Daily News
Leader Page
Only 12 days left to save Zimbabwe
from famine
12/10/2002 8:53:44 AM (GMT +2)
THERE is probably not a single person living in Zimbabwe who has not,
at one
time or another, grown maize.
For some, it may just be a handful of
pips sown in the vegetable
garden. For others, it may be the carefully tended
plot on the side of the
road or on an anthill. For the professionals, it was
those huge fields that
stretched off into the horizon, where the heavily
fertilised, irrigated,
dark green plants stood in immaculately weed-free
straight lines.
All of us know that by Christmas it is too late to
plant maize. Even
the shortest of short season varieties do not do well if
they are planted
too late in the rainy season.
In years gone by,
the message we heard every day on radio and
television in December was that
there were only so many shopping days left
till Christmas.
In
Zimbabwe in 2002 the only message we hear a hundred times a day on
the
State-run Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC)'s radio and television
is
Chave Chimurenga (It's now war).
None of us doubt that the
Chimurenga is here in Zimbabwe, but there
are only 12 planting days left
before Christmas.
What a terribly frightening piece of information
that is. There are
only 12 days left in which to save Zimbabwe from
inevitable famine.
Somehow, we have got to find a way of getting
our government to listen
to us within the next week and a half; if we do not,
we will surely die.
Last week's double page aerial photographs,
taken by The Daily News,
of the thousands of hectares of unused farmland,
should be enough to fill
every single Zimbabwean with complete
terror.
If those pictures did not frighten you, then perhaps the
latest
statements by the Minister of Lands, Agriculture and Rural
Resettlement, Dr
Joseph Made, will.
"At the moment we don't have
the projected figures of what we have
planted this season and this is a big
problem for us as government.
"We only hope that the new farmers will
be able to produce enough
grain to feed the country."
These
words, said barely a week ago by the man solely responsible for
ensuring
there is food for us to buy next year, filled me with cold terror.
Over a
month into the rainy season Made does not know how much maize is
growing in
the ground. He has not even had the wisdom to do what The Daily
News did and
hire an aircraft and go up and have a look.
Not only does Made not
know what is happening on all the farms he and
his ministry have grabbed, but
he is also remaining ominously quiet about
the rainfall patterns to date this
season.
The days have been filled with clear blue, cloudless skies
and already
the Famine Early Warning Network specialists are talking about
another
drought.
Zimbabwe is but one of five southern African
countries experiencing
very erratic rainfall this season. South Africa, the
country most likely to
be able to help us when we are starving, is also
seriously concerned about
limited rainfall and the reduced yields this will
lead to.
At the moment we only seem to worry about the critical
shortages of
grain in Zimbabwe and we queue every day for the produce made
from wheat and
maize.
What about all the other products that
used to come from those huge
but now unused fields shown in The Daily News'
aerial photographs last week?
What about soya beans, field beans, vegetables
and fruit crops?
None of these crops are being grown either and if
they are not
planted, irrigated and cultivated, we will queue for every
single food item
we can think of: jam, peanut butter, margarine, tea, coffee,
meat, milk -
the list goes on forever.
For 34 months the
Ministry of Lands, Agriculture and Rural
Resettlement has consistently
misread and misinterpreted the facts on the
ground.
ZBC
television have perpetuated the lie and tried to make us believe
that
everyone is bopping and jiving in thriving fields bursting with
produce. The
Daily News' aerial photographs show us, without any doubt
whatsoever, just
exactly what is happening on our commercial farms.
There are 12
planting days till Christmas. That old saying "You reap
what you sow" is
never truer than today. Zimbabwe will reap nothing, because
nothing has been
sown. We must beg, plead, cajole and insist that our
government puts some
competent farmers onto those huge unused fields right
now.
The
irrigation pipes lying rusting in auction yards must immediately
be put back
into the hands of the men who know how to use them.
Someone must
grow food for Zimbabwe, and they have 12 days to do so.
The census tells us
that in November 2002 there were 11,6 million people in
Zimbabwe. If we, the
educated and thinking citizens, do nothing now, how
many of us will there be
in November 2003?
Daily News
Landlords cash in on solar eclipse
12/10/2002 9:02:34 AM (GMT +2)
From Our Correspondent in
Bulawayo
Beitbridge landlords cashed in on the shortage of
accommodation during
last week's solar eclipse, with individuals who rented
out their houses to
tourists earning as much as $280 000.
Hundreds of houses which were converted into lodges between October
and the
end of November, brought brisk business to their owners who charged
an
average of $5 000 a night per room.
Kenneth Masiye, who provided
this reporter with accommodation, said
the overnight rates had been revised
upwards from $3 500 in the wake of
rising demand.
He said: "We
kept close contact with the hotels to keep track of
enquiries for
accommodation.
"We were able to gauge the numbers with the assistance
of some hotel
workers.
"In this section alone, there could be a
hundred houses which were
rented out. Most of our clients came from Harare
and Bulawayo."
Most of the multiple home owners in Dulibadzimu
suburb are absentee
landlords, who live in Bulawayo and Harare.
Motel, lodge and hotel rates ranged from $ 6 900 to $9 000 a night.
Daily News
DA attacks government heads of department
12/10/2002 9:01:23 AM (GMT +2)
The District Administrator
for Buhera, John Makoni, has accused heads
of government departments for
insubordination and absenting themselves from
meetings of the rural district
council committees.
He said the heads of departments were in the
habit of sending junior
officers to represent them at these meetings, and
often without apologies or
explanations for their absenteeism.
"Any meaningful development can only take place through the sharing of
ideas
and adopting appropriate development strategies at such meetings,"
Makoni
said.
He said it was through such meetings that officers have a
chance to
guide, assist and support the council in the implementation of
development
programmes.
Since the council did not have the
capacity and expertise to
facilitate development on its own, it was,
therefore, the senior officers'
duty to render services as expected, the DA
said.
"In some districts, the development committees have lost
support
because they are not serious enough as some members continuously
absent
themselves or attend simply because they want to be seen to be there,
but
don't make meaningful contributions," Makoni said. - ZIS
News24
Mugabe to attend ANC indaba?
Willem
Jordaan
Cape Town - Whether president Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe
will be a guest at
the ANC's national conference in Stellenbosch is an issue
that will be
decided by Zanu-PF, Mugabe's ruling party.
Smuts
Ngonyama, the ANC's head of communications, said on Monday that Mugabe
was
not invited to the conference in his personal capacity. Zanu-PF,
however, was
invited to send a delegation to Stellenbosch.
Ngonyama said the ANC had
not received any confirmation on who would be part
of the Zanu-PF
delegation.
He said the ANC had a historic link with Zanu-PF, and that it
was custom to
invite parties with which the ANC had a "working relationship"
to its
conferences.
When asked whether the Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) - the most
prominent opposition party in Zimbabwe - had been
invited, Ngonyama said he
was "unsure".
'Unwise'
In some
diplomatic circles, it is believed that it would be unwise for the
ANC to
allow Mugabe to attend its conference.
"Although it is the ANC's
conference and not government's, it is virtually
impossible that Mugabe's
presence at the conference will not raise eyebrows
among developed nations,"
a diplomatic official said on Monday.
"People must ask questions about
the wisdom of having Mugabe present,
especially in the light of the ANC's
hard work to establish itself as a
responsible leader in
Africa."
Division
ANC circles were abuzz on Monday over whether
Mugabe would attend or not.
There seemed to be division among the ranks of
the party on whether his
presence would be acceptable or not.
Some ANC
members said there would be nothing untoward should Mugabe attend.
Others
believed that the government could not afford it at this stage, and
that the
ANC leadership should negotiate with Zanu-PF behind the scenes to
ensure that
Mugabe did not represent the party.
Government
Joel Netshitenzhe,
government spokesperspon, said he had no information on
whether Mugabe would
attend or not "because it is a party matter".
For this reason he could
also not see why Mugabe's presence would have "any
implications for
government".
Zanu-PF could not be reached for comment.
From The New York Times, 12
December
Zimbabwe uses food as a political
tool, aid groups say
By Rachel L. Swarns
Insiza, Zimbabwe, Dec 8 - The cornfields that once flourished
here are just memories now. The surging rivers have become sandy grazing grounds
where goats feed on withered grass. In this village of parched earth and wilting
crops, more than half of all families need emergency food aid to survive. It is
here, amid the hungry and the vulnerable, that members of Zimbabwe's governing
party stand accused of trying to crush their political rivals by denying them
food. The militants seized sacks of cornmeal and peas from a United Nations
distribution site and gave them to their supporters, turning away opposition
party followers. And in the days before a local election, the governing party
activists reportedly kept bags of food in polling stations, to make their
message plain: vote against the party of President Robert Mugabe and you will go
hungry. The United Nations suspended its operations in Insiza in October,
protesting "the misuse of its resources for political ends," and the government
promised it would not happen again. But the culprits, though known, have not
been arrested, and, at a time when drought and land redistribution have left
nearly half of Zimbabwe's population at risk of famine, scattered incidents
persist. It is difficult to determine the frequency of such problems, which seem
to be much more common in the government-run food program than in international
operations run by the United Nations or other humanitarian groups. But the
willingness of at least some officials to deny food to the opposition shows how
rapidly this country has transformed itself from a promising democracy into an
authoritarian state. Mr. Mugabe, 78, who once won praise for building one of
Africa's most prosperous and educated nations, has after 22 years seen his
popularity plummet. In a bid to hold on to power, he has condoned the killings
and arrests of dozens of opposition supporters over the past three years. The
government insists, however, that the withholding of food for political reasons
is not widespread. A senior official recently assured Western diplomats that
"lessons had been learnt from the unfortunate incidents" in Insiza. Despite such
assurances, however, opposition supporters in the capital, Harare, and in other
towns say officials still demand party cards at some government distribution
sites to ensure that only Mr. Mugabe's supporters buy grain. Here in Insiza,
some frightened people say they have already stopped supporting their party
publicly, to ensure that they will get food when distribution resumes.
The country's catalog of recent changes under Mr. Mugabe
includes curbs on political meetings and threats against judges and journalists
who challenge the government. White farmers have been forced to give their land
to blacks as part of a government effort to undo the legacy of British
colonialism. But the farm seizures and rights violations have discouraged
foreign investment, which has in turn worsened an inflationary economy. Yet of
all Zimbabwe's problems, it is the politicization of food that has raised
concerns in Western capitals recently, with strong statements of concern coming
from the United Nations, Europe and the United States. Andrew Langa, the
governing party candidate who won the parliamentary election here in Insiza,
says he understands why political interference happens during food
distributions, although he denies using food to manipulate the voters. "No one
should politicize aid," Mr. Langa said. "I represent everybody, all the citizens
of Insiza, and I know they all need food. But I also understand how our people
feel." Speaking of the leading opposition group, the Movement for Democratic
Change, and its perceived colonialist ties, he asserted: "People see the M.D.C.
as a British-sponsored party. They're against land reform so people regard them
as an enemy. So if I have maize and you and one of my party supporters come to
me, who do you think I would sell to first?" Opposition supporters, for their
part, feel crippled by such attitudes. "My supporters don't come to me now,
because they know I have nothing," said Mathilda Dube, a local opposition
councilor. "They know we are not allowed food because we are M.D.C."
So far, there are no signs of imminent starvation. But
malnutrition levels are rising, because many people subsist on one meal a day.
The government imports and distributes most of the food supply, selling cheap
grain to the public, The United Nations administers free donations from Europe,
the United States and other countries. Western diplomats say that in the
distribution of relief aid - as opposed to government-bought food - incidents of
political interference have been relatively infrequent. One of the few
documented cases occurred in the impoverished community of Binga, where the
government refused to allow the relief agency Save the Children to distribute
food for two months after an opposition candidate won a local election. A deal
this month broke the deadlock, and food distribution has resumed. In another
needy town, Masvingo, the United Nations reported that last month, government
supporters attacked several opposition members and stole their United
Nations-provided food. The government supporters were persuaded to return it,
and the agency continues its work there. In Insiza, the United Nations has
agreed to resume food distributions after lengthy negotiations in which
officials promised that the food would no longer be withheld. "We have the
assurances we need from the government," said Kevin Farrell, who runs the World
Food Program office in Zimbabwe. "I don't think this was some grand scheme
cooked up in the upper echelons of power in Zimbabwe." But Mr. Farrell and
Western diplomats are less sanguine about the government's distribution program.
In some instances, local governing party councilors determine who can buy and
who cannot. During a recent food distribution near the town of Bikita, an
anxious man approached an official who was wearing a United Nations T-shirt. "In
my village," said the man, Elijah Chifodya, an unemployed father of five,
"they're denying us food because we're opposition." "I'm not going to give it
up," he said of his party affiliation. "but I'm going to pretend I'm no longer
supporting them so at least I can get food."
Please send any material for publication in the Open Letter Forum to:
Open
Letter Forum <justice@telco.co.zw>
JAG OPEN
LETTER
FORUM
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Letter
1 - Kerry Kay
Stephen Lewis, "United" Nations Special Envoy on HIV/AIDS
in Africa visited
Zimbabwe this week, as part of a Regional Tour ( Lesotho,
Malawi, Namibia
and Zambia). I was able to attend a meeting at the UNDP
boardroom on
Thursday afternoon. I attended, naively, with some
expectations. While
those attending spoke on their little pilot projects on
Mother to Child
Transmission, Voluntary Testing and Counselling, which are
all incredibly
important, I made the huge mistake of being totally honest and
suggesting
that the UN see the appalling humanitarian (exacerbated by
HIV/AIDS)
disaster unfolding from a different perspective. As I spoke
briefly on the
"man made genocide by starvation", "the destruction of all
organisations
(HIV/AIDS included) that represented the people of Zimbabwe",
"the demise
of the primary health care system and no drugs, not even Panadol
or Meth.
spirits in the Rural clinics," "that prior to the clamp down on
forex
early this year, generic ART (anti-retrovirals) could be imported
into
Zimbabwe at a cost of only Z$1650,00 per month ", and suggested that the
UN
rather address the root cause of the current humanitarian disaster
instead
of brushing over or ignoring it, there was extreme and tangible
discomfort
in the room. Victor Angelo (head of UNDP Zimbabwe) and Stephen
Lewis,
shuffled uncomfortably in their chairs. Lewis response to the reality
of
the situation, was that he would not get "drawn in" (I did not hear
the
exact word he used) to that "for my pleasure" and proceeded to inform
those
present that HIV prevalence rates were high even in countries like
Botswana
that had a stable government and economy!
Later, he, Stephen
Lewis, Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, apologised
to black Africa for
the "racist attitude of the West and the drug
companies" which was the reason
that money was not made available by the
West for ART in the developing
countries.
Well Stephen Lewis, please don't come to our African countries
with your
Western apologist attitudes, which incidentally are
sickeningly
patronising. Zimbabwe is a nation of strong, intelligent,
resilient and
very caring people. They do not like being patronized by Ian
Smiths
regime, Robert Mugabes, or first worlders ! With a little help from
our
friends, here in Zimbabwe and elsewhere in the world, we can manage
our
HIV/AIDS epidemic, our famine and our corruption by being realistic
and
honest. What we cannot manage and will not accept is people not having
the
guts to stand up to a corrupt, genocidal regime, such at the ZANU PF
ruling
party, and maneuvering around it in order to remain "politically
correct".
That Mr. Lewis will not save lives, will not help the orphans, it
will
merely serve to prolong the agony....... with your help.
At the
end of this discouraging meeting, Stephen Lewis, Special Envoy on
HIV/AIDS in
Africa!, asked " is there anyone here who is hopeful?".
There was a deafening
silence !!!!!!! Perhaps Stephen Lewis and Victor
Angelo, should take
cognisance of the silence of those present, and the
comments I made on "a man
made genocide by starvation" and build that into
their "plans for the
future". It is obviously not politically expedient
for them to acknowledge
that millions of Zimbabweans are being sentenced to
a premature death by a
few power hungry megalomaniacs.
The UN's credibility needs a boost -
perhaps now is the time to work on
that?
And, incidentally, there is a
lot of hope in Zimbabwe, we are people, black
and white, who have suffered,
who have fought for what is right, just and
democratic, who have worked
tirelessly in HIV/AIDS prevention, and we won't
give up until we have
achieved the ideals of true democracy, where we as
Zimbabweans will have rid
ourselves of the corrupt ruling elite and be able
to once again serve the
needs of the sick and dying, and the orphans.
with hope and great love
for our country,
Kerry Kay,
HIV/AIDS Programme Manager and Human Rights
Activist.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Justice
for Agriculture mailing list
To subscribe/unsubscribe: Please write to jag-list-admin@mango.zw
Colorado State Collegian
Cook: No hope for Africa?
by Oliver
Cook
December 12, 2002
I have no hope for Africa. I should say that I
have no hope for Africa's
future if it continues on its current path of
post-colonial failure. The
majority of the continent, specifically the
sub-Saharan part, is suffering
from a series of problems that have compounded
themselves to create an
environment that is practically inescapable.
These
problems include the spread of AIDS, corruption, ethnic and
religious
divisions and, in almost every case outside of South Africa,
under-developed
economies. I am going to emphasize a few of these points to
demonstrate how
critical they are to the continued failures of African
development.
To begin, I feel that an incredibly brief history lesson is
in order. While
Africa has historically been at the mercy of Europe and the
Islamic world,
it was not until the final decades of the 19th century that
direct control
over the continent began. The evolution of European economies
and the rise
of industrialization created a need for raw materials to fuel
this process.
The Treaty of Berlin (1885) officially divided Africa
between the several
European powers that were to use their newly acquired
territories and
populace as captive consumers and workers to extract the
natural wealth of
Africa. After about 75 years of colonial rule, the European
powers decided
that it would be cheaper to grant the colonies independence,
while
maintaining their economic stranglehold over the individual economies.
Part
of keeping the extraction economy in place was to keep incompetent
leaders
in place and discourage massive industrialization.
Most of the
1970s and 1980s were wasted with intra-African wars, corruption,
economic
crises and famine, which led us to the present. Most of the
problems of the
colonial period, and the destabilization that resulted from
the Cold War,
have not gone away. In fact, one could argue that the
International Monetary
Fund and World Bank's role in Africa is very similar
to the role of
extractive companies in the colonial period. I don't have the
space to
elaborate on these institutions, but just understand their
structural
adjustment policies work in Africa just as well as they do
anywhere else - or
I should say that they don't work at all, especially not
in underdeveloped
countries.
The one country that has gone against the wishes of the global
development
institutions, Zimbabwe, is on the verge of anarchy: economic,
ethnic, and
political. Another serious problem is the AIDS epidemic.
According to The
Economist, approximately 30 million sub-Saharan Africans
have contracted
either HIV or AIDS, while another 35 million children have
been orphaned as
a result of the disease.
This is a devastating blow
to an already inefficient economy. The populace
infected with the disease
produces little for the economy, especially since
the availability of cheap,
generic life-sustaining drugs is such a threat to
their patent holders in the
West.
What such an epidemic needs is the implementation of a welfare
state to deal
with the effects of the disease, however due to the
non-existence of funds
to implement such a humanitarian program, that is not
going to happen.
A further example of the terrible state of Africa can be
seen with the
recent riots in Nigeria. I think when over 200 people die as a
result of
ignorance and firebrand Imams, the time has come to begin
reevaluating
Africa's commitment to maintaining their old colonial borders.
Sometimes
people can't live together without killing each other, so why force
them to
like their enemies?
Africa's underdevelopment is really the
key to understanding the issue. It
breaks down to the simple fact that Africa
has no money and can therefore
take no established course of action. I think
that the time has come for a
radical new solution to be presented on the
topic of African development.
The people need solidarity.
IRIN
SOUTHERN AFRICA: Rising prices erode household food
security
© WFP
Urban poor battle to cope with rising
food prices
JOHANNESBURG, 12 Dec 2002 (IRIN) - Rising prices of staples
continued to
erode household food security in some of the most insecure
countries in
Southern Africa, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS
NET) said in
its latest update.
FEWS NET said the outlook for prices
of staples was cause for concern as
prices were likely to "remain high and
increase until the next harvest
[around March/April 2003], which will worsen
food access for an increasing
number of households in Zimbabwe, Malawi and
Zambia, as well as parts of
Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique".
Over
14 million people have been identified as needing food aid in the
six
countries, with Zimbabwe accounting for about half those in need followed
by
Zambia and Malawi.
Conditions in the three worst affected countries
remained of concern "given
that household purchasing power was already low
earlier in the consumption
year (which started in May)," FEWS NET's latest
Update on Cereal Price
Trends in Southern Africa said.
The document
noted that "abnormally high maize prices in much of the region
were acting as
a strong incentive for producers and exporters in northern
Mozambique, South
Africa and Tanzania".
But an earlier FEWS NET drought and flood hazards
assessment had reported in
early December that most of the region had only
recorded between 1mm and 10
mm of rain with "substantially inhibited"
rainfall over portions of South
Africa, Zimbabwe and central to southern
Mozambique.
A lack of rain had inhibited the planting of important crops
of maize,
wheat, sunflower, sorghum and soya in the regional breadbasket,
South
Africa.
In the countries worst hit by rocketing food prices -
Zimbabwe, Malawi and
Zambia - retail prices were generally higher than
average in food insecure
areas. Two consecutive poor harvests and
deteriorating macroeconomic
conditions - in Zimbabwe inflation stood at 144
percent in November - were
creating upward pressure on food prices.
In
Zimbabwe, "as a result of poor policies (e.g. price controls and
haphazard
land redistribution) and an insufficient pipeline of commercial
food imports
and aid flows ... most staple foods were increasingly out of
reach for many
rural and urban households".
Continued high inflation, shortages and an
increasing number of products put
under price controls were supporting these
higher prices. Parallel market
prices for maize had increased by over 300
percent in the past seven months.
As a result, members of poor urban
households were "increasingly engaging in
illegal activities - such as
robbery, prostitution, moving to illegal
settlements and selling controlled
commodities on the parallel market - to
acquire sufficient income to purchase
food and other basic needs", FEWS NET
noted.
In Zambia, high and
increasing prices of maize and maize meal were resulting
in "poor households
exhausting strategies to acquire food".
FEWS NET was "especially
concerned about the ability of households in the
southern part of the country
to acquire sufficient food between now and the
pre-harvest period. An
emergency alert statement will be available soon on
the FEWS NET website (www.fews.net) to highlight the alarming increase
in
food insecurity in Zambia between now and the next harvest."
While
prices in Malawi were increasing, they were still lower than the same
period
last year. But the report warned that "the slow delivery of food aid
would
exacerbate the impact of the high maize prices in rural parts of
Malawi
between now and the next harvest, especially in the southern part of
the
country".
ZBC
Fuel crisis blamed on corruption at Noczim
13 December
2002
The current fuel shortage has been blamed on corruption
and
maladministration within the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe,
Noczim,
working with some officials from the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and
the
Ministry of Finance and Economic Development.
Insiders told
Newsnet that plans to frustrate credit lines in favour of cash
transactions
to enable some officials to earn money among other scandalous
irregularities,
contribute to the current fuel shortage.
The sources also say some Noczim
officials have taken advantage of the
coming in of a new minister and
permanent secretary, to continue corrupt
dealings aimed at throwing the
country's economy into chaos.
Commentators say Noczim owes Zimbabweans an
explanation over the coincidence
of the fuel shortage during the festive
season and claims by the opposition
MDC and its affiliates suggesting that
December was the d-day for mass
action, including stayaways.
IRIN
AFRICA: Violence leading cause of death,WHO
[ This report
does not necessarily reflect the views of the United
Nations]
JOHANNESBURG, 12 Dec 2002 (IRIN) - Violence is one
of the leading causes of
death worldwide with every sector of society feeling
its effects in some
way, the World Health Organisation (WHO) World Report on
Violence and Health
said.
Released this week, the report said that in
2000, an estimated 1.6 million
people worldwide died as a result of
self-inflicted, interpersonal or
collective violence and most of these deaths
occurred in low to middle
income countries, with less than 10 percent in
high-income countries.
Nearly half were suicides, one third were
homicides and about one fifth were
war-related, the report said.
The
highest rate of homicide in the world was found among males aged 15-29
years
and over 60 percent of the suicides occurred among males.
There were also
regional differences. In Africa and North America the
homicide rate was three
times higher than the suicide rate, whereas in
Europe and South-East Asia the
rate of suicide higher.
Violence imposed a major burden on the health and
well-being of populations
and exacted a human and economic toll on nations,
costing economies billions
of US dollars each year in health care, legal
costs, absenteeism from work
and lost productivity, the report
said.
Youth violence was the most visible form of violence and could be
caused by
witnessing violence in the home, economic crises, poverty, being
physically
or sexually abused, prolonged exposure to armed conflict, poor
supervision
at home and peer pressure.
Because of the importance of
parental supervision, family structure and
economic status in determining the
prevalence of youth violence, an increase
in violence by young people was
likely where families had disintegrated
through wars or epidemics or because
of rapid social change, researchers
found.
This affected about 13
million children worldwide who had lost one or both
parents to
HIV/AIDS.
The extent of the epidemic meant that many communites could not
rely on
traditional structures to care for the children, having serious
implications
for violence among young people.
The report found that in
both developing and industrialised countries,
physically abusive parents were
more likely to be young, single, poor and
unemployed and to have less
education than their non-abusing counterparts. I
In addition, stress
resulting from job changes, loss of income, or health
problems could
exacerbate the situation.
Partner violence accounted for a significant
number of murders of women, the
study showed.
Studies from countries
including Canada, Israel and South Africa found that
40-70 percent of female
murder victims were killed by their husbands and
boyfriends. An American
study showed that by contrast, only 4 percent of men
murdered between 1976
and 1996 were killed by their wives, ex-wives or
girlfriends.
Partner
violence had many links with HIV/AIDS and in six countries in
Africa, fear of
ostracism and consequent violence in the home was an
important reason for
pregnant women refusing to take an HIV/AIDS test, or
not returning for their
results.
The study also found that women who lived with violent partners
had
difficulty protecting themselves from pregnancy and sexually
transmitted
infections through coerced sex which interfered with a woman's
ability to
use contraceptives.
Violence against the elderly was often
considered a private matter, the
report said. The most serious forms were
rape, assault and, in some cases,
being killed after being accused of being a
witch by heirs wanting land.
Rape of women and men was often used as a
weapon of war, as a form of attack
on the enemy, the report said. Forms of
sexual violence included forced
marriage or cohabitation, which was used to
legitimise rape, and the
marriage of children, female genital mutilation and
forced virginity
testing.
A study in South Africa found that one third
of rapes had been gang rapes.
For many women, the most common place where
sexual coercion took place was
at school and research in Africa has
highlighted the role of teachers in
facilitating or perpetuating sexual
coercion in return for good grades.
In some places like Zimbabwe, the
custom of "ngozi" meant a girl could be
given to a family as compensation for
the death of a man caused by a member
of the girl's family.
On
reaching puberty the girl was expected to have sexual intercourse with
the
brother or father of the person who died to produce a son to replace the
one
who died. "Chimutsa Mapfiwa" - wife inheritance, meant when a married
woman
died, her sister was obliged to replace her in the matrimonial
home.
Collective violence such as armed conflict, left millions of people
either
dead, tortured or raped, the report said.
This type of violence
could also lead to famine which could kill millions of
people, and the spread
of deadly diseases through bombed water sources. It
halted immunisation
programmes, forcibly closed clinics and drove medical
workers out, leaving
the population unable to heal injuries or cure
illnesses, the report
found.
In addition, it could set of a sudden mass movement of people
trying to
escape the conflict and this would place them in further danger of
violence,
rape, torture and diseases, the report concluded.
SA Should Move From a Strategy That Has Failed
Business Day
(Johannesburg)
OPINION
December 12, 2002
Posted to the web December
12, 2002
Gregg Mills
Johannesburg
Support for the MDC will
benefit both Zimbabwe and the southern African
region
NEPAD is SA's
overriding foreign policy objective. But it is more than this.
It has become
SA's overall policy framework, defining the allocation,
critically, of
presidential time and focus. Hence the recent 10-page letter
from the
executive defending peer review.
Thus it is even more puzzling that the
government doggedly remains committed
to quiet diplomacy in its dealings with
Harare, the more so when this
strategy has, by Pretoria's own admission,
failed.
And, whatever its assertions to the contrary, Pretoria's Zimbabwe
policy is
damaging the New Parnership for Africa's Development's (Nepad's)
standing
both with the west and, importantly, with those Africans whose
welfare it is
supposed to promote.
Explaining this policy stance
requires both understanding of the issues
shaping the ANC's outlook on
Zimbabwe, and the policy options if any it can
select from including quiet
diplomacy.
There are reasons why SA has chosen the course of least action
towards Zanu
(PF), in spite of the rapidly deteriorating economic and
political situation
to its immediate north.
First, there remain acute
sensitivities about leveraging SA's regional
standing and power in a manner
that is nonconsensual, particularly with a
state such as Zimbabwe whose
leadership "enjoys" a certain following
elsewhere in the continent and will
seek to exploit at every opportunity
perceptions of SA's continental
hegemony.
These sensitivities have their root in a related combination of
debts of
allegiance by the African National Congress (ANC) to the region for
support
provided during the antiapartheid struggle and the military role
played by
Pretoria under apartheid.
Second, the land crisis has racial
resonance back in SA, not helped by both
the (largely white) SA opposition
picking up the cudgels over this issue and
by the ANC refusing to see the
real victims of Zimbabwean President Robert
Mugabe's policies not as the
white farmers but as the millions of black
Zimbabweans suffering food
shortages and political repression.
The racial dimension to the crisis
should not be understated; imagine what
Pretoria's response would be if the
racial tables were turned in Zimbabwe,
that a hypothetical white government
was systematically dispossessing black
farmers and committing its citizens to
poverty?
Fundamentally, Pretoria's failure to acknowledge, through
action, human
rights transgressions in Zimbabwe represents a double standard
against the
basis on which the antiapartheid struggle was
prosecuted.
Third, the crisis has reverberations, too, in terms of the
necessary
transition by both the ANC and Zanu (PF) from liberation movements
to
political parties, and the implications of the rise of the Movement
for
Democratic Change (MDC) for ANC rule. The failure of Zanu (PF) to make
the
conversion in terms of its strategies from political emancipation and
the
mythology of liberation to good governance is symbiotic with the rise of
a
nonracial MDC opposition focused on economic delivery and
reform.
Yet the options to "quiet" diplomacy have been paraded as ranging
from
"megaphone diplomacy" to military invasion. A few alternatives to
or,
perhaps better put, variants to quiet diplomacy have been tried,
including
working through the Southern African Development Community (SADC)
to get the
regional body's membership to develop a tougher line.
This
has achieved, at best, mixed results, ranging from the embarrassment
of
support for Mugabe at the 2001 Malawi SADC ministerial summit to the
(more
positive) apparently enforced abdication of Mugabe from the SADC
deputy
chairmanship at Luanda.
A tougher bilateral diplomatic line by
Pretoria towards Harare has been
discounted on the basis that this will
achieve little and potentially reduce
the (by President Thabo Mbeki's own
admission) scant leverage on Mugabe,
though a failure, for example, to
publicly debate sanctions as even a
possibility has largely negated any
influence available through this means.
Hence the continued preference
for bilateral commissions of the sort held in
Pretoria in November, though
this not only has failed to deflect Harare from
its current course towards
economic ruin but has negatively affected
perceptions of both the SA
leadership and of Nepad outside of the region.
What options does Pretoria
have available?
At the two opposite extremes of the scale is, at the one
end, the flexing of
military muscles and outright sanctions (where it has a
range of choices
given both Zimbabwe's landlocked status and economic plight)
and, at the
other, continued quiet diplomacy.
Forgetting these as
either unlikely or ineffective in the current
circumstances, the government
could consider a combination of raising its
rhetorical tempo against Harare
(at least calling the situation for what it
is, a flagrant disregard of the
rule of law and of basic liberties) and
simultaneous engagement with
international partners (with whom it has
instead sought to place critical
distance) and the Zimbabwe opposition.
The latter offers perhaps the most
interesting possibilities. A public
meeting, for example, between Mbeki and
MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai would
have the dual effect of undermining
Harare's attempts to gag the MDC and
aligning the ANC with the forces of
change and democracy in Africa.
Public, financial and logistical support
for the MDC would have the dual
effect of restoring Zimbabwe's democratic
process and the SADC region's
political and diplomatic
credibility.
Now that would be in the best interests of
Nepad.
Mills is National Director of the SA Institute of International
Affairs at
Wits University, Johannesburg.
Park Could See Mozambicans Displaced
Business Day
(Johannesburg)
EDITORIAL
December 12, 2002
Posted to the web
December 12, 2002
Nasreen Seria
Punda Maria
About 6000
Mozambicans could be displaced from their homes to make way for
the newly
established Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park that straddles SA,
Mozambique
and Zimbabwe.
The 3,5-million hectare park, comprising the Kruger
National Park, the
Limpopo National Park in Mozambique and the Gonarezhou
National Park in
Zimbabwe, was launched yesterday with the symbolic cutting
down of part of
the fence separating the Kruger and Limpopo national
parks.
Abel Nhalidede, community liaison officer for the Limpopo park,
said the
Mozambican authorities had started negotiating with the community
living
along the Shingwezi River to have them relocated to another area
within the
park. There are about 25000 people living in the Limpopo park,
mainly along
the Limpopo, Shingwezi and Oliphants rivers.
The
Shingwezi area was identified as having the most tourism potential for
the
Limpopo park and the community has been approached to accept a package
for
resettlement.
Nhalidede said the community could be putting their lives
at risk from the
wild animals crossing over from the Kruger park to the
Limpopo park.
Agricultural land cultivated and used for subsistence farming
could also be
destroyed by animals that migrate across the borders, he
said.
The community was also given the option of remaining in the park,
but being
subjected to a set of regulations, such as limiting the amount of
land under
cultivation. "The community has reacted strongly against being
moved. They
do not understand the consequences (of remaining on the land),"
said
Nhalidede.
By 2004, 120km of fence separating SA from Mozambique
will be removed to
allow animals to roam freely in one of the world's biggest
transnational
wildlife parks.
Environmental Affairs and Tourism
Minister Valli Moosa said yesterday in
Punda Maria that the fence, built in
1975, was an apartheid structure,
serving to keep Mozambicans out of
SA.
"You cannot solve your problems with neighbours through building
fences. In
the long-term it can only be done through development and creating
jobs,"
said Moosa.
The border patrol post at Giryondo in the Kruger
park is expected to be
completed in 2004, allowing tourists visiting the park
to cross over to the
Limpopo side, without requiring additional visas. The
Limpopo park has fewer
animals and has dense vegetation, making it an ideal
environment for
migrating animals.
Hoovers
US bank tightens credit restrictions to Zimbabwe
December
12, 2002 5:58am
Staff Reporter
12/12/2002
THE Export and
Import (Ex-Im) Bank of the United States of America has
tightened lending
conditions to Zimbabwe's private sector to avoid loan
defaults by local
companies, it was learnt this week.
In its annual report, the bank said
although Zimbabwe had become a bad
credit risk, it would extend credit
facilities to Zimbabwean firms under
very strict conditions and only to
borrowers with international sources of
funds.
The government and
parastatals will not benefit from the credit facilities.
Zimbabwe and
Zambia are the only countries in southern Africa where such
restrictive
conditions have been imposed by the American bank.
"Exim will consider
structured financing arrangements such as the bank's
project finance
programme and other financing arrangements that offer a
reasonable assurance
of repayment, including reliable access to adequate
foreign currency," the
bank said.
"Coverage may be available for a transaction that is supported
by an
irrevocable letter of credit issued by a bank and/or due from a
buyer
located in a country where Ex-Im Bank is open without restrictions
for
short-term transactions."
Ex-Im bank said credit facilities to
Zimbabwean companies would also be
available if a reputable foreign financial
institution acted as guarantor.
The bank will also now demand that
applicants for the credit facilities
disclose information on international
borrowings for at least the last six
months and the bank will also take into
account the
companies' financing and ratings.
Ex-Im Bank said
information provided by applicants on syndicated loans
should include the
interest rates charged, maturity profile of the loan,
amounts borrowed and
the names of the arranging and key participating banks.
"For Ex-Im Bank
to consider such borrowers, information on the borrower's
international
borrowing for at least the past six months must accompany the
application,"
said the financial institution.
"For each traded debt security, the
required information includes maturity
and coupon, credit ratings, if any,
and recent yield data."
Zimbabwe is presently rated as a high-risk
country by most international
credit agencies because of economic and
political instability, resulting in
local companies and public enterprises
failing to access lines of credit
from the agencies.
The country has
failed to meet most of its foreign obligations because of a
severe foreign
currency crisis, further hampering efforts to secure
international
credit.
Only last month, Belgian export credit agency Office National du
Ducroire
issued a default notice against Zimbabwe to international
financial
institutions and credit agencies after the government failed to pay
more
than US$376 million owed to the organisation.
The agency, like
Ex-Im, is part of the Berne Union, which represents 51
members worldwide and
whose purpose is to provide credit and insurance cover
against non-payment of
international trade debts.
Local analysts say the Zimbabwean government
should abandon the policies
that have led to the severing of ties with the
International Monetary Fund
and the World Bank. Mending fences with the
Bretton Woods institutions would
improve the country's risk rating, the
analysts say.
Copyright 2002. All Rights Reserved.
Financial
Times Information Limited - Asia Africa Intelligence Wire
ABC News
Zimbabwe Will Not Accept Conditional Aid
-Mugabe
Dec. 12
- CHIRUNDU, Zambia (Reuters) -
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe,
whose government faces a deepening
economic crisis, said on Thursday he
would not accept foreign aid that comes
"wrapped up in political strings."
Speaking at the opening of a $25
million Japanese-financed bridge
between Zimbabwe and Zambia, Mugabe said he
would only accept foreign help
expressly aimed at improving Zimbabwe's
economy.
"Japan has given us clean grant aid packages....not those
wrapped up
in political strings," Mugabe said.
"Cooperating
partners should learn from Japan that when aid is given
objectively, given
with a purpose of improving economic capacity, that aid
is better
appreciated," he added.
Mugabe said Japanese aid was usually
appreciated as it was given to
poor countries without "political
objectives."
"We wish to state that we will never accept aid with
political
objectives even if it is given indirectly," he said.
Zimbabwe is struggling with record high unemployment, inflation and
crippling
fuel shortages in the country's worst economic crisis in two
decades, a
debacle which Mugabe has blamed on his domestic and
foreign
opponents.
Nearly half of the 14 million people in
Zimbabwe, once Africa's bread
basket, now face severe food shortages caused
by drought and Mugabe's
controversial land reform policies. Mugabe was
speaking at Chirundu border
post, 93 miles south of the Zambian capital
Lusaka, where he joined Zambian
President Levy Mwanawasa in opening the new
bridge over the Zambezi river.
BBC
Thursday, 12 December, 2002, 15:57 GMT
Bodies found in Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe's rural areas are in the grip of
drought
 |
|
|
|
By Thabo Kunene
BBC, Bulawayo |
 |
|
The remains of four opposition Movement for Democratic Change members have
been retrieved by local residents and police from an abandoned dip tank at a
village in northern Matabeleland.
They also recovered the body of a member of the Zanu-PF youth militia who is
believed to have been killed by his colleagues about two weeks ago following a
dispute within their ranks.
After the youth disappeared, villagers in Lukona in Nkayi District began
looking for him and questioned other militia members.
They admitted that the body was thrown into the dip tank but only after
villagers forced a confession out of them by beating them up.
The villagers then alerted the police who carried out an operation to search
for the body.
This also led to the discovery of the skeletons of the four MDC members.
Blame
When interrogated by police, the youths blamed local war veterans saying they
murdered the MDC members in secret camps established during the election
campaign earlier this year.
Two war veterans have
now been arrested.
The MP for Nkayi, Abednico Bhebhe confirmed the arrests, and the discovery of
the bodies.
He said he intends to meet police detectives to discuss the case.
Mr Bhebhe, a member of the MDC, was himself abducted and severely tortured by
war veterans in Nkayi during the election campaign.
Efforts to contact Matabeleland North police spokesman, Inspector Mthokozisi
Moyo, have proved fruitless.
Daily News - Feature
Too little food or too many
people?
12/12/2002 8:51:43 AM (GMT +2)
AT
first I just could not and would not believe it: that people who
have wives
and children themselves would starve mothers and babies to death
for no other
reason than to gain some dubious political advantage. This can'
t be true, I
kept saying to myself. Even the most power-hungry politicians
cannot be so
depraved.
There is a Shona proverb which epitomises for me the
generous
hospitality of traditional society: Zuva rimwe haripedzi dura. If
you let a
stranger stay for a day and share your food with him, that won't
exhaust the
granary. Come on, says the proverb, don't be niggardly, where
five or six
hands reach out to a dish of sadza, one more won't make a
difference.
Everyone knows what hunger and thirst are. We are all
bodily creatures
who are dependent for their existence on food and drink.
This is one of the
most basic human needs. We acknowledge our common humanity
when we share our
food with hungry, needy strangers and travellers. By
offering my food to the
unknown visitor I am saying, I want you to live just
as much as I want to
live myself. This gesture expresses our solidarity with
all fellow human
beings.
Presumably we are capable of such
generosity because deep down in our
hearts we remember that the Creator wants
us all, ie the entire human
family, to sit round one table and eat from one
and the same dish. Which has
not stopped us, though, from turning food, or
the denial of food, into a
cruel weapon of war.
Besieging a
fortified city so that no food can come in and no
inhabitant can get out has
long been an accepted tactic of war. Hunger and
starvation is supposed to
drive the enemy into surrender.
Does that mean that we are in a
state of war? Have we turned fellow
citizens into mortal enemies? Do they
deserve to die? We have never
experienced such serious famine before. There
have been food shortages in
certain areas of the country. But the country as
a whole almost always had
enough food. It was just a matter of moving the
foodstuffs to the most needy
parts of the population.
The
present calamity is different. At this present moment there just
is not
enough food to keep all the 11,6 million Zimbabweans (Census 2002)
alive. In
this situation giving a family a 10 or 20kg bag of maize-meal or
sending them
away empty-handed may mean the difference between life
and
death.
How much hunger can people who are already weakened
by the HIV/Aids
pandemic (25 percent of the adult population) stand? Just as
we keep getting
reports of political opponents being discriminated against in
the relief
food distribution, so we hear a steady stream of denials that
anyone is ever
denied food for reasons of political allegiance. Maybe the
people who utter
these denials are even sincere in the sense that they do not
wish to admit
to themselves that such acts of inhumanity are actually taking
place.
Maybe they are really ashamed and embarrassed that such
monstrous
injustice should be committed in their names. Maybe they still have
some
sort of conscience.
But if that is so, then they should
stand up publicly and tell their
comrades that dividing the nation into
friends and foes, those who may live
and those who must die, must stop
forthwith.
If we tackle the present calamity in solidarity,
overcoming ethnic,
linguistic and political divisions, we can emerge from
this crisis a
stronger, more united nation. Whereas, if we use it as an
opportunity to
weaken one another, there will no longer be a state to speak
of, but we will
break up into several hostile camps loyal only to
warlords.
We have been told that we would be better off with only
six million
people, with our own people who support the liberation struggle.
We don't
want all these extra people. In other words, the people have to be
cut down
to size to suit the government. May I suggest that government be cut
down to
size to suit the people?
The first duty of the State is
to uphold the people's right to life.
Leaders who consider half the
population dispensable no longer fulfil the
role of a legitimate government.
A state that is no longer committed to the
protection of the lives of all its
citizens ceases to exist. The law of the
jungle takes over. If an army,
commissioned to defend and protect the
nation, becomes a threat to its own
people, there is no longer any moral
justification for its
existence.
For the sake of the nation and its survival, we urge the
government to
quickly depoliticise the procurement and distribution of food
and put in
place controls to minimise acquisition of food by threats or any
other
means, corruption and exploitation. For maximum benefit to the people
who
are in dire need of food, the government should invite and accommodate
other
organisations which are able to help our nation. This will enable those
who
have resources to buy food and distribute it to all the people regardless
of
their sex, creed, and political affiliation, said the Catholic
Bishops
recently (Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops' Conference, Appeal for Food
in
Zimbabwe, August 2002).
Why can't the government and the
opposition sit down together with the
churches and relief agencies and tackle
jointly this unprecedented disaster
threatening the life of our nation? Are
there no leaders who can follow the
call of their conscience, rise to the
occasion, leave partisan politics and
the pursuit of power behind, and show
themselves to be statesmen who come to
the rescue of the nation in its hour
of need?
Are there no leaders who feel ashamed to play their
political games at
the cost of the lives of nursing mothers and
babies?
Our clandestine civil war must stop. All the 11,6 million
Zimbabweans
at home, plus another three million abroad, must pull together in
solidarity
to ensure the survival of the nation. There is enough food on this
globe if
only we can overcome our bloody-mindedness, bury the hatchet and sit
down
together at the one table where we were meant to sit all along
Daily News
Food aid will be required until June next year:
report
12/12/2002 8:41:07 AM (GMT +2)
Farming
Editor
EARLY projections of the current planting season show a
lower than
normal food production in southern Africa, therefore making it
likely that
food assistance will remain needed at least until the next summer
harvest in
May/June 2003, a southern African Humanitarian Crisis report,
says.
The lower crop projections, combined with poor government
policies on
land, the El Nino, inadequate agricultural inputs, eroding coping
mechanisms
due to the spreading of epidemic diseases including the HIV/Aids
pandemic,
indicate a possible extended vulnerability and need for assistance
in the
region, the report adds.
The United Nations Regional
Inter-Agency Coordination Support Office
(RIACSO) said in its latest
bi-monthly update that preliminary estimates in
the region, based on a number
of seeds sold, showed that even the next
harvest would most likely not
produce enough food.
In Zimbabwe for example, said RIACSO, with the
amount of seeds sold,
about 1,2 million hectares could be planted, yielding a
possible production
of 1,8 million tonnes.
Zimbabwe needs about
two million tonnes of maize for domestic
consumption in one year.The report
says; "Add to this (reduced seed sales)
the gradual intensification of El
Nino and the production might drop even
lower. It is therefore likely that
food relief efforts will even need to
stretch beyond June 2003."
The Department of Meteorological Services warned earlier this year
that poor
rains in the second half of the season from January to March 2003,
will be as
a result of the El Nino phenomenon.
"The responses to agricultural
input requirements have been slow and
limited," the report says. It says that
HIV/Aids has severely undermined the
coping as well as recovery capacity of
the region.
The report says as a result of the epidemic, "a new
variant of famine
emerged characterised by heightened vulnerability, a
breakdown in coping
strategies, rapid decent into starvation and inability to
recover".
Out of the 14 million people who face starvation in
southern Africa,
half are in Zimbabwe.
The report says:
"December 2002 to March 2003 will be the most
critical period in the region
in terms of food vulnerability. The World Food
Programme in the past received
some additional funding from Canada, the US
and Switzerland, but this is
still not enough. There remains an unresourced
gap of approximately 400 000
tonnes."
Daily News - Leader Page
Zanu PF meeting should discuss human
rights
12/12/2002 8:53:41 AM (GMT +2)
THERE
was a poignant example of the government's hypocritical
commitment to human
rights on the International Human Rights Day, 10
December. Thirty human
rights lawyers had planned a march through Harare on
the day. But the police,
now thought by many to be the Zanu PF Republic
Police, had cancelled the
march under the Public Order and Security Act
(POSA).
This is
the odious omnibus law under which Zimbabweans are virtually
denied the right
to assemble in their own country, as notoriously as they
were by the Law and
Order (Maintenance) Act during the worst days of
colonialism.
If
the lawyers had not challenged the police order, and if the judge
had been as
frightened of Zanu PF flak as some of his colleagues now appear
to be, the
march would not have taken place.
But it did take place, largely
because there are still citizens who
refuse to accept that only members of
Zanu PF enjoy human rights in this
country. Such citizens will go to the ends
of the earth to ensure that their
human rights are not trampled upon by a
government which, even as it
reaffirms its commitment to people's human
rights, ignores them with
impunity every day.
Zanu PF, which
holds its annual conference in Chinhoyi this week, will
probably not discuss
human rights at all. Clearly, this is not the same
party which, during its
early years of existence, was invited to every
international forum on human
rights because, during the struggle, that was
its main focus - the human
rights of the people of colonial Rhodesia were
the raison d'etre of the
liberation struggle.
Today, nearly 23 years after the victory over
colonialism the human
rights of the people who helped to defeat colonialism
are not the exact
focus of the government. It was, in fact, left to a civil
servant to make
the keynote speech on the Human Rights Day. David Mangota,
the Permanent
Secretary in the Ministry of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary
Affairs, made
the following memorable statement, among others:
"The
government regards its commitment to the human rights cause as a
continuing
process and not just as an event."
Mangota's political boss,
Patrick Chinamasa, might have been able to
elaborate on this enigmatic
statement, if it hadn't been for the fact that
many would have remembered him
mostly as the front man of the government's
onslaught against the Judiciary
beginning in 2000.
Chinamasa must count among his treasured
"scalps" that of the former
Chief Justice, Anthony Gubbay. Obviously acting
on instructions from the
highest echelons of Zanu PF, he set about
transforming the image of the
Bench into that of the party.
His
success may be considered to be only marginal, as we continue to
be
pleasantly surprised by the decisions of a Bench that we would expect
to
routinely reflect its master's anti-human rights stance.
The
government has passed two laws which must be considered to be in
flagrant
violation of two Articles of the 1948 Universal Declaration of
Human Rights.
Article 19 says: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion
and
expression: this right includes freedom to hold opinions without
interference
and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through
any media and
regardless of frontiers." The Access to Information and
Protection of Privacy
Act is a contradiction of this Article.
Then there is Article 20:
"(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of
peaceful assembly and association.
"(2) No one may be forced to belong to an
association." There are elements of
POSA which are definitely in violation
of this Article.
The
government has ratified most of the conventions in the Universal
Declaration
of Human Rights, but the truth is that this is now a government
so wrapped up
in lawlessness it hardly has time to consider the niceties of
human
rights.
Unfortunately, it is not up to the United Nations to deal
with the
government's disregard of the rule of law. Only the people of
Zimbabwe can
do that - nobody else.
Daily News
Rights groups slam food politicisation,
violence
12/12/2002 9:14:40 AM (GMT +2)
JOHANNESBURG - Human rights groups have voiced concern that
political
violence and the politicisation of food aid have continued in parts
of
Zimbabwe.
In its latest report the Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO
Forum alleged that
violence in the Insiza constituency, where a recent
by-election was held,
"continued unabated in the post-election
period".
Insiza is located near the second city of Bulawayo in
south-western
Zimbabwe.
The report, released on Tuesday, alleged
that supporters of the ruling
Zanu PF and its youth militia "were harassing
and forcing opposition
supporters to denounce the Movement for Democratic
Change and join/rejoin
Zanu PF".
There was also increasing
evidence that Zanu PF was manipulating the
distribution of food along
political lines in an effort to garner and retain
political
support.
"Reports recorded by the Human Rights Forum in September
and October
showed that food distribution had been politically manipulated to
coerce
votes from the electorate during the rural district council elections
and
Insiza by-election, respectively.
"In the month of October,
the Human Rights Forum has documented
incidents that suggest that Zanu PF,
with apparent government acquiescence,
is controlling access to food aid,
denying those perceived to be MDC
supporters access. This is happening in the
absence of a pending election,"
the Human Rights Forum alleged.
The United Nations World Food Programme suspended food aid
distributions in
Insiza in October following the seizure of food by ruling
Zanu PF
activists.
The food agency said Zanu PF activists in Senale centre
in Insiza had
"intimidated" staff of the local implementing
non-governmental
organisations, the Organisation of Rural Associations for
Progress, and
seized three tonnes of food which they "distributed in an
unauthorised
manner".
The Zanu PF supporters were campaigning ahead
of a November
by-election, which President Mugabe's Zanu PF won.
John Prendergast, co-director of the Africa programme of the
International
Crisis Group think-tank, said that unlike political violence -
which usually
"spiked around elections, manipulation of food aid continued
at pace broadly
. . . and continued to be used as a reward for political
support and to
punish the opposition.
"It is an instrument that leaves less of a
mark than torture and
putting people in prison. It's harder to prove and more
general in its
impact. We've seen no diminution in the use of political
criteria to
determine food aid distribution, particularly, of course, of the
commercial
imports and distribution mechanisms controlled by Zimbabwe's Grain
Marketing
Board," Prendergast noted.
Physicians for Human
Rights-Denmark has, in a recent report entitled
Voting Zanu PF For Food:
Rural District and Insiza Elections, concluded that
"the political abuse of
food is the most serious and widespread human rights
violation in Zimbabwe at
this time". -
JUSTICE FOR AGRICULTURE LEGAL COMMUNIQUE - December 12,
2002
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
It
seems there is still some confusion over the Land Acquisition Act and
the
recent amendment to said Act. In the interests of simplicity, we
have
prepared a question and answer explanation of the Act and
its
ramifications.
In the legal revolution you must keep ahead of the
game. Some common
questions and answers regarding the Land Acquisition Act
which now AFFECTS
MANY URBAN DWELLERS TOO:
Q1. What is a Section 5
Notice?
A1. A Section 5 Notice is a preliminary notice of acquisition,
which
must be "gazetted" and put in an official newspaper twice in
consecutive
weeks. You should also receive Section 5 Notice papers delivered
within
thirty days of the gazetting which you should sign a Certificate of
Service
for. The Section 5 Notice is valid for two years from date of
gazetting.
Q2. Who is eligible for a Section 5 Notice?
A2. The
October 2002 amendment (No2) to the act allows any title deed in
excess of
two hectares, which has been under agricultural use any time in
the preceding
fifty years to be acquired for the resettlement programme.
This includes
LARGE PARTS OF HARARE, BULAWAYO AND OTHER CENTRES.
Q3. What do I do
after receiving a Section 5 Notice?
A3. You have thirty days from the
gazetting to lodge a letter of
objection with the Ministry of Agriculture if
you do not wish to have your
property acquired. JAG can advise you on these
letters if you decide not
to see a lawyer.
Q4. What is a Section 8
Order?
A4. A Section 8 is a compulsory acquisition order. It is a
very
unassuming piece of paper without letterhead or a stamp and is signed
by
the acquiring authority. In the act it gives the owner 45 days to stop
all
activities and a further 45 days to move out of his home from the date
of
service. Anyone with a Section 5 can receive a section 8 order 30
days
after the Section 5 Notice is gazetted.
Q5. What do I do if I
get a Section 8 Order?
A5. It needs to be invalidated. There are
various procedural grounds
that can be used in the majority (80-90%) of cases
e.g.:
a) The bondholders not being served with the Section 5 or Section
8.
(Tengwe Estates precedent).
b) The acquiring authority not registering
the Section 8 with the
Administrative Court in the stipulated thirty days
(Simon & Simon
precedent) and serving a Section 7 Order within a
reasonable time period
(14 days).
c) The Section 5 being invalid after
having been in effect for more than 2
years.
d) If you do not have
procedural issues as outlined above, you need to
challenge the
constitutionality of the Section 8. Whatever the case you
need to see a
lawyer. The precedents have been set so the expense should
not be too
worrying a factor.
Q6. What do I do if I have already invalidated my
Section 8 and I get a
new one?
A6. Under the latest No 2 amendment
(October 2002) you now have seven
days to get off your property. However, in
a recent Harare High Court case
Z.R.P were specifically interdicted from
evicting any farmer till the
administrative court had determined the
individual case regarding a
specific farm. If the Z.R.P do not have a lawful
court order to evict you,
they CAN NOT LEGALLY DO SO. We advise you where
possible to further
challenge the 7 day Section 8 Order. Previous flaws in
the process might
allow for this. Obviously this should be done with extreme
haste and
farmers need to strategise a legal challenge ahead of issuance of a
7 day
Section 8 Order.
Q7. What is a Section 7 Order?
Q7.
These are your court papers that need to be registered at the Admin
Court
within 30 working days and served on you within a reasonable time
period (14
days) of your section 8 being served on you. If they have not
been served
within say 45 days, get a lawyer involved to invalidate the
process. If you
are served with Section 7 papers get them in to a lawyer
immediately as you
have to oppose them within fourteen days, although your
day in court may be a
year or two away.
Q8. When you have "your day" in the Administrative
Court what are the
chances of success?
A8. The state has only ever
won two cases both of which have gone for
appeal to the Supreme Court. The
state has to prove necessity of
acquisition, which is becoming more and more
difficult in the light of
impending famine, economic collapse etc, also the
suitability for
resettlement although under Amendment No 2 and land that has
been under
agricultural use in the preceding 50 years is now deemed
suitable.
Q9. What is the Quinnel Case?
A9. This is a
constitutional case regarding the validity of the
acquisition process in
terms of our constitution. There are 8
constitutional points that have been
raised. It should be heard early in
2003 in the Supreme Court. We need only
win one of the points to win the
case outright.
Q10. Why should I
bother with all this if my property is just going to
be acquired unlawfully
as has happened in the past?
A10. If you do not protect yourself and
your property with the law you
could end up either being imprisoned or having
your property acquired in a
legal manner by default. If you lose by default
your future claims for
restitution or compensation will be difficult to
substantiate especially as
it can be construed in law that by your silence or
doing nothing you have
acquiesced to your losses.
Q11. What about
filling in LA3 forms and the like?
A11. By filling in these forms you
are foregoing your legal right to
object to the acquisition. This could put
you in a very compromised
position when it comes to restitution or
compensation, as your ownership of
your title deeds starts to become
questionable. If you have already filled
in an LA3 form do NOT make further
agreements. Protect your title. Do not
think you can win any agreement on
the grounds of duress. If you have time
to see a lawyer it cannot be
considered a duress case. Duress in law
requires immediacy.
Q12. Can
the State just list me again if I get my Section 5 and
8
invalidated?
A12. If your section 5 and section 8 is invalidated it
is illegal for
the State to list you again for a period of 12 months. This
ensures that
your title is protected and gives you time to sort the situation
out on
the
ground.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Justice
for Agriculture mailing list
To subscribe/unsubscribe: Please write to jag-list-admin@mango.zw
