Zim Online
Wed 2 November 2005
HARARE - Former top presidential
guard Winston Changara has told an
internal police investigation team that
President Robert Mugabe's wife,
Grace, lied against him so he could be fired
and blocked from exposing her
alleged extra-marital affairs, authoritative
sources said.
Changara, until about five weeks ago the head of the
police Close
Protection Unit and Mugabe's number one bodyguard was demoted
allegedly
after Grace complained to her husband that the trusted police
guard had made
advances on her and that he had also indecently assaulted
her.
The top policeman was demoted from his rank of assistant
commissioner
and banished to the police commissioner's pool, an internal
facility to
punish and frustrate errant senior officers.
But
sources at police headquarters in Harare told ZimOnline that
Changara two
weeks ago told a committee of senior police officers that Grace
had lied
against him because she wanted him removed from near Mugabe after
he had
threatened to let the President know of her alleged extra-marital
affairs
with an exiled Zimbabwean businessman and a serving government
minister.
The internal police committee headed
by deputy police commissioner
responsible for human resources, Barbra
Mandizha, was appointed by Police
Commissioner Augustine Chihuri to
interrogate Changara before a formal board
of inquiry could be set up to
carry out a more detailed probe into the
allegations against the former
presidential guard.
A source, privy to the deliberations of
Mandizha's committee, said:
"He plainly told them that he was being fixed by
the First Lady because he
had threatened to spill the beans and let the
President know of her affairs.
"Changara said Grace wanted him
removed from near Mugabe because this
was the only way to make sure he would
never be close enough to her husband
to tell him that she was seeing other
men."
Both Mandizha and police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena were not
available
to take questions on the matter while a woman in Grace's office,
Mavis
Gumbo, referred all questions to the First Lady's spokesman Lawrence
Kamwi
who could not be reached when ZimOnline called his
office.
Changara, who has refused to speak about his demotion
before, again
refused to do so when contacted by ZimOnline. He said: "I have
told you many
times before that I do not want to discuss that issue. Only my
seniors can
do that, why don't you phone them?"
According to
sources, Changara told the police committee that he had
only threatened to
expose Grace because he feared Mugabe's wrath were the
President to find out
his wife's alleged affairs on his own and the fact
that his long-serving
bodyguard knew about such affairs but kept quiet.
Mandizha's
committee is said to have been overwhelmed by Changara's
claim that the
committee is now planning another meeting with the former
guard at which
Chihuri will be present "to hear for himself what Changara
has to say,"
according to sources.
Changara was demoted as Mugabe's top
bodyguard after Grace allegedly
told her husband before the couple were to
leave for China last July that
she was not going to board the same plane
with the police guard because he
had made advances on her and also
indecently assaulted her.
A replacement guard, Arthur Makanda, who
was commander of police in
Harare district, had to be called to take over
Changara's duties after Grace
allegedly insisted that she would not be part
of the entourage to Beijing if
Changara was not removed.
After
his demotion Changara was immediately placed in the
commissioner's pool
where he has remained after reportedly turning down
advice by fellow senior
officers to simply accept his fate and quietly
retire from the police
force.
Senior officers placed in the commissioner's pool are
immediately
stripped of benefits such as the privilege to have a police
vehicle for
personal use, telephones or even an office. The disgraced senior
officers
are also made to perform menial tasks such as cleaning toilets and
often
under the supervision of junior officers.
Chihuri is now
said to be planning to save him from further punishment
by reassigning him
to a provincial command post, away from the Mugabes,
according to sources. -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Wed 2 November 2005
HARARE - President Robert
Mugabe's long cherished dream of one party
rule in Zimbabwe may well become
a reality if the country's bickering main
opposition Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) party breaks up, analysts
told ZimOnline on
Tuesday.
They said political gains made in the past six years since
the MDC's
formation would vanish in the aftermath of a splitting of the
opposition
party that appeared imminent on Monday this week after last ditch
talks of
its top six leaders to end sharp differences over whether to
contest next
month's election flopped.
Chairman of the
University of Zimbabwe's (UZ) political studies
department, Eldred
Masunungure, said a splintering of the MDC would be a
"great leap backwards"
sure to see Zimbabweans losing many of their already
whittled down civil and
political liberties.
"The ZANU PF dream of a one party state may
well become a reality but
it will be a dark day (when the MDC splits) for
Zimbabwean politics and a
great leap backwards in terms of all dimensions of
development," said the
respected Masunungure.
Masunungure said
despite its obvious structural and ideological
weaknesses, the MDC had since
its emergence onto the political scene in 1999
shaken Mugabe's government
forcing a redrawing of Zimbabwe's political
landscape.
The MDC
was forged out of labour and a variety of civic groups many of
them inspired
to join the party only by one simple goal: to unseat Mugabe
and ZANU PF, in
power since Zimbabwe's independence from Britain in 1980.
The
opposition party came closest to unseating ZANU PF and Mugabe from
power
after narrowly losing a parliamentary election in 2000 and a
presidential
poll two years later. Both polls were however widely dismissed
by the MDC,
Western governments, local and international non-governmental
organisations
as having been heavily rigged by Mugabe.
Observers say despite the
high levels of political violence witnessed
in Zimbabwe since the MDC's
emergence, the country had far more gained from
a strong opposition that for
five years kept Mugabe's government at bay and
preventing it from fiddling
with the constitution.
Although the government eventually bulldozed
some controversial pieces
of legislation in Parliament this year, the MDC is
credited with ushering in
a new culture of vigorous debate last seen in the
1980s.
Breaking up the MDC now into weaker and rival political
formations
would be a "retrogressive step" that would not add value to
society or even
to ZANU PF, said UZ maths lecturer and political
commentator, Heneri
Dzinotyiwei.
"If the MDC collapses, it will
leave a fragmented grouping that will
be too weak to confront ZANU PF and
obviously the ruling party will slacken,
which is how we got into the mess
we had in the 1990s," Dzinotyiwei said.
"The weakening of the MDC will not
add value to society and ZANU PF."
But Masunungure said after the
flopped Monday meeting it appeared less
likely that the opposition party
would be able to patch up widening cracks
at yet another meeting of its
national council scheduled for this Saturday.
"It's highly likely
that the two sides are so deeply polarised that
the possibility of bridging
the divide seems rather remote," said
Masunungure.
Differences
over the senate vote degenerated into public wrangling and
name-calling
after Tsvangirai overruled a narrow vote of the MDC's national
council to
participate in the November 26 election.
Shooting down the 33:31 in
favour of participation vote, Tsvangirai
said there was no point in the MDC
contesting an election certain to be
rigged by Mugabe. The opposition leader
also said the whole senate project
was a waste of resources by a country
that should better be directing all
its energies on fighting hunger
threatening a quarter of its 12 million
people.
But secretary
general Welshman Ncube and the party's other four most
senior leaders
disagreed with Tsvangirai saying that first he had no right
to overrule a
decision of the national council. They also argued that it was
not wise for
the MDC to surrender political space to Mugabe and ZANU PF by
boycotting the
election.
The wrangle in the opposition has also assumed an ethnic
dimension,
with Tsvangirai, a Shona, backed by mainly Shona-speaking
provinces and
Ncube, an Ndebele, getting more solid support from the
southern region home
of the Ndebele people. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Wed 2 November 2005
HARARE - The Zimbabwe government on
Tuesday rejected criticism by
United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan
accusing the UN chief of playing
politics when he publicly censured Harare
for refusing an aid offer from the
world body.
Powerful State
Security Minister Didymus Mutasa, who also oversees
food aid distribution,
said Annan should not seek to "take a small issue (of
aid to Zimbabwe) into
the international arena". The Secretary General should
simply visit Zimbabwe
to see for himself that the crisis-hit southern
African country did not need
his help, Mutasa said.
"Annan is the one saying that (Zimbabweans
need food aid) not because
he wants to assist but for political reasons,"
Mutasa told ZimOnline.
He added: "We take very strong exception to
such behaviour. He (Annan)
was invited here but why didn't he come? If he
intends to help why does he
have to shout from New York? The invitation
still stands and he should not
be shouting from the top of his voice from
that distance."
Annan was in July invited by President Robert
Mugabe to visit Zimbabwe
to see for himself that a controversial slum
clearing operation by the
Harare government had not left hundreds of
thousands of people homeless as
stated in a report prepared by UN envoy Anna
Tibaijuka.
The UN chief has indicated he might visit Zimbabwe but
has not said
when exactly that might be.
Mugabe's government,
which has sought to portray its slum demolition
exercise that took place
amid severe food and fuel shortages as an urban
renewal campaign, says it is
building new housing for those displaced in the
operation that ended in late
July.
Tibaijuka's report, also rejected by Harare, says the home
demolition
campaign left 700 000 people without shelter or means of
livelihood and that
a further 2.4 million people were also affected in
varying degrees.
Annan in a statement released by his Press office
on Monday said he
was concerned by the humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe
and voiced concern
that Harare had turned down a UN offer for aid for
victims of its slum
removal campaign.
"The United Nations
continues to receive reports that tens of
thousands of people are still
homeless and in need of assistance, months
after the eviction campaign began
in May 2005," Annan's statement read in
part.
The UN boss said
he was particularly "dismayed" to learn that
Zimbabwean authorities had
rejected offers of assistance claiming that
government interventions had
addressed the most urgent shelter needs.
He noted that Harare's
decision to decline UN help came despite
extensive consultations on relief
efforts in the past months between the
world body and the
government.
"Meanwhile, the impending rainy season threatens to
worsen the living
conditions of the affected population," said Annan, who
also appealed to
Harare to "ensure that those who are out in the open,
without shelter and
without means of sustaining their livelihoods, are
provided with
humanitarian assistance."
In addition to the tens
of thousands left without homes or food by the
home demolition campaign,
Zimbabwe was already struggling to find food for
an estimated quarter of its
12 million people after a poor harvest last
season. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Wed 2 November
2005
HARARE - Zimbabwe's Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) yesterday
said 16
white farmers were since last month forcibly evicted from the farms
as a
fresh wave of farm invasions spreads across the country.
Only a handful of the more than 4 000 large-scale producing white
farmers
are still on the land in Zimbabwe after President Robert Mugabe
expelled
many of them and parceled out their land to landless black
villagers.
"Sixteen commercial farmers have left their
properties since September
and the situation is worrying," the CFU said and
added that several other
farmers were also in the process of winding up
operations before leaving
their properties targeted for acquisition by
mostly senior government
officials.
The farmers' body said farm
seizures had been concentrated in parts of
the prime farming province of
Manicaland where State Security Minister
Didymus Mutasa, Agriculture
Minister Joseph Made and Justice Minister
Patrick Chinamasa are said to have
toured the province advising white
farmers to leave.
The three
ministers could not be reached for comment on the matter
yesterday. But
Mutasa, who oversees land redistribution, has in the past
said he wanted to
seize more white farms to ensure every black Zimbabwean
had land ahead of
the rainy season set to start in less than two weeks time.
The
latest spate of farm seizures flies in the face of calls by
Reserve Bank of
Zimbabwe governor Gideon Gono to stop the seizures to allow
the key
agricultural sector to recover after five years of continuous
decline.
Revival of the agricultural sector, the economy's
biggest hard cash
earner, is key to efforts to resuscitate Zimbabwe's ailing
economy as well
as ending food shortages that have become routine in the
country since the
farm invasions began in 2000. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Wed 2 November 2005
NEW YORK - The United Nations
Secretary-General Koffi Annan remains
deeply concerned by the humanitarian
situation in Zimbabwe.
Annan said in a statement by his
spokesperson, that the United Nations
continues to receive reports that tens
of thousands of people are still
homeless and in need of assistance, months
after the eviction campaign began
in May 2005.
"He is
particularly dismayed to learn that the Government of
Zimbabwe's Ad-Hoc
Inter-Ministerial Cabinet Committee has rejected offers of
UN assistance,"
Anna's spokesperson said.
"In an official communication, the
Minister of Local Government,
Public Works and Urban Development stated that
there is no longer a
compelling need to provide temporary shelter as there
is no humanitarian
crisis. The Minister, in the same communication, also
claims that Government
interventions have addressed the most urgent shelter
needs," the
spokesperson said.
The Local government minister
Ignatious Chombo's statements directly
contradict the report by the
Secretary-General's Special Envoy on Human
Settlements Issues in Zimbabwe,
Anna Tibaijuka, as well as most recent
reports from the United Nations and
the humanitarian community.
A large number of vulnerable groups,
including the recent evictees as
well as other vulnerable populations,
remain in need of immediate
humanitarian assistance, including shelter.
Furthermore there is no clear
evidence that subsequent Government efforts
have significantly benefited
these groups, said the
spokesperson.
'The Secretary-General notes the government's
decision to decline
assistance comes despite extensive consultations on
relief efforts that
ensued in the past months between the United Nations and
the Government.
Meanwhile the impending rainy season threatens to worsen the
living
conditions of the affected population," the spokesperson
said.
The Secretary-General is disturbed by the continued suffering
and
makes a strong appeal to the Government of Zimbabwe to ensure that those
who
are out in the open, without shelter and without means of sustaining
their
livelihoods, are provided with humanitarian assistance in
collaboration with
the United Nations and the humanitarian community in
order to avert a
further deterioration of the humanitarian
situation.
News24
02/11/2005 07:13 -
(SA)
United Nations - Britain's Prince Charles appealed to the
United Nations on
Tuesday to help Zimbabwe, which he said was undergoing "a
traumatic
experience."
It was a rare political statement from the
heir to the British throne, who
is obviously concerned about Zimbabwe's
worst economic crisis since
independence from Britain in 1980 and its impact
on millions of people.
The seizure of white-owned farms five years ago by
the government of
increasingly autocratic President Robert Mugabe led to the
collapse of
agriculture, once the mainstay of one of the strongest economies
in the
region. UN experts say four million people urgently need relief food
to
survive until the next harvest in Zimbabwe though Mugabe disputes the
figure.
Charles mentioned Zimbabwe during a visit to UN headquarters
to attend a
round-table on youth employment. He began his speech saying he
was delighted
to help mark the United Nations' 60th anniversary and stressed
how the world
body's role had changed since it was founded on the ashes of
World War 2.
"The challenges confronting the United Nations today are, of
course, very
different than to those faced in the aftermath of World War 2
and during the
Cold War - problems such as the proliferation of extremism
and civil
conflicts, the rapid spread of disease, climate change and the
unsustainable
use of the planet's finite resources," Charles told about 200
business
leaders.
"All these things clearly have to be addressed if
our children and
grandchildren are to enjoy this world in the way that we
have been able to
do, and I believe the United Nations has a very crucial
role to play in all
this," he said.
"And while saying that, I wonder,
too, what extra role the United Nations
might be able to play with regard to
a country, for instance, like Zimbabwe
whose independence celebrations I
officiated at on behalf of the queen over
20 years ago and which is now
undergoing such a traumatic experience,"
Charles said.
For several
months, the United Nations has been trying to agree with
Mugabe's government
on an appeal for funds to help hundreds of thousands of
people evicted in a
massive slum clearance earlier this year.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan,
who sat beside Charles at the round-table, has
indicated a willingness to
visit Zimbabwe to focus on implementation of
recommendations by UN envoy
Anna Tibaijuka in July.
She visited Zimbabwe and reported that about 700
000 people lost their homes
or jobs, and a further 2.4 million people were
affected by the slum
clearance campaign.
Zimbabwean officials have
said her numbers are exaggerated.
People's Daily
Confederation of African Football (CAF)
have accepted the bid of the
Zimbabwe Football Association (Zifa) to host
the 2010 African Cup of Nations
finals.
Zifa chairman Rafik
Khan said on Monday that the fact that CAF have
accepted their bid document
and all its contents was an indication that
Zimbabwe could be given the
right to host the continent's football showcase.
"The race is now
on. I am confident the tournament will come to
Zimbabwe. CAF will now be
watching us closely as we prepare to host this
tournament. As we play
international friendly matches as preparations for
the African Cup of
Nations finals in Egypt next year we would be aware that
CAF are monitoring
our every step," said a delighted Khan.
Other countries which have
submitted their bids to host the tournament
include Namibia, Angola,
Senegal, Nigeria, Libya, and Mozambique. Gabon and
the Equatorial Guinea
weighed in with a joint bid.
The tournament which has been rotated
among the west and north African
countries look set to be hosted by a
southern African country this time
around.
The last time
southern Africa hosted the continental football showcase
was in 1996 in
South Africa.
But among the southern African countries bidding to
host the
sixteen-team competition, Zimbabwe look favorites as they are
likely to get
sympathy from CAF after they were stripped of the right at the
last minute
in 2000 with the football mother body citing lack of
preparedness and a
government guarantee.
If Zimbabwe wins the
bid, Khan and his fellow board members at Zifa
will have achieved what their
predecessors failed since independence.
The same leadership etched
its name into the history books by becoming
the first to lead Zimbabwe to
their first ever Nations Cup finals appearance
in Tunisia.
An
evaluation committee from CAF will visit all the bidding countries
in 2006
to assess the facilities presented in their bids and then report
back to the
CAF executive committee.
The 13-member executive committee will
choose the host country or
countries in May next year.
Source:
Xinhua
New Zimbabwe
By Staff
Reporter
Last updated: 11/02/2005 10:47:43
JUST a week after having his
farm seized by the government, President Robert
Mugabe's nephew and Makonde
legislator, Leo Mugabe, has invaded another farm
in Mashonaland West
province.
Mugabe's 3 000-hectare Journey End farm was confiscated by the
government
last week after government inspectors failed to detect farming
activity on
it.
But with hardly a week gone by, Mugabe invaded the
Nangadza Farm, displacing
a white farmer, according to government
sources.
"He is currently staying on the farm," a source
said.
"Last week he tried to run over the owner with a tractor. The
farmer was
injured and the matter reported to Mhangura
police."
Mugabe confirmed Tuesday that he was staying at the farm but
asked to be
called at a later time. Calls to his mobile phone had not been
returned last
night..
Mugabe, also chairman of the Parliamentary
Portfolio Committee on Transport
and Communication, is a former chairman of
the Zimbabwe Football
Association. His mother, Sabina, is President Mugabe's
sister.
Mugabe is currently on bail on charges of contravening the Grain
Marketing
Board (GMB) Act as well as the Customs and Excise Duty for
allegedly
exporting wheat to Mozambique.
Mugabe, a quiet but highly
influential figure, is regarded as one of the
wealthiest people in Zimbabwe.
The multiple farm owner has previously been
accused of high-level corruption
and violating the law with impunity.
New Zimbabwe
By
Staff Reporter
Last updated: 11/02/2005 10:38:09
MARAUDING Zanu PF
supporters have for the second day running barred
Chitungwiza Mayor Misheck
Shoko, council officials and workers from entering
their offices demanding
the mayor's immediate resignation.
The ruling party supporters allege
that Shoko, who was elected into office
in
2002, has failed to address
the problem of the town's erratic water
supplies,
non collection of
refuse and blocked sewer pipes.
On Tuesday, armed riot police had to be
summoned to break up the
demonstration.
The police also forcibly
opened council gates to facilitate a visit to the
offices by two ministers,
Ignatius Chombo and Kembo Mohadi heading the Local
Government and Home
Affairs portfolios.
The two later met acting Town Clerk Amos Matanhike,
and at their meeting
they resolved that Shoko and all council employees must
be allowed back.
It was not clear yet if the Zanu PF supporters would
allow them back
Wednesday.
Matanhike described the demonstrators,
some of them carrying placards with
the message "Shoko 100 percent
sewerage", as vicious.
"The demonstrators were very vicious. They could
not allow anyone to enter
the premises for two days. It is unfortunate that
we are being caught up in
a political wave. The problems we are facing are
beyond our control," he
told New Zimbabwe.com.
"For example we do not
have fuel to carry refuse, and that's not a
Chitungwiza issue but a national
problem."
He added that foreign currency was needed to buy sewer
pipes.
One resident who spoke on condition of anonymity said it was
surprising that
when dispersing the demonstrators the police had used kids
gloves when
compared to their brutality when dealing with National
Constitutional
Assembly or MDC protests.
Two weeks ago, MDC
supporters repelled the demonstrators when they staged a
similar protest.
The two sides were involved in running battles that saw one
MDC supporter
being arrested.
Traditionally, demonstrations against mayors elected on
MDC tickets have
been used as excuses by Chombo to either suspend or fire
them. Currently,
Mutare mayor Misheck Kagurabadza is on suspension after
Zanu PF supporters
demonstrated him on countless occasions.
Mudzuri
was also suspended and subsequently fired after going through the
same
process.
Last year, the supporters went to the extent of locking
Kagurabadza in his
offices for hours without food or water. The
demonstrators have often done
so without seeking police clearance, as is the
case with others.
The Herald
The Civil Aviation Authority of Zimbabwe (CAAZ) has embarked on an
estimated
Z$1 trillion airport development and rehabilitation programme
aimed at
upgrading local airports.
CAAZ acting chief executive Mr
David Chawota said the current harsh economic
environment and resource
limitations were, however, affecting progress,
causing delays in the
completion of some of the projects.
In a bid to meet international
standards and ever continuing changes in the
industry, about $120 billion
had been set aside for the Harare International
Airport rehabilitation
programme and about $3 billion for the Harare
domestic terminal.
Mr
Chawota said they expected to complete the international airport by
November
next year, with 60 percent of the project having been completed so
far.
In Bulawayo, the Joshua Mqabuko International Airport,
previously scheduled
for completion this year, would be finished by mid next
year.
A total of $150 billion would be spent on the Buffalo Range Airport
in
Chiredzi, with works on the site having begun earlier this year, Mr
Chawota
said.
The airport is envisaged to serve international traffic
coming to the Great
Limpopo Tranfrontier Park (GTLP).
The development
of the airport, which can accommodate the MA60 and a Boeing
737, is
scheduled for completion in 2007.
Kariba Airport has also had a facelift
under the programme, Mr Chawota said.
While he could not avail any
figures, he said plans to construct a new
terminal at the Grand Reef Airport
in Mutare were at an advanced stage.
"CAAZ will continue to play its role
in destination marketing in conjunction
with other stakeholders," he
said.
"Macroeconomic factors are affecting the development and progress
but the
major limitation is the lack of resources." - New Ziana.
The Herald
By Zvamaida
Murwira
Government yesterday dissolved the National Railways of Zimbabwe
(NRZ) board
with immediate effect citing non-performance and failure to
steer the
turnaround of the parastatal.
Addressing a Press conference
in Harare, the Minister of Transport and
Communications, Mr Christopher
Mushohwe - who did not mince his words - said
Government was not satisfied
with the way the board has been running the
parastatal.
Mr Samuel
Geza chaired the dismissed board while Mr James Maphosa was the
vice-chairperson.
The other board members included Dr Ruth Labode,
Mrs Martha Rukuni and Mr
Aaron Munzava.
A new board will be announced
soon. Until then, the ministry's permanent
secretary, Engineer George Mlilo,
would oversee the affairs of the
parastatal.
The Deputy Director of
Procurement in the Ministry of Defence, Air Commodore
Mike Tichafa
Karakadzai, has been appointed substantive general manager with
immediate
effect.
He replaces Mr Munesu Munodawafa who left in June this year to
take up the
post of Principal Director in Vice President Joice Mujuru's
office.
"In terms of the National Railways of Zimbabwe Act a minister may
require
the board members to vacate office if he is not satisfied with it
and the
NRZ board is dissolved with immediate effect and a new board will be
in
place soon," said Mr Mushohwe.
The minister said the board had
failed to implement the turnaround strategy
approved by Cabinet early this
year, which would have transformed the
fortunes of the
parastatal.
"To be honest, I have not been happy with the way the NRZ has
been run. It
was my expectation and that of Government, too, that the
adoption of the
document would see tangible results in turning around NRZ,"
said Mr
Mushohwe.
"The speed at which the board was implementing the
turnaround strategies was
not up to expectations."
The minister said
apart from its core business as a railway transporter, the
NRZ owned several
properties including houses and farms. However, the board
not only charged
unrealistic rentals, but failed to collect rents in some
cases.
In
addition, debts owed to NRZ by railway companies in neighbouring
countries
were not followed up, further worsening the parastatal's cashflow
position,
the minister charged.
All this was happening at a time when NRZ was
failing to procure spare parts
and fuel, Mr Mushohwe noted.
The
parastatal, said the minister, needed people of vision to ensure the
turnaround of NRZ and the economy as a whole.
"I want to see a
transparent board that respects good corporate governance
and does not
bicker over little and trivial issues at the expense of the NRZ
and the
people of Zimbabwe," he said.
"We are busy importing grain and fuel and
NRZ must deliver these commodities
where they are required expeditiously,"
he said.
"We believe that the new team, especially the new general
manager . . . will
be (able) to restructure the parastatal into a viable
commercial entity
responsive to the needs and expectations of the people of
Zimbabwe. The
turnaround cannot be implemented without recapitalising the
NRZ as the
wagons and locomotives have outlived their
lifespan."
However, the minister acknowledged that the board was not
entirely to blame
for some of the problems dogging the
parastatal.
For example, of the NRZ's 6 000 wagons, only 3 000 were in
good working
condition, while the rest were grounded, the minister
said.
The parastatal was expected to receive 10 locomotives from China
following a
deal signed with a Chinese company recently.
The minister
also expressed confidence in Air Commodore Karakadzai, who
holds two
master's degrees - one of them in strategic management - and
several
diplomas and certificates in accounting.
"He is an ex-combatant and has
the right political ideology that serves no
self but the people of
Zimbabwe," he said.
The NRZ board was initially set up as a commission to
look into the Dete
train disaster that claimed several lives before it was
constituted into a
board in January last year following the expiry of the
term of office of the
then incumbent board.
The parastatal has been
plagued by numerous problems in recent years
including lax timetables, a
spate of fatal accidents, obsolete equipment,
acrimonious labour disputes
and delays in remitting pension contributions,
among other
challenges.
New York Times
By
MICHAEL WINES
Published: November 2, 2005
CHIKWAWA, Malawi - It has barely
rained for a year, the scant corn harvest
of six months ago is long
exhausted and the regional hospital here is again
filling with near-starving
children - 18 admissions in August, 30 in
September, 23 by
mid-October.
Dola Sandram has come to a feeding center in Chikwawa,
Malawi, to register
her 2-year-old, Fredson, left. Such centers report a
sharp increase in the
number of children being brought in on the edge of
malnutrition.
And what people here routinely call the hunger season - the
season with no
corn - has barely begun.
"We used to have six, seven
children in the unit," said Emily Sarina, the
district nursing officer. "We
expect the number to increase by December,
because that's when the hunger is
critical."
Malawi is the epicenter of Africa's second hunger crisis in
five months, and
the second in which the developed world has responded with
painful slowness.
Drought is only the surface explanation for why
millions of Malawians and
other southern Africans are hungry. The real
reason is poverty, aggravated
by regional shortages and even Hurricane
Katrina, which have helped drive up
the price of corn, the regional staple,
to more than double last year's.
As a result, more than 4.6 million of
Malawi's 12 million citizens need
donated food to fend off malnutrition
until the next harvest begins in
April. In Zimbabwe, at least four million
more need emergency food aid.
Zambia's government has issued an urgent
appeal for food, saying 1.7 million
are hungry; 850,000 need food in
Mozambique, 500,000 in Lesotho and at least
300,000 in Swaziland.
The
World Food Program, which will feed most of the needy, has asked the
developed world for $400 million toward that goal. It remains $165 million
short.
The United States' contribution, $48 million worth of corn
bought from
American farmers, comes by ship and will not arrive until late
this year at
the earliest.
Much like July's crisis on southern
Niger's narrow band of grasslands, the
food shortage in southern Africa is
taking its toll. Growing malnutrition
has led to scattered reports of
disease-related deaths among young children
weakened by hunger.
That
said, problems here are not yet as acute as they are in Niger, where
thousands of malnourished children still flock to treatment centers, months
after international aid began arriving.
This region's emergency,
however, is far larger - more than 12 million
hungry people, versus 2.5
million in Niger. And if the death toll is likely
not to be as high, the
suffering here is no less real.
"I went to a village today in rural
Zambia where there was a lady eating
some kind of bark, in boiled water,"
Michael Huggins, the World Food
Program's regional spokesman, said in a
telephone interview. "In three years
in southern Africa, I've heard a lot
about that sort of thing. But I'd never
seen it until today."
In
Chikwawa, a district of about 400,000 in southern Malawi, half the
population was already hungry in May, when the last harvest netted only
about two-fifths of the nation's corn requirement. The British charity Oxfam
estimated then that the district's needy were getting about 30 percent of
their food requirements.
Six months later, many are calling this
Malawi's worst hunger crisis since
1993, when drought destroyed nearly half
of the corn crop. "At this point,
most of the households in Malawi have run
out of food, particularly in the
south," Schuyler Thorup, the Malawi
representative for Catholic Relief
Services, said in a telephone interview.
"They're having to rely exclusively
on the market" for corn and other staple
foods.
But few can afford to pay market prices. Just 500 miles south of
Malawi,
South Africa is sitting atop a surplus of five million metric tons
of corn
from this year's bumper harvest. But it is mostly out of reach for
both
Malawi's government and its people, 60 percent of whom survive on a
dollar a
day or less.
The same is true of most of Malawi's needy
neighbors. War wrecked
Mozambique's economy; socialism and plunging copper
prices reduced Zambia to
penury; Zimbabwe's economy collapsed after the
government seized its richest
farms, which were owned by whites.
In
Malawi, 20 years of shifting political rule and economic policies have
turned an already poor nation into a basket case. The AIDS pandemic - the
rate of infection is about 15 percent among all adults, but perhaps 25
percent in Chikwawa - has cut down family breadwinners and left 900,000
children without one or both parents.
Most Malawians survive on plots
of a couple of acres, often lacking even
oxen for plowing. Irrigation is
unheard of, leaving them dependent on good
rains for
survival.
Lately, rains have been spotty. There were severe hunger crises
in 2002 and
2003, and this year's disaster was brought on when good rains in
late 2004
dried up in 2005, just as the corn crop was ripening.
But
even in good years, Malawians are incapable of feeding themselves. A
recent
report by the United States Agency for International Development said
the
nation "is now in a near constant state of food shortage, with
persistently
high levels of nutritional deprivation." Most Malawians cannot
finance even
a minimally adequate diet. Half of all children are stunted -
and 40 percent
of those are severely stunted, the marker of deep, prolonged
malnutrition.
Corn prices are at the root of this year's crisis. In
the past, after most
poor harvests, Malawians have bought cheap corn from
traders in Mozambique,
Zambia or Zimbabwe. This year's spotty rains caused a
regional shortage,
driving up prices in Malawi's markets. In mid-October
last year, a kilogram
of maize in Chikwawa, 2.2 pounds, cost about 13 cents.
This year, it cost
nearly 32 cents.
Even Hurricane Katrina has worsened
matters. When the storm closed New
Orleans to shipping, depriving Japan of
its normal source of corn, the
Japanese turned to South Africa, and in weeks
the price of South African
corn in Malawi jumped nearly 20
percent.
For months, the charities and international donor groups that
effectively
keep Malawi afloat operated on "Scenario 1," projecting that
corn prices
would remain affordable for most, and that the destitute would
need only
272,000 metric tons of donated corn.
Donors have pledged
almost that much. But now, with prices skyrocketing, the
number of Malawians
who cannot afford food is rising as well.
"Scenario 2" calls for finding
413,000 metric tons of donated food, at
considerably higher
prices.
Especially in the south, where harvests were the worst, high
prices have
brought growing malnutrition and sometimes unrest at sites where
donors try
to distribute too little food to too many desperate
people.
A recent visit to the rehabilitation center at the regional
hospital in
Chikwawa City, a hub of about 10,000 people, made it clear
why.
Camped on the sidewalk in the unit's square courtyard, 29-year-old
Samson
Hanock watched his 2-year-old son, Ben, while his wife, Ester, 20,
cradled
their newborn son, born at the unit in September. Ben was brought
there from
Mtobwe village, about two hours distant, with malnutrition and
severe
anemia.
Mr. Hanock is a gardener. Working six days a week,
four weeks a month,
brings a salary of $6.65, from which his employer
deducts $5.85 to buy the
Hanocks a 110-pound bag of corn meal.
Mr.
Hanock spends the remaining 80 cents on sugar. "I bake some sweets that
I
ask my wife to sell," he said. "And with that, we get some money to buy
soap
and other things."
Across the courtyard, Severia Karunga looked after
Precia Yaka, a somber
9-year-old orphan from Badueza, 90 minutes away by
car, who had come to the
unit in July with malnutrition, malaria, edema and,
it turned out,
tuberculosis.
Precia's father died four years ago. Her
mother died at 21, a month after
Precia arrived here. Ms. Karunga, Precia's
aunt, now cares for Precia, her
brother and her own seven children. She
lives with her mother, who cares for
two other orphaned children.
"My
husband is divorcing me because he isn't happy that I am caring for this
child," she said, gesturing toward Precia. "He left last
month."
Mother, daughter and 11 children, ages 6 to 18, get by on less
than $50 a
month. Most comes from the $9 weekly salary the mother draws from
a
charity's self-help program. The family has an eight-acre garden, "but
this
year," Ms. Karunga said, "I don't think I will be able to cultivate it,
because I am spending all my time at this hospital."
Nationally,
admissions of malnourished children to Malawi's 95 nutritional
rehabilitation centers were up 15 percent in September from last year.
Continuing increases are all but certain. Most children will spend a few
weeks in rehabilitation, said Ms. Sarina, the district nursing officer.
Then, healthy once more, they will be sent home.
And the cycle will
begin anew.
"The problem," Ms. Sarina said, "is that when they go back,
there's nothing
to depend on."