica. Her ear had got caught in a snare and was torn and infected.

It quickly became clear that the elephants were victims of the poachers.

An hour's drive from the park, I visit another kind of orphanage. Here, children who have lost their parents through disease or malnutrition queue up for a midday meal of porridge. With thousands dying in Zimbabwe every week from poverty and food shortages, Zimbabwe has become a land of orphans.

Four-year- old Nativity scrapes hungrily at her meal and then queues up at the communal tap to wash her bowl and spoon. Her mother died of malaria last week and her father died of Aids four years ago.

Nativity's aunt - whom I cannot name for her own safety - has arrived to make the funeral arrangements for her sister. I follow them both back to the mudcaked house that Nativity once shared with her mother. 

Her aunt lifts the lids of storage pans in the kitchen. She can find only a few cobs of maize and a couple of pounds of flour. She holds Nativity in an affectionate hug and tells her she is glad that she had one good meal today, because there is not enough for another.

'We only have two days' worth of food left,' she tells me. 'All we can do is put ourselves in the hands of the Lord.'

She admits that the men in her family used to hunt for animals in the game parks. 'What else could they do?' she says. 'But now we have lost everyone in the family who could feed us.'

She tells me her male relations have either died or, in desperation, fled to South Africa in search of jobs and food.

Worse, the lorries which carry the UN food aid to Nativity's village have been delayed by recent heavy rains, and no one knows when they will arrive.

Indiscriminate: The hungry are chasing and killing all the animals - even giraffe

The UN's World Food Programme now has responsibility for some 80 per cent of the people of Zimbabwe - a bigger percentage of the population than during the Ethiopian famine in the early Eighties. No wonder life expectancy in Zimbabwe today is just 34 for a woman and 37 for a man.

And yet while the people starve, Robert Mugabe - still clinging to power as their president - has ordered that the last of Zimbabwe's white, commercial farmers must leave their farms.

'It's crazy, and it's sad,' says Bryan Bronkhorst as we drive past his farm, which has recently been occupied by members of Mugabe's political party, Zanu PF. 'But it is the government's fault. We used to be the breadbasket of Africa.'

I ask if we can go into his farm, for him to take a last look and to collect his personal belongings.

'No,' he says, pointing through the trees. 'See, they are all there, sitting on seats in my yard, and they're armed. It's too risky.' There were once 4,000 white, commercial farmers in Zimbabwe. Now, a mere 100 remain - and these have all been told they must go. Those who resist are met with violence.

Mr Bronkhorst was not the only farmer I met who had been targeted. I walked through the remains of a burned-down hunting lodge with Ben Freeth, a 47-yearold gamekeeper and farmer, and his three-year-old daughter, Anna.

'What was that, Daddy?' Anna asked as they came to a pile of tiles. 'That was the kitchen,' he explains patiently. 'Mummy used to cook supper there for all the people who used to visit.'

The family spent decades building up a game reserve in the land where they farm in Chegutu, north of the capital Harare. There were giraffes, eland, impala, zebra, warthog and wildebeest, and people used to come from the city to view the animals and to hunt in a carefully controlled programme.

Now, all the animals have gone, all killed by poachers.

Ben has struggled to cling onto his farm. But when he organised local farmers in a campaign to resist the illegal land grabs, his hunting lodge was burned down.

A year ago, the family won a vital court case in the Southern African Development Union court in Namibia, ruling that they could keep their farm. Not long afterwards, thugs arrived at his in-laws' house and attacked them, leaving his 75-year-old father-in-law Mike Campbell close to death and his mother-in-law terrified.

When Ben came to their rescue, he, too, was beaten. All three were in hospital for weeks.

Desperate: People lay traps on the paths of animals, including zebras, that lead to their watering holes

Things were expected to change for the better in Zimbabwe after the leader of the opposition, Morgan Tsvangirai, struck a deal with Mugabe two months ago and formed a coalition government.

But farm invasions continue, political prisoners are still held, and the BBC and other media outlets are still banned. Travelling around Zimbabwe illegally is tricky at the best of times, but today there are police road blocks every few miles.

Fortunately, however, most are not looking for undercover reporters. Instead, the gaunt, thin policemen and women who flag you down claim that you have been speeding, or even that your car is 'illegally' dirty, and fine you U.S.$10.

When you see the hunger on their faces and despair in their eyes, you pay up - not out of fear, but out of charity. When even the police are starving, you realise that the country has serious problems.

As well as being targeted by the starving poor, Zimbabwe's wildlife is also facing a more organised and powerful threat. Mugabe believes he must feed the army, who are essential to his grip on power, and his intelligence services, who spy on his enemies. These groups take priority over feeding his own people.

Johnny Rodrigues, of the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force, says he is receiving reports from game wardens around the country which suggest that the slaughter of wildlife is now taking place on an organised, industrial scale.

'The refrigerated lorries which were once used for transporting beef around the country are now being seen in the game parks,' he tells me. 'I am receiving reports that tonnes of elephant meat are being loaded onto these trucks and transported direct to army barracks.'

On his laptop, he flicks through pictures sent to him by safari park wardens of animal corpses. He pauses on the remains of elephants - huge spreads of skin and bones lying across the bush.

'You never saw that before,' he says. 'The poachers used to take only the tusks. Now they are taking the meat as well. If this does not stop, in five years' time there will be no elephants left in Zimbabwe.'

The UN food programme has been suspended during the harvest period, but the final yield is expected to produce a fraction of the country's needs.

The UK agency, Save The Children, warn that the poorest families will run out of food within weeks. People will starve and the government-paid poaching teams and the desperate will target the endangered wildlife of Zimbabwe with a renewed frenzy of killing.

People in Zimbabwe ask themselves when this madness will end. Alas, from what I saw on this, my fourth visit to the country during the current troubles, there is no immediate end in sight.

* Sue Lloyd-Roberts' report from Zimbabwe is on BBC2's Newsnight tomorrow at 10.30pm.

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