The Telegraph
By
Sebastien Berger, Southern Africa Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:38am BST
22/06/2007
Zimbabwe's beleaguered currency has lost half
its value in three days,
black market dealers said last night, prompting
predictions that the country
was plunging into an economic meltdown that its
veteran leader Robert Mugabe
would not survive.
According to
the government in Harare, one US dollar is worth 250
Zimbabwean dollars. But
the free market rate yesterday reached more than
Z$300,000 to one US
dollar.
"It's gone crazy," said one illegal trader. "People are
holding out
for the highest bidder and mentioning as much as 400,000-1,
which could be
tomorrow's price. It's changing by the hour. Rates have
doubled since the
start of the week."
While Mr Mugabe's demise
has been predicted time and again over the
years, analysts believe that the
financial crisis now threatens his hold
even on the loyalists who have kept
him in power for so long.
John Makumbe, a senior lecturer in
political science at the University
of Zimbabwe, said: "It is the economy
that is going to bring the regime
down.
"I don't think it's
very sustainable. Right now the transport sector
is grinding to a halt. A
lot of people are now in abject poverty. With a
million dollars you will be
lucky to buy two or three items."
A six-mile minibus ride into the
city centre could cost a tenth of
someone's monthly wages, he
said.
"I don't think Mugabe will last long if the situation is not
arrested
by an injection of foreign currency or some alleviation of the cost
of
living."
Christopher Dell, the outgoing US ambassador to
Zimbabwe, predicted
inflation could reach 1,500,000 per cent by the end of
the year. He told the
Financial Gazette in Bulawayo: "The first phase of
Zimbabwe's liberation
[from Mr Mugabe's rule] is coming to an end as the
economy is collapsing
around us and the second phase to define the future of
Zimbabwe past a few
old men is coming in the next few months."
Splits are now emerging in Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF party and last week a
"coup
plot" was proclaimed by the authorities, who charged six people with
treason. One of the defendants said the accusations were an attempt to cover
up internal divisions.
But on top of its abysmal handling of
the economy, which has been
shrinking for the last eight years, the Harare
government itself bears
direct responsibility for the collapse of the
currency.
While accusing Britain and other countries of seeking to
destroy
Zimbabwe's finances, the central bank has printed vast amounts of
Zimbabwean
currency to buy illegal dollars in a desperate attempt to pay off
the
foreign debts of state-owned fuel and electricity
companies.
More notes have been printed to pay salary increases for
soldiers and
policemen, even as senior Zanu-PF officials were able to buy US
dollars at
the official rate and resell them at vast profit.
Last month the Central Statistical Office announced that inflation had
reached 3,713.9 per cent a year in April - a calculation of unusual
precision for an economy in chaos. According to NMBZ Holdings Ltd, a local
bank, the figure for May had risen to 4,530 per cent. Other estimates put it
as high as 9,000 per cent.
The official Chronicle newspaper
yesterday blamed Britain and the
United States.
"The plan is to
topple the government before the March 2008 general
elections, which the
West knows the opposition could never win," it said.
The Times
June 22, 2007
Jan Raath in Harare
Fuel supplies in Harare have all but dried
up after service stations refused
to accept the country's wildly unstable
currency in payment.
A handful of outlets in the Zimbabwean capital were
serving drivers for
local currency at about Z$150,000 a litre, roughly five
times the price of
fuel a month ago. Blackmarket currency trading, which has
almost overtaken
the formal banking sector, began petering out as the
exchange rate for the
US dollar began to double almost every
day.
Last week international aid organisations operating in Zimbabwe gave
warning
that the country's economy was heading for full-scale collapse, with
the
currency becoming unusable and shops and services shutting
down.
After decades of reckless economic mismanagement - including an
official
policy of printing money as fast as it can be done - dictated by
President
Mugabe, Zimbabwe has lurched into hyperinflation in the past few
months.
Annual inflation in May was at 4,500 per cent, according to official
statistics, which are regarded as very conservative.
"This indicates
we are on the slippery slope and it's coming to an end now,"
John Robertson,
an economist, said. "It's an accumulation of things for
which the Government
has no answer. It cannot 'discipline' the economy like
it does its
people."
Fuel dealers said that they could no longer predict the value of
the
Zimbabwe dollar for more than half a day.
"On Friday morning it
was at Z$90,000 to US$1," said a petrol dealer, who
asked not to be named.
"By lunchtime it was at Z$100,000 to US$1. At the end
of the day it was
Z$120,000 to US$1.
"By the time I've banked the cash, it's lost its value
and I've lost money.
I've got fuel, but not for Zimdollars. I'm going to
have to close my doors."
The local prices of fuel, set to match the cost
of importing petrol and
diesel, are approved each Friday by a government
committee. "They can't
approve it fast enough," a service station owner
said. "A lot of us are
scared of going to jail or being closed down if we
charge above their
figure."
As the fuel situation tightened, the
fleets of commuter minibuses that carry
Harare's workers, traders and school
children from the poor townships pushed
up their fares by 50 per cent, after
a 25 per cent increase last Thursday.
"We cannot afford this," Chipo
Nyatsanzwa, a clerk, said. "I never thought
it would get so
bad."
This month Harare Central Hospital, the biggest in the capital,
came close
to shutting completely when nurses stayed away because they could
not afford
the bus fare to work. Last week the country's security companies
announced
that "most employees" in the industry had resigned because they
could no
longer afford housing, transport or food.
A working-class
family in a Harare township needs a minimum of Z$5.5 million
a month for
survival, the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe estimated two weeks
ago. That
figure was then worth £85. Yesterday it had fallen to £36. The
figure of
Z$5.5 million is far beyond the wages of ordinary employees.
The
International Monetary Fund has said "prospects are for Zimbabwe's
inflation
to continue accelerating and for economic crisis to deepen"
because of the
policies of printing money, refusing to allow the currency to
float and
controlling prices, as well as the lack of governance.
President Mugabe
blames the increases on profiteering and "illegal
sanctions" that he claims
have been imposed on Zimbabwe by the West in its
alleged rush to bring about
"illegal regime change" and have him replaced by
a British colonial
government run by black "puppets".
The Guardian
Friday June
22, 2007 2:01 AM
By D'ARCY DORAN
Associated Press
Writer
LONDON (AP) - Runaway inflation and the Zimbabwe currency's
largest decline
in memory will increase pressure on President Robert Mugabe
to allow free
and fair elections, the main opposition leader said
Thursday.
Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of one of the main opposition
factions, said
Mugabe needs to consider elections as a way out of Zimbabwe's
economic
crisis.
``He's got an economy that's down on its knees, he
knows he cannot sustain
it,'' Tsvangirai told The Associated Press in an
interview. ``He knows he
has an army that is jittery. He knows all his
popular pillars of support are
up against him.''
Tsvangirai spoke
after making his first public appearance outside Zimbabwe
with rival
Movement for Democratic Change faction leader Arthur Mutambara,
at a news
conference in London.
Zimbabwe's opposition leaders are on a Western
European tour aimed at
building international support and showing that the
opposition is united
after months of infighting.
The long-ruling
Mugabe has faced international criticism that he has ruined
a country once
considered an African economic success story through an
often-violent
campaign to seize thousands of white-owned farms for
redistribution to
blacks.
Critics blame the program for causing acute shortages of food,
hard
currency, gasoline, medicines and other essential imports. But Mugabe
has
defended the program as a way of fixing imbalances in land ownership
inherited from British colonial rule.
Dealers said Thursday that the
value of the Zimbabwean dollar suffered its
worst crash in memory. Black
market exchange rates - fueled by the central
bank buying at the illegal
rates to pay the mounting debts of crumbling
state fuel and power utilities
- rose to upward of 300,000 Zimbabwe dollars
to one U.S. dollar in large
offshore deals, one trader said on condition of
anonymity because his
dealings are illegal.
The official exchange rate is 15,000-1. Zimbabwe
has the world's highest
rate of inflation, estimated officially at around
4,500 percent.
In separate interviews, Tsvangirai and Mutambara both said
the opposition
needed to mobilize behind one candidate in presidential
elections scheduled
for March to ensure every opposition vote counted
against Mugabe.
``Zimbabwe is burning, we can't bicker among ourselves,''
Mutambara said.
Problems with Zimbabwe's currency are forcing stores to
close to put new
prices on what little they could afford to
stock.
---
Associated Press Writer Angus Shaw contributed to this
report from Harare,
Zimbabwe.
Zim Online
Friday 22 June 2007
By Wayne
Mafaro
HARARE - China has provided a US$200 million facility for the
supply of
fertilizer to Zimbabwe to help revive agriculture and end hunger
stalking
more than a third of the country's 12 million people, according to
Industry
and International Trade Minister Obert Mpofu.
Mpofu told a
Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) meeting in Harare on
Wednesday
that the facility would be solely funded by Beijing with the
cash-strapped
Harare not contributing a single cent.
But the Industry Minister did not
disclose the finer details of the
fertilizer facility, when exactly the
money would be made available or how
the Chinese hoped to recoup their
money.
"The Chinese government has arranged a US$200 million fertilizer
facility
for us. We are not paying from our own funds. It is a facility made
available to us and there is nothing wrong with that," said
Mpofu.
Zimbabwe has grappled severe food shortages over the past seven
years,
worsened by a deep economic recession seen in the world's highest
inflation
of more than 4 500 percent, rising unemployment and
poverty.
The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and
the World
Food Programme (WFP) earlier this month said more than four
million
Zimbabweans would face serious food shortages by early next
year.
The UN agencies blamed the food shortages on crop failure which
they
attributed to poor rainfall, government controls on prices of farm
products
and a lack of availability of key inputs such as
fertilizer.
Several business executives attending the CZI meeting however
expressed
little hope the Chinese deal would ensure availability of
fertilizer for
farmers saying deals with Beijing had yielded nothing in the
past.
"We have heard this before with promises that the Chinese were
coming to
finance electricity generation or mining but nothing came out of
it," said
an executive with a leading Harare commercial bank who declined to
be named.
Another executive with one of Zimbabwe's biggest food
manufacturers
criticized the fertilizer facility saying it provided for the
importation of
fertilizer from China at the expense of local
manufacturers.
"It is of no benefit for the government to import
fertilizer from China at
the expense of local companies. It is better to
channel foreign currency
towards resuscitation of local companies. Let us
make our own fertilizer,"
said the executive.
Mugabe has over the
past seven years pursued a Look-East policy aimed at
strengthening relations
with China and other Asian economies since falling
out with the West who
accuse his government of abusing human rights,
stealing elections and
failure to uphold the rule of law. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Friday 22 June 2007
By
Prince Nyathi
HARARE - A senior Zimbabwe magistrate Herbert Mangate has
asked to be taken
off a case involving a top public prosecutor because some
unnamed government
officials were pressuring him to convict the prosecutor,
Levison Chikafu, of
corruption, sources told ZimOnline.
Chikafu is
accused of embezzling government funds, soliciting for bribes
from suspects
in a case his lawyers say is meant to victimise and embarrass
him after he
prosecuted Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa and State
Security Minister
Didymus Mutasa.
The lawyers also charge that Chikafu was being punished
for his attempts to
have state agent Joseph Mwale arrested for allegedly
murdering two
opposition activists seven years ago.
"He (Mangate) has
communicated that he could no longer continue with the
case citing political
interference from senior officials in government whose
names he did not
give," said a source in the justice ministry, who spoke on
condition her
name was not published.
Mangate was not immediately available for comment
on the matter while Chief
Magistrate Herbert Mandeya said he was not aware
of any request by Mangate
for recusal from the trial of Chikafu.
"I
have not been told yet. If he (Mangate) cannot continue with the case I
think he is still to communicate with us," said Mandeya.
The State is
alleging that Chikafu destroyed court records and enabled
undeserving
suspects to get bail. It also alleges that Chikafu and a prison
officer,
Wilson Sengu, solicited money from two murder suspects Terrence
Katsidzira
and Richard Muparutsa with promises that he would facilitate bail
for
them.
Chikafu rose to prominence last year after he charged Chinamasa for
attempting to defeat the course of justice by allegedly attempting to
pressure a key witness in a case against Mutasa to withdraw.
He took
up the case after other prosecutors recused themselves, fearing to
prosecute
Chinamasa who as head of the Ministry of Justice was their boss.
Chinamsa
was however acquitted by the court.
Chikafu also dominated the news
headlines when he courageously pushed the
police to arrest Mwale for
allegedly petrol-bombing a vehicle carrying two
opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) party activists, Talent
Mabika and Tichaona
Chiminya, in the run-up to the 2000 general election.
The MDC activists
died as a result of the bombing, but Mwale, who is a
senior member of the
state's spy Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) and
remains employed by
the secret agency, has never faced trial for allegedly
murdering the
opposition activists amid reports top politicians have
shielded him from
justice. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Friday 22 June 2007
By Sebastian
Nyamhangambiri in Berlin
BERLIN - A senior official of the African,
Caribbean, Pacific-European Union
Joint Parliamentary Assembly (ACP-EU) has
rejected charges that two ruling
ZANU PF legislators were denied visas to
travel for a meeting in Germany.
Earlier this week, Austin Zvoma,
Zimbabwe's clerk of parliament, said Harare
would not be represented at the
ACP-EU meeting in Wiesbaden, after Germany
refused to issue visas to ZANU PF
legislators Forbes Magadu and Godfrey
Chipare.
But in a statement to
the media, Michael Gahler, the Joint Parliamentary
Assembly vice-president
said Magadu and Chipare were never denied visas as
they had not submitted
any applications at the Germany embassy in Harare.
Gahler insisted that
had the two submitted their visa applications, their
applications would have
been processed as long as they did not appear on a
list of banned
Zimbabweans banned from visiting Europe under targeted
sanctions imposed on
President Robert Mugabe and his senior party officials.
"I am surprised
to learn of the hesitation of the Zimbabwean Parliament to
send a delegation
to our ACP-EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly in Wiesbaden
next
week.
"As the First Vice-Chairman of the European Parliament delegation
in the
JPA, representing the EU side, I want to underline that we have an
interest
in working with colleagues from Zimbabwe in Wiesbaden next
week.
"I have been assured of the co-operation of German authorities in
this
respect. They have not received formal visa applications to date -
contrary
to media reports," said Gahler.
Magadu, Chipare and Movement
for Democratic Change (MDC) legislator Nelson
Chamisa were expected in
Wiesbaden as part of the Zimbabwean delegation at
the ACP-EU
meeting.
Magadu on Thursday insisted that they had been denied visas were
by the
Germany embassy in Harare telling ZimOnline to contact Zvoma for
comment on
the matter.
"Why should I not want to go to Germany? The
applications were turned down.
Ask Zvoma (for more details on the matter),"
said Magadu in a telephone
interview.
Contacted for comment, Zvoma
said: "I think we are now kicking a dead
donkey. Zimbabwe has no delegation
going (to Germany) full stop. What is the
problem?"
The German
embassy in Harare, which has remained mum on the issue, could not
be reached
for comment on the matter last night.
On Tuesday, EU press officer
Richard Freedman said ACP-EU parliamentarians
would still discuss Zimbabwe's
deteriorating political crisis next week
despite Harare indicating that it
had pulled out of the dialogue.
Freedman said the summit would discuss
the deteriorating political and
economic crisis in Zimbabwe even if Harare
was not officially represented at
the meeting.
Relations between
Harare and the EU have been strained since 2000 after
Mugabe began seizing
white farms for redistribution to landless blacks and
began a clampdown on
the opposition, rights groups and the press.
The EU and the United States
imposed targeted sanctions on Mugabe and his
senior lieutenants after the
Zimbabwean leader won the 2002 presidential
election that international
observers said were rigged and were marred by
serious voter intimidation. -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Friday 22 June 2007
By Herbert
Nyamakope
DUBLIN - There is nothing new under the sun. Oh no, you might
say to me,
what is happening in Zimbabwe is unprecedented. Well you may be
comforted to
learn that it has happened elsewhere before.
The tragedy
of it all, though, is that those who do not learn from history
are condemned
to repeat similar mistakes.
I am not going to discuss here the Yugoslavia
hyperinflation of 1993-4. By
now most of us would have read something about
it. Or even the Germany
inflation of 1923.
These two case studies,
which at the moment are sitting at the top of the
league of hyperinflation
cases, were not quite in the same situation as we
are in
Zimbabwe.
There was war in Yugoslavia and Germany was paying reparations
for the
damages of the First World War. Zimbabwe is in over two decades of
peace
times. Neither is this an economic thesis on inflation.
This is
an illustration of what I can best describe as human folly. Two
months ago I
was in Rome on a holiday.
Being someone who has an interest in history as
well as being a civil
engineer, I was so fascinated by the magnificence of
the ruins of ancient
Rome that I promised myself that should the Lord permit
I will visit again.
You can't avoid but marvel at the spectacle of this
ancient architecture;
the temples, squares (piazzas), triumphant arches, the
roads, the colloseum
and all manner of structures very well preserved today
for tourists.
Truly at its height, this must have been one of the
greatest wonders of the
ancient world. For a time I became so curious to
find out who built these
things. What you see there speaks very loudly of
the people who built them.
They must have been highly organised and
educated. I turned to the World
Wide Web, thanks to modern technology. While
deeply engrossed in this
research, I came across something that caught my
eye and diverted my
attention altogether.
Afterwards I said surely
there is nothing new under the sun.
Rome was ruled by emperors and it had
a senate, laws, judges just like any
modern society.
By the way I am
talking about the period 33BC to 476AD and by Rome I do not
mean the capital
of Italy as we know it today, I mean the Roman empire which
stretched from
North Africa, the middle east, across central Europe all the
way to
Britain.
In 283AD, Diocletian became the new emperor.
There were
problems in the empire at that time and he wanted to secure his
position. To
achieve this he increased both the numbers and salaries of the
armed forces
to keep them loyal to him.
Strangely as it happened, he also appointed
two vice emperors, which was not
the case before.
Because of these
increased salaries and numbers of the armed forces, the
government began to
mint more coins to pay them (there were no notes or
bearer cheques those
days).
However there wasn't enough gold or silver to support this vast
increase in
coins. Copper coins or tin-plated copper coins were used
instead. (Sounds
more like replacing our currency with bearer
cheques).
The vast increase in copper coins in circulation led to
inflation. Their
value fell further and even more coins had to be made. A
vicious cycle then
was set in motion.
Prices rose and Diocletian
blamed the merchants for the price increases and
called them greedy. In 301
AD he issued an edict declaring that prices were
to be fixed, (what we call
price controls today).
Anyone who was found selling above the gazetted
price would be punished by
death. Anyone found buying at that price would
also be punished by a lighter
sentence (clever).
From here you can
almost guess the rest of the story.
However you might not be able to
guess the grand finale. Of course this led
to the creation of the black
market. Goods were no longer available from the
markets but only on the
underground market. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?
Not only that but
merchants stopped selling their goods because they could
not sell at the
loss making gazetted prices. What do you think was the
government's next
accusation of the merchants? Hoarding, of course.
Penalties were
pronounced for hoarding. To escape from all this, the
merchants simply
closed shop. Diocletian wouldn't take that and another
edict was passed
which said that every man had to pursue the occupation of
his father and
failure to do so was punishable by death.
So if your father was a
merchant, you had to continue practising as a
merchant yourself. This was
the first instance of recorded hyperinflation.
Third century Rome seem to
be repeating itself in 21st century Zimbabwe.
What I like though about
Diocletian is something you wouldn't guess.
In 303AD he resigned. As if
this was not enough, he forced his two deputies
to resign as well. (well,
that was bold and is the missing link in our
society).
This perhaps
was the first time I read that an emperor resigned. They would
either die on
the throne or be assassinated or killed in battle.
The position of
emperor was much more powerful than that of even the
president of the United
States today. You were elevated to the position of a
god and to resign from
there took a real man.
This was so impressive that in 308AD he was
persuaded to resume office
again. He declined. To add icing to the cake, he
actually sorted out the
succession issue before he resigned.
So there
you are, what we are going through in Zimbabwe today, the Romans
went
through it.
The similarities are stark, but the differences are stark
also. Whereas
today we have economics textbooks, powerful computers, a
department of
economic planning, a central bank and its governor, ministries
of finance
and trade and commerce and precedents to learn from, the Romans
had none.
Interesting isn't it, that from 300AD to now we seem to have
only moved
slightly, backwards.
No wonder Rome today is such a
marvel, they were solving economic problems
that we are failing to solve
today.
* Herbert Nyamakope is a Zimbabwean writer based in Dublin,
Ireland
The Telegraph
Last Updated: 2:38am BST
22/06/2007
Peta Thornycroft, The Daily Telegraph's Zimbabwe
correspondent, was
honoured for her reporting of the suffering caused by
President Robert
Mugabe's regime yesterday when she received a Special James
Cameron Award.
The award, created in memory of the late foreign
correspondent James
Cameron, was given in "recognition of her continued
reporting of the story
of Zimbabwe from within the country despite serious
risk to her personal
safety and continual harassment by the
authorities".
A Zimbabwean citizen, Ms Thornycroft, 62, has worked
for the Telegraph
since 2001. She has covered some of the most traumatic
events in her
country's post-independence history, notably the demise of the
white farmers
dispossessed by Mr Mugabe's land grab, the 2002 election when
he stole
victory with a campaign of violence, and the country's spiralling
economic
crisis.
"I'm deeply honoured by this award, but
saddened by the fact that
Robert Mugabe's repression means fewer and fewer
independent journalists are
able to work in Zimbabwe - and those that do, do
so at their peril," she
said last night.
VOA
By Patience Rusere
Washington
21 June
2007
The Zimbabwean government has increased allowances
for village headmen from
Z$7,000 a month to Z$150,000 (US$0.50) retroactive
to the start of 2007.
Critics like Crisis In Zimbabwe Coalition Programs
Manager Phillip Pasirayi
said this gave the appearance of vote-buying as the
amounts exceed some
worker salaries.
The country is headed for local
elections in January of next year with
presidential and parliamentary
elections in March 2008. The ruling ZANU-PF
party of President Robert Mugabe
has traditionally dominated rural
constituencies which are subject to the
influence - and at times
intimidation - of traditional village leaders.
Zimbabwejournalists.com
21st Jun 2007 21:22 GMT
By Patrick
Chikwande
ZIMBABWE civic society has warned South African President
Thabo Mbeki that
his mediation efforts to solve the political and economic
crisis affecting
Zimbabwe are likely to fail in the absence of full
participation from all
concerned parties.
During a public discussion
held at Crown Plaza hotel yesterday evening under
the theme 'Mbeki-Sadc
talks' members of the civic society warned that the
Sadc initiated mediation
was likely to hit a snag following the
non-involvement of civil society, the
business community and church groups.
On a yellow paper titled 'The 2007
agenda of engaging the Zimbabwean
government', the civic society said the
mediation process must involve the
full participation by civil society,
political parties, church groups and
the business community.
The
paper says there is an urgent need for a new democratic people driven
constitution that establishes an electoral and legal framework that ensures
free and fair elections.
All parties must agree to principles of
governance and a new leadership
code, adding that there should be a defined
process to achieve truth,
justice and reconciliation.
The civil
society says the mediation must involve the consultation of its
members to
ensure 'a broad ownership of the process'.
Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition
coordinator Jacob Mafume urged political
parties and civic society members
to reach a consensus on the way forward
concerning next year's parliamentary
and presidential elections.
"We need to mobilize ourselves and make
decisions on voting, if we are to
participate in next year's elections and
if we are not going to participate
so that we have consensus," Mafume
said.
Mafume said there would be nothing amiss in the opposition
boycotting next
year's elections if the playing field is not
level.
Government has been accused in the media of not taking the Sadc
mediation
efforts seriously by sending junior officials and absconding
meetings
thereby delaying and frustrating the mediating
process.
Attempts by the Commonwealth group of nations to solve the
political and
economic crisis following the 2002 disputed presidential
elections failed
when the government pulled out of the
group.
President Mbeki is expected to report back to Sadc leaders his
mediation
efforts on June 30.
Meanwhile an eight week commemoration
of Operation Murambatsvina is being
held under the theme 'We demand an
apology' and is expected to end mid-July.
Patrick Chikwande is a
pseudonym of Zimbabwean journalist
22 June 2007
By Mfundo
Mlilo
This week marks the celebration of the World refugee day, a day in
which as
Zimbabweans we must take seriously in view of the current problems
we are
facing. Over the last few years over 4 (four) million Zimbabweans
have left
the country to neighbouring countries mainly South Africa and the
United
Kingdom. Many of these are young men and women forced out of the
country by
the current economic melt down. A major component of this group
are
professionals who have left the country in search for greener
pastures.
It is also important to note that some of these fellow
Zimbabweans have been
pushed out of the country as a result of political
elements bent on
perpetuating the illegal regime of Robert Mugabe. The
Zimbabwean economy is
currently characterized by runaway hyper inflationary
conditions with our
inflation now hitting world records of well over 8000%
and month on month
figures above 100 % which is pushed by reckless and
irresponsible money
printing.
Unemployment rates are well above 80%
and the informal sector that had
become a means for sustainable livelihood
for many of these people was
destroyed by government through operation
Murambatsvina. The once famed
education system is on the verge or has
collapsed owing to dire shortage of
professional staff and mass exodus of
teachers and critical shortages of
foreign currency. Industries are
operating at below 30% and some have either
closed or have had to undertake
massive retrenchments.
There is no direct or indirect investment by
foreign investment and a donor
flight many of which sustained public
services. Foreign currency lines of
credit have been closed resulting in a
shortage of foreign currency which
has a consequent effect of paralyzing all
public institutions. Currently the
Zimbabwe Power Company is failing to
provide adequate power supplies and
domestic and industrial consumption is
reeling under crippling power cuts.
The mafia styled land grab process
implemented by government and masked by
its propaganda as a land revolution
has further compounded the situation.
The entire agric sector has
collapsed leading to food shortages which have
claimed many lives in u rural
communities. The land grab also severed our
links with the international
community and discredited our confidence in
trade. Politically the
democratic space continues to shrink as the police,
the army and the central
intelligence have turned themselves into
institutions of violence and
repression. They have turned themselves into
departments of Zanupf and exist
to protect the legacy of Mugabe and his
cronies. This structural defect will
require years of rehabilitation to
solve. POSA and AIPPA have given the
police force unprecedented powers to
crack down on activists viewed
MDC.
Many of these people have been tortured and some killed for
demanding
democracy. The writer is no stranger to police and state brutality
as he has
been arrested and detained for several times.
All these issues
and many others have forced over 4 (four) million people to
flea from
Zimbabwe in search for a better life. Many young man and women
have been
mauled by human eating lions along the Limpopo river as they try
to cross
into neighboring South Africa. Many have been eaten by crocodiles
as they
cross the crocodile infested Limpopo river. Those who have been
lucky to
successful cross into South Africa have been met with no jobs and
rampant
abuse by officials at receiving countries.
Latest revelations in to the
Botswana police revealed how Zimbabweans were
made to masturbate in from of
soldiers. Zimbabweans have been met with very
disturbing situations. As we
mark world refugee day we must take a moment to
remember many of our people
who are suffering in neighboring countries as
they try to make a living. We
URGE South African President Thabo Mbeki to
tighten the screws on Zanupf. We
as Zimbabweans demand specific deliver
ables from the current negotiation
going on. SADC must not watch as the
situation in Zimbabwe deteriorates. Or
is it that they expect us to pick up
guns and wage a liberation struggle in
Zimbabwe.
SADC and the U.N must act on Zimbabwe before it turns into
another Dafur or
Iraq. We are peace loving people and we believe in
constructive and peaceful
engagement but at the same time HOW LONG SHALL WE
BE PEACEFUL TO A REGIME
THAT IS VIOLENT TO US. Mugabe must be aware that his
time to change is now
or never. We are ready for a revolution in Zimbabwe
and the sooner He
realizes the better for him and his cronies. Zimbabweans
also demand unity
within the bickering factions of the MDC.
Many
Zimbabweans pin their hopes on the MDC but the chances of success are
only
possible when we are a united front. Political power should not blind
politicians from the work that lies ahead. Lastly Zimbabweans are urged to
continue soldiering on, the end is nigh................it is darkest before
dawn.
VIVA ZIMBABWE
Mfundo Mlilo, is a Civic Activist, a
former student leader expelled from the
University of Zimbabwe. He works for
the Combined Harare Residents
Association (CHRA ) a social movement in
Harare. )
Nehanda Radio: Zimbabwe's first 24 hour internet radio news
channel.