The ZIMBABWE Situation Our thoughts and prayers are with Zimbabwe
- may peace, truth and justice prevail.
Back to Index
Back to the Top
Back to Index
news.com.au

30,000 flee as Mugabe begins cleansing

30mar02

PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe, emboldened by his election victory and angered by
suspension from the Commonwealth, has unleashed his own form of ethnic
cleansing across rural Zimbabwe.

Thirty thousand people have been forced to flee their homes and entire
"blacklisted" villages have been cut off from the food supply.
Thousands of incidents of rape, torture, murder, kidnap and arson have been
reported to human rights groups and the opposition Movement for Democratic
Change.

In Mberengwa East district in the Midlands, 5000 MDC supporters have fled in
the face of reprisals. The internal refugee crisis has escalated so
dramatically that earlier this week Zimbabwean human rights group the Amani
Trust applied to the UN and the Red Cross for tented villages to be set up
in the capital, Harare, where the majority of people have fled, but was
turned down.

Some MDC supporters have been buried alive for weeks in "bush pits", with
the so-called "war veterans" and youth militia demanding information from
them on the opposition.

Before the election, Zenny Dube, 27, an MDC polling agent in Nkayi,
Matabeleland north, was buried alongside two colleagues in a bush pit,
covered in logs and branches, then weighed down with soil. He was kept there
for three weeks. "They gave us water every three days," he said yesterday.
"They wanted to know everything about the MDC -- who were members, where
they lived. They said they wanted us to die because we were selling Zimbabwe
out to the white man."

One of the three, Thembeni Ndebele, is almost certainly dead. Suffering from
malaria, he was removed from the pit after two weeks and has not been seen
since. Mr Dube, a structural engineer, was dumped in the bush and left for
dead.

Mr Mugabe's campaign against white farmers has intensified. More than 20
farmers in the Esigodini district south of Bulawayo fled their properties
yesterday, having being given until today to leave. Black workers on one of
the farms were then beaten unconscious. In Matabeleland north, farmers on 60
properties have been handed the same ultimatum.

The Amani Trust estimates up to 30,000 people have been forced from their
villages since Mr Mugabe was declared the victor in the presidential
election on March 14.

The President's "war veterans" and youth militia have been on the rampage
across most of rural Mashonaland and Midlands province, where Mr Mugabe
enjoys his strongest support, targeting whole villages suspected of being
sympathetic to the MDC.

In the Midlands area of Gokwe, women and teenage girls have been raped by
regular soldiers and Zanu-PF militia, the trust says. Young girls have been
forced to perform humiliating sexual acts in public.

"Whole villages are being declared MDC and anyone living there is being
targeted," Shari Eppel, an Amani Trust veteran, said. She will issue a
report today detailing rape, murder, beatings and torture carried out since
the election.

The full scale of the torture and murder of MDC polling agents is also just
beginning to emerge. In Gokwe, James Nevana, 32, an MDC polling agent, was
abducted the day voting ended and taken to a youth militia camp. He had
bicycle spokes poked through his genitals and was forced to drink poison.

The Times

Back to the Top
Back to Index
BBC
 
Friday, 29 March, 2002, 15:38 GMT
Zimbabwe journalist 'not released'
President Robert Mugabe
It is illegal to criticise Mugabe
Journalist Peta Thornycroft is spending her third day in detention on Friday, despite reports on state-owned media that she had been released.

A spokesman for her lawyers said she was being detained on "orders from a very high level".


I had only been there three hours and was having a cup of tea when I was arrested

Peta Thornycroft
The Zimbabwe correspondent for Britain's Daily Telegraph newspaper is being held under new security and media laws which outlaw criticism of the president . She could face up to five years in prison.

Mts Thornycroft, 57, was arrested on Wednesday in the eastern resort town of Chimanimani, while investigating reports of violence against opposition activists.

Referring to her reported release, the spokesman, Tapiwanashe Kujinga, told Associated Press: "That is all rubbish... It is sickening that they should say she has been released when she is still in custody."

'Ludicrous'

Mr Kujinga said Mrs Thornycroft's case was now being handled by the ministry of Nicholas Goche, who heads Zimbabwe's secret police - the Central Intelligence Organisation.

Peta Thornycroft
Thornycroft is the first journalist detained under new media laws
On Thursday, she was transferred from Chimanimani to a jail cell in the regional capital, Mutare.

The editor of the Daily Telegraph, Charles Moore, said the allegations against her were "ludicrous".

Mrs Thornycroft was born in the UK, but she is now a Zimbabwean citizen.

Widowed

She is the first journalist to be detained since a media bill was signed into law days after Mr Mugabe's controversial re-election earlier this month.

Independent journalists have complained of a campaign of state harassment for a number of years.

The printing press of the only privately-owned daily newspaper, The Daily News, was bombed in 2001 and no arrests have been made.

In 1998, two journalists were illegally detained by the military and tortured for several days.

Using her lawyer's mobile phone, Mrs Thorvcroft denied any wrong-doing.

"I didn't have a chance to file a word or to do a proper interview with anybody. I had only been there three hours and was having a cup of tea when I was arrested."

Now widowed, Mrs Thornycroft has a son, daughter and granddaughter.

She has worked for the Daily Telegraph since last June and also works for South Africa's Mail and Guardian newspaper.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Independent (UK)

Journalist jailed in Zimbabwe 'may soon be freed'
By Mark Wilkinson
30 March 2002
Hopes were raised yesterday that a national newspaper reporter being held in
prison in Zimbabwe would soon be freed.

Peta Thornycroft, of The Daily Telegraph, was arrested on Wednesday and led
to believe she had been charged with "publishing false statements
prejudicial to the state" under the widely condemned new Public Order
Security Act.

But the newspaper today said she had been charged only with two lesser
offences – possessing a car with an incorrect number plate and working
illegally as a journalist.

The Daily Telegraph's Foreign Editor, David Blair, said: "We're quite
encouraged by this development because the charges have nothing to do with
the Public Order Security Act. Her lawyer is confident she will be free in a
matter of days."

Working illegally as a journalist in Zimbabwe carries a prison term of two
years under a controversial new media law brought in by President Robert
Mugabe two weeks ago.

Ms Thornycroft does not have the necessary accreditation but the law gives
journalists three months in which to apply for the licence. The car
registration charge carries a small fine.

Mr Blair said: "If the journalism charge gets to court there's little doubt
it will be thrown out straight away.

"There's always a danger in Zimbabwe of something unexpected happening but
it's likely she will either be let out on Sunday, or more probably on
Tuesday," he said.

"She is in reasonably good spirits. She is being treated quite decently and
humanely and is being allowed unrestricted access to her lawyer.

"Her arrest is typical of the situation in Zimbabwe. People who are seen as
a nuisance by the government are arrested, have various charges laid against
them and then after four or five days are released. It's all part of the
culture of harassment."

She was arrested in Chimanimani, on the border with Mozambique, and moved to
the police headquarters in Mutare, 200 miles east of the capital, Harare.

Ms Thornycroft, 57, who had travelled to Chimanimani to investigate reports
of widespread political violence and retribution against the opposition,
denied the charges. "I didn't have a chance to file a word ... I had only
been there three hours when I was arrested," she said.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Telegraph
 

I am so proud of my brave mother jailed in Zimbabwe
By David Blair, Foreign Staff
(Filed: 29/03/2002)

THE daughter of Peta Thornycroft, The Telegraph's jailed Zimbabwe correspondent, spoke yesterday of her pride in her mother and urged her to continue exposing President Mugabe's repression.

Emily Wellman, 23, recalled her mother's long fight against injustice, including apartheid, and demanded her release.

 
Peta Thornycroft: expects to be charged with 'publishing false statements prejudicial to the state'

"Throughout my childhood, my mother fought the evils in southern Africa through principled journalism," said Miss Wellman, who takes her name from her father.

"Both my parents were actively involved in fighting apartheid, through work and in their private lives."

Before Miss Wellman was born in 1979, her mother wrote to Nelson Mandela in prison on Robben Island asking him to become her daughter's godfather. He agreed.

When Ms Thornycroft's husband, Peter Wellman, died last year, Mr Mandela sent his condolences.

Miss Wellman said: "My father, who placed himself on the line many times in the fight against apartheid and was imprisoned for political reasons, would support her now."

Ms Thornycroft, 57, who lived in South Africa in the 1970s, was arrested on Wednesday and accused of breaking the public order and security Act. The law was forced through parliament in January and has been widely condemned as repressive.

Yesterday she was moved to police headquarters in Mutare, where she was expecting to be formally charged with "publishing false statements prejudicial to the state".

Last year, in a sign of her commitment to Zimbabwe, she renounced her British citizenship to comply with a new law and enable her to retain her Zimbabwean passport.

Besides her daughter, she has a son, Adrian, 35, and a three-year-old granddaughter, Jessica. Miss Wellman said her mother was well aware of the risks of working as a journalist in Zimbabwe.

"Many people say she should leave for her safety. I strongly disagree." Miss Wellman graduated from Cape Town University last year and is working in an Oxfordshire pub while travelling around Britain.

She has a photograph of herself as a baby bouncing on the knee of Sally Mugabe, the president's late wife, soon after Zimbabwe gained independence in 1980.

But she and her mother have been disturbed by the country's descent into repression and economic collapse. She said: "I am grateful that people like my mother are there trying to report the facts and change a terrible situation.

"I am unsure how her imprisonment will turn out. I am sure it will drag on. If it does goes badly for her, she will have all our love and support and at some stage the truth will be revealed about Zimbabwe under Mugabe's rule.

"I love my mother and I wish I could be there to support her. I am terribly proud of her and filled with admiration and respect. She is a truly remarkable woman."

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News - Feature

Lies won’t save Zanu PF leaders from their inevitable fate

3/29/02 2:25:02 PM (GMT +2)



LAST week’s decision by the Commonwealth to suspend Zimbabwe from the
54-member grouping’s government councils for a year may not be anything to
write home about in that it has caused nothing more than diplomatic
embarrassment.

In spite of that, it is cause for concern to every Zimbabwean with some
political understanding and national concern.

What perception do potential and actual investors have about Zimbabwe
following that suspension?

It is most important to be frank when discussing national issues, and not
get carried away with partisan dogmas because every nation is more important
than political parties and their dogmas.

A look at recent political developments throughout the world shows examples
of this fact: the former Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
which disintegrated into smaller nations some of which are presently at each
other’s throats to establish or maintain their individual identities.

Germany is once more a united nation after half a century or so of
acrimonious division resulting from a disastrous world war caused by some
German leaders.

In Africa, nations emerged from colonialism. Many of them, including
Zimbabwe, fought tooth and nail to achieve independence from their former
colonial masters.

Their struggles were meant to achieve not just nationhood, but an
environment in which people could share ideas in harmony, that is to say
differ without acrimony.

Unfortunately, that is not the situation today in Zimbabwe. The country is
certainly independent, but the nation is not free, hence the violence to
force people to support political parties with whose policies they do not
agree.

By nation we refer to the country’s 13 million people. They comprise the
most valuable asset individually and collectively.

It is these people, ourselves in effect, who are being brutalised,
suppressed and intimidated. The political violence denies the people, again
us in effect, the freedom we sacrificed limb and blood, life and property to
win.

Zimbabwe’s suspension from the Commonwealth government councils is a message
that our political and social norms have fallen below the acceptable
standard of civilised nations.

The government has been assessed and found wanting as far as those values
and norms are concerned.

The Zanu PF government is led by Robert Mugabe. So, praise or condemnation
by the Commonwealth of Zimbabwe’s governance must be directed at Zanu PF.

In its pursuit of power, Zanu PF has turned one Zimbabwean against another
in exactly the same manner Adolf Hitler consolidated the grip of his
tyrannical Nazi party on Germany.

Children have been recruited by Zanu PF to be its arm to attack, murder,
torture, terrorise, harass, intimidate and dispossess or displace those
perceived to be sympathisers or members of any other party, in particular
the MDC.

Hitler did exactly the same, and even boasted to adults opposed to his
racism that the Nazi party had the children under its control and guidance.

We are experiencing a frighteningly similar development in Zimbabwe today:
youths being trained to commit crime against their own parents in the name
of Zanu PF.

These young people rape, riot, destroy and murder in the furtherance of Zanu
PF membership recruitment.

It is tragic that we blame outsiders for the sad situation within our
borders and yet we ourselves, through Zanu PF, have created the monster that
devours our very national social fabric.

Universally accepted human behaviour in every people-oriented society abhors
the following:

- Violence by word or deed in both one’s private and public life, least of
all by family, community and national leaders;
- Dishonesty in the form of lying or theft by anyone, especially by public
servants
- Disrespect for and outrageous sexual harassment of other people,
particularly those of the female gender;
- Disrespect for individual, family, community and national burial and
religious sites and buildings;
- Malice against one’s neighbour, leading to the neighbour’s injury, arrest,
loss of public respect or destruction of the neighbour’s property;
- Greed and avarice, least of all by national leaders;
- Laziness at one’s home or one’s place of formal employment.

The above are culturally unacceptable because they are against individual as
well as collective interests and welfare of every people-oriented society.

Zimbabweans’ ardent wish is to live in peace, prosperity and happiness.
But what do we see at Chimanimani, Norton, Mutoko, Murehwa, Hurungwe,
Shamva, Bindura, Rusape, Kwekwe, Mutasa, Nkayi, Mberengwa and elsewhere?

Groups of people sponsored by the State to cause death and destruction!
Should this madness continue in Zimbabwe, the country’s tragic situation
will become the subject of debate at the United Nations, and the country’s
leadership could be dragged before the International Court of Justice to
face criminal allegations against the entire nation.

If lies cannot help the government now as the suspension from the
Commonwealth has proved, they will not help at the UN or The Hague.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

Future of Hippo Valley in balance

3/29/02 2:16:53 PM (GMT +2)


Farming Reporter

The future of Hippo Valley Estate Limited hangs in the balance as most of
its land has been listed for compulsory acquisition by the Ministry of
Lands, Agriculture and Rural Resettlement.



Hippo Valley is engaged in the growing and milling of sugar cane in the
Lowveld for both the export and domestic markets.
Len Bruce, the company chairman, said Hippo Valley North Estate which
consists of more than 70 percent of company’s sugar cane land and the
Mkwasine Estate, were listed in 2000 and they were later de-listed.

“On 22 March 2002, both these properties were again listed,” said Bruce.
However, in a statement appended to the company’s
results for the year ended 31 December 2001, Bruce said: “Applications for
their de-listing will be lodged with the relevant authorities.”

Hippo Valley is a subsidiary of the Anglo American Corporation Limited,
whose major shareholder is the South African Oppenheimer family, which has
huge mining and other interests in southern Africa. Last week, the
government published in The Herald a list of 388 farms for compulsory
acquisition including some ranches owned by the Oppenheimer family. No
time-frame for the seizures was given, but owners of the listed farms have
until April 22 to lodge objections.

The government claims that it is immoral for the 4 500 white farmers to
occupy 70 percent of the country’s best farmland.
The government wants to seize at least 8,3 million hectares of the 12
million hectares in white commercial farmers’ hands.
It has so far listed about 6 000 farms, representing about 90 percent of
commercial farmland, for seizure, but not all have been taken yet

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

Government speeds up commercial farm acquisition

3/29/02 2:16:10 PM (GMT +2)


Farming Reporter

THE government has accelerated the compulsory acquisition of large-scale
commercial farms under its new Land Reform Programme.



Last week the government said it had ditched the much publicised and costly
Millennium Economic Recovery Programme, launched in February, 2000, after
the constitutional referendum.

The Commercial Farmers Union (CFU), says so far about 6 000 farms have been
acquired, 1 500 of them in March alone. The programme has sparked
international controversy.

Statistics provided by the CFU show that as of 1 March 2002, 4 526 farms,
covering 8 847 270 hectares, had been acquired.
Of the 5 648 farms, covering an area of 10 231 950 hectares, listed by the
government as of 1 March 2002, 706 of them were delisted. These properties
cover 1 475 378 hectares.

Of the 706 delisted farms, 51 farms were re-listed. The CFU says a total of
467 farms appeared twice on the initial acquisition list of 5 648 farms.

The agriculture body’s figures, however, contradict those issued by the
government.
Government said at least 5 326 farms covering 10 million hectares remain
gazetted for compulsory acquisition.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News - Leader Page

The truth about ACP-EU resolution

3/29/02 2:40:15 PM (GMT +2)



Ever since his surprise 1999 marriage of convenience with Zanu PF, as the
government’s chief salesman for its proposed new constitution, Professor
Jonathan Moyo, who is now the Minister of Information and Publicity in the
President’s Office, has displayed exceedingly discomforting symptoms of a
split personality - what Sigmund Freud termed schizophrenia.

From time to time we have found it imperative to draw the people’s attention
to Moyo’s totally inexplicable sudden change from the highly pro-democracy
and anti-totalitarianism critic of the government that he used to be, to his
present fierce stance in support of the repressive tendencies in President
Mugabe’s style of leadership - a trait which used to rile him so much.

It is a mission that we have managed to accomplish fairly successfully
through the republication of Moyo’s pre-new-constitution-involvement
articles in various publications, in which he made it clear Mugabe’s
government was as undemocratic and repressive as regimes would ever come.

The latest republication of such articles was last Saturday when we
revisited his offering in The Guardian issue of 20 April 1990.

In that article, as in several other treatises, Moyo was at pains to
convince his compatriots that Mugabe and his party had betrayed the trust
they had reposed in him when they massively voted for Zanu PF in the 1980
election. He argued that, among other things, the people had voted for
non-racism, equality, a better quality of life and freedom of association
and expression - all of which have not found veritable fulfilment in the
post-independence Zanu PF-ruled Zimbabwe.

We are particularly peeved by the government’s sustained efforts, through
Moyo, to not only muzzle the independent Press, but also to ensure that the
government-controlled Press’s unstated licence to peddle falsehoods as
gospel truths is elevated to the status of unquestionable veracity. While in
the past we have silently watched those efforts in a tableau of fascination
tinged with contempt and ridicule, today we feel compelled to protest in the
strongest terms possible at Moyo’s latest attempt to transfer to us the sins
that, in fact, the government-controlled Press is guilty of.

We make reference here to our front page lead story last Wednesday in which
we reported that Minister Moyo had threatened Geoffrey Nyarota, the
Editor-in-Chief of The Daily News, with possible imprisonment for up to two
years if he did not retract a story which Moyo described as “patently false”
.

In his letter to Nyarota, Moyo accused the Daily News Editor-in-Chief of
repeatedly publishing false information with regard to a resolution adopted
last week by the African, Caribbean, Pacific-European Union (ACP-EU) Joint
Parliamentary Assembly at the end of their meeting in Cape Town, South
Africa, calling for a fresh presidential election in Zimbabwe.

It would be trite for us to take a fresh look at the merits or otherwise of
that ACP-EU call as the sentiments of both independent and interested
observers in that regard have been adequately recorded. Of concern to us
here is the attempt by Moyo to sully our reputation as a reliable source of
information by saying that we lied in our report about what transpired at
the ACP-EU meeting.

We found it necessary, in yesterday’s paper, to waste space which we should
have used to carry other stories, in order to prove that the minister was
misinformed, by printing a copy of the ACP-EU resolution in question.

Clearly, therefore, it was his paper, The Herald, and not ourselves, that
published a lie. In any case, following publication of our story last
Friday, the ACP-EU secretariat did not dispute the information we put out.

We must state here for the record that it is the State-controlled media,
rather than ourselves, who are engaged in publishing, not just falsehoods,
but outright fiction almost on a daily basis.

Our humble submission is, therefore, that, if Moyo is so keen on testing the
effectiveness of his repressive new law, it is at the Zimbabwe Broadcasting
Corporation, The Herald, The Sunday Mail, The Chronicle and The Sunday News
that he will get unlimited opportunities to do so.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

Abducted MDC supporter still missing

3/29/02 2:42:41 PM (GMT +2)


Chief Reporter

WELLINGTON Kapfumba, 43, of Ward 15 in Musana in Bindura district, is still
missing after he was attacked on Sunday night and later abducted by Zanu PF
supporters who accused his children of supporting the MDC in the just ended
presidential election.



Kapfumba’s son Lewis, 22, yesterday said three Zanu PF youths driving a
white Mazda pick up visited their home looking for him and his brother,
Challenge.

“When they realised that we were not there they started to assault my father
with sticks accusing him of allowing us to campaign for the MDC,” he said.

He added that the Zanu PF supporters were led by Nomatter Makumbe, a known
Zanu PF activist in Musana. Edson Kapfumba, Wellington’s brother, yesterday
said: “I suspect that he may be dead now because when they bundled him into
their car he was bleeding from the mouth and he cried out, saying he had
been stabbed with a knife by his assailants.”

Edson said the three youths drove Wellington to the home of Clever Masawi,
the Zanu PF political commissar in Chifamba Village before they took him
towards Nyava growth point.

“They attacked his main house and destroyed all the windows. I suspect that
they took him to Manhenga or Bindura town where Zanu PF supporters have
their main bases,” Edson said.

He said the matter was reported at Nyava Police Station but up to now his
brother is still missing.

“We need police assistance because there is nothing we can do, as a family
we cannot go into Zanu PF bases. The police are our last hope in this
matter,” Edson said.

He said Welligton’s home has been attacked on three occasions before this
latest attack, after the same group accused him of allowing his children to
support the MDC.

Since the end of the presidential election controversially won by President
Mugabe, Zanu PF supporters have been engaging in a retribution campaign
mounted against suspected MDC supporters.
Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

Hungwe flees angry war vets

3/29/02 2:42:02 PM (GMT +2)


From Energy Bara in Masvingo

Masvingo Provincial Governor, Josiah Hungwe was on Wednesday forced to flee
to the nearest police station for protection after angry war veterans
demanded his immediate dismissal.



The war veterans locked his offices. The disgruntled former liberation war
fighters, led by Isaiah Muzenda and another identified only as Mtetwa
accused Hungwe of being a “sell out”.

Heavily armed policemen wereimmediately dispatched to Benjamin Burombo
building where the governor’s offices are located.

After locking Hungwe’s offices, the war veterans also locked the Zanu PF
provincial offices and demanded the dismissal of the entire Samuel
Mumbengegwi-led executive.

The war veterans said they could not continue to be led by a person whose
liberation war credentials were questionable.

They accused Hungwe of having worked for the Ian Smith regime and,
therefore, of being a sellout.

Hungwe claims to have been detained during the liberation struggle but
allegedly fails to name a single person he was detained with.

The governor, who appeared shocked by Wednesday’s events, spent two hours at
Masvingo Central Police station in a meeting with the officer commanding
Masvingo province, senior assistant commissioner Gilbert Moyo.

The angry war veterans were also unhappy with the alleged murder of war
veteran Amos Maseva, who was buried three weeks after his death as his
family was demanding $2 million and 40 head of cattle from deputy minister
Shuvai Mahofa.

The deal to have the body buried was brokered after Vice President Simon
Muzenda’s intervention as an abirtrator One of the war veterans said: “We no
longer want him in office. He is a sell-out and cannot lead genuine war
veterans.

“He has failed the war veterans in the province and we do not know why
President Mugabe continues to keep him. Other war veterans have been killed
by people who did not fight for this country and we cannot be seen promoting
such behaviour.”

Senior Commissioner Moyo refused to comment on the issue but confirmed that
the war veterans had locked Hungwe’s offices.

Hungwe said his offices were raided by war veterans loyal to the Eddison
Zvobgo-led Zanu PF faction.

Said Hungwe: “These war veterans have closed the offices of the ministry of
lands three times but were not arrested. You have to know that these are
Zvobgo’s puppets. They have also closed party offices.

“In my view they should just be expelled from the party. They have been
working closely with whites in Masvingo town and now they have decided to
close my office. I am not a sellout.

“They say they want to know why their colleague was killed knowing well that
I was not there. I tell you that they will not win that war”.

Last week war veterans temporarily closed Zanu PF offices over allegations
that ruling party officials misappropriated $4 million.

The money, earmarked for the presidential campaign, was allegedly misused by
two named party officials. The war veterans demanded that the whole party
provincial executive be dissolved to pave way for fresh elections.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

US places Anglican bishop on blacklist

3/29/02 2:59:42 PM (GMT +2)


By Pedzisai Ruhanya Chief Reporter

BISHOP Nolbert Kunonga, the head of the Anglican Church’s Harare Diocese who
is widely regarded as a Zanu PF apologist, becomes the first clergyman in
Zimbabwe to be slapped with personal sanctions by the United States
government.



Kunonga joins several of President Mugabe’s Cabinet ministers and other Zanu
PF officials facing travel and economic sanctions in Europe and the US for
their involvement in human rights abuses and the breakdown of the rule of
law in the country.

His name appeared on an expanded list of top bankers, army generals, heads
of parastatals, senior civil servants and business people who have been
bundled with Mugabe and his top leadership, as the US government tightens
its noose around Zimbabwean government officials.

A US embassy official in Harare could not say why Kunonga was listed, saying
the embassy did not have the latest list.
Efforts to get a comment from Kunonga failed. A secretary in his office
first said he was not available.

“I am sorry, Kunonga is out of the country,” the secretary said before
hanging up the phone. However, The Daily News established that Kunonga was
in Zimbabwe and in attendance at his office. The secretary then admitted
that he was there but said he did not want to speak to the media over the
issue.

Asked why she had lied that Kunonga was out of Zimbabwe, she retorted: “That
is my job. The Bishop does not want to be bothered.” Archbishop Pius Ncube
of the Roman Catholic Church in Bulawayo yesterday said what happened to
Kunonga was a lesson for all Christians.

Ncube said: “This is a warning to Christian leaders that we should not be
partisan. We should stand for justice and desist from being embroiled in
partisan politics. As Christians, we should stand with the people and uphold
the Kingdom of God’s values.”

Last month, the Anglican Church’s Justice, Peace and Reconciliation (JPR)
Committee said Kunonga had links with Zanu PF before he was installed as
Bishop in April last year.

George Wauchope, the JPR Committee spokesman, was explaining Kunonga’s
apparent strong support for Zanu PF and the party’s violent fast-track land
reform programme, even in the face of criticism by many Anglicans in and out
of his diocese.

Kunonga’s pro-Zanu PF and pro-government pronouncements, from the pulpit and
elsewhere, have alienated members of his diocese and other Anglicans in
general, who see him as condoning the violence unleashed on the people by
Zanu PF in the name of land reform.

In January, Kunonga declared that Mugabe, who has boasted of having degrees
in violence, was more Christian than himself.
Among those on the latest sanctions list are prominent bankers Enock
Kamushinda and Taka Mutunhu, the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority’s
chief executive and Mugabe’s brother-in-law Sydney Gata, and National Oil
Company of Zimbabwe chief executive, Webster Muriritirwa.

Businessmen Mutumwa Mawere, Philip Chiyangwa, Saviour Kasukuwere, David
Chapfika, Billy Rautenbach and John Bredenkamp are listed.

Spouses of those listed will also be affected. Other latest additions to the
original list of 20 are Cabinet chief secretary Charles Utete, Dr
Mariyawanda Nzuwa, the chairman of the Public Service Commission and head of
the Election Directorate, Dr Misheck Sibanda, the head of administration in
Mugabe’s office, and the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Transport
and Communications, Christian Katsande.

Mawere has already received notification that he is barred from entering the
United States. In a letter to Mawere, the US Assistant Secretary of State
for African Affairs, Walter Kansteiner, stated that on 22 February,
President George W Bush signed a proclamation suspending entry into the US
as immigrants or non-immigrants those persons responsible for actions that
threaten Zimbabwe’s democratic institutions
Back to the Top
Back to Index
Daily News

Evicted settlers in demo

3/29/02 2:00:56 PM (GMT +2)


From Our Correspondent in Masvingo

A group of about 100 people who invaded Chidza Farm about 30 kilometres east
of Masvingo town at the height of the farm invasions on Wednesday took to
the streets protesting against their eviction after the property was
delisted.



The illegal settlers had remained on the property, ignoring several eviction
orders issued by the government through the provincial land committee.

The invaders, among them war veterans, alleged they had paid for the plots
after they were illegally allocated to them by senior war veterans.

The riot police responded promptly and quashed the demonstration which was
declared illegal under the draconian Public Order and Security Act. “We paid
for the plots and what we need are refunds before we leave,” said one of the
demonstrators.

The farm owner, John Borland, yesterday said he was living in fear after he
received death threats.
“I am feeling very unsafe”, said Borland. One of the settlers said he wanted
to kill me. My property was delisted and I do not know why the settlers are
refusing to move off.

“I have co-operated fully with the land reform programme by giving two of my
farms to government. It is my view that the rule of law should be
 respected.”

The delisting of Chidza Farm and Southwill Estates, both in Masvingo East
commercial farming area, raised eyebrows among war veterans who alleged that
senior Zanu PF officials in Masvingo had been given kickbacks.

However, the Masvingo provincial land committee chaired by Governor Josaya
Hungwe, has defended the delisting as lawful.

Back to the Top
Back to Index
The Irish Times

Zimbabwe's free speech curbs move beyond journalists

 Last updated: 29-03-02, 15:09


The Zimbabwe government's crackdown on free speech, which has long targetted
journalists, in recent weeks has expanded to include a cafe, a poet, and
meetings with diplomats, aid agencies and unions.

Only two days after President Robert Mugabe's controversial re-election, he
enacted a tough new media law, which together with a security law passed in
January, have become the two main tools in authorities' whittling at free
speech rights.

Journalists remain a favorite target.

Police have detained Peta Thornycroft, a correspondent for Britain's Daily
Telegraph, since Wednesday on accusations of "publishing false statements
likely to be prejudicial to state security" and "incitement to public
violence."

Information Minister Jonathan Moyo on Wednesday threatened to prosecute the
nation's only independent daily, the Daily News, over an article reporting
an international call for fresh elections.

Both those cases have drawn criticism from press rights watchdogs, including
the Paris-based Reporters without Borders, the World Association of
Newspapers, and the Vienna-based International Press Institute.

But police efforts to curb free speech have moved beyond journalists.

The Book Cafe, a restaurant and book store in Harare, was told by police
that it could no longer host political debates unless the event was cleared
with police first.

"We have been holding these political discussions every Thursday, and our
speakers have included government officials," the cafe's director said in a
statement from the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA).

"We no longer know what is freedom of expression, but to be frank, The Book
Cafe was holding political discussions and workshops in which top ZANU-PF
officials like Professor Jonathan Moyo ... were included. Those in and seen
as the opposition were also included in the discussions," the statement
said.

The owners said they would comply with the order.

In the town of Plumtree, on the southern border with Botswana, 25-year-old
poet Sikumbuzo Dube faces a year in prison over a poem he wrote that
ridicules Mr Mugabe. Mr Dube had been deported from Botswana after he was
found to have entered the country illegally. He was being held in Plumtree
prison, where he recited his poem, "Cry, the Beloved Country," which borrows
its title from the Alan Paton's novel set in 1940s South Africa. Prosecutors
said Mr Dube's poem caused an uproar in the prison cells, dividing the
detainees into those who enjoyed it and those who were offended, MISA said.
Police also used the security law to break up a meeting of the powerful
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) on March 14, when leaders of the
labor movement were to discuss the aftermath of the presidential election.
During and after the March 9-11 polls, police used the law to break up
meetings between diplomats, aid agencies and the opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC). MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai has rejected the
election results, saying the poll was "massively rigged." Zimbabwe's new
legislation has come under fire locally and internationally, and has been
cited by many independent and foreign observers as among the factors that
compromised the presidential poll. AFP
Back to the Top
Back to Index
Telegraph

Police fire teargas in Zimbabwe riot
(Filed: 29/03/2002)


POLICE used teargas to break up a riot today in Zimbabwe's second city of
Bulawayo, after pro-government militias attacked a township and met
resistance from residents.

The riot began around 8am (0600 GMT) in Sizenda township, where residents
had gathered to stone the militia base at a community hall in retaliation
for militia attacks during the night on homes in the neighborhood, witnesses
said.

"When they went there, there were two guys within the militia armed with
AK-47 rifles, which they fired into the air," one witness said.

"But they kept on stoning the hall, which is when the riot police came out
and started firing teargas."

Residents and at least 200 riot police staged running battles for more than
four hours. Residents blocked off the main roads in the township and stoned
cars that refused to turn around and leave.

Police fired teargas at random in Sizenda and managed to break up the riot
and dismantle the roadblocks by 12:30pm (1030 GMT). After the riot died
down, the militia remained inside the community hall.

Police officials in Bulawayo referred questions to the national police
headquarters in Harare, where officials were not available for comment.

Pro-government militants have staged regular attacks around Zimbabwe for
more than two years, but retaliation has been rare.

Back to the Top
Back to Index