http://www.voanews.com
By Peta Thornycroft
29
December 2008
Nine Zimbabwean political detainees were taken from
jail to the Harare
Magistrate's Court Monday, accused of terrorism and
plotting to overthrow
the government of President Robert Mugabe. The Harare
magistrate's court is
expected to transfer the case to the High Court for
trial.
A prominent human rights activist, Jestina Mukoko and eight others
have
denied the allegations that they were involved in a plot to overthrow
President Robert Mugabe.
Eight of the detainees were wearing green
prison uniforms and leg irons as
they were brought into the court. Two of
the suspects carried their two
year old child with them.
Opposition
activists and others have dismissed the allegations that they
tried to
recruit people for military training in Botswana as a fabrication.
Mukoko
had been missing for three weeks before appearing in court last week.
Some
of the others had been taken from their homes and held incommunicado
since
October.
Harare High Court judge Yunus Omerjee ruled earlier that the
activists be
sent to hospital so torture allegations could be
investigated.
Police have refused to comply and said the group will
remain in custody
while the government appeals the decision.
A
further 20 or so other activists, including a photojournalist are also
still
in custody, despite a court ruling that their detention is not legal.
A
lawyers group has said it will continue working to get the activists
freed.
http://africa.reuters.com
Mon 29 Dec 2008, 19:09 GMT
By
MacDonald Dzirutwe
HARARE (Reuters) - A Zimbabwean magistrate put off a
ruling on Monday on
whether a human rights campaigner and other activists
charged with plotting
to overthrow the government should be freed pending
trial.
Jestina Mukoko, head of a local rights group, and two other rights
campaigners and six opposition activists were charged last week with
recruiting or trying to recruit people to undergo military training to
topple President Robert Mugabe's government.
The case has
deepened doubts about whether power-sharing between Mugabe and
the main
opposition is possible in a country now suffering economic meltdown
and a
cholera outbreak.
A High Court judge last week declaring the detention of
Mukoko and her eight
co-accused unlawful and ordered their immediate
release, but the government
appealed.
Magistrate Mishrod Guvamombe
reserved judgement until Wednesday on whether
the accused, who appeared in
court, should be freed pending trial.
He said the accused -- some of whom
have accused police of torture -- should
be allowed to see a doctor of their
choice while in a prison hospital.
Mukoko and her co-accused appeared in
court in green uniforms with their
hands and feet shackled. They included a
woman carrying her 2-year-old
child.
A further nine opposition
activists were charged on Monday: seven with
banditry and bombing police
stations and two on lesser charges.
Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the
opposition MDC, has threatened to suspend
negotiations with Mugabe's ZANU-PF
party over the case.
14 OTHER DETAINEES
The High Court last week
also ordered 14 other activists, mainly opposition
supporters who did not
appear in court, to be freed from police custody
because their detention was
illegal.
The activists' lawyers said police were using delaying tactics
to keep them
in custody, and filed a contempt of court charge on Monday
against the
police for refusing to free them.
South Africa, the
country with the greatest influence on Zimbabwe, said on
Monday that the
arrests should not delay the formation of a government.
"We think the
most important step is to form a unity government,"
presidential spokesman
Thabo Masebe said. "There are many issues that need
to be addressed by a
unity government. This is one of them."
He also said South Africa had
reversed an earlier decision to hold back $30
million (21 million pounds) in
agricultural aid to Zimbabwe until a unity
government was formed.
He
said the humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe, made worse by a cholera
epidemic
that has killed over 1,500 people, had become too serious and
farming and
other supplies were badly needed.
SADC mediation has failed to push
Zimbabwe's rival parties into implementing
the power-sharing deal and trying
to stem a crisis marked by rampant
unemployment, hyperinflation and severe
shortages of basic goods.
Tsvangirai won the first round of voting in
March elections, but fell short
of the majority needed to become president,
triggering a run-off which
Mugabe won after the MDC leader pulled out,
citing violent attacks on his
supporters.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com
1 hour 42 mins
ago
AFP
Lawyers for detained rights activists called Monday for
President Robert
Mugabe's government to be charged with contempt, on the day
Zimbabwe's
cholera death toll rose above 1,500.
The defence team
for 18 political figures and activists were in court either
to press for
their transfer to hospital in line with a Zimbabwe high court
order, or to
fight charges that they plotted to overthrow Mugabe.
"The state is
approaching this court with dirty hands. The state did not
comply with the
order of justice Yunus Omerjee. No measures have been taken
to purge the
contempt," one of the leading defence lawyers, Charles
Kwaramba, told the
magistrates' court.
"On that basis alone, the state should be held in
contempt of the high
court," he said.
Jestina Mukoko, head of the
Zimbabwe Peace Project, and eight others --
including a two-year-old boy
also detained in a prison cell, but not
charged -- were in the court to
counter the charges that they recruited or
incited people to undergo
military training to fight Mugabe's government.
Nine others, some of who
are opposition members, were also brought to court
from police custody --
with seven of them charged with bombing and acts of
banditary while the
other two were accused of complicity.
Leading prosecution lawyer Tawanda
Zvekare said "we are ready to put the
(second batch of nine) accused on
remand."
In his preliminary argument, Kwaramba made the case for his
clients' release
to the hospital as ordered last Wednesday by the High Court
judge.
The government has appealed against the ruling.
"We are
contesting the accused being formally remanded. The actual criminals
are
their abductors. The accused are actually the complainants," Kwaramba
said.
The hearing was delayed for several hours as the prosecutor did
not
immediately turn up.
Defence lawyers had earlier said the
activists may have been tortured in
custody.
Mukoko's group recorded
cases of alleged violence against supporters of
opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai in this year's contested elections.
Mukoko was seized from her
home on December 3 by armed men who identified
themselves as
police.
Two members of her staff were taken away from their office days
later. They
have been accused together with 28 members of Morgan
Tsvangirai's Movement
for Democratic Change (MDC) party of recruiting
anti-government plotters.
Before it went on a break, the court was yet to
take arguments on the
charges that activists plotted against Mugabe's
regime.
The MDC has insisted that the abductions and detention of its
supporters
would further hamper stalled talks with the ruling party on
forming a unity
government.
"There is also the issue of abductions,
which are taking place against the
spirit of the memorandum of understanding
and the global political
agreement, and the use of hate language in the
state media," MDC spokesman
Nelson Chamisa told AFP.
"This
persecution on trumped-up charges is simply going to jeopardise the
process
and spirit of a negotiated settlement which is already
destabilised," he
said.
Mugabe and his rivals from the MDC signed a power-sharing deal in
September
in Harare but negotiations to form a unity government have stalled
as both
sides squabble over key cabinet posts.
Zimbabwe's political
crisis has added to the woes of the country suffering
from the world's
highest inflation rate, last estimated at 231 million
percent in July.
http://www.reuters.com
Mon Dec 29, 2008 6:39am
EST
By MacDonald Dzirutwe
HARARE (Reuters) - South Africa said on
Monday that the arrest of a leading
human rights campaigner should not delay
the formation of a unity
government, despite opposition threats to pull out
of a power-sharing deal
over the issue.
Jestina Mukoko, head of a
local rights group, and eight other activists were
last week charged with
recruiting or attempting to recruit Zimbabweans to
undergo military training
to topple the government.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has said he
will ask his Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) party to suspend
negotiations with President Robert
Mugabe's ZANU-PF if abductions of MDC
members continue and if the arrested
activists are not brought to court by
Thursday.
"We think the most important step is to form a unity
government," South
African Presidential spokesman Thabo Masebe told Reuters.
"There are many
issues that need to be addressed by a unity government. This
is one of
them."
Influential South Africa is the continent's biggest
economy and current
chair of regional group of nations SADC.
Zimbabwe
has appealed to its highest court against a High Court ruling
ordering the
release of Mukoko and her co-accused to a local hospital. The
court also
ordered 23 other mainly opposition activists to be freed from
police custody
because their detention was illegal.
The activists' lawyers said police
were using delaying tactics to keep them
in custody.
They appeared in
court on Monday in green uniforms with their hands and feet
shackled. The
session was expected to start shortly.
South Africa has reversed an
earlier decision to hold back $30 million in
agricultural aid to Zimbabwe
until a unity government is formed, said
Masebe.
He said a
humanitarian crisis made worse by a cholera epidemic that has
killed over
1,500 people had become too serious and agricultural and other
supplies were
badly needed.
SADC has failed in mediation to pressure Zimbabwe's rival
parties to
implement the power-sharing deal seen as the best chance for
easing an
economic crisis marked by hyper-inflation and severe shortages of
basic
goods.
Tsvangirai won the first round of voting in March but
fell short of the
majority needed to become president, triggering a run-off
which Mugabe won
after the MDC leader pulled out citing violent attacks on
his supporters.
http://www.apanews.net/
APA-Harare (Zimbabwe) The
absence of a substantive government in Zimbabwe
has delayed the announcement
of the 2009 national budget amid a deepening
economic crisis, APA learnS
here Monday.
With just two days to go before 2009, there is no roadmap on
how the
government intends to steer the troubled southern African economy
from
further decline.
Ministry of Finance sources said the absence of
a substantive finance
minister has resulted in a leadership vacuum at the
treasury.
The incumbent minister of finance, Samuel Mumbengegwi, is not
an elected
member of parliament and has been in that position in an acting
capacity
since March when the last parliamentary elections were
held.
"That (situation) has presented challenges because it means that,
even if he
were to draft a budget today, he cannot present it before the
National
Assembly because he is not an elected member," a source told APA on
Monday.
Another challenge for the Zimbabwean authorities was that they
are aware
that a viable budget would be one produced under a unity
government
involving the ruling ZANU PF and the opposition Movement for
Democratic
Change (MDC).
Talks to form the unity government have
stalled in the past two months over
disagreements between the political
parties over control of key ministries.
The international community has
pledged to inject more than £1.5 billion in
economic aid once a coalition
government was in place in Zimbabwe.
The aid is, however, dependent on
the formation of a unity government where
ZANU PF and the MDC are equal
partners.
The MDC has refused to join the unity government in its current
format,
insisting it does not want to become a junior partner in the new
regime.
Formation of the new government and the subsequent international
aid are
seen as key to ending Zimbabwe's eight-year economic crisis which is
highlighted by world-record inflation last estimated at more than 230
million percent in July, rampant hunger and shortages of essential
commodities, in addition to the ravaging cholera outbreak.
JN/daj/APA 2008-12-29
http://news.iafrica.com
Article By:
Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:53
Southern African
regional bloc Sadc on Monday insisted to Zimbabwean feuding
parties to
implement the power-sharing deal inked in Harare in September
"without any
further delay".
"Again, the Sadc's position is that the Zimbabwean
parties, without any
further delay, implement the agreement that they signed
in September," said
Thabo Masebe, spokesperson of South African President
Kgalema Motlanthe, who
is chairperson of the 15-nation bloc.
A recent
Southern African Development Community (Sadc) summit in
Johannesburg called
for the immediate formation of a unity government and
the sharing of the
home affairs ministry, which oversees the police, between
the ruling Zanu-PF
and the opposition MDC led by Morgan Tsvangirai.
"And the first step
towards implementing that agreement is the appointment
of the prime minister
and vice prime minister," he said in an interview on
public broadcaster
SAfm.
A power-sharing agreement, brokered by former South African
president Thabo
Mbeki, has been undermined by squabbling over the sharing of
key posts.
President Robert Mugabe and Tsvangirai have yet to form a
unity government,
despite several attempts by regional leaders to implement
the agreement
aimed at ending the country's political turmoil and economic
meltdown.
"The humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe is something that has
to be attended
to," said Masebe.
Zimbabwe's main Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) said on Sunday that an
"equitable" sharing of
powerful ministries and the resolution of other
outstanding political issues
were key to the formation of a unity
government.
"The biggest
passport to the formation of an inclusive government is the
resolution of
outstanding political issues, that is, issues to do with the
allocation of
governors' posts and the equitable allocation of key
ministries," MDC
spokesperson Nelson Chamisa told AFP.
"We have identified several key
ministries which we want shared equitably.
It is not about home affairs
only, as Zanu-PF falsely claims, and it is not
going to be resolved by
sharing one ministry as Sadc suggested," he said.
A cholera epidemic has
claimed over 1500 lives in Zimbabwe since August, the
World Health
Organisation (WHO) said on Monday.
Some 1564 people have died from the
disease, while another 29 131 suspected
cases have been reported, a
spokesperson from the WHO told AFP. The last
United Nations figures showed
1174 deaths and 23 712 suspected cases - which
means that nearly 400 more
people have died in the past six days since then.
Besides the epidemic
and chronic political instability, Zimbabwe is also
desperately fighting
hyper-inflation and severe food shortages.
AFP
http://www.nasdaq.com
(RTTNews) - The
death toll in the cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe has crossed
1,500 since it
began in August, said the World Health Organization (WHO) on
Monday.
The WHO said that the cholera epidemic has claimed 1,564
lives out of the
29,131 suspected cases reported in Zimbabwe since August,
adding that 50
people had died from the disease in the last three
days.
"The overall Case Fatality Rate (CFR) has risen to 5.7% - far above
the 1%
which is normal in large outbreaks - and in some rural areas it has
reached
as high as 50%," WHO said in a statement.
The UN agency said
that cholera cases were reported in all of Zimbabwe's 10
provinces, and
warned that the disease could spread alarmingly if the
epidemic is not
checked immediately.
In its report, the WHO also warned that it might
take at least 6 months to
bring the outbreak under control, as the health,
sanitation and water
services in the impoverished African country is on the
verge of collapsing
under the strain caused by the massive
outbreak.
The latest UN report indicates a steep rise in the number of
cholera deaths
in Zimbabwe in a week as a UNICEF report released last
Tuesday had placed
the cholera death toll in the country since August at
1,174.
Zimbabwe, which is currently reeling under a severe economic
crisis, is
struggling to control the massive cholera outbreak because of a
shortage of
water purification chemicals, drugs, medical supplies and health
professionals in the country.
PRETORIA (AFP) - South Africa has reversed a block on aid to Zimbabwe
because of the worsening humanitarian crisis in the neighbouring country, a
presidential spokesman said Monday.
South Africa had halted aid in a
bid to add pressure on President Robert
Mugabe and the opposition over the
formation of a national unity government.
"We have now reviewed our
earlier decision in view of the deteriorating
humanitarian crisis in that
country. We have now started sending the aid to
Zimbabwe" through the
Southern African Development Community (SADC),
presidential spokesman Thabo
Masebe told AFP.
South Africa last month witheld 300 million rand (31
million dollars/23
million euros) of agricultural aid to Zimbabwe until an
inclusive government
was in place.
"When we assessed the situation
recently in Zimbabwe, we found out that the
humanitarian situation there was
dire and we now decided to start sending
the agricultural aid to Zimbabwe
through the Zimbabwe Humanitarian
Development Assistance Framework, set up
by the SADC," Masebe said.
He said all the other 13 members of the group
were urged to send
humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe. "I am aware that Zambia and
Namibia have
already done so," Masebe said.
Zimbabwe's state-run
newspaper The Herald has commended Namibia, China,
South Africa, Tanzania
and United Nations agencies for helping to fight a
cholera epidemic which
has killed about 1,200 people in Zimbabwe.
South Africa has also made
available to Zimbabwe agricultural inputs worth
300 million rand, said the
newspaper.
"The package will translate into 12,700 tonnes of maize seed,
2,404 tonnes
of small grain seeds, 2,800 tonnes of top dressing fertiliser,
8,500 tonnes
of Compound D fertiliser and 10 million litres of fuel," it
said.
Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai have yet to form a
unity
government, despite several attempts by regional leaders to implement
an
agreement aimed at ending the country's political turmoil and economic
meltdown.
A power-sharing agreement, brokered by former South African
president Thabo
Mbeki and signed in Harare on September 15, has been
undermined by
squabbling over the sharing of key posts.
From The Sunday Tribune (SA), 28 December
Fiona Forde
South Africa's decision to
channel aid to Zimbabwe despite assurances that
taxpayers' money would not
be handed over before an inclusive government was
in place has been
condemned as "grossly irresponsible". Zimbabwe's main
opposition, the
Movement for Democratic Change, said yesterday that Pretoria
had not
consulted it. The MDC said the move legitimised President Robert
Mugabe's
"illegal" government. The aid disbursement takes place in the week
in which
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu criticised South Africa, accusing
it of
failing to stand up to Mugabe and betraying its apartheid legacy.
Earlier
this year, South Africa's government earmarked R300 million in
agricultural
assistance for the ailing nation, but said the money would be
released only
if a unity government was formed in accordance with the
power-sharing
agreement brokered on September 15. In view of the worsening
situation,
however, a decision was reached in Harare last Monday to begin to
roll out
the aid through the Zimbabwe Humanitarian and Development
Assistance
Framework. The ZHDAF was established by the Southern African
Development
Community (SADC) to ensure all aid falls into the right hands.
Short season
grains and fertilisers were dispatched from Pretoria this week.
The move
"legitimises the illegal regime that is in de facto control of
Zimbabwe",
according to the MDC's secretary general, Tendai Biti, "and
violates the
global agreement" of September signed by all parties.
Presidency spokesman
Thabo Masebe said yesterday, "We are using the money to
buy the things they
need .. . administered through ZHDAF mechanisms".
However, Biti said the
ZHDAF existed "only on paper and not in practice" and
that his party had not
been consulted about aid to Zimbabwe or ensuring it
reached the intended
beneficiaries. Although SADC executive secretary Tomas
Salomao insisted
otherwise, George Tadonki, the Zimbabwe country director
for the United
Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs,
said he too
had been kept in the dark about the ZHDAF structure. "Several
South African
teams visited Zimbabwe in the past few months," Tadonki said
yesterday. A
short while later there was a call "for an independent SADC
body to monitor
humanitarian assistance, but we are not yet fully informed
about it. We are
not aware of any SADC staff administering assistance right
now," he said.
Although Biti recognised aid was badly needed as his country
limped from
poor to pathetic, he said it could only be extended in line with
the
September agreement brokered by former president Thabo Mbeki "which
South
Africa has now decided to violate".
An estimated five million people
now need food aid, according to Tadonki's
office, while the World Health
Organisation has put the cholera death toll
at more than 1 500. In the
run-up to March's elections, there were
widespread reports of food aid being
withheld from non-Mugabe supporters.
"In the past, this kind of aid might
have been used for political
patronage," Biti said. "But now they wouldn't
even do that. Patronage is no
longer part of their lexicon. Now they just
abduct people." Masebe was
confident the assistance would reach the intended
beneficiaries. He could
not confirm how much of the R300 million earmarked
had been allocated. The
Department of Agriculture, which dispatched the
seeds to Harare, was not
available for comment. The South African government
said the decision to
dispatch aid did not affect its commitment to the
formation of a unity
government. Tutu told BBC radio on Wednesday he was
"ashamed" of South
Africa, which had surrendered the "moral high ground"
gained in the
post-apartheid era. He also said that violence could be used
to remove
Mugabe, who should be indicted by the International Criminal
Court.
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=9288
December 29, 2008
By Tendai
Dumbutshena
ROBERT Mugabe's regime has sunk to new low levels of cynicism
and depravity.
Over the past few weeks its secret police has abducted over
40 people
including a two-year old child.
This happens at a time when
the regime professes commitment to sharing power
with its political
opponents.
If evidence was ever needed to prove the utter insincerity of
Mugabe this is
it. The abductions began after the March 29 election and
continued, despite
the signing of the September 15 agreement. It is as if
nothing had
transpired.
The police initially denied any knowledge of
the whereabouts of over 40
people, included Jestina Mukoko of the Zimbabwe
Peace Project. Mugabe's
friends in the region including South Africa were
embarrassed by such
fascist behaviour. They must have pleaded with him to
release these people
because all of a sudden 10 of them including Mukoko
were at various police
stations in Harare.
Her prominence raised
concern among colleagues in civil society and some
diplomats hence the need
to produce her if only to prove that they had not
murdered her. To justify
their abductions and detentions the regime had to
charge them with
something. Laughably, the kidnap victims are to be charged
with recruiting
people for training in Botswana to overthrow the Mugabe
regime.
This
of course is not the first time Mugabe has resorted to a total abuse of
the
criminal justice system to deal with real or imagined political
adversaries.
Just after independence the leader of the newly reconstituted
ZAPU, Dumiso
Dabengwa, spent years in jail despite an acquittal by the High
Court on a
charge of attempting to overthrow Mugabe's government. A lot of
Dabengwa's
evident anger and bitterness stem from this experience.
Now that he is no
longer a member of Zanu-PF or government Dabengwa owes it
to Zimbabweans to
reveal exactly what happened to him and others when they
were guests of the
CIO. He was not the only victim during this early period
of independence.
Emergency powers inherited from Ian Smith were routinely
abused to deal with
political opponents. It is during this time that the
Gukurahundi massacres
in Matebeleland and Midlands were carried out.
Years later the CIO, which
is only answerable to Mugabe, concocted a story
implicating MDC leader
Morgan Tsvangirai in yet another plot to topple the
government. They had to
go outside the country to make the story seem
credible. A dubious character,
Ben Manashe, a paid agent of the government
based in Canada, was recruited
to incriminate Tsvangirai. The
Attorney-General's office, police and CIO
were all joined hands in a venture
to send the MDC leader to the gallows.
Fortunately sanity prevailed and the
High Court threw the case out. Now it
is the turn of the MDC's
secretary-general Tendai Biti to face treason
charges for God knows what.
This is the same Biti who is supposed to be a
negotiating partner.
Recent abductions, ongoing violence and illegal
detentions all raise a
serious question. Are those responsible to be
entrusted with the
responsibility of ushering in a new Zimbabwe based on
universally accepted
principles of good governance and human rights? The
behaviour of the regime
is a clear violation of undertakings made in the
Memorandum of Understanding
and Global Political Agreement. What more
evidence is required to prove that
Mugabe has absolutely no interest in the
power-sharing agreement? He is
cynically using it for selfish ends - to get
legitimacy for his presidency
and hopefully some economic relief from the
international community.
It is now clear that even if the inclusive
government is formed it will be
of a limited duration. Mugabe intends to
call an early election run by him.
He is confident that through a mixture of
violence and electoral fraud he
can reverse the defeat of March 29 and
govern without the MDC on his back.
In preparation for that the job of
destroying the MDC and civil society
which he regards as an integral part of
the opposition must continue. The
abductions and show trials that will
follow must be seen in this context.
The allegation that MDC bandits are
being trained in Botswana is central to
this sinister agenda. It creates the
legal basis to justify what will be a
massive crackdown on the MDC. This
will sound alarmist to those who do not
grasp the true character of Mugabe's
regime. People currently in prisons and
other unknown places are not the
targets of this campaign. The intention is
to use their testimony obtained
through torture to nail the MDC leadership
and justify draconian measures
against the party. It is a campaign in which
even children are not
spared.
This is why it will be an act of gross stupidity for the MDC to
go into an
inclusive government in which it will have neither power nor
influence. It
will only serve the agendas and purposes of other people with
no interest in
finding a genuine solution for the Zimbabwe crisis. Leaders
of SADC want the
Zimbabwe issue to go away without addressing it squarely.
They see in the
power-sharing agreement a quick fix solution ignoring all
evidence that
their friend Mugabe only seeks power for himself.
They
turn a blind eye to his brutal excesses because they have no stomach or
moral backbone to confront him. They also want to save his regime from more
anticipated sanctions from the West in the New Year. It is an open secret
that the matter will be taken again to the Security Council in January. To
pre-empt this SADC leaders are anxious for Tsvangirai to discard all his
party's concerns and commit political suicide for the sake of prolonging
Mugabe's rule. Another SADC summit is to be held in the second week of
January. Its main purpose is to put pressure on Tsvangirai to become
Mugabe's
sidekick.
Whatever happens, Mugabe will pursue his obsessive
desire to destroy the MDC
and everything associated with it. Tsvangirai must
not think for a moment
that in these circumstances the best form of defence
and self-preservation
lies in surrender. Appeasement will not save him and
his party from the
beast. Joining hands with Mugabe will only strengthen his
position without
diminishing his intent to crush the MDC.
Last week
the High Court ordered that Mukoko and nine others be taken to
hospital for
examination. After weeks of torture in unbearable living
conditions that is
the minimum attention they needed. This order was ignored
with contempt.
Over 30 people are still unaccounted for. Tsvangirai
threatened to
discontinue negotiations with Zanu-PF if all these people were
not either
freed or charged in court by January 1. In addition the MDC's
National
Council laid down conditions for joining the proposed government.
There
are no signs that any of these conditions will be met. As stated in
this
column last week the MDC must demonstrate principled and strong
leadership
by putting an end to this farce. At the SADC summit they must
formally table
a transitional government along the lines proposed by
Botswana as the only
viable solution. They will meet stiff opposition but
the majority in
Zimbabwe and wider international community will support what
is obviously
the only route that can bring to an end a long dark chapter in
Zimbabwe's
history.
http://www.news24.com
29/12/2008 08:16 - (SA)
Musina - In the
blazing midday sun, Fungai Lindlela watches as her baby
pushes a sticky ball
of maize meal into her mouth in a makeshift refugee
camp near South Africa's
border with Zimbabwe.
"I need asylum - it's too hard," Lindlela said
about how hunger forced her
to flee across the border with her 14-month-old
daughter Tandiwa strapped to
her back.
Waiting in listless
resignation, Lindlela is surrounded by a sea of people
seated on thin pieces
of cardboard which have become a precious commodity in
Musina as a buffer
with the dirt ground.
All here have the same goal: applying for political
asylum at the mobile
refugee office set up by the South African government
in July to cope with
the thousands of Zimbabweans pouring into the border
town.
The unofficial camp sprung up at the doorstep of the office, with
clothes
stretched over barbed wire fences and scant belongings mark where
people
will bed down in the open.
By evening, long rows of smokey
fires line the street where food is cooked
in blackened coffee tins by those
who can afford it. But the biggest
activity is waiting.
Since July,
the office has handled nearly 28 000 applications, mostly from
Zimbabweans,
a South African official said on condition of anonymity, giving
the figures
up to December 10.
The final triggers
"You can no longer call this
a political crisis, it's far much more. It has
become a humanitarian
crisis," he said, pointing to the scores of people
waiting outside the
office.
In the asylum queue was a woman who was forced to leave her
seven-year-old
son behind when she left her home for the border and paid
smugglers R50 to
get into South Africa.
"I couldn't take him with me
- at least I could carry this one with me,"
said the 32-year-old woman who
asked her name not be used, pointing to her
one-year-old daughter Mercy
crawling about the floor. "It took me almost six
months to make up my
mind."
The final triggers were starvation, political harassment from the
Robert
Mugabe regime, and Zimbabwe's mind-boggling inflation which has made
it
impossible to withdraw enough money to buy a loaf of bread.
The
long asylum queues move to an empty livestock handling area which people
enter in batches, moving slowly through the narrow corrals to be handed a
polystyrene container of hot stew and thick maize meal porridge.
For
many, it is the only meal of the day, donated by a local church and
international aid groups who assist with basic needs like organising
sanitary towels for the women.
After eating, the asylum seekers sleep
in the dirt field or on the street.
Blessing and Garikai Ngumdu and their
two-year-old daughter Shalom - named
in the hope of peace in their country -
sleep metres from the gate to the
refugee office.
"It's surviving,
not living," Blessing said about life in Zimbabwe.
A crackdown by
Mugabe's security forces and supporters was cited by many
Zimbabweans in
Musina as reasons for leaving the country.
Soldiers were acting as if
"there was a war", beating people on the streets,
Kenneth Sibanda from
Chinhoyi near Harare said.
"I don't have hope for my country," said the
23-year-old. "At first people
had hope, they thought maybe things were going
to change but now the
situation is getting worse."
'They destroy
everything'
"In Zimbabwe, if you survive for one day, you thank God
because you don't
have hope for tomorrow."
Zimbabwe has the world's
highest inflation rate, last put in July at 231
million percent, and faces
chronic food shortages that have left nearly half
the population in need of
aid.
A recent cholera outbreak has also claimed about 1 200
lives.
"Mr Mugabe and his thugs, the youth of Zanu-PF, they just destroy
everything
everywhere," said Challenge Ncube, who left Gokwe fearing for his
life,
after he was targeted as an opposition supporter.
"Today's
sleeping in cardboard boxes is better than living with Mugabe in
Zimbabwe
because in Zimbabwe you can't live freely," said the 20-year-old.
-
AFP
JOHANNESBURG, 29 December 2008
(IRIN) - "There is no food, we have malnutrition, there is cholera, now we are
expecting a malaria outbreak,” said an exasperated Amanda Weisbaum, the
emergency manager for Save the Children, UK, in Zimbabwe.
Photo:
WHO/Paul Garwood
Cholera
cases continue to climb
As the cholera
death toll climbed to 1,564, and its caseload to near the 30,000 mark, Save the
Children has found that acute malnutrition in children aged six months to five
years has doubled since 2007 in one of the two districts in which it has been
working in Zimbabwe.
With the onset of rain, there are mounting concerns
of a possible malaria outbreak ravaging immune systems weakened by cholera and
malnutrition, “especially among those aged under five”, said Weisbaum.
But reaching out to those who need help in a
country where most of the infrastructure has collapsed, and the inflation rate
is unofficially in the trillions of percent, is a huge challenge and “extremely
frustrating”, she said.
In terms of access, Zimbabwe,
comparatively, is one of the worst areas I have worked in...At least in Darfur,
when we ran out of stock we could fly in supplies to the areas we worked in -
here we cannot
“In terms of access, Zimbabwe, comparatively, is
one of the worst areas I have worked in,” said Weisbaum, who has worked in some
of the world’s crisis hotspots - Darfur, Chad and Niger. “At least in Darfur,
when we ran out of stock we could fly in supplies to the areas we worked in -
here we cannot,” she said.
Challenges
Weisbaum
listed the challenges an aid agency such as Save the Children, which works in
two districts in the Zambezi valley in northeastern Zimbabwe, faces:
1.
Communications: “Our day begins with us [the head office in the capital, Harare]
trying to get in touch with our offices in the two districts Binga and
Nyaminyami. It can at times take us an entire day - the phone lines don’t work.
Radio communication is also relatively poor,” said Weisbaum.
2. Foreign
exchange: When the office in Harare does get through to district offices,
raising foreign exchange to buy and deliver the supplies is a “huge” problem.
Since last month, aid agencies have been allowed to pay their national
staff in foreign exchange. The economy unofficially runs on the US dollar. “But
we don’t know who decides the exchange rate - the banks don’t function very well
and accessing US dollars can be quite problematic,” explained Weisbaum. Petrol
costs about 75 US cents per litre, and diesel about $1.20 a litre. “It [the
costs] is huge for us, especially when you calculate the distances in trying to
reach out to rural communities.”
The aid agency can also spend an entire
day trying to find foreign exchange to buy fuel and pay the driver.
3.
Food shortages: Feeding staff and beneficiaries in the Cholera Treatment Centres
(CTC) set up across the country in response to the cholera outbreak remains a
huge challenge. “We provide food packs to our staff going to the field because
often they cannot access food.”
The charity even had to raid its own
stocks to send food for 22 new cholera admissions and care givers in a CTC over
the past few days in Nyaminyami District. “It is the World Food Programme’s job
to provide food for those admitted in the centre, but they don’t have food
either,” explained Weisbaum. WFP is already rationing food aid in Zimbabwe.
4. Writing reports to raise money, which might not come: “And I think we
seem to spend many days just writing reports, attending meetings, trying to
compile data to raise money from donors, when we should actually be out there
trying to help beneficiaries,” said a frustrated Weisbaum.
The level of
donor confidence in Zimbabwe is very low partly because of the uncertain
political situation, so funds do not always follow reports and appeals. But the
response to the cholera outbreak has been good, according to Weisbaum, so the
aid agency hopes to raise money for its operations for the next few months on
the back of the cholera outbreak.
All Zimbabwe needs is a bit of money,
training “as doctors and teachers have all fled the country”, and some political
initiative, and the country would be back on its feet soon, added an optimistic
Weisbaum.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/35316.php
APA-Harare (Zimbabwe) Zimbabwe's largest mobile telephone
network is
phasing out Zimbabwe dollar tariffs and introducing United States
denominated recharge cards from Tuesday, APA learns
here.
Econet Wireless announced that the move to charge in
foreign currency was
meant to improve services by enabling the company to
invest in new equipment
and settle its foreign currency
obligations.
"Econet is introducing US dollar recharge cards from 30
December 2008.
Please use your Zimbabwe dollar cards by midnight 29 December
2008 as they
will expire thereafter," it said in a notice to
subscribers.
Local calls would cost around US$0.30 per minute while text
messages would
cost US$0.15.
The move by Econet to charge in foreign
currency highlights the lack of
confidence in the local currency by the
business sector and individuals in
the wake of Zimbabwe's hyperinflationary
environment.
With inflation pegged at a world-record 231 million percent
as of July,
prices in Zimbabwe are doubling daily, forcing most service
providers to
refuse payment in Zimdollars.
Econet is Zimbabwe's
largest cellular phone network, with a subscriber base
of about one
million.
The two other networks are the state-run NetOne and Telecel
Zimbabwe.
Posted to the site on 29th December 2008
http://www.iol.co.za/
December 29 2008 at
07:17AM
Accra, Ghana - The top US envoy for Africa has warned that
Zimbabwe
could face the same fate as Guinea when Zimbabwean President Robert
Mugabe
dies.
Guinea has been in political turmoil since its
longtime dictator died
nearly a week ago. A military-led group declared a
coup hours later and
named an interim leader.
Jendayi Frazer,
the US assistant secretary of state for African
affairs said on Sunday that
if the 84-year-old Mugabe dies while still in
power, the same fate awaits
Zimbabwe.
Frazer has been a vocal critic of Mugabe, who has been in
power since
the country's 1980 independence.
Earlier this
month, she said the US could no longer support a proposed
power-sharing deal
that would leave Mugabe as president. - Sapa-AP
http://exilestreet.com/?p=602
by Ralph Peters [author, novelist]
It's a tough holiday
season in America. Thousands of families face eviction,
while others just
have to delay buying that 52-inch plasma TV. Thanks to
Bernie Madoff, even
caviar sales are down.
Count your blessings. In Zimbabwe, once a wealthy
country that exported
food, millions struggle daily against starvation, and
inflation is counted
in millions of percent. Nothing works - except the
ruling regime's network
of thugs. For the holiday season, cholera, the
plague of the poorest poor,
has killed 1,200 people and infected 25,000.
President-for-life Robert
Mugabe, the man who destroyed his country, first
claimed that the disease
didn't exist. Now he blames Britain and the CIA for
the outbreak.
Cholera spreads through infected water and food supplies;
Zimbabwe's
sanitation has broken down utterly, while its medical system is
in complete
collapse. The disease is readily treatable with cheap saline
solutions, but
Zimbabweans don't even rate that much.
Ambulatory
victims struggle across the border into South Africa, hoping to
survive.
More than a million Zimbabweans have abandoned their country,
preferring
life in foreign slums and the risk of anti-foreigner violence.
No country
in our time has plummeted so far so fast with so little
engagement by the
rest of the world. Why? Dictator Robert Mugabe was a hero
of the global left
for decades, so today's leftists avoid discussing his
crimes. Better to let
Africans die than admit that "We were wrong."
When I visited Zimbabwe in
early 2003, the once lovely country was already
gripped by political
violence, inflation, hunger and general breakdown. Some
of us tried to write
the truth, but nobody cared.
Six years on, the UN wrings its grubby paws
but bows to oppressor regimes
that condemn all interference in a country's
domestic affairs. Folks, the
neocons may have gotten a great deal wrong, but
they were morally sound when
they stressed the inhumanity of allowing a
butcher to seize power then hide
behind claims of sovereignty.
The
Bush administration - which genuinely sought to help Africa - has lately
wagged a finger, withdrawing support for a con-job "power-sharing" deal
Mugabe pretended to offer his opposition (while stringing the world along
month after month). But the Bush years are effectively over, while Team
Obama can't find Zimbabwe on a map.
The worst villain, though, has
been South Africa, an increasingly
authoritarian state whose leaders behave
with a selfishness humbling to
run-of-the-mill African
kleptocrats.
When I entered Zimbabwe through the capital's somnolent
airport almost six
years ago, I shared the common assumption that South
Africa must mean well
by its neighbor - human solidarity among the liberated
and all that crap.
But I soon witnessed South Africa's deadly
greed.
The global media's stock explanation of South Africa's failure to
act to
save Zimbabwe's people remains the old saw that veterans of the
liberation
struggle can't bring themselves to publicly criticize an old
comrade - they
don't want to give the former colonial powers the
satisfaction.
That excuse may have applied 20 years ago, but not now.
There are two main
reasons - both ugly - why the region's great power, South
Africa, won't help
the people of Zimbabwe.
First, politically
connected South African businessmen have been buying up
Zimbabwe at
fire-sale prices. There's little left of any worth that the
fat-cat
profiteers from Jo'burg don't already own - but they're determined
to grab
that, too.
When Mugabe falls or dies, South Africans will hold the deed
to an entire
country. South Africa's buying a colony.
Another reason
for South African prevarication emerged in the last year.
Since its
celebrated victory over apartheid, the new South Africa has
developed into a
one-party state with democratic trappings (disappointingly
similar to
Putin's Russia). The ruling African National Congress was all for
free
elections - as long as it remained an all-powerful monolith.
But as its
impeccably tailored, incompetent former president, Thabo Mbeki,
was shoved
to the sidelines during a struggle within the ANC's politburo, a
new specter
loomed: real democracy. A splinter group broke from the ANC to
contest
upcoming elections.
Simultaneously, Mugabe's determination to rig
Zimbabwe's elections at any
cost could no longer disguise the people's
overwhelming revulsion toward
him. Attempting to stave off a loss of power,
he entered cat-and-mouse
"negotiations" with the
opposition.
Amazingly, the world bought it. Colluding with Mugabe, South
Africa
disingenuously pledged to be an honest broker.
There was as
much chance of spotting polar bears along the Limpopo River as
of
Zimbabweans getting a square deal. The ANC's ruling faction dreads the
notion that honest democracy could come to Zimbabwe. Next thing you know,
South Africans might demand clean elections, too.
If the world wants
to alleviate the misery of millions in Zimbabwe, we must
sideline South
Africa and act directly to remove Mugabe and his ruling
clique.
We
won't, and the world won't. Black Africans serve wonderfully for charity
appeals, but no competent state will lift a finger to save their
lives.
Merry Christmas
This entry was posted on Sunday, December
28th, 2008 at 10:52 pm