Continued issuance of acquisition notices baffles
commercial farmers
6/27/02 10:43:37 PM (GMT +2)
Farming Editor
THE government intends to compulsorily acquire 86
commercial farms for its controversial land reform programme.
The announcement by the Minister of Lands, Agriculture and
Rural Resettlement, Dr Joseph Made, caught the Commercial Farmers' Union
(CFU) by surprise.
Their spokesperson said most commercial farms
had been listed for acquisition by the government and wondered where the 86
farms were from.
In the past, the government has been accused of
duplicating acquisition lists, causing confusion and wasting taxpayers'
money.
In two latest preliminary notices to acquire land (Lot 53
and 54), Made said the government would acquire 41 commercial farms in the
first notice and a further 45 farms from the second notice.
He
said: "Notice is hereby given, in terms of Subsection (1) of Section 5 of the
Land Acquisition Act (Chapter 20:10), that the President intends to acquire
compulsorily the land described in the Schedule for resettlement
purposes.
"Any owner or occupier or any other person who has
interest and right in the said land, and who wishes to object to the proposed
compulsory acquisition, may lodge the same, in writing, with the Minister of
Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement . . . before 22 July
2002."
CFU spokesperson Jennie Williams on Tuesday said: "What
surprises me is that the government continues to list farms for compulsory
acquisition when only 20 farms were left out as of 7 June 2002."
The designation of the 86 commercial farms comes at a time when
the government has given 2 900 commercial farmers a 24 June deadline to
stop farming operations.
Amendments to the Land Acquisition Act
gazetted on 10 May 2002, indicated that once a farmer received a Section 8
acquisition order from the government, he/she had 45 days to cease farming
operations and a further 45 days to leave the farm.
The first 45
days expired on Monday and this means the 2 900 farmers cannot continue with
farming operation but start to prepare to leave the commercial farms in the
next 45 days from Monday.
The mass evictions come at a time when
Zimbabwe is facing severe food shortages due to drought and disruption caused
by farm invasions. The bulk of the wheat crop is produced by commercial
farmers while about 45 to 50 percent of maize is produced by this sector in
normal years.
About 80 percent of beef exported to the European
Union is produced by commercial farmers.
According to the CFU,
up to 27 percent of farmers with title deeds were not producing anything due
to enforced shut-downs and land invasions.
The CFU said operations
were either wholly or partially continuing on 73 percent of the farms with
title deeds "demonstrating the resilience of Zimbabwean commercial
farmers".
7.14 pm Mr. Michael Ancram (Devizes): I beg to move, That this
House deplores the deteriorating political, economic and humanitarian
situation in Zimbabwe; condemns the continuing violations of basic human
rights committed by the Mugabe regime; reaffirms the view that following the
rigged presidential election in March the current Zimbabwean government
lacks legitimacy; regrets the failure of Her Majesty's Government and the EU
to implement sanctions and exert effective pressure on the Mugabe regime
to hold new free and independently monitored presidential elections;
recognises the growing politically-induced humanitarian suffering in
Zimbabwe, and its effects on her neighbours; and calls on Her Majesty's
Government to take effective action to build an international coalition to
apply whatever pressure is necessary, in line with the Harare Declaration, to
restore democracy in Zimbabwe through fresh Presidential
elections.
This debate should have taken place a long time ago, and it
should also have taken place in Government time. Zimbabwe is not a far-off
land about which we know little; it is a land that we know all too well.
Zimbabwe is in crisis. Her people are suffering-suffering from starvation,
suffering from a breakdown in the rule of law, suffering from the loss of
basic democratic freedoms, suffering from a systematic violation of human
rights and suffering from a vote-rigging despot who uses intimidation and
lawlessness to impose his will upon his people.
If we were talking
about Kosovo or Bosnia, the Prime Minister would rightly insist on our moral
duty to intervene to save the people from tyranny, dispersal and torture. If
we were talking about the Indian sub-continent, the Foreign Secretary would
be jetting in to exercise persuasion and economic muscle to restore
normality. If we were talking about the middle east, prime ministerial
envoys would be whistle-stopping around the region seeking support for
political action to deal with the crisis. But we are talking about Zimbabwe,
yet from the Government there have been silence and inaction.
Until
Question Time this afternoon, there had been no recent statements in the
House on Zimbabwe and there has been no evidence of the creation of
the international coalition to bring pressure to bear on the Mugabe regime
that was promised by the Foreign Secretary when he told the House that
an international coalition was "exactly what we have been seeking to
put together and have, indeed, put together."-[Official Report, 21 March
2002; Vol. 382, c. 449.] He could have fooled me. He certainly fooled
the people of Zimbabwe.
It is starkly indicative that it has taken the
Opposition to bring this matter to the Floor of the House. I have accused
the Government of dithering over Zimbabwe, but I confess that I am wrong.
Since March, there has not been enough action to merit the description
"dithering." There has only been silence, broken astonishingly last week on
20 June when the Foreign Secretary claimed, as he did earlier today, that
sanctions were working and that Zimbabwe's Government were experiencing-I
think these are the words he used-isolation from the rest of the world. Who
does he think he is kidding? Certainly not the people of
Gib-[Interruption]-Zimbabwe, or of Gibraltar; certainly not the people of
Zimbabwe.
Let me say to the Foreign Secretary that the people of Zimbabwe
feel a sense of betrayal that Britain has turned its back on them and that it
is afraid to take on the Mugabe 25 Jun 2002 : Column 804 regime. They see
the Government ensconced in their well-practised mode of supine inaction.
Many Zimbabweans to whom I have spoken recently believe that we no longer
care about what happens in Zimbabwe. I can only tell them that Conservative
Members care passionately.
Hugh Bayley (City of York) rose- Mr. Ancram:
Perhaps the hon. Gentleman cares passionately, so I shall be delighted to
give way to him.
Hugh Bayley: I have taken an interest in Zimbabwe for a
long time. When the right hon. Gentleman's party were in power, Mugabe
wiped out the opposition party, ZAPU, and 10,000 Zimbabweans were butchered
in Matabeleland. What protests did the right hon. Gentleman's Government
lodge; what sanctions did they apply; and why did they later invite Mugabe to
Britain on a state visit?
Mr. Ancram: I do not understand whether the
hon. Gentleman is suggesting that that is any reason to ignore what is
happening in Zimbabwe today. I count 10 Labour Members in the Chamber for
this debate, and that is a sign of how much the Labour party cares about what
is happening in Zimbabwe.
We know that the crisis in Zimbabwe is getting
worse. It is important that not only the House but the country should know
about what is horrifyingly growing unchecked in Zimbabwe. We cannot turn a
blind eye to it and we cannot afford to be squeamish. Our motion refers to
the "deteriorating political, economic and humanitarian situation in
Zimbabwe"
and to "the continuing violations of basic human
rights".
The truth is stark. According to the report of the independent
Physicians for Human Rights, between January and April this year, there were
961 documented cases of torture. There have been many more since
then.
Some of the cases are horrifying. A Movement for Democratic
Change supporter was attacked three times. Eight-months pregnant, she was
kicked so badly in the groin and lower abdomen that she suffered internal
bleeding for which she was prevented from getting treatment. Subsequently,
her eight-day-old baby was physically abused by Mugabe's thugs while she
was gagged to silence her screams. She was told by them that her baby
should die because it was "MDC property".
Documented cases of torture
include severe beatings, mutilation by fire, whippings, permanent
disfigurement and crippling, much of it taking place in the custody of the
police or the military. One victim in May was abducted in front of the
central police station in Bulawayo and taken to a militia camp. He was
accused of being an MDC supporter. A flaming log was taken from a fire and
forced against his feet. His mutilated feet were then beaten. A former
policeman accused of being MDC was beaten about his head with a metal bar and
then more generally with sjamboks by ZANU youth militia. When he complained
to the police he was told: "anyone suspected of being MDC will be beaten
up".
25 Jun 2002 : Column 805 The fact is that the police turn a blind
eye to such torture and abuse, probably because more than 90 per cent. of
such cases emanate from the actions of persons linked to the Government-the
army, the police, the militia, the veteran groups. There is little fear
of repercussions because the Government have let it be known that grants
of clemency and amnesty will be forthcoming.
An apologist for Mugabe
told me the other day that I should not be too censorious about what was
happening in Zimbabwe because "this was Africa". Such comments are a slur on
that great continent. The abuse is not African; it is the abuse of a fascist
dictatorship. The international community can no longer stand by and let it
happen.
After elections in March that were internationally judged to be
rigged and stolen, the Foreign Secretary told the House:
"we do not
recognise the result or its legitimacy."-[Official Report, 14 March 2002;
Vol. 381, c. 1035.] I hope the right hon. Gentleman will confirm that that
remains his position.
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth
Affairs (Mr. Jack Straw): Yes.
Mr. Ancram: I am grateful for that.
Mugabe and his henchmen have ridden roughshod over democracy in Zimbabwe. It
is worth recalling that the principles of the 1991 Harare declaration-this is
ironic-state:
"We believe . . . in the individual's inalienable right
to participate by means of free and democratic processes in the society in
which he or she lives".
Yet two days after the elections, Mugabe laid
formal charges of treason against the leaders of the MDC. Between January
and August this year, the Parliament will have been closed for all but two
days in May, when legislation was pushed through without consultation or
debate.
In terms of the law, Mugabe has ignored any rulings that did not
suit him. On 9 April, a senior Government official, George Charama, said that
it was the intention of the Government to ignore rulings by the court which
were not in the Government's favour. The contemptuous Government reaction to
the Supreme Court ruling that the Public Order and Security Act did not apply
to certain internal meetings of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
only helps to corroborate that.
Press freedom and freedom of
expression are also under attack. The draconian Access to Information and
Protection of Privacy Act has already allowed the arrest of more than a dozen
journalists on various charges. Poets, too, have been jailed under that
legislation for poetry critical of Mugabe.
Zimbabwe's economic outlook
is even bleaker. The violent land-grabs continue. Yesterday, 60 per cent.
of Zimbabwe's remaining white farmers were told to close down. Many of them
will not even be allowed to complete the essential grading of the tobacco
that used to provide 30 per cent. of Zimbabwe's foreign currency.
Agricultural output has fallen 67 per cent. from last year. Farmers are
being dispossessed and their labourers are losing their jobs and watching
helplessly as their families face hunger
and homelessness.
Unemployment has soared to 70 per cent. Business
closures are rife. Everyone is suffering except for those who are in Mugabe's
pocket. Inflation has now reached 25 Jun 2002 : Column 806 122 per cent.
Skilled people are leaving Zimbabwe. Wildlife, so essential to the
tourism industry, has been devastated, including the rare black rhino. The
dire economic crisis is beginning seriously to damage neighbouring economies
as well.
Then there is the Mugabe-created and fuelled humanitarian
crisis. Some 6 million people face malnutrition in Zimbabwe. The United
Nations estimates that Zimbabwe needs 1.5 million tonnes of food aid,
including 1.3 million tonnes of corn. Mugabe cynically and dishonestly
blames the white imperialists, but the blame lies firmly on his shoulders.
He is even blocking grain imports from the port of Beira.
Home
production has been devastated by the land-grabs. Andrew Meikle, chairman of
Commercial Grain Producers, projects a harvest of only 498,000 tonnes this
year compared with 1.47 million last year and 2.1 million in 2000. Wheat is
expected to run out by the end of the month. The crisis is massive and it is
politically induced. My hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs. Spelman)
will have more to say on that in her winding-up speech.
The horrifying
truth is that Mugabe is using starvation as a political tool. He is primarily
responsible for his people's hunger. The PHR report vividly describes how
the feeding plan in Midlands school has been altered to keep MDC children
from obtaining food. A ZANU-PF councillor is chillingly reported as having
said:
"even if stone was to melt, MDC children will not get the food
because it is ZANU food".
While our Government may say little, others
have spoken out. USAID head, Andrew Natsios, describes Mugabe as tyrannical
and predatory. Mary Robinson, the UN Human Rights Commissioner, has accused
Mugabe of being primarily responsible for the hunger and deprivation
afflicting Zimbabwe. Mugabe may blame drought, but the truth is that his
people go hungry alongside full dams with the waters unexploited.
We
must make no mistake about it: the crisis and the evil are real, and
real international action is urgently needed. It simply does not wash for
the Foreign Secretary to say, as he did at Question Time today, that action
is being taken. The right hon. Gentleman has to answer some
central questions. What has exclusion from the Councils of the
Commonwealth achieved? How many meetings has Zimbabwe been excluded from?
Will it still attend the Commonwealth games at the end of next month? Will
any Zimbabwean Ministers attend those games? What message will that give to
Mr. Mugabe?
Then there are the EU targeted sanctions which the Foreign
Secretary apparently believes are isolating the Zimbabwean Government. I
thought that Mugabe and senior members of his regime were supposed to be
banned from travelling. In the words of the Foreign Secretary in January,
that policy was "clear, unanimous and unambiguous"-so clear, apparently, that
Mugabe was able to attend the United Nations in New York; so unanimous that
Grace Mugabe was recently able to go shopping in Spain; and so unambiguous
that police chief Augustine Chihuri was able to attend a meeting of Interpol
in Lille in May, and Mugabe, with offensive irony, was able to attend a
UN conference on world hunger in Rome a few days ago. Dr. Olivia
Muchena, Minister of State in the Vice-Presidents office, a former Deputy
Minister of Agriculture, is allowed to travel 25 Jun 2002 : Column 807 at
will. Kumberai Kengai, ex-Minister of Agriculture, is receiving medical
treatment in the United Kingdom. Why is the travel ban list not
comprehensive? The asset freeze includes Mugabe, individual members of the
Government of Zimbabwe and any natural or legal persons, entities or bodies
associated with them. But only 20 individuals are named in the travel
ban.
It is time that the Government faced the facts. EU targeted
sanctions are not working. The author of the recent International Crisis
Group report described the sanctions as a joke. He went on to
say:
"Britain and the EU talk tough and do nothing. They threatened
Mugabe that if he stole the election they would come down hard on him.
Mugabe must be laughing at them."
What an indictment!
The
sanctions regime needs to be strengthened both in scope and extent; it needs
to encompass more targets; and it needs to be given more bite. I would like
the sanctions regime to include the immediate families of those who are on
the banned list. Why has the EU perversely postponed further consideration
of such an urgently needed review of the sanctions until 22 July? Ministers
met-what was it, a week and a half ago? Did they not consider at that time
whether the sanctions were working? Last week's General Affairs Council
conclusions contained one page about Zimbabwe and not a single action
point.
The Government have lost the plot on Zimbabwe. The overriding
objective must now be to secure new, fresh, independently monitored
presidential elections. Any fudged and artificial compromise between ZANU-PF
and the MDC that falls short of that would be a victory for Mugabe's
dishonesty and his despotic behaviour, and the MDC are right to reject
it.
Tony Baldry (Banbury): My right hon. Friend has said a lot about the
EU, but is this matter not also a test for Africa? Today, the G8 is
discussing in earnest the New Partnership for Africa's Development. If NEPAD
is to have any substance or meaning, surely the heads of Government of
other African states should bring pressure to bear on Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is
a test of whether NEPAD will work for Africa.
Mr. Ancram: I am
grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point, which I intended to make a
little later in my remarks. I fully agree with him. The coalition I
mentioned could bring pressure to bear on NEPAD's African members to exert
pressure through NEPAD. I think that that would have a substantial effect,
so it is one of the things that we would like to see being done in the coming
days.
We should no longer expect Mugabe to listen to reason. He mocks
the British Government's rhetoric and the Prime Minister's high moral
pronouncements. He now believes that he can literally get away with murder
and that we will not react, but I tell the House that the time has come when
we have to act. Of course we should not try to act alone: we have to build a
powerful international coalition to meet the challenges of what is now an
incipient rogue state. With ourselves, such a coalition should include the
European Union, the United States, the Commonwealth and, most important of
all, South Africa and its neighbours, along with Nigeria.
25 Jun 2002
: Column 808 The coalition's objectives should be the re-running of the
presidential elections, democratically conducted and independently monitored
and refereed, if necessary involving further talks between ZANU-PF and the
MDC to negotiate the means of setting such elections in process. The
coalition must be strong and cohesive enough to exert on Mugabe
the political, economic and, if necessary, military pressure needed to
achieve its objectives. It must be bound together by an understanding that
failure to deal with the crisis in Zimbabwe threatens the whole region and
will make international economic support for the region less
practicable.
Mr. Straw: Just now the right hon. Gentleman mentioned
military pressure, and in his preliminary remarks he made a reference to
Kosovo. Is he suggesting that we should either unilaterally or
multilaterally take military action against the Mugabe regime?
Mr.
Ancram: No, I am not. At this stage I do not wish to rule anything in or
anything out in judging what is necessary to bring sufficient pressure
to bear on Mugabe to hold fresh elections. However, if the coalition is to
be effective, it must have the means-whatever means are necessary-to
achieve its objectives. For that reason, I mentioned the three areas of
economic, political and military pressure very deliberately in that
context.
The coalition must have strong and clear aims. In African
terms, it should aim to isolate Zimbabwe diplomatically if the violence and
intimidation do not cease, and it should persuade countries such as Libya to
cease the material help that they currently give to Zimbabwe, which only
serves to encourage Mugabe. In Commonwealth terms, the coalition should seek
to secure the implementation of the Abuja agreement of last September
in respect of the rule of law in Zimbabwe and the proper transfer of
land. [Interruption.] The Secretary of State for International Development
says, "We have tried," but I do not believe that we have tried hard enough.
I want a coalition that can bring real pressure to bear. In EU and US
terms, the coalition should extend targeted sanctions to directors and
top officials in ZANU-PF affiliated businesses and strengthen the freezing
of assets against them. The sanctions must be made effective in ways that
they currently are not.
At the same time, the coalition should make
the public in southern African aware of current levels of corruption in
Zimbabwe. It should implement the recommendation of the UN panel on the
illegal exploitation of natural resources in the Congo to make Mugabe face up
to the realities of Zimbabwe's crisis. As I said in answer to my hon.
Friend the Member for Banbury (Tony Baldry), at the G8 summit, progress on
the NEPAD initiative should be linked to stronger and more credible efforts
by African Governments to resolve Zimbabwe's crisis.
The time for
appeasement and empty rhetoric is over. Supine inaction must now be replaced
by action-[Interruption.] The Foreign Secretary returns to his usual theme:
in the past when I have called on the Government to stop talking and start
doing, he has always responded by accusing me of offering no plan for
action. If he had been listening for the past few minutes, he would have
realised that I have laid out a clear pattern of action that a coalition can
and should take.
Time is running short. If disaster is to be averted,
the Government can no longer afford to look the other way-the problem will
not resolve itself. Hiding behind the alibi 25 Jun 2002 : Column 809 of our
colonial past to excuse our inaction will no longer wash. Yet again, I call
on the Government to cease the hand-wringing and the empty rhetoric, and to
stand up against dictatorship for democracy and the rule of law.
I
remind the House of what the Prime Minister said at his party conference last
October, when he told the country that he would heal the scars
of Africa:
"if Rwanda happened again today . . . we would have a
moral duty to act there", and added that he would "not tolerate . . . the
behaviour of Mugabe's henchmen".
The Government must now demonstrate
that the Prime Minister's words are more than mere rhetoric. Let us see
action-and let us see it now, before it is too late.
7.37 pm The
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Jack Straw): I
beg to move, To leave out from "House" to the end of the Question, and to add
instead thereof:
"expresses its grave concern at the abuse of human
rights and suppression of freedom of expression in Zimbabwe, the increase in
poverty arising from the policies of the ruling party, and the impending
humanitarian crisis in the country; reaffirms the view that the outcome of
the recent Presidential election does not reflect the will of the Zimbabwean
people; recognises the need for Land Reform but also recognises that this
needs to be done responsibly; welcomes the actions taken on Zimbabwe by Her
Majesty's Government in co-operation with the EU, the Commonwealth, the US
and others; further welcomes the efforts of the Governments of South Africa
and Nigeria to facilitate dialogue between ZANU (PF) and MDC, and deplores
ZANU (PF)'s withdrawal from these talks; further welcomes the Government's
commitment of £32 million to humanitarian relief in Zimbabwe outside official
channels; and calls on the Government to encourage other donors to stand by
the people of Zimbabwe at this difficult time."
I am grateful to the
right hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram) and the Opposition for
organising this debate in Opposition time. The fact that it is the first
Opposition debate devoted to a foreign affairs subject for two years
illustrates the difficulty that the right hon. Gentleman had in persuading
his right hon. and hon. Friends in the shadow Cabinet to agree to it. That
is emphasised by the fact that the Leader of the Opposition takes almost no
interest in Zimbabwe or, indeed, in Africa.
Mr. Andrew Turner (Isle of
Wight): Will the Foreign Secretary give way?
Mr. Straw: No, of course I
will not.
The Leader of the Opposition has made only one foreign policy
speech in the whole time that he has occupied that post-getting on for a
year. In that speech, on foreign policy and the world, there is not a single
reference to Zimbabwe, still less to the rest of Africa.
The speech
that we have just heard from the right hon. Member for Devizes is long on
indignation and almost wholly devoid of action. He says that his agenda for
action beyond that which we are already doing is to rule nothing in and to
rule nothing out. I thought that he gave away his real interests when, in a
slip of which Freud would have been proud, he said that not even the people
of Gibraltar would be fooled by what we are doing.
25 Jun 2002 : Column
810 That illustrates only too well that he could as well have applied his
speech to Gibraltar as to Zimbabwe, despite the entirely different
circumstances.
Mr. Turner: How many people have been murdered in
Gibraltar?
Mr. Straw: None as far as I know-or if they have, the
Gibraltar police have investigated. I merely point out the fact that the
right hon. Member for Devizes made an extraordinary but highly revealing
Freudian slip.
What we heard today, and what we hear from the right hon.
Member for Devizes each time the issue is raised, is the usual incantation in
which he calls for the establishment of an international coalition, including
members of the Commonwealth, the European Union, the United States and
countries in southern Africa, to take effective action against the regime.
When we have achieved exactly that-in the Commonwealth, with Zimbabwe's
suspension, and in the EU, with targeted sanctions against the ruling party
and the military-the right hon. Gentleman has scarcely been able to hide
his disappointment.
This morning, as he has so often done, the right
hon. Gentleman made similar remarks on the radio to those that he made this
evening, describing what is unquestionably a profoundly dire situation, and
implying that all that rests between peace and harmony in Zimbabwe and the
current circumstances is what he describes as inaction by the British
Government. Would that that were the situation. When put on the spot, as the
right hon. Gentleman was this morning, and asked what Britain could
realistically do, given its history with Zimbabwe, he said:
"I think
we shouldn't try to do anything on our own . . . this is a situation which
has wider implications than just within Zimbabwe."
He went on to
say:
"I would like to see now an international coalition put together
which would put pressure on Mr. Mugabe's regime and make sure that a number
of things are done."
What the right hon. Gentleman does, which is a
deception of the good people of Zimbabwe, is to make the wish the deed. The
wish is straightforward: that we move quickly to new elections, which are
properly monitored at every stage and which Mugabe and his henchmen do not
steal. The wish is that that regime has an agricultural policy which allows
the farmers to do what they are dedicated to and skilled in-that is, planting
and growing crops-rather than the current circumstance. The wish is that
that regime signs up, in deed as well as in words, to the Harare principles
and allows the judiciary to operate properly, observes human rights and ends
the arbitrary arrest and detention of Opposition spokespersons and
journalists.
We share those wishes. The question is how they can be
achieved. That can be only by an international coalition and international
co-operation. I wish we could have gone further in some respects. The
constraint is not the desire or the wish of the United Kingdom, but the need
to ensure that we get together an international coalition.
Let me
remind the House of the steps that we are taking, both bilaterally and with
our partners in the Commonwealth, the EU, the US and countries in the region
to encourage reform and avert further disaster in Zimbabwe. Bilaterally, we
have introduced a range of sanctions, including an arms embargo and a
reduction in 25 Jun 2002 : Column 811 development assistance to the
Government of Zimbabwe, to ensure that the regime cannot divert UK funds for
its own ends.
However, in recognition of the scale of the economic
disaster engulfing the country, we have increased our own humanitarian relief
to Zimbabwe, but our aid moneys go direct to impartial groups such as
non-governmental organisations and Churches, ensuring that those most in
need, rather than ZANU-PF insiders, benefit. In the past 12 months we have
committed £10 million in humanitarian assistance. My right hon. Friend the
Secretary of State for International Development, who will wind up the debate
for the Government, announced last week £45 million of further assistance for
the region, of which we expect almost half to go to Zimbabwe.
Over the
past 12 months, we have promoted international action against Mr. Mugabe's
regime. I noticed that when my hon. Friend the Member for City of York
(Hugh Bayley) asked the right hon. Member for Devizes about the
cosy relationship that existed under the Thatcher Government and, I may say,
the Major Government, the right hon. Gentleman's answer was devoid of
content. The record of the previous Government, once the noble Lord
Carrington had ceased to be Foreign Secretary, was not altogether a
creditable one, to put it mildly.
That continued through the
astonishing blindness that the previous Government showed in the mid-1980s
when, as my hon. Friend said, 10,000 people in Matabeleland were
slaughtered, and the reward that President Mugabe received for that was a
state visit, which gave him the most astonishing endorsement of his actions.
Much more recently, when the President of the Council and Leader of the House
of Commons, my right hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), was
Foreign Secretary, throughout the period that my right hon. Friend the
Secretary of State for International Development has held her post, and since
I have held my present post, President Mugabe's principal complaint about the
current Government was that we have not been easy to deal with-unlike the
previous Government, we have been told repeatedly, who turned out to be
remarkably easy to deal with. That is a charge to which I and my right hon.
Friends are only too happy to plead guilty.
Mr. Andrew MacKay
(Bracknell): The Foreign Secretary and I were both in the House in the
mid-1980s. There is some merit in his criticism of the Government whom I
served at that time, but I have a clear memory that there was next to no
mention from those on the Opposition Benches of what was happening in
Matabeleland. There was certainly no Supply day debate, and the only person
who comes out of it with any credit is my hon. Friend the Member for
Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton). We do not need any lessons from the
Government on the dreadful tragedy of Matabeleland.
Mr. Straw: As I have
said before, the record of the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas
Winterton) is one which stands starkly in the House. He has taken a
consistent approach to the matter, and I pay credit to him, as I have done
before. I admire the frankness of the right hon. Member for Bracknell (Mr.
MacKay) about the record of the previous Government, which stands in stark 25
Jun 2002 : Column 812 contrast to the attitude of the right hon. Member for
Devizes, who speaks from the Opposition Front Bench on Foreign
Affairs.
As to our position, I am happy to go through the record, but I
expect that it will transpire that we raised the issue at the time. It was
the party of the right hon. Member for Bracknell who were in government, and
they did nothing about it. Yes, we are in government now, and I shall run
through the efforts that we have made in response to the flagrant breach by
Mugabe and his people of the Harare principles, and the even worse
humanitarian disaster into which the country is being plunged by that
regime.
We have strongly supported regional efforts led by South Africa
and Nigeria to establish a dialogue between ZANU-PF and the Opposition MDC.
One of the critical things that we had to do was to end the myth that Mugabe
had so cleverly perpetrated, that he was involved in a bilateral dispute
between him, President Robert Mugabe, the leader of the freedom fighters in
the whole of Africa, and the former unpleasant colonial power, the
United Kingdom. It has taken considerable effort, persuasion and diplomacy
by the British Government-particularly by my right hon. Friend the Secretary
of State for International Development and by my predecessor, which I have
been happy to follow-to build up the confidence of the other African
nations about our good faith in respect of Africa as a whole, and to assure
the Governments, particularly the leading Governments such as South Africa
and Nigeria, that we are doing that not as some post-colonial exercise, but
out of our commitment to the peoples of Africa, whatever their race, colour
or creed.
In addition, the European Union has adopted a package of
targeted sanctions against the leadership of ZANU-PF. The measures imposed
in February this year include a travel ban, an assets freeze and a ban on
arms sales. The EU applicant states, the United States, Switzerland, Norway
and New Zealand have since adopted similar measures, but in the case of the
US, ones that do not go quite as far.
Mr. Ancram: The Foreign
Secretary accused me earlier of not having put forward any suggestions. I
made a suggestion specifically about extending the list of those against whom
sanctions would be applied. Can he confirm that that is his intention when
he meets his EU colleagues again at the end of July?
Mr. Straw: We
will indeed review the operation of sanctions when we meet on 22 July. There
is a strong case for an extension of the measures, but I will not give
specific notice of what I have in mind, for the simple reason-[Interruption.]
I am very happy to brief the right hon. Gentleman on the usual terms. The
more specific notice that is given of what we have in mind, the easier it
will be for the regime to take pre-emptive action. I would have thought that
that was astonishingly obvious to everybody-apparently except him.
Of
course, we want the sanctions to operate in the most effective way.
The right hon. Gentleman asked me about the fact that Mugabe and some of
his people had attended a number of international meetings. That was made
clear in the terms of the common position that the EU adopted earlier this
year. When such common positions are overridden by treaty obligations such
as those arising from the United Nations charter, the treaty obligations 25
Jun 2002 : Column 813 will take precedent. That is no different from what
has happened with regard to the fact that the United States has imposed the
most powerful sanctions against Cuba ever since Fidel Castro took power,
and banned Fidel Castro and his Government from travelling to the United
States. I wonder whether any Opposition Members know how many times Fidel
Castro has travelled to New York in apparent breach of that ban in order to
attend the General Assembly of the UN. If anyone would like to tell me the
number, I shall happily give way.
Mr. Menzies Campbell (North-East
Fife): Forty.
Mr. Straw: The hon. Gentleman mentions that number from a
sedentary position. [Hon. Members: "You sent him a note."] I will not tell
hon. Members what the note said-[Interruption.] I am extremely happy,
however, for the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) to see the note;
indeed, it is being passed to him.
Mr. Michael Jack (Fylde) rose-
Mr. Straw: I hope that the right hon. Gentleman wants to give me the
answer.
Mr. Jack: I am sorry that the Foreign Secretary has reduced this
debate to an auction of information. I speak as somebody who does not know a
great deal about this matter, but I am desperately worried about what
constituents of mine who work in Zimbabwe are telling me about the situation
there. They convey to me a sense of impotence and a feeling that whatever is
contained in his list of sanctions appears currently to have no effect on
Mugabe. We are currently facing the final takeover of white-owned farms.
What comes next? More importantly, what advice has he received, especially
from African leaders who might understand Mugabe better than we do, about
what will make this man come to terms?
Mr. Straw: That is the issue.
Of course, I understand the right hon. Gentleman's frustration; everybody
shares a deep frustration. If only it were possible simply by wishing for an
international coalition to end the damage that Mugabe is doing, it would be
done. If it were possible to do "what happened in Kosovo", which the right
hon. Member for Devizes airily cited as something that we should be doing in
Zimbabwe, it would be done. However, it is irresponsible to cite that example
as a criticism of the Government and the international community and neither
to rule it out nor rule it in. Everybody knows that the suggestion that we
embark on a bombing campaign, as we had to do in Kosovo for 78 days, comes
from fantasy land, and it would be deceiving the people of Zimbabwe to
pretend otherwise.
The right hon. Member for Fylde (Mr. Jack) asked
what would happen next; I will tell him. The situation is likely to go from
a terrible situation to a worse one. That is the point that we are making
powerfully to our partners, especially those elsewhere in Africa, so that
they can increase the pressure that they are already exerting on the Mugabe
regime and recognise that this is a disaster in which they have moral
responsibility, just as we do, for the poor people of Zimbabwe and of the
rest of southern Africa who are being so severely damaged by the
regime.
On the other point made by the right hon. Member for Fylde, it
is worth while to embed in the minds of Opposition Members the issue about
Fidel Castro. Tough 25 Jun 2002 : Column 814 sanctions have been taken by
the United States in respect of Cuba, and Cuba is the first to say that they
are tough. There is a travel ban on its leaders, but on 41 occasions,
Fidel Castro, in apparent breach of those sanctions, has gone to New York to
speak to the General Assembly of the UN.
Mr. George Howarth
(Knowsley, North and Sefton, East): At length.
Mr. Straw: I am sorry to
tell the House that I will speak at slightly less length than Fidel Castro
can usually be expected to do in a short speech.
The position on the
sanctions imposed by the United States on Mugabe and the rest of the 20 is
the same. They have been put to very considerable inconvenience and also
humiliated, as they are not treated as visiting dignitaries or heads of
state. As I mentioned in Question Time earlier today, we know from the
criticism of them inside ZANU-PF that they are desperate for the sanctions to
be lifted because we have gone to the heart of part of their corruption. I
am offended by seeing Mrs. Mugabe going to Madrid, no doubt to spend
thousands of pounds shopping while the people of Zimbabwe are starving.
[Interruption.] I hope that the people of Zimbabwe find out about exactly
what she is doing. Yes, I understand the point about the extension of the
sanctions, but if we are to be effective, we must also ensure, as the right
hon. Member for Devizes said, that we get other members of the European
Union on board.
Mr. John Redwood (Wokingham): Surely the moral of the
tale about the United States and Castro is that the sanctions did not work,
as the United States did not get what it wanted by imposing them. Will the
Foreign Secretary give the House some indication of what pressures he would
like to place on this evil regime to get rid of the starvation, murders and
bestiality if he could get all the partners that he needed in the coalition
to agree with us? Will he set out to the House what he would like them to do
that would bring this man to account?
Mr. Straw: What I would like to
happen is clear. I would like President Mugabe to recognise the error of his
ways and the disaster into which he has plunged Zimbabwe. I would like him
to leave office, allow elections to take place immediately, stop interfering
with humanitarian relief, get the farmers, whether they are white, Indian or
black, back on to the land, respect the rule of law and allow this
wonderfully prosperous country-[Interruption.] I am asked how that would
happen, but that is the point. I say to Opposition Members that the issue
for the international community is how we do this. That is the truth of it.
I have not sought at any stage to pretend that there is some magic wand
waiting to be used.
Mr. David Borrow (South Ribble): Does my right hon.
Friend agree that we in this House need to have some recognition of what
influence we can have in this situation and accept that Britain's role,
however active and vigorous, will not solve the problems on its own? The key
players in making changes in southern Africa are the neighbours of Zimbabwe,
and the Republic of South Africa in particular. Without the Republic of
South Africa moving, there is very little that he and his colleagues can
do.
Mr. Straw: My hon. Friend's observation is accurate. To suggest
that we could take action without an alliance 25 Jun 2002 : Column 815 and
coalition from Africa, and South Africa in particular, would be a pretence,
as such action would bilateralise the dispute, make us ineffective and make
any international coalition almost impossible to achieve.
One of the
many things that we have done is to secure a situation whereby the decision
on the suspension of Zimbabwe from the councils of the Commonwealth was taken
not by us, not by the Commonwealth ministerial action group, of which the
United Kingdom is a member, but by a troika of the current chair of the
Commonwealth, Prime Minister Howard of Australia, and two key
members-President Obasanjo of Nigeria and President Mbeki of South Africa.
It is hugely to their credit that they made the decision that they did once
the Commonwealth observers found that the elections had been neither free nor
fair.
Mr. Richard Spring (West Suffolk): As the Foreign Secretary knows,
the G8 and NEPAD have a close relationship and there is an opportunity for
the Prime Minister to raise this matter. What will he say to the G8
about bringing direct influence to bear on NEPAD to build the coalition to
take the process forward?
Mr. Straw: The Prime Minister will discuss
Zimbabwe with his colleagues in the G8 and with African leaders. Last week,
I had a long meeting with Foreign Minister Zuma of South Africa. All the
African leaders understand the disaster into which Mugabe is plunging the
continent, especially the sub-continent. If the leaders of South Africa,
Nigeria and all the other countries in southern African thought that there
was a magic wand for saving not only Zimbabwe, but southern Africa, they
would have followed that through. One of the tragedies of the situation is
not only what Mugabe has done to the Zimbabwean economy-gross domestic
product declined by 10 per cent. last year, unemployment is running at 70
per cent., inflation stands at 122 per cent. and the industrial sector is
collapsing-but the damage that is being done to the rest of southern Africa,
including, in particular, South Africa. The decline of the rand-although it
has recently improved, it went down by 31 per cent. in the past year-is
almost wholly attributable to the damage done by the Mugabe
regime.
Sir Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield): The situation facing the
wonderful people of that once prosperous country in central southern Africa
is catastrophic. I receive daily e-mails and faxes about their suffering.
Is it not time to consider different ways of tackling the problem?
Earlier today, during Question Time, I floated an idea that was responded to,
but not positively enough. Would not someone like the modern father of
central southern Africa, Nelson Mandela, be a figure around whom a group
of countries could bring pressure to bear on Zimbabwe, and perhaps also
on Libya, which continues to fund and to support Mugabe? If that were
done, the international community, including Libya, could unite to bring
about a change of Government in order to do something for the people of
Zimbabwe, about whom I practically cry because of their
suffering.
Mr. Straw: I am happy to discuss the hon. Gentleman's
proposal regarding the involvement of 25 Jun 2002 : Column 816 President
Mandela. My own sense, which is shared by my right hon. Friend the
Secretary of State for International Development, is that if President
Mandela felt that he had been able to act as a positive intermediary in the
situation, he would have done so. It is a lamentable commentary on Mugabe
and his isolation that none of the offers of intermediation has positively
been taken up. President Mbeki and President Obasanjo said that they would
help to broker a constructive dialogue between ZANU-PF and the MDC, but that
offer has so far been refused. However, I am happy to pursue the idea and to
have it drawn to President Mandela's attention.
Libya's route back
into the international community partly depends on its showing a responsible
attitude towards Zimbabwe and in respect of Sierra Leone. We are aware of
that, and it is a point that has repeatedly been made to Libya in the
dialogue that is taking place.
I know that other hon. Members wish to
speak, and I shall therefore shortly draw my remarks to a close. One of the
excuses that Mugabe has used in respect of Zimbabwe is to blame the current
famine entirely on drought. It is true that drought has played a significant
part in the failure of the maize harvest, but there is no doubt that policy
failures-not least the mismanagement of the exchange rate and the chaotic
land reform programme-have greatly exacerbated the situation. That is
illustrated by the following figures. The United Nations estimates that
Zambia and Malawi, which have suffered similar droughts, have lost one
quarter of their food production capacity, but that figure rises to three
quarters in respect of Zimbabwe. The UN declares that "current government
policies in Zimbabwe pose formidable constraints" to a resolution of the
crisis. The UN world food programme estimates that as a result almost half
the population-up to 6 million people-will be unable to meet their minimum
food requirements in the next 12 months.
The tragedy is that a year
ago Zimbabwe still had a chance to return to the path of sustainable
development. On becoming Foreign Secretary a year ago, some of my first
contacts were with my South African and Nigerian counterparts. At that time,
we agreed there was still a prospect that Zimbabwe could rehabilitate
itself. So last September at Abuja, Commonwealth Ministers, including
myself, set out, with Mr. Mugabe's agreement, a clear road map for
Zimbabwe-via the Harare principles-back to prosperity and international
respect. Tragically, ZANU-PF did not grasp that opportunity. In the run-up
to the presidential election, the regime pressed ahead with its land reform
programme, intimidated and even killed members of the Opposition, and
implemented further measures to curb freedom of speech. That culminated in a
stolen presidential election, which compounded the country's isolation.
Since then, the regime's actions-ranging from further restrictions on the
media and harassment of the legal profession to further violence against the
Opposition and intimidation of those who work in the farming sector-suggest
that it has no plans to change course.
That is why we have to
continue, with international agreement where appropriate, to strengthen the
measures taken against Zimbabwe. I say to the right hon. Member for
Devizes, who asks me to advertise a long list, in advance of international
agreement, of the measures that 25 Jun 2002 : Column 817 could perhaps be
taken, that the only people who would be comforted by such a pre-emptive list
would be members of the Mugabe regime-especially if it transpired, for
various reasons, that it was not possible to ensure that each of the measures
was implemented in full. I promise the House that we are aware of the
continuing need to ensure that the existing measures that have been taken are
made as effective as possible and that they are strengthened where
appropriate.
This debate takes place as world leaders in the G8 are
gathering to agree, we hope and believe, a new partnership for African
development-an area in which my right hon. Friends the Secretary of State
for International Development and the Prime Minister have been in the lead
for some time.
As far as the rest of Africa is concerned, it is worth
noting that on the whole the story has been one of much better news than in
Zimbabwe. Africa has huge problems-poverty, lack of educational and
employment opportunities, hunger and low life expectancy are still the fate
of many in African countries-but there are signs that democracy is taking
root. In 1975, Africa had only three elected leaders-today there are more
than 30-and there are no military governments in sub-Saharan Africa. Ten
years ago few people-least of all those in the Conservative party-believed
that South Africa would emerge from the shadow of apartheid with a
tolerant, multi-racial government. Thanks to British intervention, last
month the people of Sierra Leone were able to vote in an election free from
the threat of violence and intimidation. Had we turned a blind eye, as some
suggested, to the plight of that country, its people would now be suffering a
fate worse than that of Zimbabwe.
There has been a breakthrough in the
world's largest conflict in the Great Lakes. The Democratic Republic of
Congo ceasefire has held for nearly 18 months. There is further to go, and I
am glad that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International
Development will visit the region between the end of July and the beginning
of August. Prompt action by the Government prevented an outbreak of
hostilities between Uganda and Rwanda last November. There are promising
signs of economic growth throughout Africa. More than 20 African countries
achieved a growth rate of 4 per cent last year. Zimbabwe's decline stands in
stark contrast to that better news.
Within the limits of our influence,
we shall do all that we can to promote efforts by the international
community, especially leaders of other Governments in the region to return
stability to Zimbabwe. That has been our goal since the beginning of the
country's slide into chaos three years ago. Thanks to our diplomacy in the
past 12 months, the involvement of the Commonwealth, the European Union and
the United States, we have been able to show that the issue is of
international concern.
Human rights abuses and violations of the rule of
law have made Zimbabwe an outcast in the region and the wider world, thus
belying Mr. Mugabe's claim that his country is a colonial victim. I am
confident that the international community will continue to unite in
condemning what has happened and working together to ensure that the true
voice of the Zimbabwean people is heard and that there is a pathway back to
peace and prosperity for that benighted land.
A PLOT by the
ruling Zanu PF party's Masvingo province to oust Dr Eddison Zvobgo, 67, at
one time the party's secretary for legal affairs and former long-time Cabinet
minister, hit a snag this week because the provincial body has no power to
expel him.
Zvobgo, a founding member of Zanu PF, dismissed
the attempt, saying those conspiring to remove him were "small boys" in the
Masvingo executive.
His sin, according to Zanu PF's Masvingo
executive, stems from his failure to campaign for President Mugabe's
re-election last March.
Zvobgo yesterday described the individuals
behind the plot as "too junior" to remove him from the party.
He
said: "Those who have been talking of firing me are too junior
to me.
I am a senior member of the party and cannot be summoned
by small boys."
In a letter copied to the provincial executive,
the Masvingo Zanu PF district co-ordinating committee, chaired by Absolom
Mudavanhu, recommended that Zvobgo, the MP for Masvingo South, be
expelled.
Zvobgo, a former politburo member, now sits in the
party's central committee.
The provincial executive, chaired by
Dr Samuel Mumbengegwi, later adopted the proposal and intended to forward it
to the national executive as party factionalism in Masvingo continues to
rage.
But a Zanu PF provincial meeting on Saturday, which was
attended by Zvobgo, agreed that it was out of the provincial executive's
jurisdiction to eject senior party members.
A Zanu PF official
who refused to be named said yesterday: "The provincial executive has no
power to restructure the central committee.
Zvobgo is a senior
party member and cannot appear before the provincial executive. The meeting
resolved that it was unconstitutional to do so."
Last month, the
Zanu PF spokesman for Masvingo, Raymond Takavarasha, said the party was on a
restructuring exercise which would result in Zvobgo being gradually eased
out.
Contacted for comment yesterday, Takavarasha claimed the
weekend meeting discussed the restructuring exercise, not the Zvobgo
issue.
Zvobgo, who has in the past been told by senior party
members, including the late Border Gezi, to leave Zanu PF, has declared he
will not leave the party he helped form with colleagues such as
Mugabe.
The Masvingo strongman was dropped from most key party
organs after the parliamentary election in 2000. He refused to work with the
Mumbengegwi executive in the run-up to the 9-11 March presidential poll,
saying he did not want to be used.
Zvobgo slaughtered 14 beasts
in celebration of Zanu PF's victory in the 2000 parliamentary election.
Zimbabwe's police provide time window to farmers
Africast has reported that the Zimbabwe police will not be enforcing
a deadline for farmers to cease in their farming activities. They have
stated that they will instead begin with evictions in August. The police say
that they do not have the man-power it would require to monitor who is in
the fields. President Mugabe has made various comments regarding the
deadline this week. The strongest of these seems to be that White farmers
will be allowed to keep one farm each. He has stated that the government is
opposed to a scenario where one farmer own twenty farms. Meanwhile the
Commercial Farmers' Union has stated that there are hundreds of farms listed
for possession by the government, where the owners do not own other
properties.
Australia was appalled at
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's push to kick white farmers off the land,
forcing the country into famine, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer
said.
White farmers in the African nation are being forced to leave their
land as part of a government policy to redistribute their farms to landless
blacks.
Mr Downer told journalists that what had happened in Zimbabwe in
recent months was absolutely appalling.
"The determination of Robert
Mugabe, not only to kick people off their land on the basis of race, but also
to force his country into starvation, is a simply appalling thing for any
head of state to do," he said.
"The sense of anger here in Australia
about the disgraceful behaviour of President Mugabe who is plunging his
country into self-imposed famine is palpable."
About 3,000 white
farmers were given until midnight last Monday to stop working their farms,
and just over a month to leave entirely, after the government amended its
land acquisition law last month.
Parliamentary secretary Peter Slipper
said consideration should be given to making President Mugabe the first
defendant before the International Criminal Court, which comes into being on
July 1.
"If Robert Mugabe is not tried by the International Criminal
Court in the coming months or years then it's obvious that court won't be
achieving what most of us do hope it will," he said.
THE court challenge
this week of two white Zimbabwean farmers seeking a reversal of the
government's eviction notices is expected to open the way for more than 1 000
single-farm owners to also take their cases to the courts.
There
are currently 1 024 single-owned farms out of nearly 3 000 farms which have
been served with Section 8 eviction orders by the government. All the owners
of the 3 000 must stop farming immediately and quit their properties by
August.
Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU) president Colin Cloete
yesterday said the farmers were anxiously waiting for a ruling to be made on
the test cases of two farmers, who made urgent chamber applications to the
High Court to have the evictions stopped.
He said most of the
farmers were insisting on taking legal action to be allowed to finish their
farming operations.
Cloete said the union, which met yesterday to
deliberate on the issue, was of the position that individual farmers should
take the issue of eviction as they saw fit.
The CFU would not
institute any class action against the government after the Supreme Court
last year ruled that the government's land reforms were legal.
"A couple of farmers are going to challenge it (the eviction orders) as
individual cases," Cloete told the Financial Gazette. "I reckon they
are waiting for the ruling of the test cases."
In a chamber
application, one of the farmers declared that his eviction order signed by
Lands and Agriculture Minister Joseph Made on May 29 2002 was invalid because
he was not at the time "a lawfully appointed minister of
government".
Cloete said the CFU was trying to meet Made to ask
whether the government could extend the time-span of the eviction
notices.
The CFU had instructed its members that wherever possible
individual farmers should contact their governors and district administrators
to get permission to continue farming.
Meanwhile a group of
ruling ZANU PF politicians and war veterans is approaching individual farmers
asking them to desist from politics if they are to be spared from the current
evictions, farmers have reported.
The exercise is said to be rife
in Mashonaland West, East and Central and Masvingo.
Nearly 3 000
white farmers countrywide have been served with eviction notices and are
supposed to have stopped farming operations after Monday this
week.
President Robert Mugabe has constantly accused the commercial
farmers of supporting and bankrolling the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) and derailing his fast-track land reforms.
Cloete
said some farmers had individually been targeted after the disputed March
presidential election and accused of conniving with the MDC.
Last
week outgoing Zimbabwe Tobacco Association president Kobus Joubert said white
commercial farmers should not take part in politics but concentrate on
farming.
THE court challenge
this week of two white Zimbabwean farmers seeking a reversal of the
government's eviction notices is expected to open the way for more than 1 000
single-farm owners to also take their cases to the courts.
There
are currently 1 024 single-owned farms out of nearly 3 000 farms which have
been served with Section 8 eviction orders by the government. All the owners
of the 3 000 must stop farming immediately and quit their properties by
August.
Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU) president Colin Cloete
yesterday said the farmers were anxiously waiting for a ruling to be made on
the test cases of two farmers, who made urgent chamber applications to the
High Court to have the evictions stopped.
He said most of the
farmers were insisting on taking legal action to be allowed to finish their
farming operations.
Cloete said the union, which met yesterday to
deliberate on the issue, was of the position that individual farmers should
take the issue of eviction as they saw fit.
The CFU would not
institute any class action against the government after the Supreme Court
last year ruled that the government's land reforms were legal.
"A couple of farmers are going to challenge it (the eviction orders) as
individual cases," Cloete told the Financial Gazette. "I reckon they
are waiting for the ruling of the test cases."
In a chamber
application, one of the farmers declared that his eviction order signed by
Lands and Agriculture Minister Joseph Made on May 29 2002 was invalid because
he was not at the time "a lawfully appointed minister of
government".
Cloete said the CFU was trying to meet Made to ask
whether the government could extend the time-span of the eviction
notices.
The CFU had instructed its members that wherever possible
individual farmers should contact their governors and district administrators
to get permission to continue farming.
Meanwhile a group of
ruling ZANU PF politicians and war veterans is approaching individual farmers
asking them to desist from politics if they are to be spared from the current
evictions, farmers have reported.
The exercise is said to be rife
in Mashonaland West, East and Central and Masvingo.
Nearly 3 000
white farmers countrywide have been served with eviction notices and are
supposed to have stopped farming operations after Monday this
week.
President Robert Mugabe has constantly accused the commercial
farmers of supporting and bankrolling the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) and derailing his fast-track land reforms.
Cloete
said some farmers had individually been targeted after the disputed March
presidential election and accused of conniving with the MDC.
Last
week outgoing Zimbabwe Tobacco Association president Kobus Joubert said white
commercial farmers should not take part in politics but concentrate on
farming.
KENZO Oshima,
under-secretary-general of humanitarian affairs at the United Nations (UN),
will raise with President Robert Mugabe at a meeting expected to be held by
the two in Harare today the world body's concerns regarding emergency food
aid provision and distribution in hunger-stricken Zimbabwe, diplomatic
sources said yesterday.
Oshima is in Zimbabwe as part of a UN
mission, which includes representatives of the UN's Crisis Prevention and
Recovery Committee and the World Food Programme, examining southern Africa's
worst food crisis in recent years.
The delegation will also
visit Zambia, Malawi and Angola to talk to national authorities and the donor
community on the crisis.
The sources said Oshima was expected to
bring to Mugabe's attention the question of transparency in food aid
distribution and check whether all deserving people were being given access
to food aid.
Although the government says the distribution of food
aid has been handled fairly, the opposition MDC and some non-governmental
agencies claim that ruling ZANU PF activists are barring MDC supporters from
getting the aid.
At least six million Zimbabweans - or half the
population - face famine unless huge food imports start arriving now after
crops failed last season and also because Mugabe's supporters seized most
farms from February 2000 in the name of land hunger.
Oshima is
also expected to press Mugabe to allow players from the private sector to
import the staple maize and other foodstuffs and also reduce bureaucratic
delays and speed up inflows of food imports into the country, once the
region's chief food exporter.
Before the food crisis, Zimbabwe was
already grappling with its worst economic and political crisis shown out by
record high inflation of 122.5 percent, unemployment of nearly 70 percent and
poverty of 80 percent of the population.
The country is being
shunned by the rest of the world after Mugabe in March was declared winner of
what the international community said was a highly flawed
ballot.
Meanwhile the UN says in its latest humanitarian situation
report on Zimbabwe that 600 000 children - or 30 percent of under fives out
of two million - are already vulnerable to nutritional problems due to
the deepening food crisis.
It says a total of one million
pregnant women are also at risk.
THE United States has
blasted the government's seizure of commercial farms, saying the exercise has
led to gross human rights abuses and compounded Zimbabwe's political and
economic crises.
A US State Department spokesperson said the
government-backed land seizures had exacerbated the food crisis in Zimbabwe
and southern Africa.
"A fundamental duty of every government is to
put in place the legal and policy framework to enable its citizens to feed
themselves, a duty that the government of Zimbabwe has wilfully scorned at
great cost to the people of Zimbabwe and the region," the spokesperson
noted.
The US aired its concerns as most white commercial farmers
in Zimbabwe this week started the countdown to a 45-day deadline to cease
farming operations just when the country is facing severe
famine.
Washington said the shortfall in Zimbabwe's agricultural
production was in a very large measure due to the government-sponsored
seizure of commercial farms and its failed economic policies which were
having a direct impact on food availability and prices throughout the
region.
The US also lamented the destruction of Zimbabwe's
agricultural sector, once one of the most developed and productive in
southern Africa.
"The destruction of Zimbabwe's agricultural sector
will take years to fix, if ever, thereby consigning Zimbabwe - once a
prominent agricultural exporter - to the role of food importer and aid
recipient," the spokesperson said.
The US said it will continue
to provide food assistance to help the most needy in Zimbabwe, but stressed
that the Harare government bore much of the responsibility for the country's
growing humanitarian crisis.
United Nations agencies say at least
six million Zimbabweans - other statistics say up to 7.8 million - need
emergency food aid between now and next year out of a population of 12
million because of the disruption of farming caused by seizures of commercial
farms and drought.
TWO white Zimbabwean
farmers filed a lawsuit this week seeking to stop a government order that
they abandon their farms, in a test case closely watched by 3 000 others also
facing eviction.
A 45-day countdown for the white farmers to leave
their land began on Tuesday, but many vowed to stay put rather than watch
vital crops rot in a nation short of food.
The order was the
latest shot by the government in its battle to seize white-owned farms for
redistribution to landless blacks - which it asserts is needed to redress the
imbalances of the colonial era.
"Two farmers are taking legal
action. They will act as test cases. They are looking for interim relief,
which is expected to be granted or denied on Friday (tomorrow)," Jenni
Williams, a spokeswoman for the Commercial Farmers' Union (CFU),
said.
The CFU did not join the legal action and will keep talking
to the government on behalf of its 3 150 members, she said.
"I
think the worst blow will be if the legal action is denied. Then we will know
that there is no semblance of law in Zimbabwe. There's no predicting which
way the court will go. It will close the final legal door if it's denied,"
Williams said.
About 3 000 white farmers were given until midnight
on Monday to stop working their farms, and just over a month to leave
entirely after President Robert Mugabe's government amended its land
acquisition law last month.
Agriculture Minister Joseph Made told
state radio this week the government was moving to finalise the farm seizures
and would soon begin sub-dividing the targeted farms for redistribution to
blacks.
An estimated 250 000 farmworkers stand to lose their jobs
if the agricultural operations are shut down.
Jean Simon, who
owns a farm in Raffingora province some 125 km (78 miles) northwest of
Harare, had to stop grading 200 000 kg of tobacco and watering seedlings for
next season's crop.
"We are stranded because of the law and the
move that we should stop all operations. I have 340 workers here who have
over 1 000 dependants. We are being stopped from earning a living," she
said.
Simon said she had appealed to the government to continue
working her 500-hectare (1 236-acre) farm with its tobacco, maize and
livestock but had received no response.
"This is not a
money issue ... when we are facing starvation we are fighting about who
should be growing food," she said.
Zimbabwe is one of six southern
African states facing severe food shortages. Analysts blame its crisis partly
on disruptions caused by the "fast-track" land acquisition programme. -
Reuter
ZIMBABWE'S
lawyers told an African human rights probe team this week of a
well-orchestrated plan by the government to cow the judiciary and suppress
dissenting voices as the political climate worsens.
The Law Society
of Zimbabwe (LCZ) on Tuesday told members of the African Human Rights
Commission, currently in the country to investigate allegations of human
rights abuses by the government, of the intimidation of lawyers seen as
opposed to President Robert Mugabe, as well as the general breakdown of law
and order.
They expressed concern about the selective application
of the rule of law, the independence of the judiciary and protection of
lawyers from harassment by the security forces.
"We really hope
that as an African commission on human rights, they would be listened to by
our government," Mordecai Mahlangu, a council member of the LCZ, told the
Financial Gazette yesterday.
The commission, led by Gambia's
Jainaba Johm and which reports to African heads of state and government, is
in Zimbabwe to investigate reports that Mugabe has been cracking down on his
opponents in order to stay in power.
It is expected to meet
Zimbabwean journalists today to hear their views on the human rights
situation and the repressive media and public security laws introduced by the
government early this year.
The meeting has been jointly arranged
by the Zimbabwe chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa and the
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe (MMPZ).
"We will make a
presentation to the commission on the repressive laws and the general
situation in the media," MMPZ project co-ordinator Andy Moise
said.
Several Zimbabwean journalists and lawyers have been arrested
under the draconian Public Order and Security Act (POSA) and Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA).
Mugabe's
critics have accused the 78-year-old leader, who in March controversially won
a second term in office, of using POSA and AIPPA to silence opponents.
HE government has set
up a five-member steering committee to draw up a structure of a new land bank
to be set up early next year to support an agro-led economic recovery
programme, it was learnt this week.
The new bank, initially
earmarked to come on stream in the second half of this year, would see the
government selling off its shareholding in the Agriculture Bank of Zimbabwe
(Agribank), which is operating as a commercial bank.
Official
sources said this week the government's Cabinet Action Committee on Land -
one of several panels set up last August to try to refloat the crumbling
economy - had established a steering committee to work on a structure of the
new bank.
The sources said Agribank's managing director Taka
Mutunhu was leading the steering committee, but Mutunhu yesterday denied any
involvement. He said the new bank project was being handled at ministerial
level.
It was not possible to get comment from Agriculture and
Lands Minister Joseph Made, who was said to be out of his Harare office since
last week.
He had also not responded to written questions sent to
him by this newspaper last week and could not be contacted on his mobile
telephone.
According to the sources, the Action Committee on Land
headed by Made threw out an initial proposal brought by the steering
committee.
The proposal suggested the setting up of a holding
company, with the government as the majority shareholder, consisting of two
business units - a commercial bank and the land bank.
"That one
was thrown out and the committee was told to come up with a structure of the
land bank and how it will function," said one source. "The (steering)
committee was told to bring its fresh proposals before the end of next
month."
The government had initially intended to set up a credit
guarantee institution last year with the support of Zimbabwean banks and the
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
However this fell
through because the UNDP pulled out, citing violations of last year's Abuja
agreement on the land question, while local banks were not willing to pledge
large sums of money.
The sources said if the government set up the
new bank, it would then relinquish its stake in Agribank, which would need to
be privatised like most state parastatals.
Although Agribank
would continue operating as a commercial bank, it was not clear this week if
the government would immediately let go of its entire stake or only part of
it.
"The Agribank will go the same way of firstly commercialisation
and then privatisation," another source said.
"But the
government will be either the sole owner of the land bank or will have the
majority shareholding."
Agribank is currently raising funds to give
loans to peasants who are being resettled by the government under its land
reforms, but it is the government that is guaranteeing the loans through the
Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe.
So far this year, the government has
guaranteed $2.1 billion, which Agribank is raising.
before the
nomination court sits next week. I am lucky to be alive as you can see from
the extensive property damage."
The nomination court sits
on 4 July. Mugomba escaped unhurt. Zanu PF is fielding Fanuel Phiri, the
acting Kadoma mayor, who took over the job after the death of Ernest
Shamuyarira in February.
Mugomba said two petrol bombs were hurled
into the house shattering two bedroom windows. All the property in the
bedroom was gutted.
"I suspect this was done by Zanu PF supporters
in order to stop me from taking part in the election," he said.
Mugomba reported the matter to the police, but when asked for
comment yesterday, an officer at Rimuka police Station said the
officer-in-charge was out of his office on business.
Mugomba
said both the fire brigade and the police responded quickly to his report and
part of his property was rescued by the fire-fighters because the fire was
only limited to his bedroom.
"The police were very co-operative
following the report," he said.
Mugomba, an engineer by profession,
is the chairman of the Kadoma Residents and Ratepayers' Association, district
chairman of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions and chairman of the
Southern African Development Community water project research in the
area.
Despite the harrowing experience, Mugomba vowed to remain
focussed on the key problems affecting the residents of Kadoma.
"I want to urge the residents of Kadoma to be tolerant, desist from any form
of political violence and to pursue the development of our city," the
opposition candidate said.
He said his party had promised to beef
up security at his house in order to safeguard his life and
property.
Learnmore Jongwe, the MDC spokesperson, yesterday
condemned the attack, saying: "The MDC is worried by these wanton acts of
terrorism by Zanu PF, which is illegitimately clinging to power after
stealing the March presidential election.
"The attempt on
Mugomba's life is evidence that Zanu PF has permanently adopted violence as
an integral part of its campaign strategy in every election."
Mugomba said the attack was the first major incident of political violence in
the area since the March presidential election, disputably won by President
Mugabe.
The attack comes at a time when a delegation of the African
Human Rights Commission is in the country to meet political parties,
government officials and all interested parties, to hear evidence on alleged
human rights violations in the country.
Kadoma town falls under
the Kadoma Central constituency which was won by the MDC's Austin Mupandawana
in the 2000 parliamentary election.
Mupandawana polled 12 049 votes
against the Zanu PF candidate's 5 666. In the 9-11 March presidential
election, MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai polled 14 446 votes against
Mugabe's 9 346 in the town.
The MDC has won all the mayoral
elections conducted since the 2000 parliamentary poll in which it won 57
seats, mostly in urban areas.
Bulawayo, Harare, Chitungwiza,
Masvingo and Chegutu now have MDC mayors.
THE
lawyers for Andrew Meldrum, the United Kingdom's Guardian correspondent in
Harare have said their papers were in order when Justice Anne Marie Gowora
refused to make a ruling on their client's application in the High Court for
a review on a decision by Lillian Kudya, a Harare provincial magistrate, to
place him on formal remand.
Kantor and Immerman, in a letter dated
14 June to Joseph Manzunzu, the registrar of the High Court, said their
client's papers were in order.
The letter, part of the court record
of A Meldrum vs Lillian Kudya and the Attorney General (AG) HC 4256/02, was
copied to Rodrick Tokwe of the AG' s Office. Meldrum, an American, is the
first journalist to be tried under the internationally-condemned Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA).
His trial
opened at the Harare Magistrates' Court on 12 June, the same day that Gowora
declined to give a ruling on his application for the review.
The
outcome of the application in the High Court might have determined whether
the trial against Meldrum, now awaiting a decision on 12 July would be
dropped at the close of the State case or would go ahead.
Meldrum
applied to the High Court for a review after Kudya turned down his
application on 2 May for refusal to be placed on formal remand and for the
matter to be referred to the Supreme Court for a determination on
the constitutionality of charges against him.
He is charged with
contravening section 80 of AIPPA by publishing a false story of a Magunje
woman allegedly beheaded by Zanu PF supporters.
Gowora postponed
the matter for a week, to give Meldrum's lawyers time to put their papers in
order.
The lawyers said: "Annexure 'A' to the police's Request for
Remand Form, which contains the allegations being levelled against your
client, is not on record.
"Missing is the portion of the
magistrate's judgment, where she refused your client permission to challenge
the constitutionality of the offence he is being charged with."
Gowora had also directed Meldrum's lawyers to further serve notice for the
application for review to Kudya and the AG, who were barred after failing to
respond in the stipulated period.
They said: "The presiding judge
indicated that Annexure 'A' to the Request for Remand Form was not on record.
We have since perused the file and confirm that the annexure is indeed in
records at the Harare Magistrates ' Courts and the copy of the review
proceedings filed with the courts.
"We do not know how these two
copies could have been missed. For ease of reference, we once again attach a
further copy."
On the magistrate's refusal to refer the matter to
the Supreme Court, the lawyers said Kudya declined to refer the case, despite
her failure to find that the application was frivolous and
vexatious.
"The failure to refer was clearly a misdirection in
terms of the law," they said.
They said they were not certain on
what basis Gowora directed them to serve Kudya and the AG notice for the
application for a review.
"There is no obligation, in terms of the
rules of the High Court, to serve any further notices on the parties, who are
barred," they said.
"We attach hereto a copy of a letter sent to
the AG's Office on 30 May which fully sets out our position on the automatic
bar and the effect thereof. There has been no response to the letter and the
view we take of the matter is that there is no legal basis, in terms of the
rules, to effect any further service of documents on the barred
parties."
The lawyers requested that the copy of the letter be
placed before Justice Lavender Makoni who would preside over the matter on 19
June.
BEATRICE Chanetsa, Zimbabwe's ombudsman, told a visiting team of African
human rights investigators that neither herself nor her office ever received
or heard complaints from anybody claiming to have been stopped from taking
part in any political party.
On allegations linking the Border Gezi
"graduates" to human rights abuses during the election campaign, Chanetsa was
quoted in The Herald as saying: "I found that very absurd."
An
ombudsman is a public protector, a human rights watchdog. Zimbabwe has
none.
The facts on the ground are clear. Chanetsa was appointed to
the office in 1992. She was supposed to have had that job for five
years, although there is a provision for a maximum three-year extension of
her term of office.
In November 1999, she told The Daily News
that she was working on her 1996 report which she expected to complete in
December of the same year.
By October 2000, she was still working
on the same 1996 report. This time, she said it was to be completed two
months later. The report was only finalised in April 2002. That is the latest
copy available to the public.
The Ombudsman Act states: "The
Ombudsman shall annually lay before Parliament a general report on the
performance of his functions in terms of this Act and may from time to time
lay before Parliament such other reports with respect to those functions as
he thinks fit."
The abuses of 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001 are
yet to be documented and debated in Parliament.
Chanetsa is
clearly violating the law by failing to submit these reports as required by
the law. As a lawyer, she knows that. Who is supposed to supervise that
office? Parliament?
The composition of our Parliament changed
radically in June 2000, so did our political culture. Complaints against
abuse of power, administrative corruption, abuse of State resources and gross
violation of human rights reached new heights during the period between
February 2000 and today.
If Chanetsa has not heard about any of
these issues, or is unaware of the volatile political climate in our country
today, then something is very wrong somewhere.
"I was trained
under the Tanzania national youth programme, so I told them that the
programme here is not different from the Tanzania programme," she reportedly
told the delegation from the African Commission of Human and People's Rights
on a fact-finding mission on the human rights situation
in Zimbabwe.
She did not say when, nor did she give details of
the Tanzanian programme. What is clear is that the Tanzanian scheme was not
initiated by the late Border Gezi, or hastily put together for the purposes
of an election campaign, pitting Robert Mugabe, Morgan Tsvangirai and
others.
In Zimbabwe's case, the strategy was surely to remove, in
as controlled a manner as possible, every single voice of the opposition in
the rural areas.
Chanetsa's office was made possible by a
constitutional requirement to protect the public against excesses of public
officials and offer remedies in cases where the rights of Zimbabweans are
unmitigated by the normal course of justice and the law.
Given
Chanetsa's complete lack of capacity to see anything bad or suspicious, why
was she allowed to play down our concerns about the conduct of the Border
Gezi militia?
Ephraim Tapa, the national president of the Civil
Service Employees' Association, and his wife, Faith Mukwakwa, only managed to
claim their freedom after a High Court judge ordered the police to storm a
Border Gezi base in Mutoko in March.
Tapa's crime: failure to
produce a Zanu PF membership card. Chanetsa never heard about the agony of
the Tapa family; nor any of the testimonies from the militia about their
brutal exploits on the instructions of senior Zanu PF officials
countrywide.
Zimbabwe will never be able to rebuild its lost image
as long as officials like Chanetsa ignore the demands of their offices to
safeguard the rights of ordinary people against bureaucratic
excesses.
The investigations of the visiting African team must be
used to garner lost sympathy and support of those essential to our
survival.
Aid agencies call for more southern Africa famine
relief
6/27/02 8:41:01 AM (GMT +2)
LONDON -
Millions of people could face starvation in drought-wracked southern Africa
in coming months unless emergency food aid is stepped up sharply, British aid
agencies said this week.
"If political will internationally and
within southern Africa is exercised now, a tragedy for millions of people can
be avoided," said Brendan Gormley, chief executive of the Disasters Emergency
Committee (DEC) umbrella aid group.
"It would be scandalous if
failure to act now meant that once again we had to watch a human disaster
gradually unfold on our television screens," he added in a
statement.
DEC, which comprises 14 British aid agencies including
Oxfam, Help the Aged, the British Red Cross, Christian Aid, CAFOD and
Tearfund, said the lives of 13 million people could be on the line unless
there was urgent government action.
The United States has led
the way in pledging food aid to the drought-stricken area that covers Malawi,
Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland, provoking strong criticism from its own
farmers who accuse it of undermining their market.
Britain,
Germany, Japan, Australia, Canada, Finland, Swizerland, the Netherlands and
South Africa have followed suit, although with smaller amounts of
aid.
DEC said however that there still remained a yawning gap
between what had been promised and what was needed to avoid a repeat of the
famines that killed or displaced millions of people in Ethiopia and Somalia
in the mid-1980s.
But deep divisions remain among world
governments on how to prevent hunger.
Even a UN-sponsored World
Food Summit in Rome earlier this month that was supposed to help tackle the
issue featured more bickering and back-biting than
problem-solving.
As has happened frequently in the past, the
meeting revealed deep north-south differences and a flat rejection from the
rich United States and European Union to pour billions more dollars into
agricultural development aid.
Regional analysts say the problem
in the southern African region has been compounded by failed government
policies and political conflicts - particularly in Zimbabwe and
Malawi.
Food production has slumped in once surplus-producing
Zimbabwe as the government of President Robert Mugabe has seized thousands of
mainly white-owned commercial farms in the past two years arguing it was a
belated righting of colonial wrongs.
This week nearly 3 000
white Zimbabwean farmers faced a midnight deadline to stop farming altogether
despite critical food shortages and the looming famine.
In
Malawi, the food shortage problem was compounded by a government decision to
suddenly sell off its entire 167 000-tonne strategic food reserve - not even
retaining the 60 000 tonnes its own policy dictated.
The government
said it had been told to sell the stockpile by the International Monetary
Fund - Reuter
THE National Bakeries
Association of Zimbabwe (NBAZ) has asked the government to urgently import 50
000 tonnes of wheat to augment supplies which it says are dwindling rapidly,
with parts of Zimbabwe already experiencing shortages of flour and
bread.
NBAZ chairman Armitage Chikwavira said bakers and millers
last week told Industry and International Trade permanent secretary Stuart
Comberbach and his Agriculture counterpart Ngoni Masoka that the country,
already experiencing severe shortages of other basic food commodities, could
be hit by serious shortages of bread unless the government moves to buy wheat
from abroad.
He said Comberbach and Masoka told the bakers and
the millers they would forward their request to Finance Minister Simba Makoni
for implementation.
Makoni, Comberbach and Masoka could not be
reached for comment this week.
The government has in the past
promised it will import some wheat to avert a severe food crisis. It is now
importing large amounts of the staple maize meal, but shortages of foreign
currency are hampering the food imports.
Chikwavira said the
baking industry faced collapse because wheat supplies had reached critically
low levels, with several parts of the country such as Masvingo and Zvishavane
having already run out of flour.
"We requested the government to
import 50 000 tonnes of wheat to sustain the baking industry that is facing
collapse due to dwindling wheat supplies," he said.
"Flour
allocations to places like Masvingo and Zvishavane have totally run dry and
we are receiving calls from headmasters of schools that their pupils are not
receiving their daily bread."
Chikwavira said in the meantime the
government has asked its Grain Marketing Board (GMB) to increase the
allocation of wheat to millers from 4 500 to 6 000 tonnes per week. The GMB
had reduced these supplies, saying the millers were exacerbating the
shortages by hoarding wheat.
Like the shortage of maize, the
shortage of wheat in the country is largely self-inflicted because of
seizures of productive farms by ruling ZANU PF supporters.
The
government's own chaotic fast-track land reforms have disrupted agricultural
production further.
Only 150 000 tonnes of wheat are expected to be
produced this winter season, down from 360 000 tonnes produced last year,
because many farmers could not plant the crop after being ordered by the
government to stop farming under its Land Act.
Zimbabweans
consume about 400 000 tonnes of wheat a year, most of it produced
locally.
Apart from the looming shortages of wheat, controls on the
price of bread imposed by the government in October last year continue to
pose a serious viability headache to the baking industry.
Restore real interest rates, adjust exchange rate, IMF tells
Harare
By Joseph Ngwawi Business News Editor 6/27/02
8:42:58 AM (GMT +2)
THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) has told
the Zimbabwean government to restore real interest rates and immediately
adjust the exchange rate to a realistic level that would ensure the country's
external competitiveness and reduce the speculation associated with the
current foreign currency crisis.
According to a report released
by the IMF last week, the Bretton Woods institution noted that the loose
monetary policy pursued by the Zimbabwean authorities since January last year
has aggravated economic imbalances, fuelled inflation and increased the
vulnerability of the banking sector.
The multilateral financial
institution, which earlier this month suspended technical assistance to
Harare, urged the government to take immediate corrective measures to mop up
excess liquidity in the money market, allow interest rates to become positive
in real terms and dismantle the subsidised credit facilities for farmers and
emergent businesses introduced in the past two years.
Finance
Minister Simba Makoni has deliberately kept the money market awash with funds
as part of a plan to depress interest rates and reduce the cost of borrowing
on the government's domestic debt, presently estimated at about $300
billion.
"Directors also stressed the need to ensure the health of
the banking system by dealing promptly with non-viable institutions and to
fully enforce prudential regulations and capital adequacy requirements," the
report says.
The Fund expressed concern at the overvaluation of the
Zimbabwe dollar, which has seriously affected the country's
international competitiveness, fuelled the shortage of hard cash in the
economy and hampered efforts to build the level of usable foreign reserves,
presently estimated at three days of imports.
Analysts say the
local dollar is overvalued by more than 200 percent against the currencies of
Zimbabwe's major trading partners.
The local unit has been pegged
at 55 against the trade-weighted US greenback since October 2000 despite
calls by industry and economists to devalue the currency and boost the
competitiveness of exports.
The shortage of hard cash has also been
responsible for the large accumulation of external payment arrears and the
widening spread between the official and the parallel market exchange
rates.
Zimbabwe owes more than US$1 billion in arrears to major
donors and multilateral financial institutions.
The IMF said an
adjustment in the official exchange rate to a more realistic level, supported
by tight monetary and fiscal policies, was urgently required to restore
external viability and reduce the rent seeking associated with foreign
exchange rationing.
Speculators have thrived on the back of the
shortage of hard cash on the official market by quoting sharply depreciated
rates on foreign currency.
Dealers on the parallel market are
currently levying 700 Zimbabwe dollars against one US dollar.
The report noted that while the required adjustment would be achieved by a
substantial upfront devaluation, followed by a return to the
previous crawling peg arrangement, the Fund considered that a unified,
floating exchange rate should be the ultimate objective for the
Zimbabwean authorities.
This week the first
batch of commercial farmers who were served with acquisition notices will
have to stop farming, by law, while they wind up their personal affairs over
the next several weeks.
At a time of famine, they will face jail
terms and/or fines if they continue their farming activities, according to a
new law.
Meanwhile, the government some time ago announced that
"the Third Chimurenga" will officially come to a close at the end of August,
when everyone who applied for a piece of land for farming purposes would
have been allocated it.
Is something like land reform amenable
to such arbitrariness, whether with regards to cut-off dates, or the many
other important criteria?
Is land reform an event, or is it a
process?
Obviously it must have measurable ways of progressing, and
of its success being measured, so it can not be indefinitely open
ended.
But surely it is absurd to talk in terms of the land reform
effort as being wound up and to be "completed" at the end of
August.
To do so is to give the impression that a process of such
momentous effects on every aspect of Zimbabwean life can be turned on and off
at the whim or declaration of a politician, when the truth is far more
complex.
This kind of thinking by the architects of land reform as
currently being practised in Zimbabwe today may haunt the effort in negative
ways for years to come.
It suggests a short-sighted approach to
a huge issue that has needed attention for a long time.
Unfortunately, whatever one's favoured explanation for why land reform has
been so delayed in Zimbabwe, the fact of the need to now get on with it in
earnest does not in itself mean that many of the nuts and bolts of
a long-term process can just be ignored or rushed through to meet
some arbitrary, political deadline.
Yet that is exactly what
appears to have been the case.
Because of the need to not only
finally address a long standing issue of concern, but to do it in a dramatic,
"revolutionary" way that also gave President Mugabe and his party a reprieve
from their political travails with the electorate, many basic issues were
left to be dealt with in an ad-hoc way.
An example is the plight
of the hundreds of thousands of farm workers that all of a sudden find
themselves with at best very uncertain futures.
It is all very well
for a political fatcat to say that they too will be allocated land, and will
fend for themselves that way.
While a minister who has feathered
his nest for years may do rather well for himself if he suddenly finds
himself out of his ministerial job, it is utterly cynical to expect that
hundreds of thousands of mostly barely literate workers already surviving at
the margins of existence will be able to quickly, easily make the transition
to being self supporting farming entrepreneurs. There has simply been no
provision in Mugabe's land reform scheme for the massive human upheaval of a
large number of soon to be destitute workers.
Yet catering for
them in the planning for land reform would have almost necessarily meant that
the process could not have been rammed through into a time scale that was
politically convenient.
Political expediency simply meant this
important aspect, like many others of a wholesale change in the land
occupation structure, had to be shunted aside to hopefully take care of
itself somehow. But it will not "take care of itself".
For those
few farm workers who will be lucky to find jobs with the new farmers, will
those new farmers be in a position to provide schools, even rudimentary
medical facilities?
If we felt the white farmers did this poorly or
grudgingly, will a new farmer struggling to raise money for fertiliser,
irrigation equipment, wages and so forth for the first several years be able
to provide even rudimentary versions of such amenities?
Certainly it is not unreasonable to expect the new black farmer to pay and
generally treat his workers better than the stereotypical white farmer. But
are basic economics going to make this possible?
These and many
others are issues that needed to be addressed at the outset in a way they
have not been and they cannot be solved with a ministerial directive, or yet
another fast track law because they simply need resources to deal
with.
Resources that are not there, and for which no provision has
been made.
One of the reasons that the whole effort had to be
conducted in such dramatic fashion, apart from Mugabe's political needs, was
to punish the white farmers in particular, and send a message to whites in
general about their nerve in supporting Morgan Tsvangirai and the MDC
opposition in an en-bloc way.
Changing the social, racial and
economic implications of the way commercial farming land has been held may be
the official and widely accepted reason for the upheaval that has been
experienced in agriculture but an element of revenge has certainly also been
a part of the reason for the methodology.
But what price
revenge? Even when we consider that as a group, the white farming community
have not exactly endeared themselves to the larger society, is the clear
vengefulness of their treatment justified?
If it is, does a
vengefulness that is expressed in ways that will disadvantage the black
majority for longer, and to a far greater extent than the whites, make
sense?
Let us hope for the best and assume that this year we will
have a normal rain season so that we are able to get the amounts of
foreign currency that we require for all the various farming inputs and that
all those who have been allocated farming land take their new
vocation seriously.
In the unlikely event that all these
variables, and others crucial to successful land reform, fall in to place at
once, I am still astonished at the simplistic, romanticised version of
farming that we have been sold.
I would certainly not expect
government to launch this historical process by emphasising to prospective
farmers the many pitfalls awaiting them on the long road to becoming seasoned
farmers. Yet it is also a great disservice to the eager would-be farmers, and
to the nation at large, to paint such a falsely glossy picture of
it.
Even if we assume the most optimistic set of economic
and environmental conditions over the next few years, there is no way that
the new farmers are immediately going to match the productivity of the
old farmers.
The emotional ZANU-PF response to this is to scream
"racism" and argue that after all it is blacks who have enriched the white
farmers all these years, now the blacks are going to enrich
themselves.
This facile, politically correct retort ignores the
fact that more than most other types of business, farming is a business with
a long learning curve and has many variables outside one's
control.
Besides, weeeding ,watering or harvesting a tobacco or
maize field are not what in themselves constitute "farming" but a whole gamut
of activities covering the sourcing of finance, organising and supervising
labour, servicing machinery and many others.
It simply takes
time to get all these systems in place and optimised for each particular
farmer.
It may help that a new farmer is a graduate of a farming
school, or that hegets concessionary finance, but the many othar factors that
will determine his or her success will simply have to be learned on the job
over the years, and at a particularly difficult time to be starting any
new enterprise in Zimbabwe. This is not an argument for people not to seize
the opportunity, it is simply to say that all these peculiarities of
farming, and our current messy political and economic environment, are such
that the revolutionary romanticism that seems to drive a lot of the effort
will cost us dearly for many years to come.
Even the more
cautious, politically unsexy methods of land reform that I would have
favoured might have still entailed some years of reduced output while the new
farmers found their feet, but this could have been projected , budgeted and
managed for. Explained to Zimbabweans properly, I believe they would have
been willing to endure a transitional period of reduced agricultural
performance as long as it was clear that it was part of a well thought out
process. It should actually have even been possible to have a land reform
process that adressed all the key issues without even a transitional drop in
agricultural output at all. But then this would have been politically
unacceptable, as it would not have met the requirement for a pro-black land
reform that in the process also caused whites maximum disruption and
discomfort, which is the great emotional appeal of the chosen method for an
embattled ruling group.
Because of this latter requirement, for
example, it is considered unacceptable to try to harness the skill base that
the white farmers have accumulated over the decades. As brutalised,embattled
and desperate as many white farmers now are, this would be quite possible to
do. It would help to avoid the new farmers having to re-invent the wheel over
the first several years of necessary but expensive experimentation, and trial
and error.
So the blind need for revenge against the whites
justifies not only kicking them off the farms as unceremoniously as possible,
and with maximum humiliation to them, but throwing away all the knowledge
they have acquired about the systems of large scale farming. The fact of the
matter is that while there are now a small group of black large scale
commercial farmers, our political/economic history has been such that it is
the white population that has been the repository of the large scale farming
knowledge base, and it seems silly to me to fail to find ways to use to make
the land reform effort more successful, sooner, for the benefit of the black
majority. So we rush headlong into a reckless method of land reform that may
very well be far more disastrous for its intended beneficiaries than for the
dispossessed whites, but that's okay, at least we showed them that we can
mess them around the same they did us! And as for the joblessness,starvation,
reduced foreign currency earnings, the unavailabillity or non-affordability
of farm machinery and spare parts, and so much more? Let's worry about
that tomorrow, today let us sing and dance about the fact that we now
have possession of the soil!
The nitty gritties of agriculture
for commercial and economic purposes are simply not amenable to our political
whims, as I fear we are going to disastrously find out over the next few
years. I am a type of a farmer in my own right, and one of the most important
lessons I have learned over the years is that learning to be one is a process
rather than an event, and that it is much more involved and complicated than
it first appears. I hope for the sake of Zimbabwe that the politicians that
have tried to force a process into an event that fits a political season know
what they have got us in to.
THE Biblical adage
to the effect that those who live in glass houses should not throw stones has
become of particular relevance to Zimbabwe, especially in the wake of a
possible mass action as proposed by the opposition.
The simple
reason why I say so is none other than safety because any mass action at this
volatile time will give the government a "justification" for a crackdown on
the opposition akin to the PF ZAPU and ZUM scenarios.
The political
history of Zimbabwe is replete with incessant crackdowns on the opposition
political parties by the ruling party in a manner that is fraught with
ruthlessness and a pervasive gusto to maintain a one-party policy in this
country.
I will not reminisce on the notorious Fifth Brigade fiasco
of the 1980s in which the Korean-trained brigade perpetrated a reign of
terror in the Midlands and Matabeleland provinces under the guise of
thwarting dissident activity.
It is this crackdown that
frog-marched PF ZAPU into the shackles of submission and culminated in the
"Unity Accord" under which PF ZAPU and Z ANU PF "united" to form ZANU
PF!
I am also not at liberty to delve into how the Zimbabwe Unity
Movement was utterly destroyed under the ruling party's untiring and vicious
cycle of bulldozing all barricades on the one-party-state road of
autocracy.
My fears are that the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) has posed the greatest challenge to the ruling party since
"independence" and all that the latter is waiting for is an opportunity to
make sure that the MDC will "never, ever" be a problem again.
This determination can be catalysed by any grievous policy blunder
the underdog can make which will give the ruling party a justification to
detain leaders of the opposition, perpetrate merciless brutality on members
of the opposition and crack down on any movements that are likely to
cause "despondency" in the country.
My submission is that the
MDC must never even think of mass action as that will be tantamount to
sacrificing its life on an altar of political expediency. Mass action at this
unfortunate time will be the worst blunder any party can make as that will
also affect the country's economy that is already writhing in pain owing to
quick-fix policies that defy all economic fundamentals.
Mass
action will not do the masses of this country, who have suffered enough under
the iron grip of the present regime, any good because of the consequent
"minimum force" which will be used to quell the action. The irony of it is
that in this country "minimum" force is so vaguely defined that it can reach
the cataclysmic heights of claiming the lives of
innocent citizens.
Canisio Mudzimu is a freelance
writer. He can be contacted on e-mail address cmudzimu@-hotmail.com