The ZIMBABWE Situation | Our
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This week Zimbabwe
pulled out of the Commonwealth and has threatened to cut
ties with Britain,
which President Mugabe accuses of being responsible for
Zimbabwe's isolation.
Government's official mouthpiece, the Herald, called
for the severance of
links with London this week.
Western diplomats in Harare said all the
EU and the acceding countries were
in accord with Britain's position on
Zimbabwe. There was an agreement to act
in concert on this as in all
matters.
The diplomats said Zimbabwe's position was already
compromised after its
withdrawal from the Commonwealth and cutting ties with
Britain would have
damaging consequences.
President Mugabe's
position is more precarious now as diplomats who attended
the Commonwealth
meeting in Abuja, Nigeria, said the new government in
Malaysia supported
Zimbabwe's suspension. The watershed decision by the
post-Mahathir Mohamad
administration headed by Abdullah Ahmad Badawi
delivers a potentially lethal
blow to Mugabe's "Look East" policy which is
hinged on Malaysia's
goodwill.
Mugabe believes that Zimbabwe's salvation lies in forging
ties with the
Asian Tigers and China. Britain, despite vexed relations with
Zimbabwe, is
still the largest humanitarian and technical support donor to
Zimbabwe.
Since September 2001 Britain has provided humanitarian assistance
to
Zimbabwe worth £62 million.
The diplomats said Zimbabwe would
soon be counting its losses after plunging
itself into less-than-splendid
isolation.
"Mugabe should not forget that he has asked the donors to
provide US$142
million in food and non-food assistance," said a European
Union diplomat. "W
hat he needs at the moment are friends. Subtracting them
will not help
much," he said.
Government spin-doctors this week
tried to defend Mugabe's decision to leave
the Commonwealth saying there were
no benefits accruing to Zimbabwe's
membership of the club.
But
economic analysts said the move by Zimbabwe would further tarnish
the
country's image as an investment and tourist
destination.
"Zimbabwe's image is already tarnished and investors
from countries in the
Commonwealth will think twice about coming to
Zimbabwe," said analyst Eric
Bloch.
"The loss cannot be readily
quantified but without aid, it means Zimbabwe
will have to get foreign
currency to buy food and medicines," he said.
Bloch said any decision to
cut ties with Britain would compound the
country's isolation. "I think that
would be the stupidest thing imaginable.
I hope this is just idle talk," he
said.
He said humanitarian support to Zimbabwe was bound to be
affected as key
donors in the Commonwealth were likely to
retreat.
Zimbabwe's parliament is set to lose its support from the
Commonwealth
Parliamentary Association, which is a key donor to the House of
Assembly's
capacity-building activities. These include training of MPs
and
parliamentary staff through workshops. The CPA was instrumental in
funding
the parliamentary reform exercise over the past four
years.
Zimbabwe has also benefited immensely through scholarships
offered to
Zimbabwean school leavers and graduates by Commonwealth countries
such as
Britain, Australia and Canada. Working-holiday visas are exclusive
to
Commonwealth applicants.
Sport has been assisted by the
provision of training facilities and funding
for local sports associations.
Last year Canada funded implementation of the
strategic plan for the Sports
and Recreation Commission. In addition to the
loss of such benefits, Zimbabwe
will now be booted out of the Commonwealth
Games.
Zim Independent
Mugabe commandeers AirZim plane to Geneva
Dumisani
Muleya/Itai Dzamara
PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe, still chafing after his ban from
the just-ended
Commonwealth summit, on Monday disrupted Air Zimbabwe
operations when he
hastily arranged a trip to Switzerland to attend the World
Summit on the
Information Society to prove he was not isolated.
After
his angry withdrawal from the Commonwealth on Sunday over the
country's
continued suspension, Mugabe on Monday hurriedly left for
Geneva,
Switzerland, to attend the summit.
He was able to get a
visa even though he is under a Swiss travel ban because
the summit fell under
the auspices of the United Nations. Mugabe and 79 of
his associates are under
European Union and American travel sanctions for
repression and human rights
abuses. Switzerland, which is not an EU-member,
has imposed its own separate
travel restrictions.
High-level sources said Mugabe travelled to
Geneva to prove he was not
isolated after his Commonwealth humiliation. The
state media this week
trumpeted his presence at the summit as evidence that
he was not isolated.
Official sources said Mugabe's decision to go to the
Geneva was an
afterthought following events in Abuja, Nigeria. Initially,
Science and
Technology minister Olivia Muchena was expected to represent
Zimbabwe at the
summit.
Sources said Air Zimbabwe was only
notified on Sunday that government wanted
a plane to Geneva. This was after
Mugabe had been told Zimbabwe's suspension
from the Commonwealth
remained.
Sources said Mugabe commandeered an Air Zimbabwe Boeing
767-200, the broke
national airline's cash cow which plies the Harare-London
route. The plane
will be at his service for nine days. This could lead to Air
Zimbabwe losing
billions of dollars.
The aircraft makes three
trips a week to London and generates over $3
billion for Air Zimbabwe over
that period. Due to the advance bookings, Air
Zimbabwe had to hire a plane
from a British airline for US$1 million after
Mugabe had taken the Boeing
767-200.
"Bookings had already been made and the aircraft was
expected to leave for
London on Sunday evening," a source said. "But the
flight had to be
cancelled because Mugabe wanted the plane the following
day."
Mugabe's persistent disruptions at Air Zimbabwe have caused the
ailing
airline serious financial prejudice. Currently Air Zimbabwe is reeling
under
the economic crisis and heavy losses and debts. At Independence in
1980, it
had 15 aircraft but now out of the five planes it remains with, only
three
are operational.
Contacted for comment yesterday Air
Zimbabwe acting managing director
Mordecai Magaisa declined to discuss the
matter. He referred questions to
company spokesman, David Mwenga, who was out
of his office.
Due to lack of preparation, Mugabe suffered on his way
to Geneva. At first
he had to wait for three hours at Harare International
Airport as Air
Zimbabwe officials tried to secure permission for the use of
Ugandan and
Sudanese airspace.
After Uganda and Sudan refused to
cooperate, Mugabe had to use an
alternative but longer route over the
Democratic Republic of Congo which
required refuelling. The plane was
refuelled in Egypt.
Mugabe was last night expected to travel to
Ethiopia for the Sino-Africa
summit.
Zim Independent
Tekere spurns Zanu PF olive-branch
Blessing
Zulu/Godfrey Marawanyika
EFFORTS by Zanu PF Manicaland Province to lure Edgar
Tekere back into the
ruling party appear to be faltering after the veteran
politician this week
said he had not rejoined the party.
Tekere did
not attend last week's ruling party conference in Masvingo
despite
expectations that he would be there.
Last month politburo member
Didymus Mutasa announced that Tekere was back in
Zanu PF. But Tekere in an
interview on Tuesday poured cold water on Mutasa's
claims.
"The
issue of them (Zanu PF leaders) having expressed the desire to have me
back
in the party has not been solved. I haven't returned to the party,"
said
Tekere.
Tekere did not attend the Zanu PF conference last week
despite clear
pronouncements by Mutasa that the veteran nationalist would
attend as a
first move towards reconciliation with his colleagues. Tekere
told the
Zimbabwe Independent on Tuesday that he did not attend the
conference
because he had not been formally invited and in any case had not
returned to
the ruling party.
"I was not invited formerly," said
Tekere. "I just heard through media
reports that they wanted me to attend. So
how could I attend something I was
not formally invited
to?"
Tekere has also spurned approaches by members of the war
veterans'
association for him to replace the late Chenjarai Hunzvi as
national
chairman. The position had earlier been offered to President Mugabe
who
turned it down. The name of Tekere is now being touted as the
possible
successor to Hunzvi. But Tekere, who is also the war veterans'
patron for
Manicaland Province, said it was not the proper thing to
do.
"I do not think it would be appropriate for me to become their
chairman," he
said.
Tekere said the very idea of approaching
Mugabe in the first place was not
well thought out.
"Mugabe and I
were at a higher level during the liberation war. This is an
association of
people we were commanding and they must choose one of their
own. If they have
a crisis it is up to them to solve it amicably,"
said
Tekere.
Mutasa in an interview on Wednesday lashed out at
Tekere, describing his
case as of no importance in the face of a plethora of
problems faced by the
party.
"Why does he have to be invited?"
said Mutasa "Those who came to the
conference, were they invited? We have
much more serious issues concerning
the Commonwealth. This is a more serious
issue than Tekere.
"ZvaTekere zvinotadzisa vanhu kudya sadza here
izvozvo (Can people stop
eating because of Tekere?) In fact the media is to
blame for the problems in
the country. You focus on Tekere yet there is a
problem of the
Commonwealth," Mutasa said.
Tekere severed ties
with Zanu PF in 1989 after he accused the party of
failing to deal with
corruption.
The fallout between Tekere and Zanu PF led to the
maverick Manicaland
politician forming his own political party, the Zimbabwe
Unity Movement,
that contested the 1990 presidential election.
Zim Independent
Platform for muzzled war vets at congress
Itai
Dzamara
WAR veterans who were denied an opportunity to speak out on the
contentious
succession issue at last weekend's Zanu PF annual conference are
expected to
express their views in Mutare this weekend at their annual
congress.
Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans Association
secretary-general Endy
Mhlanga this week confirmed that war veterans had left
Masvingo aggrieved
due to the manner in which the top Zanu PF leadership
swept the succession
issue under the carpet. He said the congress in Mutare
was likely to be
contentious because of the issues he described as
"thorny".
"Oh yes, zvinotyisa (it is scaring)," said Mhlanga. "The
congress will be
explosive I tell you. The comrades (war vets) have a number
of burning
issues.
"It is true some have said that the issue of
succession has been evaded and
is dividing the party and want it dealt with.
At the same time there is
likely to be blood and thunder over elections to
choose a substantive
executive."
Contrary to widespread
expectations, both inside and outside the party, the
Zanu PF leadership
excluded the succession issue from the conference's
agenda. Mugabe himself
poured cold water on aspirations to have the debate
come alive by reaffirming
that he still needed to preside over the
leadership of the party as well as
cling to the state presidency.
That came against a background of
massive lobbying behind the scenes for the
succession debate in which war
veterans are heavily involved.
Mhlanga has in the past confirmed that
Zanu PF bigwigs eyeing Mugabe's post
have enlisted the support of war
veterans' factions to lobby for them.
The war veterans' body has
subsequently split over the succession issue as
well as along tribal lines.
These divisions are set to manifest themselves
this weekend.
Among
those believed to be in the running for Mugabe's post are party
secretary for
administration, Emmerson Mnangagwa, and national chairman,
John
Nkomo.
"As war veterans, we are not happy with the manner in which
the succession
issue is being handled, and we promise fireworks over the
matter. There will
be miracles," said acting war veterans' chairman, Patrick
Nyaruwata,
recently.
Zim Independent
Mugabe in no position to lecture summit
Vincent
Kahiya
EMBATTLED President Robert Mugabe, with a record of legislation
that
militates against freedom of information, this week travelled to
Switzerland
for a United Nations information summit.
The Swiss
government, in keeping with a UN convention, waived international
travel
restrictions on Mugabe to enable him to travel to Europe.The trip to
Geneva
for the UN's World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) afforded
Mugabe the
opportunity to grandstand in a bid to position himself as a
champion of
developing countries' fight against domination by the
developed
world.
In his address to the summit on Wednesday Mugabe
lashed out at Britain and
the United States accusing them of using
information technology to undermine
the country's sovereignty. He said the
two countries were using their
technological superiority "to challenge our
sovereignty through hostile and
malicious broadcasts calculated to foment
instability and destroy the state
through divisions".
Mugabe's
laws on information management are completely contrary to the
spirit of WSIS,
which is "to promote the urgently needed access of all
countries to
information, knowledge and communication technologies
for
development".
In 2000 the government passed the Post and
Telecommunications Act, which set
punitive licensing fees for private players
wanting to enter the telephonic
and Internet sectors. Mugabe in March last
year signed into law the Access
to Information and Protection of Privacy Act
which has barricaded from
public scrutiny information held by
government.
The Broadcasting Services Act has ensured that the state
remains the sole
broadcaster as no private company has been licensed since
the promulgation
of the Act in April 2001.
Mugabe has not had many
opportunities to travel to Europe lately. He has
used such occasions as the
World Summit on Sustainable Development in
Johannesburg last year and the UN
General Assembly in September to lambast
the West.
A spokesperson
for the Swiss foreign ministry said Bern had agreed to waive
the travel ban.
Switzerland had "agreed not to apply visa restrictions for
personalities
invited to the summit", including Mugabe, the spokesperson
said.
Zim Independent
Evicted farmers demand $36 trillion
Augustine
Mukaro
DISPOSSESSED commercial farmers plan to mount a lawsuit to force
government
to pay an estimated £4 billion compensation for improvements on
their seized
properties.
Government is estimated to have seized over 4
000 highly-mechanised
commercial farms across the country in the past three
years.
The amount demanded by the farmers translates to $36 trillion
at the
prevailing parallel exchange rate of £1: $9 000 and is more than four
times
Zimbabwe's 2004 national budget of $7,7 trillion.
Government
allocated about $1 trillion to agriculture in the 2004
national
budget.
Justice for Agriculture (JAG), which is
spearheading the suit, said
government was not serious on compensation,
leaving the evicted farmers with
no option but to resort to the
courts.
JAG vice-president John Worswick yesterday said government
showed lack of
seriousness when it allocated a mere $20 billion for
compensation in the
2004 budget.
"Farmers require up to £4 billion
as compensation for all improvements on
the acquired farms," Worswick
said.
"The allocated amount does not suffice to pay compensation for
even 30
farmers because of the devaluation of the local
currency."
He said government had used under-qualified evaluators to
assess
compensation levels to farmers.
"All farmers called to the
Agriculture ministry for a meeting to discuss
compensation packages ended up
being offered 10% of the real value," he
said.
JAG spokesman Ben
Freeth told the Zimbabwe Independent that JAG's meeting
that was disrupted by
riot police two weeks ago at ART Farm was meant to
discuss the way forward on
compensation.
"Compensation was the main issue on our agenda," Freeth
said.
"We are however still going to hold the meeting soonest because the
police
acted illegally. We are a properly constituted organisation and
therefore
exempted from Posa. Police's Law and Order section have extended an
apology
for disrupting our meeting."
JAG officials said farmers
had opted for the legal route because some of the
amounts offered by
government were unrealistic in the highly
inflationary
environment.
"Some of the prices offered to farmers
would not be enough to buy a tractor
tyre and that is unacceptable," an
official said.
Commercial farmers forcibly evicted from their
properties since the
beginning of farm invasions in 2000 have taken
government to court demanding
billions of dollars in compensation. Government
agreed to compensate the
farmers for all the improvements on their farms but
not for the land itself.
Last year government allocated $10 billion for
compensation, which farmers
said was enough to pay for improvements on only
30 farms.
Meanwhile essential agricultural equipment worth billions
of dollars is
lying idle at auction floors and warehouses across the country
where it was
moved by evicted farmers at the height of land seizures, the
Independent has
established.
Despite ad hoc auctioning of the
equipment at garages and agro-dealerships
along the country's major highways,
sales have been painstakingly slow over
the past three years.
The
auction centres are in Selous, Mount Hampden, Ruwa, Bindura, Chinhoyi
and
along Chitungwiza road and Beatrice road.
The equipment includes
combine harvesters, tractors, irrigation equipment,
cultivators and harrows.
The revelation of stored equipment comes amid
reports that newly resettled
farmers are struggling to till and harvest
their crops.
Zim Independent
Mkapa urged to rein in Mugabe
Blessing Zulu
THE
Southern African Trade Unions Co-ordinating Council (Satucc) has
petitioned
President Benjamin Mkapa to rein in President Robert Mugabe's
repressive
regime.
Mkapa is the chairman of the Southern African Development
Community (Sadc).
The petition sent to Mkapa last month was also copied to
all regional
leaders, including President Mugabe.
Satucc, which
represents trade unions in the Sadc region, said Zimbabwe tops
the list of
oppressive regimes, followed by Swaziland.
"The Zimbabwean and
Swaziland governments continue their brutal attacks,
arbitrary arrests and
general use of force to clamp down and silence the
trade union movement in
general and their leaders in particular," the
petition
said.
Zimbabwe and Swaziland were also blasted for their abuse of the
rights of
vulnerable groups in society.
"The Zimbabwean and
Swaziland governments continue to perpetuate a
methodical assault on the
workers' rights, such as the right to collectively
organise wage demands,
including the rights of the disadvantaged such as
women, children and people
with disabilities, as evidenced by systematic
cases of rape and torture," the
petition said.
Satucc said it was concerned that the two countries
had not adhered to the
Sadc Charter on Fundamental Social Rights, the
International Labour
Organisation conventions and other relevant
international laws on human
rights despite being signatories.
The
two countries instead had continued to "advance political repression
and
blatant abuse and non-adherence to human rights".
Satucc said
it was prepared to mobilise other trade unions in the region
and
internationally to oppose gross human rights abuses.
ZCTU
president Lovemore Matombo said they had not received a response
from
government on the petition.
"The leaders normally respond
through Satucc offices, who then communicate
to us," said
Matombo.
Meanwhile, a South African Communist Party (SACP) delegation
has been in the
country since Monday on a five-day visit.
The team
is led by SACP secretary-general Blade Nzimande and includes
deputy
secretary-general Jeremy Cronin, central committee member Lindelwa
Dunjwa,
KwaZulu Natal provincial secretary Themba Mthembu, and Young
Communist
League committee member Lucian Segami.
It has met Zanu
PF, MDC, civic groups and other stakeholders to gather
information and
suggest solutions to the Zimbabwe crisis.
Zim Independent
Public ignore firearms audit
Augustine
Mukaro
POLICE efforts to carry out a firearms audit have hit a snag after
the
public ignored calls to submit their weapons for verification, the
Zimbabwe
Independent heard last week.
The police force's Criminal
Investigation Department (CID) launched a
nationwide firearms audit on
November 21, inviting people to bring in their
weapons for verification. The
audit is expected to run until the end of the
month.
In a
statement issued last month, police called on the public to take
their
firearms to the police for verification.
"Members of the
public are required to take their firearms and firearm
certificates to their
nearest police station for verification," police said
in the
statement.
Highly placed sources in the CID said the call was widely
ignored by members
of the public.
"The response has been dismal
considering the number of firearms suspected
to be in the public's hands," a
source said.
"Police could be forced to seek an alternative method to
do the audit if the
response doesn't improve."
Police spokesman
Assistant Commissioner Wayne Bvudzijena last week said the
audit was still
going on and people with firearms were being encouraged to
take them in for
verification.
"I haven't checked with the department that is dealing
with the audit but we
urge people with firearms to bring them in for
verification," Bvudzijena
said.
He said the police would proceed
to check on all people registered as having
weapons to ensure that they are
audited.
Bvudzijena said most of the guns used in armed robberies
were stolen
weapons. It is widely believed however that government handed out
assault
rifles to war veterans and party supporters at the height of farm
invasions
in 2000 and 2001 and that most of these have not been returned or
accounted
for.
Zim Independent
Radical measures urged to rescue economy
Dumisani
Muleya
TRUST Bank chief executive William Nyemba says there is an urgent need
to
address Zimbabwe's skewed macro-economic fundamentals to rescue the
economy
from the current morass.
Nyemba said government should tackle
inflation, the exchange rate, interest
rates and the foreign currency crisis
through pragmatic measures.
"We need to address macro-economic
fundamentals and re-engage the
international community. We anxiously await
the monetary policy statement to
show us government's policy direction,"
Nyemba told the Zimbabwe
Independent.
"We have to deal with these
issues now. Currently we are breaking world
records for all the wrong
reasons. Interest rates are now over 500% and that
is a world record. We have
done some research on statistics and we have
discovered that this is actually
a record."
He said exchange rate and interest rate distortions
together with high money
supply were fuelling inflation, which stands at
526%.
"Attempts to have positive real interest rates will destroy the
productive
sector. We need to fight consumptive borrowing but there should be
other
means of doing it besides the hiking of interest rates. After
all,
consumptive borrowing only takes 20% of total borrowings, Nyemba
said.
"The question is, do we need to sacrifice the entire productive
sector and
hence the economy in general in a bid to deal with a small section
of
consumptive borrowers?"
Nyemba said interest rates should not
be more than 50%. But there are two
contending views on the issue. Some
analysts want monetary authorities to
hike real interest rates to above
inflation to drag them out of negative
territory, while others want the rates
lowered significantly.
Those who want interest rates increased argue
that this would encourage
savings and hence domestic investment, while those
who want them reduced say
this would promote productive borrowing and
economic expansion.
The debate on macro-economic fundamentals has
been intensifying as the
country anxiously awaits new Reserve Bank governor
Gideon Gono's monetary
policy statement expected next week.
There
has been great expectation that Gono would provide the brakes needed
to
arrest the current economic free fall. In his recent budget
announcement,
Finance minister Herbert Murerwa deferred a lot of key policy
issues, saying
Gono would deal with them.
But sceptics say such
hopes are misplaced because the problem here does not
lie with the Reserve
Bank as such but with the political leadership and its
unworkable
policies.
In his state of the nation address two weeks ago, President
Robert Mugabe
promised economic recovery next year. He said his government
would
vigorously deal with hyperinflation, interest rates, the foreign
currency
crisis, corruption, brain drain, parastatal restructuring,
infrastructural
development, indigenisation, and land
reform.
Mugabe also said a raft of rational monetary and fiscal
measures to address
economic problems were in the offing. However, analysts
said his speech
offered little or no prospects for fundamental political and
economic change
to save the sinking economy.
In 1997, Zimbabwe had
the fastest-growing economy in Africa. Now it has one
of the
fastest-shrinking economies in the world. Agricultural production
has
collapsed. Maize yields are down 67%, tobacco production has fallen by
75%,
while wheat production has plunged by a staggering 90%.
The
Commercial Farmers' Union reports that only 600 of its members are able
to
continue farming, compared to 4 500 before the chaotic land reform
programme
began.
Zim Independent
Zim asks donors for US$109m
Shakeman Mugari /Godfrey
Marawanyika
CRISIS-RIDDEN Zimbabwe has implored aid agencies to solicit
US$109 million
from donors to meet outstanding funding requirements for next
year, it has
been learnt.
The figure represents about 10% of the $7,7
trillion 2004 budget presented
last month. The agencies have appealed for
donations to help President
Mugabe's embattled government to breathe new life
into almost every sector
of the economy.
According to recent
figures by the United Nations Humanitarian Appeal 2004
report, Zimbabwe needs
funding to boost the agricultural sector, resuscitate
the crumbling economy,
and revive the health delivery system.
The report also indicates that a
big chunk of the money (US$42,8 million)
would go towards "economic recovery
and infrastructure".
Mugabe has blasted the same donors - especially
Britain and the United
States - accusing them of sabotaging the country's
economy.
The two countries have been Zimbabwe's biggest financiers in
food
assistance.
The agencies are also appealing for international
donors to pour in US$24,2
million to cater for the health sector which is
crumbling due to the
perennial shortages of medicines and intermittent
strikes by doctors and
nurses.
A further US$2,9 million is
required for "protection, human rights and rule
of law". For coordination and
support services, the UN said Zimbabwe needed
US$3,3 million.
In
July this year Minister of Finance Herbert Murerwa appealed through
the
United Nations Development Programme for food and medicinal drugs
worth
US$142 million.
Zimbabwe needs to import over 700 000 tones
of maize to make up for the
deficit caused by the chaotic land reform
programme and drought conditions
in the region.
High on Murerwa's
priority list were health requirements to cater for
malaria and
Aids.
"The needs assessment established that at least five million
tablets of
chloroquine and 1,5 million tablets of S/P were urgently required
for an
estimated 509 000 malaria cases," said Murerwa in the appeal
papers.
Analysts doubt whether donors will be forthcoming with their
money following
President Mugabe's decision last week to unilaterally
withdraw Zimbabwe's
membership of the Commonwealth after the country's
suspension was extended
indefinitely in Abuja. Much aid from Britain and
Australia was premised on
close Commonwealth ties.
Zim Independent
Unicef forms street kids task force
Irin
A TASK
force has been established to assist the rapidly increasing number of
street
children in Zimbabwe's capital, Harare.
Ron Pouwels, UN Children's Fund
(Unicef) project officer for child
protection, told IRIN on last Friday that
an assessment of street children
would be conducted this
week.
Among the organisations involved in the task force are Unicef,
the Harare
city council, the department of social services, Zimbabwe Republic
Police,
and various NGOs.
Pouwels said while task forces had
already been set up in other parts of the
country, such as Bulawayo, the
increasing number of street children in
Harare necessitated a more
co-ordinated intervention.
Previous attempts to set up the task force
had failed for one reason or
another, but the initiative was revived in the
latter half of the year by
the Zimbabwe National Council for the Welfare of
Children, with the
financial support of Unicef.
Zimbabwe's
humanitarian crisis - fuelled by a combination of food shortages,
rapid
economic decline and the impact of HIV/AIDS - had contributed to the
increase
in street children.
"We know that children are dropping out of school
because of the food
shortages, and it is definitely one reason why they end
up on the street,"
said Pouwels.
"Another is the collapse of
community structures and the orphan crisis as a
result of
HIV/Aids.
"Communities are overstretched already because of poverty -
with food
insecurity and the impact of HIV/Aids they are less and less able
to cope
with the increasing number of orphans, and Harare is a magnet for
these
children," Pouwels said.
He said that while HIV/Aids, food
shortages and rising poverty had
contributed to the crisis, "there is also an
increase in child abuse, which
is also one of the reasons why children choose
to leave home," Pouwels
explained.
The main aim of the task force
"is to bring together partners, so as to
better coordinate the work that they
are doing for street children", Pouwels
said. "We've seen the numbers of
street children increasing and, while there
have been responses, these have
not really been coordinated".
An assessment of street children in
Harare was crucial, as it would guide
the response to the
crisis.
"There's a lot of pressure from government in terms of
rounding up these
children. Their numbers are increasing and government wants
to take action,
but our opinion is that just to round [them] up will not
solve the problem.
In two weeks' time they will be back on the streets. State
institutions are
full, and just sending them home does not solve the
problem," Pouwels said.
The assessment aims to identify where the
children are coming from, why they
are on the street and whether they are
permanently on the street, or just
there during the day and going home at
night.Pouwels said each group of
street children required different
interventions.
For those who are permanently on the streets, or have
been there for some
time, integrating them back into their home communities
may not be an
option, Pouwels said. It was perhaps better to "teach them life
skills and
vocational skills, so they can survive on their
own".
The assessment would allow the task force to "immediately
target" children
who had recently left home. "If the separation with
community or family is
recent, and the ties are still strong, it is easier to
try and get them back
to their family and community in general," Pouwels
noted.
Zim Independent
Ghost of Verwoerd haunts Mugabe
Dumisani
Muleya
FILM footage of apartheid architect Hendrik Verwoerd’s rapturous
return from
the 1961 Commonwealth conference in London shows the hardline
South African
premier addressing a frenzied gathering of the volk at Jan
Smuts airport
where he tried to spin South Africa’s humiliating withdrawal
from the club
of nations into a national victory.
South Africa had
been told to pack its bags and leave because its policies
were inconsistent
with Commonwealth values.
Although the National Party leader — who
engineered institutional
apartheid — played to the gallery to rally domestic
support, his move marked
the beginning of over 30 years of international
isolation. It also signified
the start of a process that was to eventually
bring down apartheid.
Forty-two years down the line, Verwoerd’s folly and
self-delusion have been
reincarnated in Zimbabwe.
Like Verwoerd who
withdrew when his continued stay in the Commonwealth
became unacceptable to
other members, President Robert Mugabe on Sunday did
the same in reaction to
news that Zimbabwe’s suspension from the
Commonwealth for electoral fraud had
been extended. He withdrew from the
54-member club of mostly former British
colonies and tried to pretend it was
a foreign policy
triumph.
Mugabe’s angry pullout came shortly after telephone
conversations with new
Commonwealth chairman, Nigerian President Olusegun
Obasanjo, South African
President Thabo Mbeki and Jamaican Prime Minister
Percival Patterson who
briefed him on what had transpired at the summit from
which he was barred.
The Abuja Chogm was characterised by intense
diplomatic haggling around the
Zimbabwe issue. At stake was whether or not
Zimbabwe, which was suspended
last year on March 19 after the hotly-disputed
presidential poll, should be
readmitted — and on what basis.
Britain
and other Commonwealth nations across the racial divide wanted
Zimbabwe to
remain on suspension until it addressed issues of concern.
They argued
that Zimbabwe was in clear material breach of Commonwealth
principles
enshrined in the Harare Commonwealth Declaration, Millbrook
Commonwealth
Action Programme on the Harare Declaration, Marlborough House
Statement and
the Zimbabwe Mid-Term Review Statement.
The Harare Declaration outlines
Commonwealth principles on democracy, good
governance, human rights and
elections and it is reinforced by the ancillary
Millbrook Statement. The
Marlborough House Statement was issued when
Zimbabwe was suspended from the
club, while the Zimbabwe Mid-Term Review
Statement, which proposed ways of
resolving the current crisis, was issued
by the Commonwealth troika on
Zimbabwe in Abuja on September 23 last year.
When Zimbabwe was suspended
it was required to address issues of political
dialogue and reconciliation;
implementation of the recommendations of the
Commonwealth election observer
group to the Zimbabwe presidential poll; the
promotion, in collaboration with
the UNDP, of a transparent, equitable, and
sustainable land reform programme;
and engagement with Commonwealth
secretary-general Don McKinnon in dealing
with these matters.
However, Mugabe simply refused to attend to these
issues. He even went to
the extent of barring McKinnon or his envoys from
coming to Zimbabwe. Mugabe
’s defence was his claim that Zimbabwe had no case
to answer. Thus instead
of compliance, he offered nothing but abrasive
defiance.
When Commonwealth leaders gathered in Nigeria last weekend, a
dark cloud
hung over their summit as a result. Britain and its allies wanted
Mugabe to
remain on suspension while South Africa and its followers thought
it was
better to accommodate him if he was to be persuaded to
change.
Both arguments were sharp and persuasive but diametrically
opposed. The
British position was that if the Commonwealth succumbed to the
antics of a
stubborn dictator who wanted readmission without adhering to the
club’s
principles it would set a bad precedent.
The South African view
was that it was better to readmit Mugabe and then
force him to comply.
Mbeki’s argument — which ironically was similar to that
of apartheid
apologists — was that if Mugabe remained in isolation he would
create a more
repressive system and no one would be able to influence him to
change. Mugabe
could actually become a worse tyrant if left alone, he
argued.
But
South Africa’s African Christian Democratic Party differed.
“The argument
by some African states that the readmission of Zimbabwe into
the Commonwealth
would encourage reform is a joke,” it said.
British Prime Minister Tony
Blair said if Mugabe was readmitted without
complying with Commonwealth
demands he would actually think what he was
doing was
acceptable.
Blair said the problem was that Mbeki had not been able to
influence Mugabe
to reform and it was not clear why he thought this time
round he would
succeed.
To break the impasse, Kenya, acting on a
suggestion by Canada’s premier Jean
Chretien, proposed that a committee
comprising six countries, South Africa,
Mozambique, India, Jamaica, Australia
and Canada, be set up. The team,
subsequently joined by current club chair
Obasanjo, was mandated to resolve
the issue. The outcome was shocking for
Mbeki: All the countries except his
own voted for Zimbabwe’s continued
suspension.
That marked a second defeat for Mbeki who had been
ferociously fighting
Mugabe’s corner. The first came when Commonwealth
leaders voted for the
secretary-general’s post.
Britain and its allies
supported incumbent McKinnon while South Africa’s
camp backed former Sri
Lankan foreign minister Lakshman Kadirgamar. McKinnon
routed Kadirgamar by 41
to 11 votes. Out of 18 African Commonwealth
countries, South Africa, Namibia,
Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi,
Lesotho, Swaziland, Uganda, Mauritius
and Seychelles reportedly voted for
Kadirgamar. Cameroon, Nigeria, Ghana,
Kenya, Botswana, Sierra Leone and
Gambia voted for McKinnon whom Zimbabwe
wanted out.
But worse was yet to come. Mbeki tried to turn the tables
against Blair by
ensuring the final resolution on Zimbabwe’s status restored
Harare back to
the Commonwealth fold. He was blocked and lost again — for the
third time.
After huffing and puffing about his reversals, Mbeki went
into a private
meeting with Blair to find consensus — by which the
Commonwealth makes
decisions — and he emerged agreeable. It is not known what
Blair said to him
but reports suggest he was reminded of Nepad values of
democracy and good
governance.
At the end of Sunday his “quiet
diplomacy” was in shreds and his position
outside South Africa apparently
weaker than when he went to Abuja.
But Mbeki seems to think he has been
vindicated. He had earlier warned that
isolating Mugabe would be
counterproductive. But his critics say this was an
apologetic
argument.
Political analysts say whatever argument Mbeki advances, the
fact is that he
suffered a humiliation in Abuja.
“Mbeki never likes to
admit that he’s wrong, but the softly-softly approach
hasn’t worked,” said
Tom Lodge, political science professor at South Africa’
s University of
Witwatersrand. “I think that the government’s policy is so
vague, so subtle,
so nuanced, that it scarcely amounts to being a policy.
“I think that
within Africa Mbeki looks weak and within the Commonwealth he
will be taken
less seriously in future.”
MDC foreign spokesman Moses Mzila Ndlovu said:
“It was diplomatic bungling
at such a high level that Mbeki will feel hurt
for some time to come that
his stand was tossed out of the
window.”
Sehlare Makgetlaneng, head of research for Southern Africa at
the Africa
Institute in Pretoria, said Mugabe had put his hand-wringing
allies in a
corner over the Zimbabwe crisis.
“Mugabe has not been
helpful to South Africa and Nigeria. He is also
isolating himself from the
leaders on the continent,” Makgetlaneng said.
Zim Independent
Comment
More isolated than ever
IT is
emblematic of the dire straits in which the government finds itself
that its
media has to boast of President Mugabe being able to travel to
Geneva to
attend an event for which there is a special dispensation for even
the most
repulsive of rogue leaders. This proved Mugabe was not isolated,
his media
minions pathetically claimed.
On the contrary, the exception proved the
rule. Mugabe is now only able to
go to functions organised by the United
Nations in Geneva or New York, or
meetings in Addis Ababa where, like the
African Union or Non-Aligned
Movement, he cannot be excluded.
But his
speech to the World Summit on the Information Society on Wednesday
shows that
whatever the occasion, he will abuse the platform provided to
engage in
redundant nationalist rhetoric that no longer finds purchase on
even the most
sympathetic minds.
Which is why last weekend’s Commonwealth Heads of
Government Meeting in
Abuja represented a watershed. The old Mugabe magic no
longer works.
Since his appearance at the UN Conference on Sustainable
Development in
Johannesburg last year Mugabe has sought to situate himself as
the
standard-bearer of the developing world in its epic battle with the
new
global order. He received some support at the Johannesburg event —
although
nothing like the rapturous ovation subsequently manufactured in the
state
media — because many NGOs present were engaged in their own private
wars
against the Bush administration.
Many of their causes were
entirely laudable. But they naively found
themselves represented as
supporters of a wholly unacceptable tyranny.
Ever since then Mugabe has
been attempting to perform the same trick with
diminishing success. At the UN
General Assembly meeting in September he
tried to erect the same moth-eaten
banner but found France had spoken more
eloquently — and with a great deal
more weight — on why unipolar power was
unacceptable.
Clearly Mugabe
was hoping to do the same thing in Abuja. But Chogms do not
lend themselves
to populist demagoguery and in any case there was the small
matter of
non-compliance with the club’s rules.
So he has had to content himself
with claiming in Geneva that Zimbabwe is
the victim of informational
aggression from Britain and the US. He referred
to “hostile and malicious
broadcasts” which would be a more accurate
definition of the stations he
controls.
No voice is permitted other than his own on ZBC, no
broadcasters except
those approved by him have seen the light of day despite
a Supreme Court
ruling three years ago ordering an opening up of the
airwaves, and media
laws passed last year are the very antithesis of what the
Geneva process has
been trying to overcome.
Mugabe’s address was thus
both inappropriate and mistimed. His people are
the victims of aggression,
not his country. That aggression comes entirely
from within his own party.
And it is precisely because he won’t allow
alternative views to be heard that
NGOs have set up stations outside the
country. Mugabe’s office is the source
of most of the misinformation he
dishonestly tries to pin on
others.
What is significant about the events in Abuja last weekend is
that Mugabe is
no longer able to manipulate the message as he once did.
Nobody accepts his
land crusade as an excuse for violence and misrule. Even
close allies such
as Jamaica’s Percival Patterson have agreed to his
continued suspension from
the Commonwealth. And the little conspiracy with
South Africa to advance the
Sri Lankan candidate as a lesson to Don McKinnon
fell flat when West African
states, and Kenya and Botswana declined to play
ball.
The solidarity front has irretrievably cracked.
So what is
left? President Olusegun Obasanjo is keen to reengage with
Mugabe. At first
he will be rebuffed. But, immeasurably strengthened by his
tactical victories
at Abuja, Obasanjo cannot be ignored. He speaks for much
of Africa as well as
the Commonwealth.
Thabo Mbeki, recovering from a major setback at Abuja,
says he will continue
to hold a door open to Mugabe. Sadc has already said
there must be national
dialogue in Zimbabwe.
This is an agenda that
won’t go away. Indeed, there is no other. Despite his
fist-waving at the
“mere club”, Mugabe loves to strut upon the world stage.
Once his fury has
abated he will look for ways to escape his isolation. The
events of the past
two weeks have left Mugabe weaker. Sadc is also conscious
that its
collaborationist diplomacy is not appreciated elsewhere in Africa.
It will
now try to recover its position by pressing for what it has hitherto
failed
to achieve: a Zimbabwean leader prepared to recognise the realities
of his
own failure and willing to negotiate with the opposition.
It may not
sound a likely proposition. But with the abject failure of
Zimbabwean
diplomacy and Zimbabwe’s friends now fully aware that simply
indulging Mugabe
is unacceptable to many on the continent and most beyond,
the political
picture is less cluttered than it was.
There can be little doubt Mugabe
is losing his battle to win friends and
influence people. His promise in
Masvingo to employ more violence has been
widely reported abroad.
This
is a delinquent leader who believes he is helping his country by
isolating it
further. He may get away with occasional grandstanding in
Geneva and Addis
Ababa. But the bell is tolling. And everybody can hear it
except him.
Zim Independent
Eric Bloch
Severe economic effects of pariah
status
ZIMBABWE’S isolation is becoming ever greater and the prospects of
economic
recovery getting dimmer. Following upon Independence in April 1980,
Zimbabwe
had scores of friends the world over. Those friends included
countries in
the region who had earlier attained their independence, and with
Zimbabwe
joining their ranks, they formed a bond in seeking the independence
of
apartheid-governed South Africa.
Although that bond of friendship
was, in the main, that they had all
struggled and fought for Independence,
and were united in their
understandable hatred for the South Africa of those
days, and had a
commonality of race (but not of tribe, heritage, custom or
language), the
bond was also economic. The friends developed trade links,
although
necessarily weak as almost all of the countries had straitened
economies
which restricted their ability to fund cross-border
trade.
Zimbabwe was a welcome member of the United Nations and of the
Commonwealth,
of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and other
international
organisations. Developed nations flocked to the Zimbabwe
Conference on
Reconstruction and Development (Zimcord), donating billions of
dollars
towards the restoration of the Zimbabwean infrastructure and its
expansion,
towards development of educational and health resources, and
towards
building a virile economy. They not only re-established the economic
and
trade links which had been severed by Rhodesia’s Unilateral Declaration
of
Independence in 1965, which resulted in near-worldwide trade sanctions
under
the aegis of the United Nations. Pursuant to its undertakings at
the
pre-Independence talks at Lancaster House in London in late 1979, the
United
Kingdom expended £48 million (a great deal of money in those days)
towards
facilitating redistribution of land.
Unfortunately, much of
the world’s investment, trade and benevolent
endeavours were only partially
beneficial to Zimbabwe, much of the potential
benefits being dissipated by
the government’s intensely destructive pursuit
of Marxist-Leninist economic
policies (which failed in the former Soviet
Union for 70 years, in Cuba, in
China under Mao-Tse-Tung, in Tanzania and in
Mozambique). They were also
wasted by pronounced corruption, bureaucracy
and
misdirection.
However, Zimbabwe notionally pursued economic
transformation from 1991 by
adopting an Economic Structural Adjustment
Programme (Esap), but without
conviction and commitment, with few positive
results. In 1993, after the
country’s economic ills had been worsened by two
successive droughts,
government was faced with no alternative but to pursue
Esap with greater
vigour. Critics of Esap have blinded themselves to the
result, which was
that from 1994 to 1997 the economy underwent a
metamorphosis characterised
by a sharp drop in inflation, a sharp increase in
gross domestic product,
new investment and concomitant creation of employment
and a lessening of
foreign currency constraints. Of course, that this
occurred was not
acknowledged by Esap critics who to this day blame
Zimbabwe’s present
economic distress upon that programme.
To some
extent, Esap was a success because of the magnitude of the support
given to
Zimbabwe by the IMF, the World Bank, the European Union in general
and the
United Kingdom in particular, and almost all members of the
Commonwealth.
They provided balance of payments support, development and
humanitarian aid,
investment and trade. But, disregarding the progress
achieved under Esap and
the goodwill of the world at large, government
reversed itself on Esap. It
also abandoned adherence to the precepts of
democracy, justice, good
governance, racial equality and respect for human
rights. Admittedly, it has
pretended to the contrary, but eventually “the
truth will out”. And as it did
progressively show its true colours,
government alienated much of the
friendship that had been extended to it and
became an international
pariah.
Government has blinded itself to the truth and the realities:
None of
Zimbabwe’s economic ills are of its making! If government is to be
believed,
those ills are primarily due to malevolent acts of its perceived
enemies,
allegedly led by Britain, aided and abetted by other countries of
the
European Union, the US, and the predominantly white populated
member
countries of the Commonwealth, Australia and Canada. Government turned
to
Libya, Malaysia, and Arab states for funding and imports. For a short
while
those countries came to Zimbabwe’s aid, but real friendship flows in
two
directions, and the inadequate reciprocity from Zimbabwe soon turned
off
those supply lines. Now Zimbabwe is pinning its hopes upon China,
and
undoubtedly some mutually beneficial economic interaction will result —
but
for how long?
Zimbabwe needs much more than the few friendship and
economic links that it
still has. If the Zimbabwean people are not to starve
and the overwhelming
poverty is not to continue and worsen, if Zimbabwe is
not to teeter over the
precipice to total economic collapse, Zimbabwe cannot
continue to be a
pariah in the world of nations. Zimbabwe needs to recognise
the extent to
which its conduct is internationally unacceptable, and the
extent to which
that conduct flouts the very foundational principles upon
which bodies such
as the United Nations are based.
Very clearly
government is not prepared to recognise that fact. Instead, it
is prepared to
sacrifice the Zimbabwean people on the altar of its own ego
and its dogmatic
adherence to the belief in its own omnipotence and
inability to be wrong. As
a result, when the IMF suspended Zimbabwean
membership because of its gross
indebtedness, government took great
exception to that, notwithstanding the
long time wherein the IMF had, almost
silently, condoned its default.
Government accused the IMF of being a tool
of developed countries in waging
their alleged war on Zimbabwe. And
government has repeatedly stated that
Zimbabwe does not need the IMF and can
go it alone, citing Malaysia as its
role model. In doing so, it ignores that
the only similarity between
Malaysia’s circumstances in 1998, and Zimbabwe’s
today, is the absence of IMF
support. Malaysia had all the other ingredients
for an economic revival —
considerable export market demand for its
products, a willingness to target
inflation, a genuine determination to
enforce fiscal discipline, a resolve to
abandon unsuccessful policies and
implement alternatives, and genuine
consultation and interaction with the
private sector.
Now, with no
evidence of change in Zimbabwe, and no endeavour to address its
debt
obligations to the IMF, that body is contemplating terminating
Zimbabwean
membership, instead of just continuing its suspension. As was to
be expected,
the Zimbabwean reaction was to reiterate that Zimbabwe does not
need the IMF.
Government is unconscionably prepared to extend Zimbabwe’s
pariah status
further, and intensify the economic hardships of an already
near-destitute
country.
But that did not suffice for the ruling party. At its conference
last
weekend, reacting to Zimbabwe not having been invited to Chogm in
Nigeria,
and to the expectation that Zimbabwe’s suspension from Commonwealth
councils
would continue, President Mugabe made good his threat to withdraw
Zimbabwe
from the Commonwealth. He was vociferously supported by thousands
of
scapegoats. It was argued that Zimbabwe has no benefit from membership
in
the 54-nation Commonwealth. That contention has no credibility. Why, if
that
were so, did Zimbabwe previously treasure that membership to the extent
of
hosting Chogm in 1991, and desperately sought invitation to this
year’s
Chogm, and why do 53 other nations value membership? Why has
there
previously been only one resignation from the Commonwealth, being
South
African, in 1961, under the then leadership of arch-racist Hendrik
Verwoerd
(What a strange bedfellow for President Mugabe to
choose!)?
No! There is much to be gained from a unity of nations, but out
of sheer,
immature pique, Zimbabwe was willing to forfeit all, and thereby to
extend
its pariah status. Soon Zimbabwe will be the world’s foremost leper,
with
all the inevitable negative economic effects.
Zim Independent
Muckraker
Who's the real coward
here?
FRANKLIN Delano Roosevelt described Sunday, December 7 as a “date
that will
live in infamy”. He was referring to the Japanese attack on Pearl
Harbor in
1941.
Zimbabwe’s government must be feeling equally
shell-shocked after the events
of Sunday, December 7 2003 at the Abuja
Commonwealth summit. There have
certainly been charges of infamy as countries
hitherto regarded as allies
abandoned Zimbabwe without batting an eyelid. The
best they could do was
complain about being “outmanoeuvred” by perfidious
Albion. Most sensibly
kept quiet as democratic imperatives won the
day.
One can understand Zimbabwe’s dismay. In the months leading up to
the summit
we were told the decision to suspend Zimbabwe was taken by Britain
and
Australia. They had no support outside the “white” Commonwealth,
President
Mugabe’s spin doctors insisted. The African, Caribbean and Pacific
states
would back Zimbabwe in demanding the lifting of its
suspension.
But in the weeks preceding the summit, there were indications
that it was
not as simple as that. The Pacific states had made their position
clear in a
joint statement hammering Harare’s human rights record. Then
President
Obasanjo said he would not be inviting Mugabe to Abuja. And finally
there
was some fist-waving against African states that were not “their
brother’s
keeper” which rather gave the game away. Zimbabwe was looking
isolated.
But still we were told by the official media that African and
Caribbean
states would show their solidarity with Zimbabwe at Abuja. Sadc had
passed a
resolution to that effect. Bermuda was leading the pro-Zimbabwe gang
in the
Caribbean, we were told.
It later transpired this was a
reference to Antigua & Barbuda, which is
nowhere near Bermuda and a great
deal less significant!
But everything fell apart on Sunday. The Caribbean
coalition didn’t emerge.
In fact Zimbabwe’s most important Caribbean ally,
Jamaica, led by Percival
Patterson who is on hugging terms with Mugabe, voted
for a continuation of
the suspension. So did India. Only South Africa on the
committee of six held
out against suspension. And after a few words from Tony
Blair about the
future of Nepad that front fell as well.
When
Obasanjo, Mbeki and Patterson called Mugabe to tell him that they
were
holding a door open for him if he would only agree to abide by at least
some
of the club’s rules, they were abruptly told to club off.
Their
position in continuing the suspension was “unacceptable”, they were
haughtily
informed.
But, just like the dogma of the 300 000 resettled farmers which
persists in
the face of the facts, Zimbabwe’s exclusion was declared “blatant
racism”.
Exactly how India and Jamaica could be guilty of racism was not
explained.
Nor was the role of Ghana and Kenya in declining to side with
Zimbabwe.
The endless diet of lies dished out in the state media had
finally met their
Waterloo. This was the greatest defeat for Zimbabwean
foreign policy since
1980. And there was no way to disguise
it.
Didymus Mutasa’s “escape from hell” statement was, if nothing else,
amusing.
Why had President Mugabe spent so much energy on trying to remain in
the
club if it was “hell”? Mutasa didn’t say.
Stan Mudenge, having
made such a fuss about John Howard’s “minority of one”
on the troika, now
complained how unfair it was that South Africa should
find itself in a
minority of one on the committee of six. It was the
Commonwealth that had
failed the test, not Zimbabwe, he complained
topsy-turvy
style.
Mudenge referred to “prejudged decisions” at Abuja. What does he
call Sadc’s
pre-conference posture then?
As for the pathetic
squealings of Levy Mwanawasa and Joachim Chissano, we
can only quote Olusegun
Obasanjo on those who agreed to abide by a consensus
in Abuja and then
complained about arm-twisting once they got home. What
does this say about
the quality of leadership in Zambia and Mozambique?
It must be said
Zambia has not exactly been blessed by fine leaders in its
39 years of
independence!
The Herald has been calling for the severance of ties with
Britain. Does
this mean Zimpapers staff, ZBC employees and President’s Office
officials
will stop applying for those scholarships they put so much store
by?
The claim that the Zimbabwean government has agreed to address issues
of the
independence of the judiciary, press freedom, human rights and
democracy is
simply risible. The campaign against Michael Majuru, the attack
on ZCTU
protestors, and the locking up of women in Bulawayo speak for
themselves.
And how can the Herald argue Britain is all-powerful in the
Commonwealth
when for months it has been arguing Britain was
isolated?
Is “contradiction” not a word the Herald understands?
Congratulations to all
those representatives of Zimbabwe whose lobbying in
Abuja paid off.
The score this week: Civil society 1, Mugabe
0.
Cyclone Eline, it would seem, remains a naughty little girl.
Her
misbehaviour in 2000 was notorious. But she continues to be chastised
three
years later when you would have thought she might have been
forgiven.
Speaking to the faithful in Masvingo last weekend, President
Mugabe said
education, health and social welfare continued to be hit by Eline
as well as
her equally naughty sister, Drought.
These two feature in
most speeches by the president as the reasons for the
government’s poor
performance in the southern part of the country. They must
be fed up with
being blamed for everything.
Mugabe also expressed discontent with the
performance of the party in
Masvingo which he said should lead by example as
the home of the Great
Zimbabwe monument. It used to be called the Zimbabwe
Ruins which is the name
now used for the rest of the country!
Mugabe
said bad planning and poor mobilisation had led him to postpone
presidential
rallies in Harare and Bulawayo.
The implication here was that with sound
planning and effective mobilisation
the residents of the two cities would
attend his rallies. As they haven’t
voted for him since 1996, it is difficult
to see why they should want to
attend his rallies to hear him rant about
sovereignty and independence while
they go hungry.
In any case, at
every other demonstration in the city Zanu PF has had to
truck in its
supporters. Why should his rallies be any different?
A number of
newspapers gullibly bought the line that the Kadoma result
showed the ruling
party winning back urban voters. If you prevent MDC
supporters from
registering, forbid their rallies, deny them access to the
public media, set
up Green Bomber camps next to polling stations and record
the names of those
voting, then of course they are going to “win back”
urban
voters!
Media and Information Commission lawyer Johannes Tomana
was recently quoted
as saying that given the MIC’s chances of winning its
case in the Supreme
Court, there was no reason why the ANZ should be allowed
to resume
publishing.
“Citizens of Zimbabwe have a right to
information, yes, but that should be
in accordance with the laws of the
country. If they are really being
deprived of information as the ANZ would
like to suggest, they could have
shown that by way of demonstrations. But
nothing of that sort has so far
happened.”
So demonstrations are OK
then Johannes?
The Zimbabwe Tourism Authority, one of several parasitic
state agencies that
impose a compulsory tax on users for a questionable
service, has been
promoting the illusion that tourism in Zimbabwe is picking
up. It has in
fact been unashamedly used by the state’s misinformation
machinery to
propagate this fiction.
Muckraker can reveal the
following facts: The country’s flagship hotel,
Elephant Hills, had a grand
total of four people staying there recently. The
hotel has 279 rooms. It
needs 100 filled to break even.
Kingdom Hotel at Victoria Falls, the
country’s premier resort touted by the
Department of Information as the key
to the country’s tourism recovery has a
34% occupancy rate. At the Victoria
Falls Hotel it is 24%.
And how much did it cost Mugabe’s office to
compile that CDRom promoting
Zimbabwe’s attractions and launch it in
Johannesburg and Cape Town?
Here’s one thing the ZTA should understand.
So long as Zimbabwe remains a
byword for tyranny and misrule it stands no
chance at all of pulling in the
punters. Tourists don’t want to visit a
country where the law is selectively
applied, where civic protest is brutally
crushed, and where rich wildlife
resources are cruelly butchered by the
president’s followers.
Meanwhile, the reputable Zimbabwe Council for
Tourism could perform a useful
service by publishing — or giving us to
publish — a list of all
conservancies, parks, lodges, chalets and hunting
concessions invaded or
transferred under threat. That is information the
public needs to know
together with accurate figures for game lost. We will
then put that
alongside the ZTA’s claims for a tourism recovery and let
people draw their
own conclusions.
One side-effect of Zimbabwe’s
departure from the Commonwealth will be the
transformation as from this week
of Commonwealth high commissioners into
plain and simple ambassadors. Let’s
see how quickly the media catch up with
this one. The distinction has
invariably been a source of confusion.
Did you notice all those carefully
constructed posters at Zanu PF’s Masvingo
conference? They had about as much
spontaneity as a Mugabe
State-of-the-Nation address. Such inspiring slogans
as “To hell with the
racist white Commonwealth” adorned the tent where Mugabe
spoke.
“Sendekera Mwana Wevhu” was much in evidence. So was “Howard the
Coward”,
thus suggesting that the same person who invented that facile line
was the
one who produced the posters!
Howard, it turned out, was
anything but a coward, refusing to be impressed
by Mugabe’s insults, pursuing
him out of Abuja and holding the firm line
against Zimbabwe’s errant leader
that subsequently became the majority view.
But Zanu PF, clinging to its
one-party state project, showed it was also a
one-joke party.
“Blair
the toilet” was the best they could manage — an old “joke” for all
the old
fools who still run the dying party and were probably running to the
toilets
given the gorging that went on.
We were interested to note that ZBC has
abandoned any claim to
professionalism by putting up Zanu PF’s childish
placards in their studio.
“Blair’s uncommonwealth” could be seen behind a
news presenter this week.
This was evidently the best they could do. What a
bunch of losers!
One parting thought. Who is the real coward here? A
leader who is so
frightened of criticism that he passes draconian laws making
it a criminal
offence to create “disaffection” towards him, hiding behind
those laws while
hurling abuse at others; or a leader who, despite the
torrent of crude
abuse, holds firm to a principled position and understands
political
invective as part of the price to be paid for life at the
top?
It is abundantly clear who the real coward is!
Zim Independent
RBZ gets tough on travellers
Godfrey
Marawanyika
THE Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) has come down hard on banks in
line with
the Exchange Control Regulations pertaining to holiday travel
allowances to
financial institutions.
The RBZ has sent a circular to
commercial banks informing them that
individual foreign currency account
holders should not carry-over to the
next calendar year a maximum US$2 500 in
allowances.
Regulatory requirements allow individual foreign currency
account holders to
annually receive US$2 500 as their holiday travel
allowance.
In the past, holiday allowances could accrue for a period
of three years,
but with effect from last month this will no longer be
applicable.
In 2001, the then Minister of Finance and Economic
Development Simba Makoni
slashed holiday allowances from US$5 000 to the
current US$2 500 per annum.
According to a circular Reference Number
453, written last month by the
central bank to financial institutions, there
have been amendments
pertaining to holiday travel
allowances.
"Exchange Control advises that Directive RE 451 dated 13
November 2003, is
replaced by this directive RE 453, with amendments made on
holiday travel
allowance," the central bank said.
"Current
Exchange Control policy states that an equivalent of up to US$2 500
may be
issued a holiday travel allowance to any one individual per calendar
year.
This amount may not be accumulated to another calendar year. The
amount
issued must be endorsed in the applicant's passport as evidence to
the
exchange control of holiday travel allowance availed to any one
individual
year."
The RBZ has already instructed banks to retain 50% of foreign
currency from
individual FCAs with effect from November.
The
arrangement means that when an individual intends to withdraw
foreign
currency from a personal account, half of the money must be exchanged
using
the official rate of $824 against the greenback.
The bank
has to remit the other 50% of the hard currency to the RBZ.
This
development comes in the wake of moves by government proposing to
target
individual FCA holders although it was never enforced. Finance
minister
Herbert Murerwa said he would be tough on all banks. Banks have now
been
ordered to account for foreign currency held in all accounts.
"The
holder of a foreign currency account may be issued with additional
funds from
his/her foreign currency account for the purpose of travel," the
RBZ
said.
"In addition, individuals holding cash may exchange same with
travellers'
cheques issued by the authorised dealers. Exchange control
further advises
that foreign currency drawn from the individual FCA's for
travel purposes,
or foreign currency cash exchanged for travellers' cheques
must not be
endorsed in the applicant's passport."
As part of
managing the foreign currency shortages in Zimbabwe government
has since
formed a special taskforce to address the management of foreign
currency
which it says is being abused.
The taskforce has directed the RBZ to
scrutinise all individual FCA
transactions.
However, like all
government taskforces, the latter is still to announce
what it has achieved
so far.
Zim Independent
Private sector seeks ways to rescue NRZ
THE
Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) has intensified efforts
to
coordinate the private sector initiative to mobilise resources for
the
repair of the fast deteriorating railways infrastructure.
The
deterioration is further compounding problems being faced by
industry.
The railway users met with the National Railways of Zimbabwe
(NRZ) at CZI in
Harare where the railway users expressed their willingness to
come up with a
package to rescue NRZ.
Many industries that rely
heavily on NRZ for transportation of goods have
been failing to transport
goods to their various destinations.
As a result, companies have
resorted to road transportation which is more
expensive.
The major
problems being faced by the NRZ are the unavailability of foreign
currency to
buy spare parts to repair and service equipment, shortage of
wagons and
locomotives as well as the shortage of diesel fuel.
Some participants
at a recent meeting said they felt that industry should
only put money in the
NRZ if industry is to have some power to help turn
around the fortunes of the
NRZ.
Of major concern to industry in helping NRZ is that they will
put money in
the NRZ and then government, being the controlling authority,
will give
priority to other things at the expense of freight which pays
for
locomotives.
However, industry recongnises that as an exporting
country, Zimbabwe cannot
do without NRZ hence the need to come up with a
"fast-track" revival plan.
The meeting set up a committee to quickly
explore alternatives and come up
with recommendations of how to resolve the
crisis on a long-term basis.
NRZ general manager Munesu Munodawafa said
what was more disturbing was that
the situation was not going to get better
unless some concrete measures were
taken.
He said 99% of the
locomotives spare parts are imported from the US and
these need foreign
currency.
He said NRZ failed to get on the priority list of foreign
currency
allocation from govern-ment through the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
hence the
situation is likely to continue
deteriorating.
Munodawafa said gov-ernment has allowed NRZ to
approach com-panies that are
willing to help pay for spare
parts.
Some companies have heeded the plea and that is what has kept
the NRZ
running although at a very limited capacity.
He said
another way to getting the solution could be through the
restructuring of
NRZ.
Munodawafa said the draft Railway Regulatory Authority Bill that
seeks to
restructure the NRZ is now with the Attorney General's
office.
He said the draft bill seeks to split NRZ into three
companies that include
a rail and signal company, freight company and a
passenger company and was
expected to be brought before parliament before
soon.
As a result of the low capacity utilisation at the NRZ, coal
distribution
has been adversely-affected. This has further constrained
production levels
in downstream sectors such as agriculture, manufacturing
and con-struction.
In view of these problems, industry in conjunction
with NRZ is working on a
rescue package for NRZ.
The focus of the
package is on the refurbishment of the existing wagons and
locomotives,
purchase of new rolling stock and repairs of the railway track
including
signalling. - CZI Review.
Zim Independent
Policy should address foreign exchange rate
Staff
Writer
ZIMBABWE'S new monetary policy should address the problem of
foreign
exchange rates otherwise the economy will not regain its stature,
analysts
have said.
"The monetary policy yet to be announced by the
Reserve Bank governor,
Gideon Gono, should get rid of the two-tier monetary
system currently
existing in the economy," said John Mupfukari executive
director of the
Employers Confederation of Zimbabwe.
He said in
terms of foreign currency, Zimbabwe has two systems operating -
the parallel
market and the official market.
Mupfukari said what was being
prevented from happening in commercial banks
was happening behind closed
doors. Government is refusing to lift foreign
exchange controls to allow the
exchange rates to be determined by market
forces.
Zim Independent
People want true freedom
AS a sovereign state
Zimbabwe is entitled to leave the Commonwealth. But
there is no need to be
deceptive about this. The land legally owned by
whites was seized illegally.
People have been deliberately maimed and
killed.
The land invasions
were planned and executed with military precision.
President Mugabe has
himself become a prisoner of Zanu PF and the military.
The land seizures have
not helped the common man. The beneficiaries are
those who maintain the
system.
Between them they haven't got much brain power to plan for
the future, hence
the starvation, profiteering and political tension in the
country. We are
now out of the "Anglo-Saxon unholy alliance", so let's
demonstrate what we
can do. My bet is more poverty, more rigidity, more
posturing, more
electioneering, more killings and intimidation of
dissenters.
What the people dream of is one man one vote and freedom
- true freedom.
Let those African leaders who tried to maintain the
status quo by backing
Mugabe think of the Zimbabwean people who have been
deliberately
dispossessed and killed just to further the interests of a few
blacks who
are no more interested in the lot of the povo than Ian Smith
was.
We are being enslaved and dehumanised by fellow blacks. We
should all resist
tyranny and intimidation and organise for freedom. Anyway
the underhand
activities during the Zanu PF conference in Masvingo show all
is not well in
the great house.
The problem with Zanu PF is in its
slogan "Pasi naye/newe". Please don't
kill them, they are telling you the
truth and it's time you took notice. The
list of true nationalists who are
now marginalised is ever increasing. Zanu
PF leaders are extinguishing their
place in history.
Bob Marley was there on Independence day, hear the
echo "...Dem bellyfull
and we hungry". In the 1980s it was whites, now it's
the black elite but
still the same povo.
The UK still has a duty
to get all the white farmers compensated and absolve
many of us Zimbabweans
who have been tainted by what has happened in our
name under Zanu PF and
PF-Zapu. Zanu PF has no mandate to unilaterally take
us out of the
Commonwealth.
This demonstrates the interpretation of democratic
decision-making in
Zimbabwe today. We have seized all the land, let's now get
on quietly with
our business and resolve the politics of Zimbabwe. Do not
blame the demons
from abroad before you deal with those at home. After all
charity begins at
home.
No More Posturing,
UK.
Zim Independent
Cricket selectors hurt the game
I HAVE no idea who
comprises the current panel of selectors at Zimbabwe
Cricket Union
headquarters but, like thousands of other devotees of the game
in this
country, I am left wondering just what it is they are trying
to
achieve.
Zimbabwe went into the final weekend of their recent ODI
series against the
West Indies in the unusual position of holding a 2-1 lead
in the five-match
series. It appeared that, at last, our success-starved
nation was on the
brink of pulling off a shock win over a vastly superior
team.
Saturday's game was a disaster for the home team,
notwithstanding the
two-hour rain delay which left the home side at the mercy
of the curious
Duckworth-Lewis formula. That, and a sensational spell of pace
bowling from
debutante Fidel "Castro" Edwards, ensured a heavy defeat for
Heath Streak's
troops. Two all and one game to go. So, what do the selectors
do?
They choose to blood a first-timer in the batting order in the
crucial
number 5 position - Alastair Maregwede. All too predictably, in a
situation
of such intense pressure, the unfortunate youngster lasted a few
balls
before going back the way he had come literally only moments
earlier.
Sitting at home that Sunday were proven batters like veteran player
Stuart
Carlisle, fresh from a test match century in Sydney, the elegantly
forceful
Travis Friend (who also bowls at pace) and the unorthodox
all-rounder
Douglas Marillier.
The selectors, in their infinite
wisdom, opted instead for a brand new
player, a rookie, on the basis of one
good knock for the "A" side against
the Windies in Kwekwe.
Worse
still, they brought him in ahead of attacking batsmen like Sean Ervine
and
Andy Blignaut. This was, in every sense, a proper final. Their actions
beggar
belief!
Graver even than this faux pas is the fact that, throughout
the ODI series,
the coach and his selectors clung rigidly and stubbornly to a
totally
unsuitable batting order.
Quite how Sean Ervine, in
particular, and Andy Blignaut can be kept hanging
around in the pavillion
while the top 7 not only fail to generate a
sufficient run-rate but
invariably lose their wickets so as to ensure that
these two come to the
crease just in time to hear the fat lady warming up
her vocal chords, is
beyond me.
Heath Streak and Tatenda Taibu, both of whom,
incidentally, did a splendid
job in this series, are the ideal batsmen to
enter the fray lower in the
order.
They are accomplished batsmen
who can, if necessary, up the tempo. They are,
or should be, the team's
batting insurance, if you like, but neither of them
should be batting ahead
of Ervine and Blignaut. Sean Ervine looks for all
the world like a natural
successor to Andy Flower but he is being grossly
misused.
Does the
coach, Geoff Marsh, have any say at all in the composition of this
team or,
once selected, its strategies? If so then where is his cricketing
brain? If
not, then what is he doing in this highly-paid job?
Above all,
though, what are the selection panel playing at? Are they really
trying to
put Zimbabwe back on the winning trail, or does the political
imperative
still prevail at the expense of all else? We, the fans, would
really like to
know.
Peter Lovemore,
Harare.
Zim Independent
Editor's Memo
A good thing
UNTIL last
weekend it would be fair to say Zimbabweans were generally
indifferent to
this strange animal called the Commonwealth. Most had heard
of it, but few
knew or cared what it did. The benefits it brought to
Zimbabwe - mainly in
the fields of technical cooperation, education, science
and sport - were not
widely understood. Nor were the economic advantages of
Commonwealth
membership.
But as soon as it became clear this was an organisation that
was prepared to
stand firm against President Mugabe's electoral rigging and
repression, they
suddenly took an interest. It must be a good thing, people
said.
The modern Commonwealth can trace its roots to decisions taken
in 1926, 1931
and 1949. Britain's self-governing dominions of Canada (1867),
Australia
(1901), New Zealand (1907), and South Africa (1910) were
amalgamations of
groups of colonies that had individually already enjoyed an
advanced measure
of what was termed responsible government. As dominions they
were virtually
independent of London although bound by their allegiance to
the Crown.
However, when Britain declared war on their behalf in 1914
there was
indignation that no consultations had been held, especially when
they were
expected to do much of the fighting. Australia and New Zealand came
of age
during the First World War through their ANZAC landings at Gallipoli.
South
Africa invaded and occupied German South West Africa and sent its
forces to
German East Africa (Tanganyika).
It was therefore
unsurprising that the dominions should insist on being
represented at the
Versailles peace conference in 1919. South Africa's
deputy prime minister,
the Cambridge-educated ex-Boer general Jan Christian
Smuts, played a key role
in Allied war councils and provided the idea of a
League of
Nations.
This maturing led in turn to demands that Britain recognise
the sovereignty
of the dominions, conferring on them a status they in
practice already
enjoyed. This Britain finally agreed to in 1926, finding a
formulation in
the Balfour Declaration (not to be confused with an earlier
one on
Palestine) which recognised their nationhood ("independence" is a
relatively
new word) while reaffirming their common allegiance to the
Crown.
This was given legislative effect by the Statute of
Westminster in 1931. The
dominions followed suit making King George V their
own sovereign. So he
became King of Canada, King of South Africa
etc.
In the Second World War Britain's loss of Singapore to the
Japanese dented
its aura of invincibility. With the advent in 1945 of a
Labour government
committed to granting independence to India, the "jewel in
the crown", it
was clear the Empire would have to face radical
transformation. Already it
was being referred to as the British Commonwealth,
rather than Empire.
Following its independence in 1947, India drew up
a constitution which would
turn it into a republic, replacing King George VI
as head of state. This
created a crisis for the Commonwealth. How could a
republican member be
reconciled with the monarchical nature of the
grouping?
At the London conference of 1949 a solution was found. It
was agreed that
independent Commonwealth states wishing to become republics
could apply to
have their membership renewed so long as they recognised the
British monarch
as Head of the Commonwealth and symbol of their unity. India
thus became a
republic inside the Commonwealth in 1950 and Pakistan in
1956.
The following 10 years saw the emergence of an independent
Malaya (1957)
with its own king, and the birth of a bevy of African states in
1957-68
headed by Ghana and followed by Nigeria (1960).
In 1961,
after a referendum in which a slim majority of white voters opted
for a
republic, South Africa applied at the Commonwealth conference in
London to
stay on as a member. But, led by India, the prime ministers made
it clear
they could not have as a member a state that practised racial
discrimination
and violated the club's rules on democracy.
Rhodesia's UDI proved a
serious challenge in 1965. Divisions were evident at
the Lagos conference in
1966, the first outside Britain. Suspicions
persisted that Britain was not
doing enough to rein in its rebellious
colony. But the Commonwealth played a
key role at the Lusaka Chogm in 1979
in dissuading Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher from recognising the Muzorewa
government and instead getting her to
agree to convene a constitutional
conference in London of internal and
external parties. Commonwealth
peace-keepers played an important role in
supervising the February 1980
elections.
The Commonwealth was also
able to play a constructive role in South Africa's
transition to democracy
through its Eminent Persons Group.
At Singapore in 1971 Commonwealth
heads had drawn up a declaration of
Commonwealth Principles which defined the
voluntary character and consensual
working methods of the club, as well as
its objectives. These include its
belief in human liberty and democratic
rights. The Harare Declaration of
1991 reaffirmed those objectives while the
Millbrook Statement of 1995
provided methodologies for
enforcement.
The Commonwealth is thus one of the few international
organisations that
pays more than lipservice to the values binding it. And it
represents a wide
diversity of states from Antigua to Zambia, large and
small, developed and
developing. In addition to their principles on
governance, what they have in
common is a language - there are no headphones
at Chogms - and a shared
history. Most have a shared legal system as
well.
The Commonwealth's work in the field of technical cooperation,
scholarships,
parliamentary capacity building, and humanitarian assistance
has benefited
Zimbabwe enormously. It is unlikely Britain or Australia would
have provided
the levels of assistance they have if Zimbabwe had not been a
Commonwealth
member.
But the Commonwealth itself has retained its
credibility by standing up for
its principles in the face of aggressive
demands by President Mugabe. By
taking Zimbabwe out he has isolated and
weakened this country while the
Commonwealth will live on. Once again he has
proved what a great destroyer
of good things he is. But, like South Africa,
we shall be readmitted once
the evil in our midst has been eliminated. And it
won't take us 33 years!
Zim Independent
Zimbabweans can deliver themselves from evil
By Mondli
Makhanya
ONE of the most shameful events in modern African politics occurred
on a
weekend in March 2002 when President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe cheated
his
people of their most basic right - the right to choose who they want to
be
ruled by. In the months leading up to the election, Mugabe's political
and
security machine beat up thousands of Zimbabweans and
disenfranchised
hundreds of thousands more.
And over the voting
weekend, the Mugabe government, in a very blatant and
unsophisticated manner,
stole the election before the eyes of the world.
The majority of
Zimbabweans, who were convinced that this election would
mark the end of
Mugabe's 22-year rule, were incensed. They shouted their
anger into TV
cameras, at scribbling journalists and at the foreign
observers who were
standing powerless.
The following day they diligently went back to
work, still cursing under
their collective breath. Their bravest act of
defiance was to snap up copies
of the independent newspapers that were
decrying the electoral fraud that
had just been committed by the Mugabe
government. That event was shameful
not only because the ageing despot stole
an election from his people, but
because his people allowed him to do
so.
Zimbabwe today stands alone in southern Africa as an island of
instability,
social decay and brutal human rights violations. The
constitutional
democracy, with its attendant freedoms and safeguards, exists
only insofar
as Zanu PF will allow - which is not far. The only country that
comes close
to Zimbabwe when it comes to subverting democracy is that tiny
kingdom run
by a randy monarch.
Today's Zimbabwe bears the classic
hallmarks of the apartheid regime when it
was on its last legs. That is
precisely why the seemingly don't care
attitude of the South African
government and other regional governments to
the plight of oppressed
Zimbabweans is nothing short of despicable. Their
mouthing about the land
problem and insistence that the Zimbabwean crisis is
merely an economic and
not a human rights issue, is tantamount to saying
that Zimbabweans are a
lesser people, who do not deserve the rights enjoyed
by most of southern
Africa's citizens.
But the attitude of Zimbabweans to their own
oppression and the gross
mismanagement of their country is as inexplicable as
that of the don't care
brigade. South Africans have been where Zimbabweans
are and certainly took
their own oppression a lot more seriously than the
people of the land north
of the Limpopo.
Little more than a decade
ago South Africans were facing up to a most
morally hideous government that
was bolstered by the most vicious and
sophisticated security apparatus on the
continent. During the states of
emergency, a large section of the leadership
of the internal resistance
movement was jailed and forced
underground.
South Africans who opposed the apartheid system clearly
had the odds stacked
against them. They could have sat back and hoped for
some foreign
deliverance. Instead, through their own actions - and not empty
pleadings -
they turned world opinion against apartheid into world action
against
apartheid. When the world saw throngs of protesters on the streets,
youthful
combatants taking on the armed battalions of the apartheid
government,
humanity's conscience was pricked.
South Africa's
struggle became an international cause célèbre rather than a
passing
interest. The world's people took to their own streets, pressuring
their
respective government to crack down on the National Party government
through
sanctions, disinvestment and isolation. Before the venom-spitting
Professor
Jonathan Moyo accuses this paper of motivating for insurrection,
it must be
stated that the only means of regime change we would ever
countenance are
those allowed by the norms of the United Nations and other
multilateral
bodies to which Zimbabwe subscribes.
However, these organisations'
protocols allow for the recognition of
national liberation struggles. So why
don't Zimbabweans realise that it is
their responsibility to liberate
themselves? We could surmise that because
the country was liberated after a
classical guerilla war in which the exiled
leadership and the rural peasantry
played the major roles, the current
anti-Mugabe leadership lacks the
wherewithal to conduct a decent resistance
campaign.
The urban
working class and intelligentsia played a minimal role in that
struggle and
for the first two decades of independence hero-worshipped the
country's
leadership.
Now that the liberation movement has gone rotten, the
mainly urban-based
resistance is at a loss as to how to mount a systematic
campaign to remove
Mugabe. And because those now leading the new liberation
struggle do not
wear the Chimurenga badge, it is very easy for Mugabe to
discredit them in
the eyes of the peasantry and the leaders of neighbouring
states who come
from same tradition as Zanu PF.
There is a
distinct lack of creativity about how to harness the anger and
discontent
among the country's poor into mass action against the Mugabe
government. The
trade unions, civil society organisations and the political
opposition are,
at every turn, outmanoeuvred by the Mugabe government. At
the risk of
sounding arrogant about the South African experience, one has to
say that
Zimbabweans need look no further than their southern neighbour for
tips on
how to mount a modern resistance campaign. The reasons South
Africans, many
of whom were not even heavily politicised, readily joined in
the struggle
against apartheid was that their leadership was able to
convince them of the
illegitimacy of the government in power. They worked
among the people,
creating leadership structures at the most basic community
level - leaders
with whom villagers and township residents could identify.
Ordinary
people were educated about the exact nature of the society they
were
struggling against and not just indoctrinated to oppose the existing
order.
There was regular contact between national leaders and the people on
the
ground, a factor that presented to grassroots activists the image of
national
leadership accountability.
Mass actions such as marches and stayaways
were not an end in themselves but
were used as vehicles to conscientise
people and keep communities active.
The people took up their leaders' call to
action instead of cowering in
their homes and planning border-jumping
expeditions. The rootedness in
communities ensured that even when the state
removed a layer of leadership,
the struggle was not immobilised. All of this
served not only to defeat
apartheid but also to ensure that the
post-apartheid South Africa was not
one of leader-worshipping masses, as was
the case in post-liberation
Zimbabwe.
That culture of community
involvement in the liberation effort is what today
keeps South Africa's
premier liberation movement on its toes and will ensure
that this country
never follows the Zimbabwean route. Zimbabweans should
begin to build that
culture now instead of blaming the world's inaction for
their woes. Building
sustainable mass movements is the only way they will be
able to remove their
despotic government.
-Mondli Makhanya is editor of the Mail &
Guardian
Zim Independent
A tragedy of epic proportions
By Chido
Makunike
ANOTHER disastrous year for Zimbabwe under the rulership of Robert
Mugabe is
drawing to a close. He is still firmly at State House despite the
suspicion
of many that he was spurned by the majority of voters during last
year's
presidential election. But it has not been an enjoyable ride for
Mugabe
since then, and this year is ending on a particularly sour note for
the
Zimbabwean strongman.
He was stunned at his regime's suspension
from the Commonwealth last year,
but felt quite confident that the
organisation would suffer such withdrawal
pangs without him that they would
surely clamour for his return this year,
despite him not having done a thing
about the issues for which he was kicked
out. Alas, despite a few weak
expressions of rhetorical support from a few
regional leaders, Mugabe found
he did not have enough support to be invited
to tea at Abuja. Host Olusegun
Obasanjo not only declined to invite him,
insult was added to injury by Chogm
continuing his regime's suspension.
Mugabe is so out of touch with the
reality of his failed propaganda and
waning influence that he didn't see all
this coming when it had been staring
him in the face for a long
time.
In response to his being spurned by the Commonwealth, he
ranted, raved and
threatened at the rather less-prestigious-than-Abuja
conference of the party
he totally dominates. He quashed any notions of
freely discussing succeeding
him in the party he has brought to ruin by
veiled threats that amazingly
still work. Zanu PF is called a political party
but it might as well be a
personality cult given how easy it is for one man
to bludgeon 3 000 of the
party's highest members to submit to his
will.
After it became clear that Chogm was not at all amenable to
being hoodwinked
by the cheap blackmail tactics of bitter, failed and washed
up dictators,
Zanu PF obediently and helpfully soothed a wounded ego by
"pulling out" of
the Commonwealth from which they had just been pushed out!
The Commonwealth
is "just a club", squeaked Mugabe pitifully, trying to act
nonchalant about
being dumped. We were expected to somehow forget that for
weeks he had been
desperate to be invited to the club that he now tries to
dismiss as
inconsequential!
What a pathetic example of the lengths
to which a person will go to avoid
examining his own weaknesses with a view
to personal growth. And Zanu PF was
not feeling brave enough to hold up a
mirror to him, satisfied to let him
continue to delude himself and be taken
down with him. What we are
witnessing is a fascinating human tragedy of epic
proportions.
Mugabe has recently made his periodic comments decrying
corruption amongst
his cronies, but I don't know of anyone who takes this
seriously any more.
The corruption has gone on so long, is at such high
levels and is so
widespread in the top echelons of both the government and
the ruling party
that it is beyond being addressed by publicity stunts by
Mugabe. How would
the decision be made on which corrupt cronies to sacrifice
and which ones to
leave untouched? Ministers, ruling party provincial
chairmen,
would-be-presidents, the top-most Zanu PF allied businessmen and
women about
town, who is clean any more? And other than using threats and the
fear of
the loss of the benefits of patronage, does Mugabe any longer have
the moral
authority to be pointing fingers at the crookedness of his cronies?
One's
own Borrowdale mansion's glass might come crashing down from an
exercise as
reckless as throwing stones at others for faults one may have in
equal
measure!
Younger, less tainted members who have cut their
teeth in business are
taking Mugabe's call for self-renewal in the party
seriously and joining the
bandwagon as Mugabe jettisons those he no longer
needs.
Daniel Shumba was very crafty to make himself available to be
made Zanu PF
chairman for Masvingo province. This satisfies the party's
appetite to
replace popular support by recruiting ambitious youngish
businessmen who
have their own strategic reasons for wanting to be on good
terms with the
ruling gang. The economic conditions brought about by the
party Shumba has
chosen to be a high-ranking member of have not made it
possible for his
TeleAccess to get off the ground since being awarded a
licence to compete
with the state's Tel*One for telephone service
provision.
His being a party official will certainly help to avoid
his licence being
withdrawn if he continues to find it difficult to start
business, giving him
desperately needed breathing space. Smart move Shumba,
at least as long as
Zanu PF can continue to cling on!
Don't be
surprised if Shumba goes overboard to prove his "radicalism" and
loyalty by
speaking more harsh nonsense than anybody else, the way Philip
Chiyangwa,
Jonathan Moyo, Patrick Chinamasa and other good boys did when
they were first
given plum posts that have certainly helped them all in
these tough economic
times!
Deposed provincial governor of Mashonaland West Peter Chanetsa
may have been
a little more brazen than others in helping himself to the
benefits of
office. He was linked to more confiscated white farms than other
corrupt
Zanu PF officials who were clever enough to be a little more discreet
in
their greed.
But why was Oppah Muchinguri removed as Manicaland
governor? Apart from not
having been associated with corruption as many other
party and government
officials Mugabe has allowed to retain their positions
have, she has always
been considered a "darling" (no, this is not a
typographical error) of the
throne who was more or less assured of some top
post or another to keep her
quiet and happy, but perhaps relations have
soured in recent years!
Certainly for someone who occupied a
governorship, whose main purposes are
to be loyal to the president and serve
his interests, she spoke a little too
independently and moderately at a time
when being a rough, enthusiastically
unthinking robot is the main test of
loyalty to Mugabe. Clearly in one of
several provinces that Mugabe has
consistently failed to win over by every
tactic he has tried, Muchinguri was
not ruthless, uncouth and unthinking
enough to completely turn a blind eye to
the national ruin Mugabe has
visited upon Zimbabwe. She clearly had to go!
This conveniently fits in with
Mugabe's years-long strategy of gradually
getting rid of party stalwarts who
have liberation war credentials and
constituencies in their own right,
rather than as just appendages of
Mugabe.
Some of these people, after admittedly enjoying patronage
benefits quietly
for years, are now expressing alarm at how far Mugabe has
strayed from the
ideals of the liberation struggle. Mugabe has been gradually
replacing these
people with weak, shameless bootlickers like Moyo, Chinamasa
and others.
They are good parrots and are to be trusted not to utter any
subversively
independent thoughts!
It has been yet another
disastrous year for Zimbabwe under Mugabe, but he
has not exactly enjoyed the
position to which he clings so desperately given
all the hypocrisy and
contradictions around him that can no longer be kept
under wraps. Be ready
for a lot more hardship and repression, but change is
palpably in the
air.
-Chido Makunike is a regular columnist based in Harare.
Zim Independent
Georgia: any lessons for Zimbabwe?
By Ivor
Jenkins
The events in Georgia may seem rather remote from Zimbabwe,
but, like
Serbia before it, there seem some obvious similarities. An
authoritarian
ruler loses the confidence of his nation in the midst of
economic decline
and massive corruption, and is deposed following allegations
of electoral
fraud.
Two weeks ago Eduard Shevardnadze was ousted
amid mass demonstrations
and replaced by a coalition. What made it possible
for this "Velvet
Revolution" to take place peacefully? Why did Shevardnadze
opt to give up
power, rather than move his troops into Freedom Square and
violently restore
order?
There are several reasons.
The broad-based support in the population for
opposition leaders and
the fact that the Georgian people wanted Shevardnadze
to go meant that
Shevardnadze had little popular support.
Despite unsuccessful efforts by the government to shut down
Georgia's
independent television station, which is highly critical of the
government,
the country's media has held onto its independence, providing a
major outlet
for people to understand what is happening in the country.
Beyond that,
Georgia's highly literate and nationalistic people follow the
news closely,
engaging in lively political debate about the
issues.
Shevardnadze's support base within the government
itself had been so
significantly eroded that he had few places to look for
help by the time
protestors took over the Georgian parliament. When it
finally came down to a
decision whether to use force the president also found
that the security
infrastructure had abandoned him, with military forces
siding with the
opposition.
While certainly guilty of
misrule, Shevardnadze cannot be accused of
having committed serious
atrocities against his people. These relatively
clean hands made it possible
for him to step down without serious fear of
reprisal. Indeed, such fears
would have been justifiably created, had he
decided to violently put down the
opposition. As it stands, however, and
especially because of Shevardnadze's
international stature for helping end
the cold war, it was politically
feasible for his opponents to offer amnesty
and promise him safety within the
country.
The governments of the US and Russia supported and
facilitated the
transition. This was demonstrated by the presence of Russian
foreign
minister, Igor Ivanov, at Shevardnadze's resignation and Colin
Powell's
constant communication with both sides. Indeed, it appears that
signals from
these outside powers gave additional encouragement to opposition
leaders
while barring the president from holding on to
power.
Immediately the similarities and differences with
Zimbabwe can be
seen. A discredited leader, severe economic decline, massive
corruption
amidst a favoured elite, electoral fraud, and the loss of
international
allies are all familiar in the Zimbabwe case.
Missing however from Georgia is the repression and violence so
prevalent in
Zimbabwe: repressive legislation, violence against and torture
of members of
all opposition groups, the absence of independent
broadcasting, and the
shutting down of the national press.
Possibly even more
important a difference between Zimbabwe and Georgia
is a lack of
international consensus about Zimbabwe, and, worse than this,
large divisions
between Southern African countries and the rest of the
international
community.
Mugabe and Zanu PF still command a modicum of
respect amongst African
states: the major players are certainly not publicly
showing any discontent
with the Mugabe regime, and showed no discontent at
all over a deeply-flawed
series of elections.
Does the
Georgia example now show the region that there was an
opportunity lost in
March 2002?
South Africa here has a key role, very similar to
that of Russia.
South Africa, like Russia with Georgia, is able to wield
considerable
leverage over Zimbabwe.
However, if we compare
the positions of Russia and South Africa with
Georgia and Zimbabwe
respectively, the differences are patent. Within the
bounds of diplomacy, and
despite having originally validated the election,
Russia creates the pressure
that forces Shevardnadze to abdicate, and thus
ends the possibility of
another civil war or prolonged confusion.
The options are not the
same for managing Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe
and Zanu PF. Firstly, unlike
Shevardnadze, there are very credible
allegations about Mugabe's
responsibility as president for gross human
rights violations, and, possibly
even worse, his direct involvement in the
organised violence and torture in
two different decades. Secondly, there are
the allegations over the
involvement of the Zanu PF elite in massive
corruption and asset stripping:
like Georgia, Zimbabwe gets a highly
unfavourable rating from Transparency
International.
So perhaps the lesson for South Africa is that
diplomacy is usually
quiet, but that effective diplomacy means making
positive choices. And,
since South Africa frequently states that the Zimbabwe
crisis must be solved
by Zimbabweans, perhaps South Africa can see in the
Georgian case that there
are ways to facilitate Zimbabwean solutions by
Zimbabweans.
The best options will lie in creating conditions
for Zimbabweans to
manage their own destiny, and here there can be no
substitute for demanding
the open space that political parties and civics
need for peaceful,
democratic action. Velvet revolutions after all are
preferable to violent
ones, and negotiated transitions are better than velvet
revolutions. - M&G
Online.
-Ivor Jenkins is director:
special projects for the Institute for
Democracy in South Africa
(Idasa).