Reuters
Sat 2
Jun 2007, 9:46 GMT
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe's government has promised
to reduce monthly
inflation to below 25 percent from the current 100 percent
by year-end after
signing a price and wage protocol with business and labour
to halt a deep
recession.
The southern African country is battling
its worst economic crisis that has
pushed inflation to the world's highest
at over 3,700 percent as prices
double every month in an economy where
unemployment is above 80 percent and
poverty levels rising.
Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe governor Gideon Gono has advocated for a social
contract to
halt rapid price increases, saying this is the only way to
stabilise an
economy the World Bank says is shrinking faster than any on
earth.
On Saturday the official Herald newspaper published three
protocols which
had been agreed by labour, business and President Robert
Mugabe's
government. The protocols, which will initially run for a year,
were signed
on Friday.
"Government (will) reduce monthly inflation to
below 25 percent by the end
of 2007," according to the incomes and prices
protocol, adding that the
budget deficit would this year fall to below 10
percent from 43 percent in
2006.
Under the agreement, business
committed itself to exercise restraint in
increasing prices and only resort
to job cuts as a last measure while labour
groups should advocate for
reasonable salaries for workers and limit
strikes.
According to the
other two protocols, the government is required to reduce
price distortions,
including that of foreign currency where the local unit
fetches Z$250 on the
official market but Z$55,000 on a thriving parallel
black
market.
Economic analysts say Mugabe's government should restore property
rights,
ensure productivity on farms, liberalise the foreign exchange market
and
implement bold political reforms and end a crackdown on opponents as
measures to revive the economy.
Mugabe's government has been shunned
by international donors over its
controversial policies, such as the seizure
of white-owned farms to resettle
blacks, which critics say has decimated the
main agriculture sector and
stoked food shortages.
The Telegraph
By David
Blair in Pretoria
Last Updated: 2:53am BST
02/06/2007
Tony Blair endorsed South Africa's
controversial approach towards
Zimbabwe yesterday when he threw Britain's
weight behind President Thabo
Mbeki's latest attempt to resolve the crisis
in his northern neighbour.
On the last day of his tour of Africa,
the Prime Minister met Mr Mbeki
in Pretoria and said that Zimbabwe was an
issue for the continent's leaders
to resolve.
Throughout his
journey across Africa, Mr Blair has passionately
defended his
"interventionist" foreign policy. But the limits became
apparent when he
appeared alongside Mr Mbeki after their two-hour meeting.
Zimbabwe does not
fall into Mr Blair's doctrine of intervention.
"My views on what
has happened in Zimbabwe are well known, so are my
country's," said Mr
Blair. "But the only thing that matters is what happens
to the people of
Zimbabwe."
The Prime Minister said the "solution comes from within
this region of
Africa" and Britain would "put our efforts behind the process
which
President Mbeki has laid out".
Mr Blair added that he
"welcomed" Mr Mbeki's latest efforts to address
Zimbabwe's problems through
diplomacy. The South African leader has tried
one initiative after another
for the last seven years. In the process, Mr
Mbeki has infuriated Zimbabwe's
opposition by refusing to condemn President
Robert Mugabe's
excesses.
Since Mr Mugabe lost a referendum on a new constitution
in Feb 2000 -
his first ever electoral defeat - he has fought a ruthless
battle to retain
power.
Political violence has claimed hundreds
of lives, Mr Mugabe has stolen
victory in three deeply flawed elections and
the economy has fallen into
ruin.
Mr Mbeki has always declined
to utter a word of public censure.
Yesterday, Mr Mbeki laid out his
latest plan.
"The position of the region here is that there are
real problems in
Zimbabwe which need to be solved," he said.
Mr
Mbeki will "facilitate" talks between Mr Mugabe's regime and
Zimbabwe's
deeply divided opposition.
A team of experts will look at the
"problems affecting the Zimbabwean
economy" and report back to African
leaders. "President Mugabe was present
at that meeting and he agreed to all
of this. It is that two-pronged
approach which we are following," said Mr
Mbeki.
The Guardian
As Tony Blair said this
week, African countries should help Zimbabwe - but
countries such as Britain
can also play an important role.
Kirsty Whalley
June 2, 2007 1:00
PM
As Tony Blair landed in South Africa earlier this week, it must have
struck
him as ironic that while he spoke of Africa's great successes, a mere
500km
away one of its worst failures still limps on against all
odds.
Zimbabwe's dramatic and rapid demise has been well documented: the
runaway
inflation - soon to hit 4,000%, the non-existent economy, the
millions of
refugees and hundreds of thousands of displaced people, and the
shocking
human rights abuses and government-sanctioned torture that occur on
a daily
basis.
Given his proximity to the country Mr Blair could
hardly fail to comment on
the Zimbabwean issue. "African governments should
also hold other African
governments to account," he said, and rightly so.
There can be no effective
solution in Zimbabwe without the engagement of its
neighbouring countries,
including South Africa. Until very recently, African
leaders have been very
reluctant to speak out against Mugabe, mainly because
he is still viewed as
a liberation hero across the continent.
The
brutal beating of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai on March 11, as
well
as the growing challenge to Mugabe's leadership within his own party,
went
some way towards changing this view. For the first time, the South
African
government voiced their concern over the human rights abuses in
Zimbabwe.
However, if views of African leaders are changing, they are
doing so slowly.
At the SADC meeting held on March 30, Mugabe may have been
criticised in
private for his actions, but when the conference ended in
demands that the
west lift sanctions against the regime it was tantamount to
a vote of
confidence in him. Further farcical back-peddling took place more
recently
as Zimbabwe was elected by 26 votes to 21 to head the United
Nations
Commission on Sustainable Development. The ballot was secret, but it
would
be interesting to know how South Africa voted.
Thabo Mbeki's
arbitration efforts have been nothing but a smokescreen for
his tacit
approval of Mugabe's government. One South African newspaper
recently noted
- with an apparent sense of irony - that Mbeki was "mediating
between
President Robert Mugabe's ruling Zanu PF party and the main
opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) opposition through quiet
diplomacy". It
is South Africa's silence on the Zimbabwean issue that has
been most
damaging, especially as she is largely responsible for propping up
the
Zimbabwean economy through loans, aid and investment.
Blair said that
pushing for a solution on the Zimbabwean issue is high on
his agenda in
South Africa. One wonders, as the outgoing incumbent, how
effective his
talks with Mbeki will be. He cautioned the president publicly
this week:
"South Africa's economy loses 3% of GDP thanks to Zimbabwe's
economic melt
down." No doubt these words will elicit the usual vitriol from
Mugabe, who
blames almost all the problems faced by the country on its
former colonial
power. In light of the situation in Iraq, it is very easy
for Mugabe to cast
himself as a victim of western imperialism. "Britain is
trying to
re-colonise Zimbabwe," is one of his favourite refrains.
While Mr Blair
is trying to convince Thabo Mbeki to take decisive action in
resolving the
situation in Zimbabwe, he should spare a thought for the
thousands of
Zimbabwean refugees stuck in limbo in his own country. There
are about
20,000 Zimbabweans claiming asylum at present. They are unable to
work and
receive either very little or no state support, as a result, many
are
destitute, sleeping in the streets and waiting for a decision on their
asylum cases, which can take years.
The result of this is the
de-skilling of thousands of professionals such as
teachers, nurses,
businessmen and politicians. In addition many asylum
seekers are waiting on
appeal decisions dependent on the outcome of two
cases that are going
through the courts, the AA case and the HS case, where
the Home Office is
arguing that it is safe to return asylum seekers back to
Zimbabwe. The
asylum seekers involved say that they face torture at the
hands of
government thugs if they are deported.
In Britain, the Zimbabwean
community is very active. One only has to pass by
the Zimbabwean Embassy on
a Saturday afternoon to see the ever expanding
ZimVigil carrying out their
weekly protest. Charities such as WeZimbabwe
regularly organise events to
galvanise the immigrant community into action
and Britain plays host to an
exile Zimbabwean newspaper (sold in Zimbabwe)
and a radio station - SW Radio
Africa - that are vital in disseminating
independent news in a country where
almost all of the media is state
controlled. When Mugabe finally goes, there
is no doubt that Britain will
pour a lot of aid into its redevelopment. Part
of that will be ensuring good
governance in the country and a reinvigorated
electorate.
In his speech this week, Mr Blair said that African countries
should be
prepared to "help rebuild the shattered country" after the
Zimbabwean
government has been reformed. Africa does need to take
responsibility for
what is happening in Zimbabwe, but countries such as
Britain can also play
an important role. One significant contribution would
be allowing asylum
seekers to work while their claims are being processed
and equipping them
with skills to enable them to take an active role in the
reconstruction when
they return to Zimbabwe. This would be much more
constructive than spending
thousands on an expensive court case in a bid to
resume mass deportations of
failed asylum seekers and immigrants without
status.
Comments
SeerTaak
Comment No.
614783
June 2 13:18
GBR
Kirsty Whalley:"One significant
contribution would be allowing asylum
seekers to work while their claims are
being processed and equipping them
with skills to enable them to take an
active role in the reconstruction when
they return to Zimbabwe. This would
be much more constructive than spending
thousands on an expensive court case
in a bid to resume mass deportations of
failed asylum seekers and immigrants
without status."
Self evidently, if asylum seekers are allowed to work
they will never return
to Zimbabwe. The longer they are here, the more they
have real jobs and earn
proper incomes, the less chance there is they will
return. That will no
doubt be good for them and many cleaning companies that
want cheap labour,
but it will not be good for Zimbabwe in the long term.
What is needed here
is short sharp military action to get rid of Mugabe and
so they can all go
home.
westcoaster
Comment No.
614801
June 2 13:39
GBR
I'm confused, or maybe the author is.
How does allowing failed asylum
seekers to work in Britain provide any help
to Zimbabwe whatsoever? It may
well make good liberals feel better, and make
more money for companies by
increasing downward pressure on wages, and make
union bosses happy by
providing more members, but none of this seems to help
Zimbabwe (or indeed
most of Britain).
Yiskra
Comment No.
614833
June 2 14:05
GBR
African immigrants tend to make the
largest contributions to their countries
of origin: in remittances (sending
money - famously, in total at least twice
the level of total international
aid), small and large scale investment and
political pressure. They're also
more likely to return when their countries
stabilise because they tend to
have made enough money to guarantee a good
standard of
living.
westcoaster: they'll be paying
taxes.
emmanuelgoldstein
Comment No. 614834
June 2
14:05
GBR
Kirsty,
Thanks for a constructive suggestion.
Allowing Zim asylum-seekers to work is
win/win. They'd send money home, keep
themselves busy, and benefit the UK.
Exploitation by UK employers might
be an issue, so it'd be nice to see plans
to avoid
it.
westcoaster
Comment No. 614848
June 2
14:17
GBR
Could we see some real evidence that working asylum-seekers
actually benefit
Britain? Are they actually doing 'new' jobs, or just
displacing earlier
immigrants or native-born workers? I ask, wondering if
there is any actual
research on this, as opposed to the two contending
streams of belief and
anecdote. Clearly, if the jobs are new, then there is
benefit, otherwise I'd
suspect not (though I take the point about
remittances benefiting people at
home).
donge
Comment No.
614853
June 2 14:24
GBR
I think the english should keep well
away from Afrika, they have done quite
enough damage over the last two
centuries.
iamwhoiam
Comment No. 614903
June 2
15:14
GBR
Donge:-"I think the english should keep well away from
Afrika, they have
done quite enough damage over the last two
centuries."
I think the damage started when they
left.
WASPi
Comment No. 614952
June 2
15:57
BHS
"One significant contribution would be allowing asylum
seekers to work while
their claims are being processed and equipping them
with skills to enable
them to take an active role in the reconstruction when
they return to
Zimbabwe. This would be much more constructive than spending
thousands on an
expensive court case in a bid to resume mass deportations of
failed asylum
seekers and immigrants without
status."
------------------------------
Wouldn't this actually
contribute to the skills drain in Zimbabwe as
professionals from that
country continue to come to Britain knowing that
they will be able to work
at high paying jobs and have a much better quality
of life in Britain than
if they stayed behind?
Also, how are so many people able to travel
from Zimbabwe to Britain?
Is the British embassy still giving tourist,
student and work Visas to
people who present such a high risk of becoming
illegal immigrants and
asylum
seekers?
WheatFromChaff
Comment No. 615055
June 2
17:32
GBR
""African governments should also hold other African
governments to
account," he said, and rightly so."
He did say that,
didn't he.
So why did he not likewise believe that Middle Eastern
governments should
hold other Middle Eastern governments to
account?
joatsimeon
Comment No. 615110
June 2
18:07
Hark... somewhere, faintly through the aether, I hear the sound of
Ian Smith
laughing.
anaxagoras
Comment No.
615168
June 2 19:01
GBR
Isn't it funny how asylum seekers from
Zimbabwe find themselves in Britain?
Malawi, RSA, Namibia, Zambia etc
etc.are more likely destinations if one's
first priority is asylum leaving
the conclusion that they're economic
migrants anyway.
WASHINGTON, June 1
/PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A new report published
today reveals comprehensive
evidence that Chinese authorities are complicit
in the illegal ivory trade,
which is fueling a surge in elephant poaching
across Africa. The report
release coincides with the opening of the
169-nation Conference of the
Parties to the Convention on International
Trade in Endangered Species
(CITES) in The Hague, Netherlands.
Made in China - How China's Illegal
Ivory Trade is Causing a 21st
Century African Elephant Disaster, published by
the Environmental
Investigation Agency, exposes how Chinese government
ministries,
government-owned companies, and nationalized industries are
openly flouting
the international ban on ivory trade, all while China
prepares to stage a
"green Olympics."
EIA President Allan Thornton:
"China's illegal ivory trade is fuelling
a massive new poaching crisis for
Africa's elephants. We are calling on the
Government of China to ban all
domestic trade in ivory before the Beijing
Olympics. Unless the Government of
China acts now, African elephants in
many countries will once again face
extinction."
The report is based on eight years of undercover
investigations into
illegal ivory trade in China, Hong Kong, and Africa and
documents how:
-- China's most powerful bodies have been implicated in
ivory trade,
including the Communist Party of China, the Ministry of
Defense, and
the China National Petroleum Corporation;
-- 110
tons of ivory have gone missing from China's government held
ivory
stocks;
-- China and Chinese nationals are implicated in illegal ivory
trade
involving 13 African nations where extensive elephant poaching
is
wiping out many elephant populations, including Sudan, Central
African
Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi,
Mozambique,
Zambia, Zimbabwe, Gabon, Cameroon, Chad, Nigeria and
Mali;
-- Chinese traders have been allowed to export ivory in
contravention of
the international ban;
-- China has failed to
implement the international ban that prohibits
imports and exports of
African elephant ivory for the past 16 years;
-- Chinese authorities have
sold poached ivory, seized from smugglers
onto
China's domestic
market, as recently as November 2004 when almost one
ton of ivory was
auctioned;
-- Ivory traders stated they have continued to purchase ivory
from
government stocks throughout the 1990's and into the
2000's;
-- Traders allege that seized stocks of poached ivory are
'disappearing'
into government ivory stocks;
-- Ivory is widely
available across China, despite the fact that
official
legal ivory
stocks would have been exhausted years ago due to the
trade
ban;
-- China is registering dozens of companies to legally sell
ivory.
View EIA undercover video of managers of the Chinese Government
owned
company Beijing Gongmei offering to sell and illegally export millions
of
dollars of elephant ivory at: http://www.eia-global.org
Contact:
Allan Thornton, EIA President: (202) 361-6941 (USA)
Julian Newman, Senior Investigator and Campaigner: +44 07966
171191
(UK)
SOURCE Environmental Investigation Agency
africasia.com
JOHANNESBURG, June 1 (AFP)
South African President Thabo Mbeki defended
China's growing involvement in
Africa on Friday, saying Beijing had as much
right as any country to seek
access to the continent's natural
resources.
Mbeki said suggestions that China was developing a
neo-colonialist
relationship with Africa were "quite unfair" as he answered
questions from
an audience of businessmen at the launch of television news
network CNBC
Africa.
"China should be entitled as everybody else to
access" resources such as
oil, the president added.
China's
burgeoning economic presence in African nations such as oil-rich
Angola and
copper giant Zambia has sparked criticism that it is only
interested in
plundering the continent's vast natural resources to feed its
economic
boom.
There are also frequent complaints from workers' and consumers'
groups in
Africa that China dumps sub-standard products on African
markets.
Mbeki said it was important that the economic relationship
between China and
Africa produced "mutual results".
"We wouldn't want
China to merely have access to goods and sell their goods
but we want them
to invest and ensure there is a balance," he said.
The South African
president played host in February to his visiting Chinese
counterpart Hu
Jintao when he described the emerging relationship as a
"win-win"
situation.
©2007 AFP
SABC
June 02, 2007,
18:45
Zimbabweans in South Africa have converged on Bloemfontein for the
inaugural
congress aimed at establishing structures in South Africa for
Zimbabwe's
opposition Movement of Democratic Change (MDC).
Lovemore
Moyo, the movement's chairperson, says these will form a potential
base for
the movement to liberate Zimbabweans in their political struggle.
He says
the MDC has declared that the struggle of Zimbabweans is no longer a
national one, but an international and regional one.
Moyo says that
having a structure in South Africa will immensely help them
to send their
message and also help to mobilise a huge population of
Zimbabweans in South
Africa. "There are more than 3 million Zimbabweans in
South Africa, not
because of choice but because of the political situation
they are facing in
our country."
Meanwhile the congress is electing MDC SA leadership:
Malcom Mutandirwa from
Mpumalanga has been elected as chairperson and Amon
Ndlovu, from Gauteng,
his deputy.
The Telegraph
By David
Blair
Last Updated: 2:47am BST 02/06/2007
Commentary
Throughout Tony Blair's decade in office, the situation
in Zimbabwe
has deteriorated on every possible level.
Inflation
now exceeds 3,700 per cent - the highest in the world - life
expectancy has
fallen to only 37 and perhaps a quarter of the entire
population has packed
up and left, voting with their feet on the
catastrophic consequences of
President Robert Mugabe's rule.
Zimbabwe's relentless decline has
reached a critical juncture. With
prices doubling every few weeks, the
regime is under permanent pressure to
increase the pay of soldiers,
policemen and civil servants.
But Mr Mugabe's bankrupt government
must print the money to pay these
bills - which pushes inflation still
higher and leads to demands for even
more pay rises. So Zimbabwe is locked
in a spiral of economic collapse.
Yet on his last visit to Africa
as prime minister, Tony Blair was
content to hand responsibility for dealing
with this disaster to President
Thabo Mbeki of South Africa.
When the Prime Minister spoke alongside Mr Mbeki in the splendour of
the
Union Buildings in Pretoria, the limits of his "avowedly
interventionist"
foreign policy became clear. Despite all Mr Blair's soaring
rhetoric,
Britain's moral duty to intervene on behalf of suffering Africans
has strict
boundaries - and Zimbabwe falls outside them.
Nothing so perfectly
illustrates the key problem with the Prime
Minister's approach to Africa as
Zimbabwe's crisis. Mr Blair's fervent
declarations about our moral duty to
"intervene" raise expectations which
are, quite simply, impossible to
fulfil.
There will always be limits to what Britain - or any other
country -
can accomplish. The great danger attached to the Prime Minister's
passion is
that by raising expectations only for them to be dashed, he risks
discrediting the noble cause of helping Africa.
His military
intervention in Sierra Leone was generally acknowledged
to be immensely
courageous and successful.
He also won praise for urging G8 leaders
to cancel Africa's debts,
increase their aid budgets and give developing
countries fairer access to
world markets.
But although few who
watched him this week can doubt that Mr Blair's
motives are noble and his
words sincere, his rhetoric remains repellent.
Writing about
Britain's world role in the current issue of The
Economist, Mr Blair says:
"We should be prepared to intervene, if necessary
militarily, to prevent
genocide, oppression, the deep injustice too often
inflicted on the
vulnerable."
This sweeping statement is impossible to reconcile
with inaction in
the face of Zimbabwe's crisis. By every one of Mr Blair's
criteria - save
for genocide - Zimbabwe would justify
intervention.
In practice, however, British military intervention
in Zimbabwe is
inconceivable. Mr Blair's ability to stop Mr Mugabe from
wreaking havoc
inside his own country is almost non-existent.
Mr Mbeki has spent the last seven years studiously refraining from
criticising the old dictator while privately trying to persuade Mr Mugabe to
change his ways. This has achieved virtually nothing.
So
leaving Mr Mbeki to sort out Zimbabwe is a policy of utter despair.
In the
real world, however, it may be Britain's only realistic option.
The
Prime Minister should not shy away from saying as much.
His
speeches this week would have been more welcome if they had struck
an
occasional note of sombre realism. In particular, he should have stated
that
the doctrine of intervention will always have limits - and countries
like
Zimbabwe fall beyond them.
Mr Blair said that he abhorred
"cynicism" above everything else. The
tragedy is that by raising impossible
expectations, he may encourage the
very cynicism he so despises.
http://africantears.netfirms.com/thisweek.htm
Saturday 2nd June 2007
Dear Family and Friends,
As
ridiculous as it may sound, little lights of hope are flickering on all
the
time now in Zimbabwe. They are not practical everyday lights of
decreasing
prices, increasing food and medical supplies or improved
services - quite
the contrary in fact. The lights of hope that I am talking
about are those
that are beginning to illuminate the future direction. Some
are from events
across the border where it seems there are actually things
going on -
although no one is saying what!
Other signs of hope are coming from
within. One is the blatantly obvious
declining interest and support by
people in rural areas for overweight
politicians in smart clothes and fancy
cars who come only at election time -
and then shout and threaten people in
their bid to garner votes. A prime
example is underway at the moment in the
run up to a by election about to be
held in Zaka East. At last both sides of
the MDC have managed to stand
together and say they will not contest the
seat - what is the point if
conditions are not free and fair. This leaves
Zanu PF standing against two
virtually unknown parties, the UPP (United
People's Party) and the UPDP
(United People's Democratic Party). Some of the
earlier ZANU PF rallies were
shown on ZBC television and it was embarrassing
to watch great obese men,
shouting and waving their fists at the painfully
thin people, sitting
barefoot in the dust staring blankly ahead. The
contrast between speaker and
spectators was so extreme it was a wonder it
was shown on national TV at
all.
A few days later, arriving to whip
up support for the ruling party candidate
, a former soldier, disappointment
was immediate and the rally cancelled.
Zanu PF Chairman, John Nkomo, said:
"We have to postpone this rally to
Thursday next week because we cannot
address these few people." The days of
Zanu PF being able to take support
for granted - even in remote dusty
villages - are gone.
Other reasons
for hope are coming from people in positions of responsibility
who are
making courageous decisions and are standing up to do the right
thing -
politics and propaganda aside.
This week High Court Judge Tedious Karwi
granted bail to Ian Makone - one of
32 leading opposition officials and
activists arrested in late March who
have been held without trial for the
past 2 months and 2 days. In making the
bail ruling Judge Karwi stated a
fact which of late is not guaranteed and
has been very elusive in Zimbabwe.
The Judge said:" Our law presumes people
to be innocent until proven
guilty."
Until next week, thanks for reading, love cathy.
http://africantears.netfirms.com/indexph.htm
Friday 1st June 2007
Dear
Friends.
The British weather is renowned for its unreliability and it's a
standard
joke about the Brits that their one staple of conversation is the
weather,
usually described as ' the bloody weather'. For Zimbabweans in the
diaspora
accustomed to planning events months ahead in the sure knowledge
that the
weather will do exactly what it's supposed to, it's utterly
maddening to
know that in Britain the one thing you can never be sure of is
the weather.
Take this May, for example. We had had three weeks of
glorious weather;
temperatures climbed to record levels for May, trees burst
into full summer
foliage and gardens bloomed in premature glory. The native
Brits, determined
to catch a tan, stripped off to reveal their wormy
whiteness and every
possible variation of un-dress paraded itself on the
streets.
Then came the last weekend of May and a Bank Holiday, in the UK
that's
almost a guarantee that it will rain! The Saturday was cold and grey
but
undeterred I made my way to London to meet up with my daughter. Rain or
no
rain, we were not going to miss Bank Holiday Monday in the
Square.
Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London, had organized a huge
celebration of
Africa Day in Trafalgar Square. What better time to celebrate
Africa's
contribution to the world. Two hundred years since the Abolition of
Slavery
and the commemoration on Africa Day of the Founding of the OAU. It
was to be
one joyous celebration and Africans living in London together with
Londoners, young and old, black and white and every shade in between, were
there to join the party and dance their socks off. We were all Africans that
day. There were stalls selling African food, African crafts, African
jewellery and clothes and above all there was African music. From all over
the continent the musicians came; Algeria, Ethiopia, Cameroon, Nigeria,
Ghana, Madagascar, the Congo and South Africa. Mama Africa herself, Miriam
Makeba, was to be the star of the show. All the warmth and vitality of
Africa was there in Trafalgar Square that day right under the statue of
Nelson towering above us on his Column.
And it rained and rained and
rained! Not just gentle English rain but a cold
driving rain that soaked us
to the skin. Trafalgar Square was a sea of
umbrellas. At one point a cheery
d.j worked the crowd with the brolly dance:
'Brollies to the left, brollies
to the right, lift your brollies up and
shake 'em all about.!' It certainly
kept us entertained but we got even more
soaked as rain streamed off the
shaking umbrellas and down our necks.
By the time Miriam Makeba came on
stage at three thirty it was absolutely
chucking it down! But it didn't make
a bit of difference; we roared our
admiration and love for this wonderful
woman who has fought all her life
against racism and whose music has stirred
the conscience of the world. To
see her there with her backing band of
musicians of all colours from Africa
and the diaspora, including her
grand-daughter the singer and her great
grandson, a twelve year old drummer.
It was a sight I shall never forget.
What changes she has seen in her life!
From the dark days of apartheid right
through to the birth of the Rainbow
Nation, Africa has come a long way and
this woman has been an integral part
of that long struggle for freedom.
But in the midst of all the
celebrations we were reminded that the struggle
is not yet over. A slim
young Congolese woman came onto the stage between
the musical acts to tell
of her experiences as a Prisoner of Conscience.
Speaking through an
interpreter she told us how she had been imprisoned for
five months and it
was only through the efforts of Amnesty and the
international community that
she was finally released. She wanted to thank
all the people who had helped
her and to remind us that there are still
dictators in Africa who imprison
people for daring to disagree with the
ruling party. Her testimony was a
salutary reminder to all those people who
in the name of Pan Africanism
choose to turn a blind eye to the corruption,
the denial of basic human
rights and the downright bad governance that still
prevails in much of
Africa. Yes, it is good to celebrate our Africaness and
the rich and varied
cultures of Africa but we do the continent and its
people a huge disservice
by denying that there is still a long way to go
before Africa and her people
are truly free.
Zimbabwe, of course, was not mentioned once by any
speaker during this
Africa Day celebration in Trafalgar Square, neither was
Zimbabwe's wonderful
music heard. In politically correct Britain it is
considered racist even to
acknowledge that black Africans are as capable of
violence against their own
people as any nasty white colonisiser. Tony Blair
has been in the lead with
this 'political correctness' and while Londoners
and Africans in the
diaspora danced in Trafalgar Square to celebrate Africa
Day he was away on
his 'Farewell' tour. In Sierra Leone he got a rapturous
welcome; Sierra
Leonians believe that it was Blair's military intervention
back in 2000 that
ended the bitter civil war.
'Had we not intervened
here,' Blair said, 'we would have been unable to set
Africa's beneficial
path going.' And he added, 'If we hadn't decided to make
that intervention
(in Sierra Leone) then not just this country but the
countries of this whole
area would have been adversely affected'
Blair, you see, believes in what
he calls 'liberal intervention' arguing
that in a global world where nations
are more and more inter-connected the
world cannot afford to ignore the
crimes of brutal tyrants and the excesses
of rogue states. As Mugabe
continues his brutal repression of all dissenting
voices, the Zimbabwean
people will surely appreciate the irony of that
philosophy coming as it does
from a man whose government has stood by while
Zimbabwe collapsed and up to
four million Zimbabweans have fled their
country.
As I write this,
Tony Blair is in South Africa talking to the President.
Commentators are
saying that Zimbabwe will be high on their agenda. What
chance is there that
Blair will be able to persuade Thabo Mbeki to bring his
northern neighbour
to book, stop the violence and ensure free and fair
elections so that next
Africa Day we will all be home in the sunshine in
Africa Unity Square to
celebrate?
As they say, don't hold your breath!
Ndini shamwari yenyu.
PH.
BBC
Saturday, 2 June 2007
Football's world governing body says it is yet to decide whether
official
team base camps for the 2010 World Cup could be outside South
Africa.
The news may well lead to a rethink in Zimbabwe, whose sports
minister
Aeneas Chigwedere has just announced plans to build two new
stadiums ahead
of the World Cup.
Chigwedere said that stadiums would
be built at Victoria Falls and the town
of Beitbridge on the South African
border
Zimbabwe is hoping to attract teams to prepare in the country
ahead of the
tournament and take advantage of the South African organising
committee's
plan for nearby countries to host teams during the
tournament.
Reports in recent weeks suggested that Fifa had given the
go-ahead for the
plan, provided stringent host city requirements were
met.
With Portugal reportedly looking at sites in Mozambique which was
ruled from
Lisbon until it won independence in 1975.
But Markus
Ziegler, director of communications at Fifa, said that nothing
was decided
and that a ruling would need to be made if teams were to be
based outside
South Africa during the tournament itself.
"There are two important
things, proper preparation camps or training camps
and then there are formal
team base camps during the competition," Ziegler
said.
Cricinfo staff
June 2,
2007
Kate Hoey, the former sports minister, told Cricinfo that she
opposed
Scotland and Ireland playing against Zimbabwe, regardless of where
the
matches took place. "What ICC should be doing is putting them right out
of
any competition because of the way cricket has been politicised," she
said.
If the ICC did decide to include Zimbabwe in the Intercontinental
Cup then
she said she would like to see Alex Salmond, the Scottish first
minister, do
something but that ultimately it would be a British government
decision.
"The sooner they make a John Howard type of statement, the
better."
Asked if it would make any difference were Zimbabwe to be
scheduled to play
in Scotland and Ireland rather than have those countries
play away, Hoey
said she was against any matches against an official
Zimbabwe team as "it's
saying the situation in the country is
normal".
Ireland presents a different set of problems as the national
team is picked
from both Northern Ireland, governed from Westminster, and
the Irish
Republic, so there would need to be discussions between the two
governments
. But the Dublin authorities have been very sympathetic to the
cause of
those fleeing Zimbabwe and there are large numbers of Zimbabwean
expats
living in Dublin who would be very against any sporting
contact.
Hoey warned that the strength of feeling is such that "there
would be
massive demonstrations on a par with those that surrounded the
South African
sides who toured in the era of apartheid".
©
Cricinfo
From cricinfo, 31 May
Steven Price in Harare
Despite an undertaking from
Peter Chingoka, the then interim chairman
Zimbabwe Cricket , that the report
on the investigation of charges of
financial maladministration would be made
public, no one apart from ZC and
ICC have seen it. Chingoka announced
sixteen months ago that an independent
auditor "of international repute"
would be asked to undertake a thorough
investigation of the board's affairs
following serious allegations from a
number of stakeholders that large sums
of money were unaccounted for.
However, the audit was ultimately entrusted
to Ruzengwe and Partners, a
small Harare-based outfit. And the terms of
reference were drawn up by the
interim board, the body at the heart of the
allegations. "Their report will
be there for all to see," Chingoka said at
the time. Unfortunately, although
the initial report was delivered to the
ICC in November, nobody outside the
ICC and ZC has been allowed to know what
it contains. Few expected anything
sensational. When the audit was
announced, Clive Field, the former players'
association chief executive, was
sceptical. "In the time which has passed
since these issues were highlighted
last year, it seems to me there would
have been ample opportunity to
sanitise the books," he said. "All we could
originally hope for was that the
audit was done quickly."
A senior administrator said that ZC had
"appointed a small one-partner local
firm who had little chance of
investigation the affairs as it was too
complex. It would need the
assistance of an international firm, as funding
included sponsorship
worldwide ... as the rights to the various tours would
have been put
together and sold by Octagon CSI and others and would need the
international
resources to follow through the paper trail and establish
where the funding
ended up." The ICC remains tight lipped, only saying that
Sir John Anderson,
the chairman of New Zealand Cricket who is overseeing the
process, is still
in dialogue with Ruzengwe and Partners. It is hoped that
things will be
sorted in time for the ICC's AGM at the end of June. What the
ICC cannot say
is whether the audit will be placed in the public domain.
Against this
backdrop of secrecy, Zimbabwe Cricket's coffers are about to
swell by
another US$11.5 million from the World Cup. Given the virtual total
secrecy
with which ZC operates, the ICC owes it to the game, to all those
who worked
tirelessly to build Zimbabwe cricket, and to the thousands of
local
cricketers who are scraping by with almost no equipment, to make
public the
report. We were unable to obtain any response from Zimbabwe
Cricket. The
board refuses to answer any questions from Cricinfo as it
objects to our
coverage of cricket in the country.
Goldseek
By: Bill Bonner
& The Daily Reckoning Crew
-- Posted Friday, 1 June
2007 |
The FT cited a recent case where the dependent spouse, a
wife, insisted she
needed $800,000 a month in child support payments, even
though she already
had an income of $7 million a year.
To you and to
us, dear reader, these amounts seem unbelievable. Seven
million dollars per
year...plus $800,000 a month in child support! Why do
people think they need
so much money to live happily? We have very simple
tastes. We could easily
get by on half that much.
Money isn't everything. We provide additional
proof this morning by looking
at a place with a lot of money - Zimbabwe.
Nowhere on the entire planet is
money piling up at a more rapid pace. The
printing presses in that hellhole
must be working around the clock. Consumer
price inflation is increasing at
an annual rate of 1,729%!
"My bad,"
says Robert Mugabe, the nation's democratically elected tyrant.
We look
to Zimbabwe not merely for entertainment but for instruction. It
shows us
that not only is money not a good gauge of wealth and happiness,
neither are
asset prices. Rich Americans look at rising stock prices.
'All is well,'
they say. 'We're getting wealthier.' Poor and middle class
Americans look at
their house prices. 'All is well,' they say.
'Our houses are worth twice
as much as they were 5 years ago; we're getting
wealthier.'
Alas, it
is not so. As money comes off the presses in Zimbabwe, it has to go
somewhere. More of it goes to the rich than to the poor. So, ASSET PRICES
RISE MORE THAN CONSUMER PRICES. Guess which stock market has gone up the
most in 2007? The Zimbabwe stock market! It's up 600% so far this year...up
12,000% over the last 12 months.
Imagine that you live in Zimbabwe.
You are one of Robert Mugabe's cronies
and you get your hands on $50,000. Of
course, the first thing you want to do
is to shuffle it out of the country.
But short of that, what do you do? Do
you invest in real capital
improvements...new industries...new
equipment...new property? No chance. Not
in an economy that is rapidly
collapsing. People don't have enough to eat.
They can't buy fuel.
Public services are crumbling. Transport, education,
health, trash
collection, police - they are all disintegrating. It used to
be the richest
part of Africa. Now, thousands of refugees sneak out of
Zimbabwe every week.
The place is a disaster.
Instead of investing in
fixed capital improvements, you put your money into
stocks - hoping that the
stocks will go up faster than your currency goes
down. The result? A
speculative, asset-price boom - even while the whole
country is falling
apart.
Meanwhile, America has its own asset-price boom...its own crony
capitalists...its own printing presses...
But even as asset prices go
up, the real economy slows down. Today's news
tells us that the GDP is
barely growing at all. And the Fed says housing
will be a drag for longer
than expected.