http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
News
THE Zanu PF politburo deliberated on the Second All-Stakeholders’
Conference
consolidated report on the contentious Copac draft constitution
on
Wednesday and agreed to hand over disputed issues to the
principals.
The report all but confirmed the sharp differences in the
stalled
constitution-making process by the three parties in the inclusive
government
as Zanu PF, MDC-T and MDC all stick to their entrenched
positions.
The report was divided into four parts comprising proceedings
of the
conference; areas where no changes were recommended to the draft;
areas
where recommendations for change to the draft were made and agreed to,
as
well as areas where changes to the draft were recommended and disagreed
on.
Zanu PF spokesperson Rugare Gumbo yesterday said the politburo had
agreed
the management committee would deal with sticky points before handing
over
the draft to the principals.
The politburo was pleased that its
recommendations were highlighted in the
report although other parties
disagreed with them.
“We received the report on the Second
All-Stakeholders’ Conference from Cde
(Patrick) Chinamasa. Our proposals are
now part of the process. Copac didn’t
edit or leave anything out,” said
Gumbo.
“We also agreed that there is need to mobilise for the referendum
and
election. We are telling people to be ready for a referendum and that
they
are supposed to follow what the party says.
“The report is going
to the management committee which will forward it to
the principals, after
which the draft will go to parliament and to a
referendum,” Gumbo
said.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in News
PRESIDENT
Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai have agreed to
end
invasions of the money-spinning Save Valley Conservancy –– the largest
private wildlife sanctuary in the world –– by army generals and party
heavyweights.
Report by Staff Writer
In a recent interview
with Zimbabwe Independent Tsvangirai said the two
principals agreed to deal
with the issue at their Monday meeting last week.
“We agreed to stop the
nonsense at the Save Valley Conservancy,” said
Tsvangirai.
“It would
appear the (Masvingo) governor (Titus Maluleke) is being defiant
by putting
his own chiefs into the conservancies. The president said he will
deal with
that issue. It is a political issue –– a Zanu PF issue. In terms
of the land
reform, the president confirmed that conservancies were
excluded,” he
said.
The move comes two months after Mugabe, in a politburo meeting,
fiercely
attacked army commanders, including major-generals and senior Zanu
PF
officials, for grabbing safari landholdings in the Save Conservancy and
ordered them out immediately.
He accused them of being “greedy” for
grabbing conservancies when they
already owned farms seized from white
commercial farmers evicted during the
chaotic and violent land reform
programme.
The Zanu PF politburo set up a committee comprising Local
Government, Rural
and Urban Development minister Ignatius Chombo, Lands,
Land Reform and
Resettlement minister Herbert Murerwa, Tourism and
Hospitality minister
Walter Mzembi and Environment and Natural Resources
Management minister
Francis Nhema to deal with the issue but the committee
has reportedly made
no headway.
Zanu PF officials and military elites
have benefitted from the seizures of
safari operations at Save
Conservancy.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
News
EVERYWHERE around the world, vote-buying is rampant and a
controversial
issue.
Report by Brian Chitemba
Scholars,
researchers and journalists have been increasingly writing about
this
subject which continues to plague many a body politic in different
countries, especially those where the political culture easily permits the
corruption of democracy and perpetration of electoral fraud.
Zimbabwe
is certainly not an exception. Since 1980 there have been
activities mainly
during elections, done mostly by President Robert Mugabe
and Zanu PF
officials, which have been widely interpreted as vote-buying.
These often
include food aid and donations of agricultural inputs and
implements,
computers, as well as doling hand-outs to voters.
Zanu PF is, however, by
no means the only party which towards elections
distributes goods and
materials usually seen as vote-buying activities even
if it is not easy to
draw the line.
To the oft asked question of whether vote-buying is
undemocratic, most
people’s gut feeling is that it is, yet we have few full
explanations of
why.
The reason is that normative assessments of
vote-buying depend on situations
and circumstances, although on the surface
it appears like a straightforward
issue.
United States professor of
politics, Frederic Charles Schaffer, wrote a book
titled Elections for Sale:
The Causes and Consequences of Vote-buying, which
is very
revealing.
Schaffer specialises in comparative
politics.
Substantively, he studied the meaning of democracy, the
practice of voting,
and the administration of elections.
His works
cover such topics like what is vote-buying?, why study vote
buying?, when
does a market for votes on sale emerge? how do rules and
institutions allow
vote-buying? and is vote-buying undemocratic?
Since Independence in 1980,
Zimbabwean politics has been dominated by
patronage, mainly driven by Mugabe
and his Zanu PF cronies, which is part
and parcel of their election campaign
strategy and survival.
Zanu PF has also often unleashed political
violence using state machinery,
including the army, police and intelligence
services.
Over and above politics of patronage and violence, the party
also relies on
vote-buying and ballot-rigging.
These problems are now
entrenched in Zanu PF’s internal systems and national
elections.
Vote-buying has been a critical tool in maintaining Mugabe
and Zanu PF’s
grip on power as they often splurge on farming inputs,
computers and food to
purchase the loyalties of usually vulnerable
communities ahead of elections.
Institute for a Democratic Alternative
for Zimbabwe public policy and
governance manager and political commentator
Jabusile Shumba said: “In the
Zimbabwean context, vote-buying is a key
feature of Zanu PF’s patronage
politics since 1980 to sustain its political
regeneration.
It stretches beyond food to the more complex policy arena
where the state
chooses winners and losers. Land reform and indigenisation
are cases in
point.”
Patronage has been playing out in local politics
for a long time and
manifests itself in various ways, including senior party
and government
appointments, government programmes such land reform and
indigenisation as
well as access to state resources.
The launch of
farming initiatives such as the farm mechanisation programme
which saw the
dishing out of implements by Mugabe through state
institutions, including
Reserve Bank, ahead of the 2008 harmonised polls
became synonymous with Zanu
PF’s notorious vote-buying strategy.
That was over and above, the handing
out of farms seized from white
commercial farmers, their equipment, houses
and other assets, including
safaris and companies grabbed through political
pressure.
The current indigenisation programme is also another campaign
strategy and
vote-buying mechanism, never mind its ideological and
philosophical
underpinnings.
In fact, Zanu PF made it clear during
its annual conference in Bulawayo last
year it will campaign on the
indigenisation platform, after using land as
the main centrepiece of its
canvass for votes during the past decade.
As the next elections loom,
Mugabe was last week in another controversial
unveiling of US$20 million
farming package for the 2012-13 summer cropping
season in which Zanu PF
supporters are expected to receive seed maize, bags
of ammonium nitrate
fertiliser and seed cotton, while Matabeleland farmers
will get dipping
chemicals and livestock supplements.
Convinced this amounted to
vote-buying, Mugabe’s critics were quick to
question the source of the US$20
million he is splashing on agricultural
inputs given that Zanu PF and the
government are supposedly bankrupt.
This prompted observers to conclude
Zanu PF is siphoning diamond revenues
which have failed to consistently flow
to Treasury.
Recently Zanu PF failed to pay its 180 workers and has a debt
amounting
close to US$3 million.
During its last two annual
conferences in Mutare and Bulawayo in 2010 and
2011, respectively, Zanu PF
declared it was broke.
Bulawayo-based political analyst Rodrick Fayayo
said a glance at Zanu PF
history indicates political patronage has always
been part of survival
mechanisms.
“Our view has always been that
instead of handing out parcels of food to
people, policies should be put in
place to enable people to fend for
themselves rather than reducing and
dehumanising people to beggars,” he
said.
“I think it is important
for a government to assist its people but what
surprises us is that it is
not part of the current leaders’ DNA to genuinely
uplift electorates, beyond
vote-buying.”
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Politics
ZANU PF
provincial chairpersons who recently returned from Beijing where
they
received ideological and mass mobilisation training from the Communist
Party
of China (CPC) with regard to elections were told their party must
embrace
change or die.
Report by Elias Mambo
This comes as the CPC, which
has been ruling since the end of the civil war
in 1949, yesterday opened its
congress in Beijing which began the
once-in-a-decade leadership changes and
power transfer with a warning that
corruption might destroy the party if it
goes unchecked.
Chinese President Hu Jintao, who will hand over power to
Xi Jinping, opened
the congress at the Great Hall of the People before 2000
delegates, warning
corruption “could prove fatal to the party and even cause
the collapse of
the party and the fall of the state”.
In the process
he threatened to deal with those involved in corruption
“whoever they are
and whatever power or official positions they have”.
He was mainly
referring to disgraced CPC heavyweight Bo Xilai and other
corrupt senior
party officials. He could also have been referring to
outgoing premier Wen
Jiabao, who will be succeeded by Li Keqiang, after
revelations his family
had amassed a vast fortune during his reign.
The Zanu PF delegation was
told new leaders of the CPC, who would be elected
at the congress which
started yesterday, would be the first generation born
after the 1949
revolution that brought the party to power.
Jinping, taking over from Hu
as president, is 59. He was born on June 1,
1953. Hu is retiring at 69. Li,
who will take over from Wen as the new prime
minister, was born on July 1,
1955 and is 57. Wen is retiring as premier at
70.
By contrast
President Robert Mugabe is 88. The Chinese top leadership is
mainly young
while Zanu PF is largely dominated by geriatrics.
Hu’s legacy would be
consensus-based and collective leadership in an age in
which Chinese society
is undergoing rapid, profound and disorientating
changes amid economic
prosperity.
CPC’s congress comes ahead of Zanu PF’s annual conference
from December 4-9
and the party’s elective congress next
year.
Sources said CPC leaders frankly told Zanu PF chairpersons that
without
leadership renewal and reform their party was going
nowhere.
“We were warned of the need to constantly renew our party
leadership so that
we remain relevant and adopt as a priority economic
development strategies
that boost the economy and empower the masses,” said
a source.
After Mao’s disastrous land reform programme in 1958, China has
been rapidly
changing.
Since 1978 China, with the late Deng Xiaoping
in charge, has gradually
pursued market economy reforms, creating an
investment-and-export-led
economy which has now become the second largest in
the world.
The key to China’s success has been vision, leadership
renewal, reform, as
well as investor-friendly policies and property
rights.
Speaking at the congress yesterday, Hu said a new model for economic
growth
was needed to respond to domestic and global changes.
“On the
basis of making China’s development much more balanced, coordinated
and
sustainable, we should double its 2010 GDP and per capita income for
both
urban and rural residents (by 2020),” he said.
Sources said Zanu PF
provincial leaders were shocked when the CPC bluntly
told them that unless
their party adopted leadership renewal it would be
difficult to reinvent
itself ahead of crucial elections next year. The
Chinese party emphasised to
Zanu PF leaders the need for ideological
training, mass mobilisation and the
importance of being dynamic in the face
of shifting challenges.
It is
said the Chinese advised Zanu PF to change leaders much to the
disbelief of
the chairpersons who were unwilling to discuss the issue of
succession, a
topic which is taboo in their party back home.
The 10 Zanu PF
chairpersons were recently dispatched to China to draw
lessons on how the
CPC had managed to remain relevant in an ever-changing
political and global
landscape.
Upon return the chairpersons dwelt on the other lessons they
had learnt from
the CPC but were mum on the leadership renewal warning as
they feared it
could backfire on them, especially now that Zanu PF is
heading towards its
annual conference next month and congress next year. The
party has
suppressed debate on Mugabe’s succession despite his advanced age
and
ill-health. Mugabe frequently flies to Singapore for medical
treatment.
Former Mozambican president Joaquim Chissano recently
expressed similar
sentiments in his address to the 2012 Open Forum
conference in Cape Town,
South Africa, where he urged former liberation
struggle leaders like Mugabe
to retire and allow a new generation of leaders
to take over. Mugabe and
Angola’s Eduardo dos Santos are the only remaining
founding liberation
leaders in southern Africa still in power.
“In my
country, you will not find more than three people in cabinet who
fought in
the liberation struggle,” Chissano said. “All the other ministers
and their
deputies didn’t fight any war.”
Former South African president Nelson
Mandela, who left office after one
term, repeatedly urged Mugabe to quit
while he was still politically active.
Regional leaders have also tried to
persuade Mugabe to retire in a dignified
way. Another ex-South African
president Thabo Mbeki also tried to do the
same, while former United Nations
secretary-general Kofi Annan and “Mandela’s
team of Elders”, among others,
also made an effort.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
Politics
PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe is using constant election talk as a
ruse to prevent
Zanu PF from discussing his succession, with the unintended
consequence of
the ploy being the scaring away of investors and sluggish
economic growth,
MDC leader Welshman Ncube said.
Report by Owen
Gagare
In a wide-ranging interview in which he spoke about his
relationship with
Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, their
continued support for
Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara, the stalled
constitution-making
process and his prospects in the next elections, Ncube
said he did not
anticipate polls in March as repeatedly claimed by
Mugabe.
Ncube suggested Mugabe may not be serious about early polls given
that he
has been calling for elections “tomorrow” since 2010.
“Mugabe
has said to us there will be an election every year for the last two
years,”
said Ncube.
“There should have been an election before the end of last
year. There was
supposed to be an election before the end of this year; now
there is
supposed to be an election no later than March next year … Look,
there is a
method to that madness and the method is simply to say if I’m
having an
election around the corner there is no issue about who is the Zanu
PF
candidate.”
Ncube said Mugabe’s antics had kept the country’s
economy stagnant for the
past three years as investors adopt a wait-and-see
attitude.
“It is a damaging and selfish strategy to make sure the economy
does not
grow so that others do not get the credit. So you can go into an
election
and say all these others have also been in government with me but
they also
failed.”
Given outstanding processes needing completion
before polls, Ncube said it
is likely elections would be held around June
2012. He confirmed he would
contest the presidential poll, but would not
forge alliances with the MDC-T
out of which his formation split in 2005
because the MDC-T reneged on an
electoral pact on the eve of the 2008
harmonised elections.
Although he did not share the same values, policies
and ideology with
Tsvangirai, Ncube said he had a good working relationship
with him in
government. He had also managed to find “comfort zones” to work
together
with Mugabe on government business despite having a “disrespectful
disagreement” over the way Mugabe had handled the principals’
issue.
Ncube insisted Mugabe and Tsvangirai were interfering in the
internal
affairs of his party by disregarding a High Court ruling and the
Sadc Maputo
resolution which declared Mutambara was not a
principal.
Mugabe and Tsvangirai’s argument that the matter was still in
court after
Mutambara’s appeal to the Supreme Court does not hold water
because the
High Court judgment stands until the Supreme Court rules
otherwise, said
Ncube.
“If they didn’t want to interfere in the
internal affairs of MDC, they would
accept our communication from the party
that says the MDC had its congress
and it elected so and so as its president
…,” he said.
“Read (Justice) Kamocha’s judgment; it’s clear that the
legal position is
that the congress is valid unless there is a court of law
which has
overturned it. So what Mugabe and Tsvangirai have done is to say
the
congress is invalid unless and until the matter is finalised in the
Supreme
Court.”
Ncube also said Tsvangirai was shooting himself in
the foot by siding with
Mugabe, who want a dysfunctional government so he
could implement very
little of the Global Political Agreement.
Read the
full interview next week.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Politics
OVER the
years since Independence in 1980 Zanu PF’s deep-rooted
factionalism, which
started during the liberation struggle in camps across
Zambia, Tanzania and
Mozambique, has been playing itself out mainly on the
Masvingo political
landscape, with two rival groups led by the late
vice-president Simon
Muzenda and maverick Edson Zvobgo at each other’s
throats.
Report by
Owen Gagare/Tatenda Chitagu
So vicious and acrimonious was the
factionalism and divisions that by the
end of his life, Zvobgo, a
Harvard-trained lawyer and one-of-a-kind
political mover, had become so
contemptuous of Muzenda –– who was fiercely
loyal to President Robert Mugabe
–– that at one time after he had been
sidelined from the party he celebrated
Zanu PF’s defeat by the MDC in
Masvingo’s mayoral elections in
2001.
In a withering attack at the party leadership, particularly
Muzenda’s
faction, Zvobgo, a former cabinet minister and politburo member,
said the
ruling party was in doldrums because it has been infiltrated by
“strangers”
who were ravaging its fabric.
Zvobgo, who was now
sympathetic of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and the
MDC before his
death, said Zanu PF had performed dismally due to bungling by
opportunists
who wanted to “harvest where they had not planted”.
“Baboons are on the
run in Masvingo,” Zvobgo told the Zimbabwe Independent
then. “As is well
known, they tend to want to reap where they did not sow.”
Prior to that
in 2000, Muzenda had told Zanu PF supporters to vote for any
candidate the
party fielded even if it were a baboon.
That intensified Muzenda’s fight with
Zvobgo, resulting in Mugabe completely
sidelining him from mainstream Zanu
PF and government functions.
Muzenda’s faction included senior Zanu PF
officials like the late Stan
Mudenge, who died recently, former Masvingo
provincial governor and
politburo member Josaya Hungwe, the Mumbengegwi
brothers, Samuel and
Simbarashe, and former MP Shuvai Mahofa, among
others.
The Zvobgo faction had in its fold the likes of Zanu PF politburo
member
Dzikamai Mavhaire, the late Josiah Tungamirai and Vitalis Zvinavashe,
and a
number of MPs at the time.
While the Muzenda faction tended to
be linked to the Zanu PF camp led by
Defence minister Emmerson Mnangagwa,
the Zvobgo group was somewhat connected
to the bloc led by Vice-President
Joice Mujuru. Most of Zvobgo’s former
lieutenants, including Mavhaire and
Tourism minister Walter Muzembi, are now
allied to the Mujuru
faction.
Zvobgo and Mnangagwa generally fought for political turf in the
ethnic
Karanga-dominated Masvingo and Midlands provinces. Zanu PF factions’
rivalry
is not based on ideology or policies but regional, ethnic and
personality
differences, with power being the overarching
objective.
Reflecting Zvobgo’s desire for the president to retire in the
late 1990s as
Zimbabwe started declining, Mavhaire made the unprecedented
“Mugabe must go”
statement for which he was severely punished through
insults, intimidation
and isolation.
Zvobgo, who had presidential
ambitions but did not want to publicly declare
them except through hints and
insinuations, died fighting to dislodge
Mugabe from within.
His
philosophy was that it was better for a Zanu PF faction than outsiders
to
remove Mugabe for legitimacy and continuity.
This is partly captured in
United States diplomatic cables filed from Harare
after meetings with
Zvobgo.
The cables were released by whistle-blowing website,
WikiLeaks.
However, after Mudenge’s death last month the dynamics of Zanu
PF politics
in the faction-riddled Masvingo province have changed and are
shifting.
Almost all the party heavyweights in Masvingo –– except Hungwe ––
have now
died, leaving the situation fluid and open to
realignments.
With Mudenge’s death, Hungwe, a staunch Mnangagwa ally, has
wasted no time
in trying to stamp his authority in the province and has made
it clear to
other party cadres he had a mandate from Mugabe of uniting the
party ahead
of elections.
Zanu PF officials in the province say
Hungwe believes Mugabe gave him the
role to lead the province during
Mudenge’s burial at the Heroes Acre in
Harare. Mugabe appealed for senior
party cadres from the province to unite
and avoid fights along factional
lines.
He mentioned Hungwe by name, giving him the licence he needed to
stamp his
authority and position himself as the new Masvingo political
Godfather.
“Hungwe, who was in the Muzenda camp, is basically saying he
is now the most
senior party leader left in Masvingo and naturally he should
lead. But of
course you know there is resistance from officials like
Mavhaire who were
close to Zvobgo,” a senior Zanu PF official said. “Hungwe
is now claiming to
be following the president’s orders.”
Asked about
his new role in the party politics in the province, Hungwe
confirmed he was
trying to provide leadership but suggested he was merely
implementing
Mugabe’s directive.
“If you were there at the Heroes Acre during
Mudenge’s burial, you will know
what was said by the elders (Mugabe). You
should be asking me what I think
about what was said, instead of asking me
what my role now is,” said Hungwe
last week.
“But I accept the
challenge and our focus is to unite the party and win the
upcoming
elections.”
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Politics
MOVES by
Zanu PF provinces to inject new blood into their structures are
likely to
further widen the party’s factional cracks ahead of primary
elections to
select candidates for the make-or-break polls set for next
year.
Report by Staff Writer
The young turks being infused
into party structures are now pushing for
wholesale leadership renewal,
fuelling divisions with the old guard which
still prefers the seniority and
hierarchical approach.
Sources say the Zanu PF Provincial Co-ordinating
Committees are battling to
bring sanity to the party as the young turks push
for the infusion of new
blood.
A PCC member in Midlands said Zanu PF
primaries are likely to be more
volatile than before given the way the young
turks are aggressively pushing
for their candidacies to win slots to
represent the party in the next
elections.
“The party is up for a
rude awakening and the politburo has to come up with
a good strategy to vet
and consider the new politicians,” said a source.
“These new guys boast
resources to bankroll their campaigns because many of
them are successful
business people.”
Chaos almost broke out at a Zanu PF meeting attended by
Defence minister
Emmerson Mnangagwa and former Midlands governor July Moyo
at Senga Training
Centre in Gweru last month over the issue.
A source
said youths the meeting called for the ouster of Gokwe-Nembudziya
MP Flora
Buka accusing her of batting for Vice-President Joice Mujuru’s
faction.
Local Government minister Ignatius Chombo is also reportedly
facing stiff
competition from another young turk, businessman Edwin
Matibiri, for the
Zvimba North constituency.
In Manicaland, Economic
Development deputy minister Samuel Undenge is being
challenged by Joshua
Sacco, a white farmer and militant Zanu PF supporter.
Former Mashonaland
West provincial chairperson Philip Chiyangwa is eyeing
the Chinhoyi seat
after being re-admitted into the party after a five-year
expulsion for
alleged espionage.
Chiyangwa’s youthful businessman ally Chamu Chiwanza
is targeting the
Mabvuku seat in Harare, which is also being eyed by
Zimbabwe Mining
Development Corporation chairman Godwills Masimirembwa.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
Politics
LAST week Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai exclusively spoke to
the Zimbabwe
Independent on the topical issues of elections, the contentious
constitution-making exercise and the role of the military in politics and
the polls.
Report by Faith Zaba/Owen Gagare
This is the second
and final part of the edited interview in which
Tsvangirai (MT), who is also
MDC-T president, spoke to the Independent’s
news editor Faith Zaba (FZ) and
chief reporter Owen Gagare (OG) on key
matters including the party’s primary
elections, intra-party violence,
corruption and his relationship with
President Robert Mugabe.
FZ: Will primary elections in MDC-T include a
confirmation process for party
heavyweights?
MT: We have a process in
which we have a number of constituencies with
sitting MPs and others
without. We have said why don’t we start primaries in
those areas we don’t
control, and later on in constituencies we control.
There are no sacred
cows.
OG: But we hear in constituencies which you control there is going
to be a
controversial confirmation of candidates, not primaries?
MT: Yes,
we do have confirmation of sitting MPs. If the people want to
retain an MP
they will say so through a vote. If not they (MPs) will be open
to
primaries.
FZ: But this goes against the democratic principles you claim
to uphold; are
elections not about allowing people to choose?
MT: The
confirmation is done through structures — districts and branches. We
say if
you want him/her (sitting MP), vote secretly; if he/she wins with a
majority, then we retain him or her, but if he/she loses, we open up the
process. It’s more democratic.
FZ: Really?
MT: Confirmation is
about you and your constituency. After that, it is for
everyone. You don’t
want us to confirm?
OG: People are saying it shuts out some prospective
candidates.
MT: The party has internal democratic processes.
OG: But
the confirmed candidate has an unfair advantage because people are
not given
the right to choose.
MT: What you are saying is that we should open up
everything as if the party
is new. The party exists and has MPs and if they
have the confidence of the
people, why not retain them? Some people want to
tear the party apart. We
have the responsibility of managing the processes
so that we don’t impose
people or start with a parliament full of new,
inexperienced people.
FZ: You were commended for dealing with corruption
at council level, but you
are being criticised for focusing on the lower
levels only.
MT: I am dealing with the issue of top leadership. There is an
internal
process to investigate and establish the truth.
FZ: Is
anyone currently under investigation?
MT: There have been allegations here
and there. People are being
investigated.
FZ: How many?
MT: Not
many; we will tell you when the time comes. It is not good for
people who
have been found guilty to then try and mess up other people’s
reputations.
OG: People have been waiting for action against party
officials named in
your report on internal political violence.
MT: Action
is already underway. There was a (Harare lawyer Trust) Manda
commission
which investigated pre and post-election violence and
post-congress
violence. Those named are now going to appear before a
national disciplinary
committee chaired by party chairman (Lovemore Moyo).
FZ: Some are saying
there is a cover-up because those fingered are top
officials like Deputy
Prime Minister Thokozani Khupe.
MT: Yes, she will appear before the national
disciplinary committee.
OG: What about Gorden Moyo and Matson
Hlalo?
MT: All of them will come before a national disciplinary
committee.
OG: Have you had an opportunity in the National Security
Council meetings to
ask why army generals violate the constitution and laws
by uttering pro-Zanu
PF political statements?
MT: Yes. Their response has
always been that it is an individual opinion and
doesn’t represent the
institution. But if they are allowed to say what they
want, can we have
order and discipline in the security sector?
OG: What is the attitude and
mood like when you meet the generals?
MT: A lot of barriers have been broken.
There was a lot of suspicion and the
first meetings were very tense, but now
the tensions have eased.
FZ: What is your relationship with President
Mugabe like?
MT: It has evolved over time. You know, we had an acrimonious
relationship,
but now we have a working relationship which has served the
country well. We
may not have achieved everything, but the coalition would
not have worked if
our relations were acrimonious.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in News
THE running-mates
clause in the Copac draft constitution is causing serious
ructions and
headaches within the MDC-T which insists the document must go
to the
referendum without amendments as all parties to the unity government
had
appended their signatures to it to signal approval.
Report by Elias
Mambo
According to senior party officials, the party is deeply divided
into three
groups over the criterion for choosing the running-mates as
jockeying for
positions intensifies.
One group is lobbying for the
handpicking of running-mates by party leader
and presidential candidate
Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, another prefers
election by the provinces,
while the third backs appointment by seniority.
The appointment option is
preferred by the party’s top leadership. Under the
running-mates clause, the
first running-mate would automatically take over
as president should the
incumbent resign, die or is incapacitated.
The sources said MDC-T bigwigs
are making strategic manoeuvres to clinch one
of the two running-mate slots
if the controversial clause in the draft
constitution is adopted in the
final governance charter ahead of elections
next year.
The clause
stipulates that a presidential candidate nominates two
running-mates to
contest elections on the same party ticket.
The running-mates would serve
as first and second deputy presidents should
their party’s candidate win the
presidential poll.
If adopted, it would also effectively address the
succession issue within
different parties.
Contrary to earlier
indications Tsvangirai preferred to handpick his
running-mates, provinces
are reportedly calling for Finance minister and
party secretary-general
Tendai Biti to be the first running-mate ahead of
Deputy Prime Minister
Thokozani Khupe and chairman Lovemore Moyo, sources
said.
Other names
being bandied about include national deputy chairman Morgan
Komichi and
former organising secretary Elias Mudzuri.
“Almost all provinces are
calling for running-mates to be elected rather
than handpicked which is
against Tsvangirai’s wish,” said a source.
Provinces such as Manicaland,
Masvingo, Mashonaland West, Harare, Bulawayo
and Matabeleland North and
South want Biti to be the first running-mate
ahead of Khupe and Moyo,
sources said.
There are fears within the party that should Tsvangirai be
allowed to
handpick his own running-mates he might settle for his right hand
man Ian
Makone, the sources said.
However, MDC-T Harare provincial
spokesperson and Justice deputy minister
Obert Gutu dismissed allegations
his province wants Biti nominated as first
running-mate.
“We dismiss
such rumours that are divisive in nature because we are
pre-occupied with
more pressing issues such as the constitution rather than
expending our
energies on rumour-mongering,” said Gutu.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in News
RESERVE Bank of
Zimbabwe (RBZ) governor Gideon Gono says Zimbabwe’s economy
is now
increasingly reeling from a liquidity crunch as the problem is now
manifesting itself in various ways, including financial instruments, the
market, monetary funding, balance sheet and bank forms.
Gono told
bankers yesterday at a local hotel in Harare during the Banks and
Banking
Survey breakfast event organised by the Zimbabwe Independent and FBC
Bank
that liquidity challenges were deepening even though the multicurrency
system has brought exchange stabilisation and macro-economic
stability.
He said the problem was the major sources of liquidity and
broad money
supply in the economy, which comprise export earnings, diaspora
remittances,
offshore lines of credit, foreign direct investment and
portfolio
investments, were not performing well.
Gono, who was the
guest speaker, made the remarks while delivering an
address under the topic
“Liquidity Trumps Growths”.
“To the extent that the RBZ has not been
issuing currency under the multiple
currency system, there is need to ensure
streams of foreign currency inflows
continue to meaningfully contribute to
liquidity levels in the economy,”
Gono said.
“Regrettably, the
recovery in the export sector has remained sluggish,
diaspora inflows have
been stunted by adverse global economic developments,
while capital inflows
have remained subdued on account of growing investor
uncertainty.
These developments have conspired to perpetuate
liquidity shortages in the
economy.”
Apart from the liquidity crisis,
Gono said since 2000 a worrisome import
syndrome has gripped the country,
driving the external sector position into
disequilibrium.
“This has
combined with the country’s narrow export base which is dominated
by
low-value primary commodities to worsen the country’s external sector
position. In addition, subdued capital inflows in the wake of the suspension
of budgetary and balance of payments support to the country by international
creditors has compounded the external sector position as well as the
liquidity situation in the country,” he said.
“Against this
background, the export earnings realised by the country as
well as the
subdued capital inflows, have been drained by a burgeoning
import bill that
has been necessitated by attendant supply gaps in the
economy.”
He
also said short-term deposits “have largely remained short-term in nature
with the banking system mainly used as a conduit to facilitate salary
payments and withdrawals”.
“Despite securing credit lines, Zimbabwean
borrowers have continued to face
stringent borrowing conditions. Notable
conditions that have affected
utilisation levels include facilitation fees,
deposit requirements and
various legal aspects, which sometimes take up to
six months to fulfill,”
Gono said.
“Evidently, out of offshore
facilities worth US$2 billion approved by the
External Loans and
Coordinating Committee, only US$899 million was
drawn-down since the
beginning of the year.
“Against such low utilisation levels of 42%
realised this year to date, the
country will continue to face persistent
liquidity challenges.”
Gono also spoke about limited policy space,
re-emergence of malpractices
within the banking sector, capital adequacy,
issuance of Treasury Bills and
banks’ reluctance to support their tenders,
financial inclusion, structural
challenges and debt resolution, even though
he omitted details due to time
considerations on some of the issues in his
official presentation.
At the function, at which the Development Bank of
South Africa’s continental
development-finance institutions head David
Monyae spoke about his bank’s
vision and projects in the region, Standard
Chartered Bank was crowned the
best bank in the country for the second year
running in the Independent’s
2012 edition of banks and banking
survey.
Stanbic Bank and MBCA Bank Ltd were named first and second
runner-up,
respectively, while former FBC Holdings CEO, Livingstone Gwata,
received
special commendation.
The survey was based on financial
results for the half-year to June 30,
2012. The banks were rated on a strong
domestic franchise, reasonable profit
levels, good asset quality, low risk
to earnings, and liquidity.
The evaluation matrix considered, among other
variables, the size of the
bank’s balance sheet relative to the country’s
gross domestic product,
balance sheet growth as represented by growth in
loans and deposits as well
as asset quality.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in News
IT is
nearly midnight and seven-year-old Nelson Dara (not his real name)
should be
in deep slumber so that he wakes up fresh and ready for another
day at
school.
Report by Wongai Zhangazha
But the young lad is far from
being asleep.
Nelson is actually sitting on a 25-litre plastic container
in a long queue
at the Dzivaresekwa municipal office patiently awaiting his
turn to fetch
water for domestic use from a borehole. He is just one of
several visibly
tired and sleepy children in the sluggish queue.
After
another hour, which seems an eternity for him, it is finally nearly
his turn
so he dashes home close by to call his parents so they can come and
fill the
family containers with the precious but scarce liquid.
This is
increasingly the plight of children in most of the country’s
high-density
suburbs parched by a severe water crisis whose solution remains
elusive.
Despite dry taps for more than six months in most suburbs
around Harare,
many residents were recently issued summons and letters of
final demand from
council. Some risk even having their properties attached
and auctioned.
While council has, with increasing vigour, set its debt
collection machinery
on hard-up residents, little has been done to improve
the situation which in
some cases is actually deteriorating.
To
compound residents’ plight, some councillors have been accused of
corruptly
amassing personal wealth instead of fulfilling their public
mandate of
serving communities. The MDC-T national executive recently
expelled 12
councillors from various cities for allegedly lining their
pockets through
corruption, while others were due to be reprimanded.
The United Nations’
Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs
(Unocha) has warned
that Zimbabwe’s humanitarian situation remains in a
state of fragile
stability as a result of challenges of infrastructural
degradation in the
basic sectors of water, sanitation and health.
On its website Unocha says
the humanitarian situation required “a massive
financial investment” before
the alarms developed into emergencies. The body
also warns that about half
of Zimbabwe’s estimated 13 million people could
be drinking water from
unprotected sources and living in unhygienic
conditions.
The country,
whose social services have collapsed, continues to battle
water-borne
diseases, namely typhoid and dysentery, mainly attributed to
erratic water
supplies, poor hygiene practices and inadequate sanitation.
Unocha
further warns that cases of water-borne diseases could multiply with
the
onset of the rainy season if authorities do not address current daunting
challenges.
According to the monthly Unocha bulletin for September, a
typhoid outbreak
was highly concentrated in Chitungwiza while dysentery
killed 19 people
between January and September this year, also recently
affecting 206 pupils
and staff at Chishawasha Secondary School in
Mashonaland East.
A few years ago a cholera outbreak killed over 4 000
people in Zimbabwe.
About 33% of the country’s population has no toilet
facilities and use open
spaces, with roughly 1% of these are urban
dwellers.
Consequently, chances of meeting the much-vaunted Millennium
Development
Goals target on water, sanitation and hygiene are virtually
non-existent.
Current investments in sanitation and hygiene are said to be
nowhere close
to the estimated requirements of around US$800 million per
annum.
Fed up with the water crisis in their suburbs, which poses a
serious health
threat, about 200 Harare residents demonstrated at Town House
on Tuesday
demanding an end to the city’s water woes.
Harare
Residents Trust director Precious Shumba said residents from various
high-density areas were angered by the high water bills they are receiving
despite going without a drop of tap water for months.
“Residents are
saying enough is enough,” said Shumba.
“They have been lied to by the
councillors who want to make themselves
relevant as their terms are about to
end yet they never considered their
plight seriously while in office. There
has also been no refuse collection
in their areas yet they (council) demand
money.”
Most residents in high-density areas now depend on
non-governmental
organisations for water supplies as council fails to
deliver.
Harare deputy mayor Emmanuel Chiroto said council has written off
debts in
some parts of the city because they were not receiving any
services.
“We had to write off bills for areas like Hatcliff Extension
because the
area does not have water at all and refuse has never been
collected,” said
Chiroto. “Our cars don’t even go there because there are no
proper roads.
However, there are areas that have not had water for some time
now but
receive fixed water charges. These are for maintenance of the
infrastructure.
“But these fixed charges should not be high. I
received the residents’
petition and we are going to sit down together with
the mayor and Town Clerk
to discuss the issues.”
Last week Finance
minister Tendai Biti told a parliamentary pre-budget
seminar in Victoria
Falls that Zimbabwe required about US$4,2 billion to
restore and build new
water and sanitation facilities.
This is a herculean task given that
Zimbabwe’s 2012 budget was in July
revised from US$ 4 billion to US$3,6
billion.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Business
RESERVE Bank
Governor Gideon Gono has sharply rebuked foreign-owned banks,
which he
accuses of snubbing efforts to introduce tradeable paper on the
market,
setting the stage for the imminent introduction of harsh measures to
enforce
compliance.
Report by Clive Mphambela/Taurai Mangudhla
A visibly
frustrated Gono, who was guest of honour at the Zimbabwe
Independent Banks
and Banking Survey 2012 yesterday, said his office would
hit back at the
foreign-owned banks for snubbing the Treasury bills.
“While it is true
that an eye for an eye leaves the world blind, and love
begets love,
snubbing the very authorities who have been bruised by verbal
shrapnel of
the nature we have all been witnesses to … their unstrategic
actions can
only invite and beget snubs as well,” he said.
Gono, who has been at the
forefront of defending the foreign-owned banks,
admitted failure of moral
suasion and instead threatened to use compulsory
means to make the banks
comply.
“We have tried as the Reserve Bank board; we have tried as the
monetary
policy committee of the central bank; we have tried as Treasury to
use moral
suasion approaches to the sector so that they can see sense in
following up
on these matters,” Gono lamented.
“None of those
approaches have worked and you would know that extraordinary
circumstances
demand extraordinary measures. We will be introducing a
battery of measures
that will ensure compliance.”
“Our civility and persuasive approach of
the past may have been misconstrued
to imply absence of policy instruments
and lack of decisiveness. Nothing
could be further from the
truth.”
In an interview later, Gono said his office would pursue many
options,
including some where banks would have no way out but to subscribe
to the
financial instruments.
“We have many options to play with,
including the introduction of perfectly
legal and legitimate fiscal and
monetary instruments in the market whose
uptake may be non-negotiable,
non-optional,” he said.These could be in the
form of statutory deposits,
negotiable and non-negotiable certificates of
deposits (commonly known as
NNCDs), among others.
Gono’s statement comes after repeatedly failed
attempts by the apex bank to
find a home for idle bank balances in a manner
that unlocked value and at
the same time re-activating the interbank market
and improving liquidity.
In October, Treasury floated an inaugural issue
of US$15 million 91-day
Treasury bills which were “snubbed” by the financial
institutions.
A subsequent tender for US$15 million also flopped while a
lukewarm response
to a similar issue on October 26 resulted in 89% of bids
being accepted with
a total US$9,85 million raised at an average rate of
8,5%.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Business
ZIMBABWE’s coal
industry needs US$1 billion in the long-term to fully
recapitalise, Chamber
of Mines CEO John Chikombero said.
Report by Gamma
Mudarikiri
Chikombero told businessdigest in an interview this week coal
production was
this year expected to drop to 1,96 million tonnes compared to
2,56 million
tonnes in 2011, owing to a myriad of challenges, chief among
which were
erratic power supplies, working capital limitations and archaic
and
out-dated machinery.
He said the biggest challenge facing the
coal industry is limited working
capital, hence the US$1 billion it needs
over the next five years.
In the nine months to September 30 2012, coal
production amounted to 1,246
million tonnes. Production of 2,56 million
tonnes was recorded in the full
year in 2011. At its peak in the mid-1990s,
Zimbabwe’s coal sector produced
more than five-million tonnes a
year.
Chikombero however, said the 20 special grants recently issued by
the
Ministry of Mines and Mining Development, would significantly improve
coal
production although this was dependent on the success of
capital-raising
efforts by government.
Zimbabwe’s leading coal
producer Hwange Colliery Company Limited (HCCL) this
year suffered a 22%
drop in overall production while deliveries plunged by
more than 50% owing
to increased competition from new coal miners in a
market where demand has
stagnated.
Competition is expected in the future to be stiffer with the
licensing of
additional 20 mining companies to explore the possibility of
extracting coal
in the nearby Hwange, Gwayi and Binga mining districts. This
is also
expected to improve production volumes.
HCC last month
commissioned equipment worth US$6,3 million procured under a
pre-purchase
financing arrangement while awarding of tenders for the supply
of mining
equipment worth US$40 million is also in progress and expected to
be
finalised in this last quarter
In another bid to increase production, a new
subsidiary, Hwange Coal
Gasification Company, plans to raise coke production
by 40% to an estimated
200 000 tonnes per year.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
Business
TREASURY is finalising sweeping amendments to the Banking Act
which will,
among other things, see shareholders being held responsible for
bank
failures.
Report by Paidamoyo Muzulu/Clive Mphambela
The
amendments will compel impromptu and mandatory stress tests, limit the
number of shares an individual can hold in a bank as well as outlaw multiple
directorships for banking institutions.
Finance minister Tendai Biti
is spearheading the amendments to the Banking
Act to bring lasting stability
to the financial services sector after two
banks –– Interfin Banking
Corporation and Renaissance Merchant Bank ––
collapsed this year and last
year respectively, owing to poor corporate
governance and lack of periodic
stress tests on banking institutions.
Genesis Investment Bank also
collapsed.
“We are working on comprehensive amendments to the Banking Act
which are now
with the principals,” Biti told parliamentarians at the
pre-budget seminar
in Victoria Falls last week.
“The amendments will
address the failing corporate governance we witnessed
at Interfin and
Renaissance, where shareholders were more powerful than the
board and
management,” said Biti.
If the amendments are incorporated into law, a
bank’s shareholders will
become liable for its collapse.
“We will
lift the corporate veil so that the shareholders will also feel the
pain of
the collapse of their banks, just like depositors,” Biti said.
“We will
put a limit to the number of shares an individual can control in a
banking
institution and a banker would only be allowed to sit on not more
than two
boards of a financial institution,” he added.
The proposed Banking Bill will
also introduce a banking ombudsman who will
look into issues such as
interest rates and would have the same powers as
provided under the Consumer
Protection Act.
The banking ombudsman will adjudicate matters relating to
fair trade
practices.
There will be mandatory and random stress tests
on a bank’s financial
position to protect depositors, Biti said.
He
said the amendments would also create synergies among the three financial
regulatory bodies –– the Securities Commission of Zimbabwe, the Insurance
and Pensions Commission and the Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe.
Stakeholders have called on the regulatory authorities to
improve the
governance structures within the local banking
sector.
Biti’s proposals also come soon after the International Monetary
Fund staff
team, in its concluding report following Article IV consultations
in June,
identified the reduction of financial sector vulnerabilities as a
key
objective for government.
“The IMF welcomed that the financial
regulatory framework was being
strengthened after a long period of
forbearance. In July 2012, the RBZ
announced steep capital requirement
increases, to be phased over two years.
The announced increases in minimum
capital requirements is expected to speed
up consolidation in the banking
system. The RBZ will need to monitor closely
banks’ efforts to comply with
the new requirements, which will undoubtedly
alter the banking system
structures,” the IMF said.
The frequent and unannounced spot checks and
stress tests on banks’ balance
sheets will help detect trouble early,
enabling authorities to take timely
corrective action.
The IMF
strongly advocated for a more proactive approach to banking
supervision,
noting that a significant number of banks remained inadequately
capitalised
and relatively weak despite meeting minimum capital
requirements.
The
team raised concern credit risks were unacceptably high, particularly
for
smaller banks that have low capital buffers, adding asset quality had
deteriorated due to unsound lending practices, poor risk management and weak
corporate governance.
The IMF said it would also be essential to
ensure tight and transparent
governance in the banking
sector.
Analysts have attributed the breakdown of corporate governance
structures in
banks and public listed companies to the overbearing influence
and power of
some shareholder managers as well as multiple directorships
blamed for
diluting board member effectiveness and compromising their
independence.
“Staff welcomes planned amendments to the Banking Act to
improve oversight
and surveillance. The authorities plan to strengthen the
Troubled and
Insolvent Bank Resolution Framework to incorporate prompt
corrective
actions, and improve corporate governance,” the IMF team said in
its report.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in
Business
GOVERNMENT’S decision to regularise activities of illegal
panners will not
have immediate impact on gold output, Chamber of Mines of
Zimbabwe (CMZ)
chief economist Issac Kwesu said.
Report by Taurai
Mangudhla
In an effort to boost mineral production and grow the economy,
President
Robert Mugabe last week said steps were underway to decriminalise
activities
of illegal panners, who are mostly active in the gold
sector.
The move allows the players, now recognised as artisans, to
operate in a
legal and properly managed manner as the country seeks to boost
mineral
production and meet the extractive industry’s projected 17 % annual
growth
target for 2012.
Unless government ensures the newly licensed
miners get access to adequate
capital and critical equipment, Kwesu said,
the impact of the decision might
barely be felt, particularly in the
short-term.
“This will definitely mean we have more players in production,
but output
depends on whether or not government puts in place policies that
support the
artisanal miners,” he said.
“Growth in output may be seen
in the medium- to long-term and it depends on
access to capital and critical
mining equipment which is required to produce
substantial amounts of
minerals because the illegal panners normally use
pick and
shovel.”
Small scale producers, who include illegal panners, have made
significant
contributions to gold mining in recent years.
In an
update, the African Development Bank (AfDB) last week said Zimbabwe’s
gold
deliveries by primary producers declined by 9,17% from August 2012 to
September 2012, whilst deliveries by small scale producers increased by 2,02
%, resulting in an overall decline in total gold deliveries by
7,14%.
The regional bank said a comparison of deliveries in September
2011 and
September 2012 shows deliveries by primary producers increased by
2,49%,
while those by small-scale producers declined by 14,74 %, resulting
in a
1,48% decline in total gold deliveries.
According to AfDB, gold
deliveries in Zimbabwe grew by 30,7% in the first
half of 2012 from the
comparable period in 2011, on account of firming
prices on the international
market.
In 2012, gold production is expected to reach 15 000kg despite a
downward
review on overall mining growth from the MTP’s targeted 20% to
17%.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Opinion
It is widely known that one
of the key areas of Zimbabwe’s embattled economy
that has become very
weakened is the manufacturing sector.
Report by Eric Bloch
The
decimation of industry has occurred nationwide, but has had a marked
impact
upon the industrial sector of Bulawayo, which for long has been the
hub of
Zimbabwean industry.
Bulawayo had far more manufacturing enterprises than
other cities or towns.
Industry was not the sole contributor to
Bulawayo’s economy, for the city
also benefitted extensively from tourism,
the distributive sector (wholesale
and retail) and service provision.
However, proportionately, other cities
and towns have suffered similar
industial decimation since 2008.
Of the many causes of Zimbabwe’s
industrial decline, foremost was the
hyperinflation that peaked in 2008,
when prices were rising by an average of
98% per day.
It is that
hyperinflation which denuded almost every manufacturing
enterprise of its
essential working capital — vital to fund stock-holdings
and to fund
operational, marketing, distribution, and administrative costs.
By 2009,
every industrial business required trillions of dollars to maintain
operations effectively. However, access to working capital was virtually
impossible. Banks and other financial institutions had minimal resources to
fund the borrowings necessary for industry to re-establish its working
capital base.
What miniscule funding the banks could make available
was for untenably
short periods, wholly unaligned to the industrial needs,
and only made
available at substantially high rates of interest and allied
charges.
Alternative sources of accessing working capital, being new
investment into
the enterprises was rarely available.
Because of
hyperinflation, domestic investors had been stripped of
investment capital,
while foreign investors were deterred from investing in
Zimbabwe by the
draconian, ill-conceived and structured laws of
indigenisation and economic
empowerment, as well as by the overall political
and economic instability
which prevailing.
The gross insufficiency of capital further impacted
negatively on Zimbabwean
industry by precluding industrialists from being
able to replace plant,
machinery and equipment timeously.
This
failure to operate the latest, state-of-the-art technologies, adversely
affected local industry’s ability to be market-competitive against products
manufactured externally. The antiquated machinery of most Zimbabwean
industries negatively affected productivity and quality.
Another
debilitating constraint on manufacturing has been, and continues to
be, the
frequent non-availability, or erratic availability of essential
utilities,
as electricity and water, compounded by the exceptionally high
costs of such
utilities.
Not only are the advertised load-shedding schedules not
adhered to, but in
addition, there are inumerably frequent supply
interruptions. These cause
loss of production, and in some instances,
irreparable damage to
manufacturing inputs and especially in the
pharmaceutical, food processing,
and textile industries.
Another
impediment to the viability of manufacturing is unfair competition
from
foreign manufacturers who are able to supply like products.
On the one
hand, those competitors enjoy the benefits of economies of scale,
being able
(with state-of-the-art technologies) to produce substantial
quantities of
products than Zimbabwean industrialists.
In addition, some countries are
providing subsidies to their manufacturers
of very greater substance
(generally considerably greater than prescribed by
the World Trade
Organisation (WTO)), resulting in the selling prices being
immensely
reduced.
Despite endless representations to Zimbabwe’s government, import
tariffs are
not imposed at levels which would eliminate that unfair and
unjust
competitive advantage. Concurrently, excessively great import duties
are
imposed upon many essential imports of the Zimbabwean manufacturers,
including many material inputs and consumable spares, further minimising the
ability of manufacturers in Zimbabwe to be price-competitive.
Aligned
to such negative and debilitating fiscal policies is absence of
export
incentives, albeit such incentives should be consistent with the
provisions
of Gatt. It is long overdue and necessary that Minister of
Finance and
parliament ensure the provision of equitable and effective
export incentives
and the re-creation of export processing zones, as well as
constructive
revision of import policies and tariffs.
Industrial viability is also
severely prejudiced by the never-ending delays
in clearing imports at
Zimbabwe’s border posts. They are neither adequately
structured or staffed
to ensure timeous clearance of imports. All too often
goods being held up
for many days, and sometimes weeks, before being
cleared. This impedes
industrial productivity and exacerbates cash flow
constraints.
It is
also all too frequent that customs officers of the Zimbabwe Revenue
Authority (Zimra) deliberately create impediments and delays to customs
clearance in order to motivate the offering of bribes, although fortunately
this does not pertain to all Zimra personnel.
Some in government have
recognised certain of the restraints confronting
industry and have taken
some limited actions to address them, such as the
creation of the Distressed
Industries and Marginalised Areas Fund, although
the funding thereof is
grossly inadequate. The selection of recipients of
funding is not
transparent and the loan conditions are unduly burdensome.
If government
is genuinely intent on a substantive recovery of the economy,
and of
achieving ongoing real growth, with the concomitant reduction of
nationwide
poverty, creation of employment and meaningful national
well-being, all of
these hindrances to the success of the manufacturing
sector must be urgently
and constructively addressed.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Opinion
After months of
arduous campaigning by incumbent Barack Obama and aspirant
Mitt Romney,
Americans this week went to the polls to elect their next
president.
Report by Collins Rudzuna
Most observers contend
that unlike the last presidential election, this one
will probably be won by
a very small margin. Traditionally, Democrats, to
which Obama belongs, and
Romney’s Republicans are considered to be driven by
different ideologies,
with the former being liberal and the latter
conservative.
Colloquially, they are referred to as left or right
wing, respectively.
Pundits have already begun contemplating what the
election of either
candidate will mean for the politics and economy of the
country.
Apparently, even investors are factoring the election outcome
into their
scenario analyses and making investment decisions based on that.
Outside
America, people are considering what relations with that country
will be
like under either one of the candidates.
The general feeling
is that a Mitt Romney win will result in an
administration which is more
business-friendly. On the other hand, a Barack
Obama win is expected to
result in more support and funding for social
programmes.
Whatever
the case, we will soon know who will captain the American ship.
Whether the
winner will steer the country in the direction expected is
anyone’s guess.
Politicians are known for making a lot of unmet promises.
Closer to home
it is a bit more difficult to try figuring out how politics
will play out.
For one thing, it is not even certain whether we will have
elections and if
so, when exactly they will be held. The constitution-making
process is yet
to be finalised, money for the election is yet to be availed
and no clear
official statement has been issued.
Yet talk of harmonised elections in
March 2013 is heating up and, like the
Americans, we cannot help but
contemplate a post-election scenario for
Zimbabwe.
Clearly, the
government of national unity (GNU) cannot be a permanent
solution. It was
always an arrangement borne of compromise, an uneasy
co-existence of
politicians with polarised views. On this basis it is likely
the GNU will
soon be a thing of the past, one way or the other.
So, say an elections
are held and the GNU is indeed dissolved, what are the
key economic issues
to watch out for?
One immediate concern would be the issue of outstanding
debt owed by
government to international financiers. Zimbabwe owes in excess
of US$10,7
billion, approximately 109% of the forecast GDP for
2012.
Any potential growth is overshadowed by this huge debt overhang and
whoever
will lead the country must have a workable solution for resolving
this debt
position.
One probable solution would be to seek assistance
under the International
Monetary Fund’s (IMFs)’s debt relief programme for
Heavily Indebted Poor
Countries (HIPC).
Already, different opinions
have been expressed across the political divide
on whether this is the right
route for Zimbabwe or not. Whatever position is
taken on this issue in a
post GNU Zimbabwe will go a long way towards
determining the future of the
economy.
Another key policy issue that an elected leader would need to
address is
indigenisation. There is pressure from different lobby groups for
government
to correct historical imbalances through indigenisation of the
economy. No
agreement has been reached on how to address this
issue.
Currently, government has a policy where companies are supposed to
cede 51%
of their equity to indigenous people. Points open to contention
include the
principle of indigenisation itself; the definition of who is
indigenous; and
the way the programme is implemented. So far, the mining
sector has been
targeted more aggressively than other economic
sectors.
Most recently, Anglo American Platinum’s Unki Platinum Mine
completed a deal
in which 51% will go to locals. As with other
indigenisation deals in the
mining sector, concerns have been raised as to
how the acquisitions will be
paid for and whether the new shareholders have
capacity to put in fresh
capital should it be needed.
More
importantly, questions have been raised about the effect indigenisation
has
on potential investors.
As a capital-hungry nation, Zimbabwe is supposed
to be going full throttle
to attract foreign investment. We expect the
approach to indigenisation to
differ greatly depending on which candidate
wins the elections.
The issues discussed above are but two examples of
policy issues that a
newly elected leader would have to deal with among a
plethora of other
matters that need urgent attention. Before one even gets
to dealing with
policy there are issues around the election itself that we
have to get
right.
In Zimbabwe, perhaps the process of the elections
per se is just as
important as the outcome. Ensuring that voting is peaceful
is vital in
gaining acceptance among local and international
observers.
Also, ensuring a peaceful post-election period is of paramount
importance.
If elections do take place next year, they will hopefully be
peaceful and
immediately widely accepted as free and fair, for the sake of
the country.
After that we will then wait to see if politicians can
deliver on election
promises and put into place progressive
policies.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Opinion
THE
Communist Party of China (CPC) opened its 18th congress yesterday in
Beijing
after lengthy preparations, factional infighting and heated
discussions
among the authorities and public over the direction the country
with the
biggest population and second largest economy in the world should
take.
Report by Dumisani Muleya
Chinese President Hu Jintao,
who will be replaced by Xi Jinping, opened the
congress which began a
once-in-a-decade power transfer, warning corruption
“could prove fatal to
the party, and even cause the collapse of the party
and the fall of the
state”.
In the process, he threatened to deal with those involved in
corruption
“whoever they are and whatever power or official positions they
have”. He
was mainly referring to disgraced CPC heavyweight Bo Xilai and
other corrupt
senior party officials. He could also have been referring to
outgoing
premier Wen Jiabao, who will be succeeded by Li Keqiang, after
revelations
his family had amassed a vast fortune during his
reign.
Hu’s legacy would be consensus-based and collective leadership in
an age in
which Chinese society is undergoing rapid, profound and
disorientating
changes, amid economic prosperity.
It is interesting
the CPC’s congress comes ahead of Zanu PF’s conference
from December 4-9 and
the party’s elective congress next year. While it is
difficult to predict
political events in a state of flux like in Zimbabwe
(Zanu PF in
particular), one thing for certain is, come next month Mugabe
will seek to
extend his leadership of the party by getting endorsement as
the candidate
in next year’s elections.
It is however not clear whether Mugabe would
seek re-election as party
leader during next year’s congress. Ordinarily, at
89, Mugabe should retire,
but given his ambitions to be president, he might
want to cling on.
While Mugabe and his Zanu PF loyalists like to be
associated with China, and
particularly the CPC, they have clearly learnt
nothing from their
counterparts since Independence in 1980. China
ideologically trained and
armed Zanu PF during the liberation struggle, but
Mugabe and his party
failed to pick up any useful lessons from their
handlers.
All they enjoy doing is going to Beijing, Shanghai and other
glitzy cities,
only to come back with bags full of largesse and trinkets,
not political and
economic ideas.
Clearly showing he has no vision,
Mugabe has failed to emulate former CPC
luminary Deng Xiaoping who picked
great ideas during his visits to Singapore
and the United States to
transform China into an economic powerhouse.
Mugabe and his hangers-on
have been all over the world, but learnt nothing
useful from there. They
have only brought back manuals on political
repression and poisonous
propaganda from countries like Iran and Cuba, not
to mention North Korea
where Mugabe has been.
As Nelson Mandela once said, Zimbabwe is suffering
from “tragic failure of
leadership”. The country’s toxic leaders have
virtually ruined the country
and that’s Mugabe’s legacy.
However,
what is disturbing though is not just Mugabe’s leadership and
policy
failures alone, but that he doesn’t seem to have any regrets and thus
won’t
quit.
Mugabe ought to have learnt from his Chinese role models how to run
a party
and a country. Even if the CPC is ideologically handcuffed to the
past and
is repressive, it has at least managed to ensure consistent
leadership
renewal and economic prosperity in the past 34 years.
By
contrast, Mugabe has been at the helm of Zanu PF for 35 years and his
reign
has mainly spawned dictatorship and economic failure. Whatever his
achievements, they pale in comparison to his monumental
failures.
Although it’s too late for Mugabe to change course, Zanu PF —
whose
provincial chairpersons recently returned from ideological drilling by
CPC
and training on massive mobilisation — might still reinvent itself if
only
it is willing to now learn something from China. The ongoing CPC
congress
provides that opportunity.
http://www.theindependent.co.zw/
November 9, 2012 in Comment
One of the
redeeming features of the GPA and government of national unity is
that
President Mugabe is unable to get away with his populist claims.
Report
by MuckRaker
When he castigated Tendai Biti this week over government’s
failure to
provide money for agricultural inputs, David Coltart was quick to
demand
that the president disclose the source of his funding.
Mugabe
had raised US$20 million for the agricultural input scheme, US$12
million
more than the annual education budget.
The source of the input scheme may
be legitimate, Coltart said on Facebook,
but Zimbabweans will only know that
if the president is candid about its
source.
Mugabe’s input scheme
came soon after the party bought over 500 vehicles
worth around US$14
million for election purposes.
MDC-T spokesperson Douglas Mwonzora
weighed in, according to NewsDay,
challenging Mugabe to disclose his donors
or risk being accused of
benefiting from illegal dealings in Marange
diamonds whose exact revenue
remains unclear.
It was illogical for
Mugabe to ask Biti to borrow money, he said, when it
was a Zanu PF
administration that destroyed the country’s creditworthiness
in the first
place.
Lame excuses
Other MDC spokesmen accused Mugabe of
grandstanding. MDC leader Welshman
Ncube said Mugabe was proffering lame
excuses and blaming the wrong people
for his own failures as president of
the country.
“This is the deliberate uninformed attitude that got us to
the worst
inflation when Mugabe ordered Gideon Gono to print money,” Ncube
said. ‘It’s
untrue that government can have unlimited
resources.
“President Mugabe is head of government and whatever happens
requires his
approval. He cannot therefore blame anyone. Minister Biti
reports to
cabinet and funding priorities are approved at cabinet level,
approved by
Mugabe. There is no way the president can distance himself from
Biti’s
budgets.”
So it’s now clear accusing Biti of sabotage was
nothing more than political
grandstanding.
‘Head of
govt’
Ironically, any reference to Mugabe in the state media is prefixed
by the
“Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe
Defence
Forces” mantra, with the desired impression being that the president
calls
the shots in all facets of government. However, when it comes to
government’s
shortcomings, Mugabe likes to portray himself as a mere
spectator.
Mugabe’s remarks confirm that any administration he heads will
attempt to
borrow its way out of difficulty. That is irresponsible and
inflationary.
But Zanu PF will do it.
And if Mugabe thinks no
government can go bankrupt he should read the
history of Weimar Germany or
Hungary in the 1920s or post-break-up
Yugoslavia in our own era. The problem
is he heads an ignorant party which
thinks it can print money to escape its
obligations. And its followers are
told the West is responsible for all our
problems as a nation,
This is populism writ large, dishonest and hugely
damaging to any economy.
Yet not a single apparatchik has the courage to
tell Mugabe he is getting it
wrong at every turn. Instead they are all
required to pretend he is
all-knowing –– the father of the
nation.
Purleez!
Damascene moment
The Herald reports that
President Mugabe lashed out at false prophets and
“dubious” spirit mediums
whom he accused of extorting money from people.
Some people who claimed
to see things in advance, Mugabe said, were instead
“false
prophets”.
“Now the prophets are all over the country. (If they are true
prophets) let
them tell us where these curses (njodzi) befalling us are
coming from. The
prophets should tell us how to overcome these?” he said,
“leaving mourners
in stitches” according to the Herald.
This is clearly a
Damascene experience for Mugabe who in 2007 was duped by
“diesel n’anga”,
Rotina Mavhunga’s claims she had powers to extract diesel
from a
rock.
Mugabe personally chaired meetings to discuss the issue, setting up
a
taskforce packed with government ministers to investigate. The taskforce
included Zanu PF secretary for administration Didymus Mutasa, Defence
minister Sydney Sekeramayi and Home affairs co-minister Kembo
Mohadi.
The team is reported to have camped in Chinhoyi for close to a
fortnight,
but strangely they did not detect that Mavhunga, with a Grade
three
education, was a fraud. They accompanied her to rocks in Chinhoyi to
perform
rituals hoping refined diesel would pour out of the rocks. Mavhunga
was
pampered like a true “African Queen” and was allocated a farm, two head
of
cattle and three buffaloes, a car and received billions of Zimdollars for
her upkeep.
Mugabe later ordered her arrest claiming the taskforce
had been blinded by
Mavhunga’s “beauty”.
Civilian
bureaucrat
Retired Col Tshinga Dube says he wants to dispel rumours
soldiers are being
deployed in most key economic positions in the country.
“This is not true,”
he said. Contradicting himself he proceeded to ask: “Who
is not a soldier
and what is wrong with being a soldier? Is the president
not a soldier?”
Mugabe led guerrilla warfare during the liberation
struggle, he said. “How
could you lead guerrilla warfare if you are not a
soldier?”
Dube evidently has a short memory. Edgar Tekere in his book A
Lifetime of
Struggle gives a detailed account of Mugabe’s attempts to lead
the struggle
in the teeth of resistance from the military commanders in the
field. In
Mozambique, Mugabe and Tekere were under virtual house
arrest.
“I then taught him how to handle weapons,” Tekere recalls, “and
to keep them
always within reach. “Yes, up to that time he had not learnt to
use a
weapon.”
“There were other examples of his lack of appetite for
war,” Tekere noted.
They had difficulty getting him into uniform. Inspecting
the graves after
the Chimoio massacre, he was conspicuous without a
uniform.
“Here he was, surrounded by the rest of us dressed in our
military attire,
wearing a suit,” Tekere recounted. “It was most
incongruous.”
“Tongogara and I decided he must have a uniform and
arranged for one to be
made for him but somehow this never happened. He was
really a civilian
bureaucrat. He would sit in his office waiting to receive
military briefings
from me and never took the initiative himself unless
pushed. He did not know
how to salute.” Ndabaningi Sithole described him as
a good civil
administrator.
So Col Dube there you are. No more
misleading claims please!
Partisan military
As for his claim that
it is not true that the military are being deployed in
key economic
positions in the country, we need to recall the following
appointments:
Justice George Chiweshe, formerly ZDF Judge Advocate; Air
Commodore Mike
Karakadzai , National Railways of Zimbabwe general manager;
Albert Mandizha,
general manager, GMB and Brigadier-General Gibson
Mashingaidze; not
forgetting of course Brigadier-General Douglas
Nyikayaramba, formerly Chief
elections officer of the Electoral Supervisory
Commission who has expressed
a strong commitment to Zanu PF and is among
those threatening to block
Morgan Tsvangirai’s admission to State House
should he win the elections,
among others.
As for what is “wrong” with any of this, the obvious point
to make is that
in a country purporting to be a democracy, the military
should not interfere
in civilian administration and must reflect the
constitution and laws.
This is elementary stuff. How can soldiers say
they will block Tsvangirai
admission to State House and thereby refuse to
recognise the outcome of a
democratic election?
What is the point of
holding elections if the military supported by the
Justice minister and Zanu
PF spokesman seek to predetermine the outcome?
‘Youth’
levy
FINALLY Saviour Kasukuwere’s Indigenisation ministry says it is
calling for
the introduction of a youth levy in the forthcoming national
budget despite
poorly administering the disbursement of funds allocated to
community share
ownership trusts.
We recently carried a story which
revealed the wrangle pitting Kasukuwere’s
and the Local Government
ministries as well as the National Indigenisation
and Economic Empowerment
Board.
These three, it was revealed, are fighting among themselves and at
times
conniving to loot funds contributed by companies that have complied
with the
indigenisation laws, leaving the intended beneficiaries once again
out of
the equation.
As if Zimbabweans are not being taxed enough,
Kasukuwere has forwarded the
US$15 million budget proposal to fund
“vocational training programmes”.
Forewarned is forearmed!
