http://www.hararetribune.com
Tuesday, 14 October 2008
20:12
Zimbabwe MPs have heckled each other during the first working
session of the
new opposition-dominated parliament as negotiators tried to
salvage the
African country's power-sharing agreement.
Riot police
also broke up a demonstration staged by students outside the
legislature.
Witnesses saw at least three students bundled into a police
van. A number of
others were injured in a scuffle and had to be helped to a
nearby clinic.
Police did not comment.
The new 210-seat parliament that met on Tuesday
was the first controlled by
the opposition since Zimbabwe gained
independence from Britain in 1980. At
the official opening ceremonies in
August, many MPs jeered Mr Mugabe.
The speech Mr Mugabe made then was
debated in a lively session, with MPs
heckling each other. Mr Mugabe was not
present.
Speakers addressed the need for the unity government to be
formed so the
country's humanitarian crisis could be addressed.
But
opposition MP Sam Nkomo warned the new government should not be formed
at
"any cost". "There is a need to share power equitably," he said. "We want
to
be genuine partners in this agreement."
The MPs will reconvene on
Wednesday, when legislation will be introduced
which is necessary for the
formation of the new government. The constitution
needs to be changed to
create the post of prime minister, which is supposed
to be filled by Mr
Tsvangirai.
Meanwhile, opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai said that no
agreement had
been reached Tuesday in power-sharing talks with President
Robert Mugabe,
but that negotiations would continue the next
day.
"There was no conclusion to discussions. We will continue tomorrow
at 10:30
am (0830 GMT)," Tsvangirai said as he left a Harare hotel after
more than
seven hours of negotiations led by former South African president
Thabo
Mbeki.
http://www.nytimes.com
By CELIA W. DUGGER
Published: October
14, 2008
JOHANNESBURG - Zimbabwe's military commanders have pressed President
Robert
Mugabe to shield them from prosecution for the violent crackdown on
his
political foes this year, senior government officials say, and his
response
is threatening to derail a power-sharing deal that was supposed to
halt the
country's dizzying downward economic spiral.
Mr. Mugabe's
efforts to placate his generals, as well as senior politicians
in his party
who are disgruntled about their loss of clout, culminated in
his decision
last week to unilaterally claim control of ministries that have
been pivotal
to his 28 years of unbroken political dominance and are seen as
critical to
protecting his senior generals from the risk of being charged
with
crimes.
Mr. Mugabe, 84, signed an agreement on Sept. 15 to share power with
the
political opposition after a brutal election season in which more than
100
opposition supporters were murdered and thousands were beaten - a
campaign
of violence that senior officials in Mr. Mugabe's party said was
organized
by the military.
A collapse of the deal would probably
intensify Zimbabwe's status as an
international pariah, deepen hunger and
poverty, and spark a fresh exodus of
refugees to neighboring countries. Yet
since the agreement was signed, the
country's three senior military
commanders have worried about their fate
under a unity government that
includes the opposition leader, Morgan
Tsvangirai, as prime minister - a man
they deeply distrust, who was himself
viciously beaten by the police last
year - three officials close to Mr.
Mugabe said in recent
interviews.
In addition to his retention of control of the armed forces,
Mr. Mugabe's
insistence on retaining the Home Affairs Ministry, which
oversees a police
force that could potentially investigate and arrest those
responsible for
political violence, threatens to destroy the
deal.
Mr. Tsvangirai told thousands of wildly cheering supporters in
Harare on
Sunday that he would not be part of a deal that did not give his
party
control of the Home and Finance Ministries - and he denounced what he
termed
Mr. Mugabe's power grab.
Thabo Mbeki, the ousted president of
South Africa who brokered the
power-sharing deal, met on Tuesday with Mr.
Mugabe and Mr. Tsvangirai to try
to rescue the accord. But Mr. Mbeki's own
clout is now greatly diminished by
his precipitous fall from power last
month as leader of South Africa, the
regional superpower.
Zimbabwe's
information minister, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, disputed the idea that
the military
commanders feared prosecution. "President Mugabe is commander
in chief of
the armed forces and head of the security ministries," he said.
"There is no
one guilty here. No one is talking about arrests of anyone. The
army is
apolitical."
According to other senior officials in the government,
however, three days
after Mr. Mugabe and Mr. Tsvangirai signed their deal,
Mr. Mugabe huddled
with the inner circle of generals and politicians who run
the country with
him, known as the Joint Operations Command.
Even
without the pressure from his top generals and officials, Mr. Mugabe
may
well have been unwilling to relinquish control of core ministries. But
on
that day, he asked them what they thought of the deal. His military
commanders told him they feared it would leave them vulnerable to
prosecution for their role in organizing the crackdown before the June
runoff election - a crackdown so sweeping that it prompted Mr. Tsvangirai to
quit the race days before it was held, saying none of his supporters should
have to die to vote for him.
"They said it was too risky to leave the
repercussions of such an apparently
brutal operation to chance," said a
Mugabe confidant; that person and two
others who attended the meeting
described what happened on condition that
they not be named because the
deliberations were secret.
Mr. Mugabe and Mr. Tsvangirai, a 56-year-old
former trade union leader, have
developed a surprisingly comfortable
relationship over months of
negotiations, and in the days after the deal was
signed, Mr. Tsvangirai said
the octogenarian leader had complained that he
was getting a lot of
resistance to the deal from within his own
party.
"But if he's getting pressure from his own party, so are we," Mr.
Tsvangirai
said in an interview.
Many of Mr. Tsvangirai's workers and
supporters paid a terrible price for
their political views, in burned homes,
broken bones and flayed bodies. At a
minimum, opposition officials say, the
party's rank and file want a police
force that will protect them from abuse
- and many also want justice for the
wrongs done to them.
The
passions within Mr. Tsvangirai's own party were on display Aug. 26 when
Mr.
Mugabe inaugurated Parliament, where, for the first time since Zimbabwe
gained independence from white minority rule in 1980, the opposition had the
majority. Opposition members, many of whom had been in hiding for months,
shouted over and over, "You are a murderer!" Mr. Mugabe's hands
trembled.
At the rally on Sunday, Mr. Tsvangirai sought to reassure Mr.
Mugabe's party
that the Movement for Democratic Change, the opposition
party, would not
seek retribution. "The guilty are afraid," he said, "but
the M.D.C. means
well."
Still, as the generals are said to have noted,
the 30-page agreement signed
a month ago with great fanfare before heads of
state from across southern
Africa includes no explicit promise of immunity
for political crimes.
The seeds of the current impasse were planted on
the day the deal was
signed. Mr. Tsvangirai put his name to the document,
though he had not yet
reached an understanding about how he and Mr. Mugabe
would divide the
ministries, said an opposition official close to the
confidential talks.
Mr. Mbeki, the mediator, convinced Mr. Tsvangirai
that agreeing to a
framework for governing would build confidence. "It was
to tie Morgan's and
Mugabe's hands together and their feet together until
they realized they
have to cohabitate," the opposition official
said.
The next day, Mr. Mugabe came under withering fire at a meeting of
his party's
politburo for surrendering too much authority, politburo members
said. The
deal was unpopular with both of the main factions in the party:
one led by
Emmerson Mnangagwa, 62, a former security chief who ran Mr.
Mugabe's
campaign for the election runoff; the other led by Joice Mujuru,
53, one of
Mr. Mugabe's two vice presidents, and her husband, Solomon
Mujuru, 59, a
former army commander. The Mujuru camp complained that Mrs.
Mujuru had been
reduced to a figurehead in the deal.
Both factions
saw the agreement as threatening their control over patronage
that they need
to win elections, according to a senior official close to Mr.
Mugabe. And
both were angling for the most powerful jobs from a shrinking
pie of
ministerial appointments. Under the deal, ZANU-PF, Mr. Mugabe's
party, was
entitled to only 15 of the 31 ministries. Politburo members loyal
to Mr.
Mujuru accused Mr. Mugabe of planning to give Mr. Mnangagwa the best
portfolios, as a reward for leading the warlike campaign for Mr. Mugabe's
re-election in the June 27 runoff.
Mr. Mugabe, in turn, blamed
factionalism within the party, and the failure
of party leaders to campaign
vigorously for him, for Mr. Tsvangirai's having
won more votes than he did
in the March general election - sentiments he
repeated a day later, Sept.
17, at a meeting of the party's Central
Committee.
"If only we had
not blundered in the harmonized election, we would not be
facing all this
humiliation," the state-owned newspaper, The Herald, quoted
Mr. Mugabe as
saying, even as he insisted, "We remain in the driving seat."
Mr. Mugabe
got another earful when he met on Sept. 18 with the Joint
Operations
Command, the inner circle.
Opinion within the command was divided on the
deal.
The commissioners of the police and of prisons, Augustine Chihuri
and
Paradzai Zimondi, and the director general of the Central Intelligence
Organization, Happyton Bonyongwe, said the opposition would not want to
violate the spirit of the deal by seeking prosecutions, according to
officials who were present. A senior official close to Mr. Mugabe who
attended the meeting explained that the police were not so worried about
prosecution because their vulnerability stemmed more from negligence - that
they did not stop the violence or arrest its perpetrators. Nor had the
prison services participated directly in the violence. And the intelligence
agents, because they dress in plain clothes, are less
recognizable.
"The C.I.O. agents are faceless," the official said. "The
problem is with
the uniformed forces, because their names are out there with
the people."
But Gen. Constantine Chiwenga, the commander of the Defense
Forces; Lt. Gen.
Philip Sibanda, the army commander; and Air Marshal Perence
Shiri, the air
force commander, said they worried because there had been no
explicit
guarantee of immunity, according to participants in the Sept. 18
meeting.
Spokesmen for the military did not return calls left in their
offices on
Tuesday. Col. Ben Ncube, spokesman for the Zimbabwe Defense
Forces, was
reached on his cellphone, but the line went dead when he was
asked about
General Chiwenga's views on the power-sharing
agreement.
Officials at the military meeting said the military leaders
had reason to be
concerned that there was simply too much evidence of their
role. A list of
200 officers they had deployed across the country to oversee
the
intimidation and beating of opposition supporters - complete with names,
ranks and districts where each one was posted - had been leaked to
journalists and civic groups.
"The real fear is with the army
generals, because their people ran the
runoff campaign," one official
said.
Two journalists contributed reporting from Harare,
Zimbabwe.
SABC
October 14,
2008, 21:00
Zimbabwe's political leaders have emerged from a marathon
meeting expressing
satisfaction with progress made at unlocking a
power-sharing dealock.
President Robert Mugabe says some ground has been
covered in resolving the
impasse over the sharing of cabinet positions.
Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai has also
expressed satisfaction,
saying talks will resume tomorrow.
The leader
of the smaller MDC faction, Arthur Mutambara, says positive
progress has
been made.
Former President Thabo Mbeki is on a make or break mission to
salvage the
shaky power-sharing agreement he brokered last month.
The Times
October 15, 2008
Mugabe is cynically thwarting
the power-sharing agreement with the
Opposition
There can no longer be
any doubt that President Mugabe has no intention of
honouring the deal to
share power with Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the
opposition Movement
for Democratic Change. His acceptance of the formula
negotiated by Thabo
Mbeki, South Africa's former President, appeared purely
tactical - a way of
buying time, alleviating the growing pressure from
Zimbabwe's anxious
neighbours and throwing a sop to the millions of
Zimbabweans outraged at his
Government's electoral fraud and intimidation.
Only now, however, has the
depth of the wily Mr Mugabe's cynicism and
opportunism become clear. He has
refused to cede any power to his opponent,
insisting on keeping the main
ministries for his minority Zanu (PF) party
and retaining control of the
apparatus of intimidation - the police, army
and security agencies - as well
as foreign affairs, mining and land. Mr
Tsvangirai has been offered only the
Finance Ministry, a poisoned chalice
that would give him responsibility,
without any real leverage, for coping
with an inflation rate of some 231
million per cent.
Mr Tsvangirai has rightly decided that this is not
power-sharing but a power
grab, and has refused to conclude an agreement.
Meanwhile, Mr Mbeki arrived
in Harare yesterday in a last-ditch attempt to
rescue the deal that he
mediated a month ago. This time, however, he comes
without the authority of
his country's presidency behind him. There is
little indication that Mr
Mugabe will now pay any attention to his views or
make any concession to his
political rival. The hopes that Zimbabwe might
follow the example of Kenya
and forge out of electoral antagonism a
government of national unity to
avert social breakdown now look rashly
optimistic.
Mr Tsvangirai is in a difficult position. He has on his side
moral
authority, an electoral victory and a majority in the first Zimbabwean
Parliament not to be dominated by Zanu (PF). All that counts as nothing
against the thuggish intimidation, political adroitness and loyalty of the
police and bully-boy "veterans" ready to attack any opponent, which Mr
Mugabe can still command. The would-be prime minister is not helped by his
own lack of political experience and naivety, which the President has
exploited to thwart him. Unilaterally, Mr Mugabe has already appointed two
members of his party as vice-presidents.
Related Links
a..
Police violence stops Zimbabwe demo
The West also faces a dilemma. Should it
encourage Mr Tsvangirai to continue
negotiating and offer him the emergency
aid essential if Zimbabwe is to
escape disaster? The humanitarian arguments
are compelling. Aid agencies say
that five million people, almost half the
population, now face starvation.
Many children in rural areas are sick from
malnutrition. The Harare
Government is indifferent to their fate, and has
done almost nothing to
relieve the suffering apart from allowing a partial
resumption of food aid
by foreign agencies. There is no scope for sanctions
that might add to the
suffering. Zimbabweans should not be punished for Mr
Mugabe's actions.
In the longer term, time is on Mr Tsvangirai's side.
With Mr Mbeki's
resignation, Mr Mugabe has lost his only apologist; Jacob
Zuma would
certainly take a tougher line. Zimbabwe's neighbours are growing
increasingly restless with his intransigence. Unless Mr Mugabe cuts a deal
now, he will soon find he is totally isolated. He and his cronies have the
most to lose.
http://www.zimonline.co.za/
by
Nokuthula Sibanda Wednesday 15 October 2008
HARARE -
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and the opposition failed to
reach
agreement on Tuesday on the formation of a power-sharing government
but said
negotiations will continue today.
"We are continuing tomorrow, we have
not finished," Mugabe told reporters as
he left the Harare Rainbow Towers
hotel where negotiations were taking
place.
The leaders of the two
opposition Movement for Deomcratic Change (MDC)
formations Morgan Tsvangirai
and Arthur Mutambara confirmed the negotiations
that are being facilitated
by former South African President Thabo Mbeki
would resume Wednesday
morning.
"There was no conclusion to discussions. We will continue
tomorrow at 10:30
am," said Tsvangirai, who has threatened to walk away from
the September 15
power-sharing agreement if Mugabe sticks to his decision to
allocate key
government ministries to his ruling ZANU PF
party.
Mutambara said: "We have had a very productive day but our
discussions will
continue tomorrow."
Mbeki returned to Harare on
Monday night on an urgent mission to salvage a
historic power-sharing deal
that he brokered nearly a month ago between
Mugabe and MDC leaders
Tsvangirai and Mutambara.
The deal has looked in danger of failing after
Mugabe last weekend
unilaterally allocated the key ministries of defence,
home and foreign
affairs, information, local government and provisionally
finance to his
ruling ZANU PF before conclusion of negotiations with the
MDC.
Main MDC leader Tsvangirai told supporters last Sunday that he would
quit
the deal if the new efforts by Mbeki to end the impasse over Cabinet
ministries did not yield positive results. Tsvangirai said fresh elections
would have to be called if the power-sharing deal collapsed.
But one
of Mbeki's aides told the media earlier on Tuesday that the former
South
African President was confident he would be able to rescue the
September 15
power-sharing deal. "We are convinced that we should be able in
the end, no
matter how long it takes, to reach a conclusion," the aide said.
Under
the agreement Mugabe will remain president while Tsvangirai becomes
prime
minister and Mutambara deputy prime minister. The agreement allots 15
cabinet posts to ZANU PF, 13 to the Tsvangirai-led MDC and three to
Mutambara's faction.
However it is silent about who gets which
specific posts and the rival
parties have since the signing of the agreement
wrangled over who should
control the important ministries of home affairs,
finance, local government,
foreign affairs.
As Zimbabwe's leaders
bicker over Cabinet positions, an economic crisis
gripping the southern
African country continues to worsen as highlighted by
the latest inflation
figures released by the government's Central
Statistical Office last week
showing annual inflation rocketing to 231
million percent in the month of
July, the highest such rate in the world.
In addition to hyperinflation,
Zimbabweans also have to grapple with acute
shortages of every basic
survival commodity and eight in 10 people are out
of employment. Shortages
of water and electricity are common, burst sewers
flow unchecked in the
country's cities while roads are littered with
potholes. - ZimOnline.
http://www.zimonline.co.za/
by Tendai Maronga
Wednesday 15 October 2008
HARARE - Zimbabwe's opposition MDC
party called for a parliamentary probe
into political violence and for
perpetrators to be brought to justice as
Parliament resumed sitting on
Tuesday.
Senior opposition legislator Sam Sipepa Nkomo told the House of
Assembly
that national healing could be achieved only if there was full
disclosure on
political violence, broaching a sensitive subject that has
potential to
wreck a power-sharing agreement between Zimbabwe's three
biggest political
parties.
Nkomo, who is Member of Parliament for
Lobengula constituency and is home
affairs secretary for the main MDC
formation led by Morgan Tsvangirai, said
there was need for a select
committee of Parliament to investigate the
violence that engulfed Zimbabwe
after March 29 elections won by the
opposition.
"For there to be any
meaningful national healing, there is need for all the
crimes of political
violence to be investigated and all the perpetrators
brought to book," Nkomo
said as he stood to debate a speech by President
Robert Mugabe officially
opening Parliament on August 25.
"Let's not underestimate the violence
that was suffered by the people of
this country," Nkomo said to a Parliament
that appeared as still bitterly
divided as when MDC legislators jeered and
booed Mugabe as he addressed the
house in August.
Touching on the
power-sharing deal between Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF, the MDC
and a breakaway
faction of the opposition led by Arthur Mutambara, Nkomo
said the pact could
only succeed if power was shared equitably amongst the
three
parties.
"For the agreement to succeed, we will have to share power
equitably . . .
it cannot be an inclusive government at any cost," said
Nkomo.
The legislator was speaking as ex-South African President Thabo
Mbeki held
talks at a Harare hotel with Mugabe, Tsvangirai and Mutambara to
resolve an
impasse over sharing of Cabinet positions in a proposed unity
government
that is threatening the power-sharing pact.
But the
abiding differences between Zimbabwe's politicians were on full
display as
ZANU PF legislators ignored Nkomo's pleas for a probe into
political
violence or his calls for equitable power-sharing - taking to the
floor only
to sing praises to Mugabe for agreeing in the first place to
share power
with the MDC.
A ZANU PF legislator, Savior Kasukuwere, reminded the MDC
of a call made by
Mugabe in his speech to Parliament that the country should
put the divisions
of past elections behind in order to move
forward.
"It will help no one to start to open old wounds. Let's put the
past behind
us and move the country ahead," said Kasukuwere, amid heckling
and booing by
MDC legislators.
Mugabe, Tsvangirai and Mutmabara
signed a deal on September 15 to form a
power-sharing government to tackle
Zimbabwe's deepening economic and
political crisis.
Under the
Mbeki-brokered deal Mugabe will remain president while Tsvangirai
becomes
prime minister and Mutambara deputy prime minister. The agreement
allots 15
cabinet posts to ZANU PF, 13 to the Tsvangirai-led MDC and three
to
Mutambara's faction.
However it is silent about who gets which specific
posts and the rival
parties have since the signing of the agreement wrangled
over who should
control the important ministries of home affairs, finance,
local government,
foreign affairs.
The power-sharing pact is also
silent on the potentially divisive question
of how to achieve national
healing while ensuring those who committed
political violence and abused
human rights are brought to justice.
Many of those accused of
masterminding the political violence that the MDC
says killed at least 200
of its members while displacing thousands of others
after the March polls
are senior officials of ZANU PF and top military
commanders loyal to Mugabe.
- ZimOnline
Yahoo News
2 hours,
47 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States on Tuesday accused
Zimbabwe's President
Robert Mugabe of violating a power-sharing deal with
rival Morgan Tsvangirai
by offering key government posts to his own
party.
"President Mugabe apparently overstepped the bounds of that
agreement in
claiming several ministers that were not part of the
power-sharing agreement
that was brokered," State Department spokesman Sean
McCormack told
reporters.
"What we hope is that you get back the
implementation of the agreement that
was struck between the MDC (Movement
for Democratic Change) and President
Mugabe," he added.
Tsvangirai is
the leader of the MDC.
McCormack appeared to doubt Mugabe's intentions
when a reporter asked if the
United States trusted the veteran
leader.
"Well, we'll see," he said. "That's always been the open
question."
Tsvangirai, leaving a Harare hotel after more than seven hours
of
negotiations led by former South African president Thabo Mbeki, said that
no
agreement had been reached Tuesday in power-sharing talks with
Mugabe.
But he added that negotiations would continue the next
day.
Mbeki brokered the agreement reached four weeks ago that called for
84-year-old Mugabe to remain as president while Tsvangirai takes the new
post of prime minister.
The deal had been hailed as a breakthrough in
efforts to end months of
deadly political turmoil and to rescue the nation
from economic ruin.
But Tsvangirai has threatened to pull out of the deal
after Mugabe last
weekend announced he would give his own party the most
important posts in
cabinet.
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=5861
October 14, 2008
HARARE (Reuters)
- Former South African President Thabo Mbeki began
mediation between
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader
Morgan Tsvangirai
on Tuesday to try to rescue a power-sharing pact.
The deal, brokered by
Mbeki last month, is in danger of collapse over
disagreements about cabinet
posts and Tsvangirai, leader of the MDC,
threatened to pull out of it at the
weekend after Mugabe allocated key
ministries to his ZANU-PF
party.
Negotiators for ZANU-PF and the MDC met briefly at a Harare hotel
before the
leaders arrived to meet Mbeki. Arthur Mutambara, who heads a
splinter MDC
faction, is also taking part in the talks.
Mutambara
expressed frustration over the stalled deal.
"The fact that we are here,
bickering over cabinet posts is a travesty of
justice. Mutambara, Mugabe and
Tsvangirai should shape up or ship out," he
told reporters as he
arrived.
Justice minister and ZANU-PF's chief negotiator in the
power-sharing talks,
Patrick Chinamasa, told the state-run Herald that he
hoped Mbeki could offer
new ideas.
"As far as we are concerned, the
only contention is the Ministry of
Finance," he said. Mugabe this weekend
angered the MDC by allocating the
ministries for defence, home affairs -
which oversees the police - and
finance to his ZANU-PF party.
On
Tuesday, Zimbabwe's parliament began sitting for the first time since it
was
officially opened by Mugabe in August amid jeers and boos from MDC
members.
Mugabe's party was stripped of a majority for the first time
since
independence from Britain in 1980 after a March 29 election which the
opposition says he rigged to retain power.
Tsvangirai defeated Mugabe
in a March presidential poll held concurrently.
But he did not have enough
ballots to avoid a June run-off poll, which was
won by Mugabe and condemned
around the world after it was boycotted by
Tsvangirai.
Sharp
differences were evident in parliament, with ZANU-PF lawmakers
praising
Mugabe for agreeing to share power, while their MDC counterparts
said they
could walk away from the deal.
"If we are genuine . we should share power
equitably. It cannot be an
inclusive government at any cost," said MDC
lawmaker Sam Sipepa Nkomo. "We
can't be swallowed and we should not allow
ourselves to be lipstick on
ZANU-PF, a decoration."
Lawmakers are
expected to prioritise a constitutional amendment allowing the
creation of
the prime minister's post, which the power-sharing deal agreed
would be
filled by Tsvangirai.
Nelson Chamisa, an MDC spokesman, said he hoped
Mbeki would break the
cabinet impasse.
"We are still placing our
faith in the efforts of the mediator, and that
ZANU-PF has to be persuaded
that it has to share and not grab power," he
said.
Analysts say that
although the talks look doomed, the rivals are under
pressure to reach a
settlement, although some say Mbeki will have less
leverage in Zimbabwe
after being ousted as South African president by his
own party last
month.
A new government will have to tackle the world's highest inflation
rate of
231 million percent and severe food, fuel and foreign currency
shortages.
Reuters
VOA
By Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
14
October 2008
Newly appointed Governor Martin Dinha of Zimbabwe's
Mashonaland Central
province urged magistrates this week to punish all
perpetrators of political
violence without fear or favor, but members of the
former opposition
Movement for Democratic Change, which won a majority in
parliament this year
in violence-ridden elections, questioned his
sincerity.
Dinha issued the anti-political violence call Monday during
the swearing-in
of a magistrate in Bindura, Feresi Chakanyuka. But his
remarks drew
criticism from local officials of the MDC, which took the brunt
of
post-election violence by militia members and war
veterans.
Many observers accused the ZANU-PF party of President
Robert Mugabe,
re-elected in June in a highly controversial uncontested
election, of
orchestrating the wave of violence which sprang up after Mr.
Mugabe and
ZANU-PF were dealt a stinging defeat in March
elections.
Mashonaland Central MDC officials said Dinha's remarks
insulted those who
lost loved ones and property in violence which reached a
crescendo before
the June 27 presidential run-off election. They said he
knows there will be
no prosecution of those responsible for such deadly
violence so long as
ZANU-PF retains control of the levers of executive
power.
Mashonaland Central was one of the provinces worst hit by
political
violence.
Dinha, a former ZANU-PF mayor of Bindura and head
of the pro-government
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Justice, called on President
Mugabe in May to declare a
state of emergency to safeguard lives and
property amid rising violence he
said the MDC was
perpetrating.
Mashonaland Central Organizing Secretary Gilson Chitakunye
of the MDC
formation led by party founder and prime minister designate
Morgan
Tsvangirai told Jonga Kandemiiri that he does not expect magistrates
to take
Dinha's statement seriously.
VOA
By
Patience Rusere and Brenda Moyo
Washington
14 October
2008
Zimbabweans have been living with food shortages
for years, but the outlook
through the first quarter of next year is more
alarming than ever before.
The National Association of Non-Governmental
Organizations said recently
that a national emergency should be declared -
but for the domestic and
international organizations monitoring and
projecting food security in the
country the emergency is all too well
established.
Despite the dire outlook, aid continues to flow in from
abroad, reported
Patience Rusere of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe.
A
British-based organization has committed 50,000 British pounds to provide
seed to 118 families and three primary schools in the Mberengwa district of
Midlands province.
Christian Aid Africa Specialist Judith Melby
outlined the program to
reporter Brenda Moyo.
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=5857
October 14, 2008
By Our
Correspondent
BULAWAYO - Journalists have allegedly resorted to theft of
assets to make
ends meet amid reports all is not well at the troubled
government newspaper
stable where reporters are on a go-slow in protest over
the late payment of
salaries.
Citing serious financial and viability
problems, management at Zimbabwe
Newspapers (1980) Ltd, has failed to pay
September salaries to its staff at
the Chronicle, Sunday News and the
Ndebele vernacular newspaper, Umthunywa,
in Bulawayo.
Official pay
day at Zimpapers is the 27th of each month. Staff has now gone
for over two
weeks without pay and morale is reported to be very low, as a
result, among
staff at the government's main propaganda outlet in Bulawayo.
The least paid
journalist at The Chronicle earns about $90 000 a month,
enough to buy about
four litres of fuel on the black market.
"Management is issuing
conflicting reports about our September salaries,
either blaming banks for
the late processing of our pay or saying there is
no money at the company,"
said one disgruntled journalist.
Another journalist said: "We are on a
go-slow in protest over the late pay
and most journalists are not reporting
for duty, citing lack of bus-fare.
The Newspapers are now virtually run by
interns.
"Reporters have resorted to pilfering pf company resources to
make ends meet
with various computer components disappearing at an alarming
rate."
It was learnt Trends Magazine, a Bulawayo based monthly
entertainment
magazine published by the company in Bulawayo has ceased
publishing due to
serious financial and viability problems facing the giant
publishing house.
The company has of late been struggling to publish the
magazine on time, a
development which has seen advertisers pulling adverts
out of the magazine.
"Trends magazine has been closed. Normally the
magazine is supposed to hit
the streets by the first of the month, but as I
am talking, the magazine has
not yet come out," source
said.
Zimpapers also failed to publish its Ndebele vernacular newspaper
Umthunywa
last Friday. The Ndebele newspaper has become popular on account
of its hard
hitting anti-government stories and editorials.
The
editor of the paper was dismissed last month for publishing stories
attacking the government for running down the economy through mismanagement
and corruption. Zimpapers Bulawayo branch manager, Sithembile Ncube
confirmed the government newspaper stable was facing serious financial and
viability problems.
"We are not immune to the financial crisis that
is affecting other companies
and everyone else since we are operating under
the same environment. That is
all I can say," Ncube said on Thursday in a
telephone interview.
The Zimbabwe Media Institute of Southern Africa
(MISA) last week attacked
the state newspapers for their unprofessional
coverage of the ongoing
power-sharing talks that are teetering on the brink
of collapse due to
disagreements that have stalled the formation of a unity
government, more
than three weeks after the deal was signed.
http://www.hararetribune.com
Monday, 13 October 2008 16:40
MISA
MISA Zimbabwe has condemned the continued use of repressive media
laws to
harass practitioners during the transitional period and has called
for the
immediate cessation of harassment and the complete repeal of the
restrictive
media laws in the country.
The journalists were
barred from entering the premises by security guards on
the basis that they
had failed to produce accreditation cards from the Media
and Information
Commission (MIC).
"Ironically, the Movement for Democratic Change has in
the past criticized
the creation of the MIC under the Access to Information
and Protection of
Privacy Act (AIPPA) and the licensing of journalists by
the commission,"
said Misa Zimbabwe.
Several journalists were on
Thursday, 9 October 2008, allegedly barred from
entering the Prime Minister
Designates Strathaven home for a press
conference.
"Ironically,
the Movement for Democratic Change has in the past criticized
the creation
of the MIC under the Access to Information and Protection of
Privacy Act
(AIPPA) and the licensing of journalists by the commission,"
said Misa
Zimbabwe.
The security guards are alleged to have claimed that they had
been given
instructions from the 'top' not to allow journalists without MIC
accreditation cards. Attempts by journalists to explain that they were
freelance journalists were fruitless.
The press conference was
however, deferred to 10 October 2008.
In Article 19 of the Agreement
between ZANU PF and the two MDC formations of
15 September, 2008, the
parties agreed to ensure the immediate processing by
the appropriate
authorities of all applications for re-registration and
registration in
terms of both the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) and The
Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA)
PRESS STATEMENT
Issued Tuesday, October 14, 2008.
While Mugabe
continues to display his intransigence in violation of the
spirit of unity
for nation building, there are positives surrounding the
precipitous
appointments. Msika and Mujuru are some of the few
less-combative
individuals in the Zanu PF old-guard that represent a voice
of moderation.
Mujuru is known for her opposition to the use of torture by
the Joint
Operations Command (JOC) during the bloody elections of 2008 that
saw
several civilians brutally murdered.
These appointments by Mugabe are
obviously=2 0a disppointment to those in
Zanu PF that brutalised people
hoping to be rewarded for their role in
torturing civilians by ascending to
Vice-Presidency and other top
cabinet-level positions. The nation has been
spared what might otherwise
have been a more vicious, cunning and
power-hungry Zanu PF leadership. We
should however never lose sight of the
fact that these individuals bring no
new ideas nor relief to Zimbabwe's
battered economy. Unfortunately the
appointments are made out of political
considerations and not real issues of
serious concern to Zimbabweans such as
economic recovery, respect for human
rights and restoration of civil
liberties.
We call upon Zanu PF and MDC to work as expeditously as
possible for the
successful resolution of disagreements surrounding the GNU
deal. At the same
time, MDC must not waive whatsover, for the portfolios
contended for,
chiefly Home Affairs and Finance. Doing so will equal a
betrayal of the
people's hopes and dreams for a freer and liberated
society. We already
saw how the police continue to harrass and intimidate
citizens. As recent as
yesterday, Zinasu was ruthlessly quashed by the
police as students took to
parliament pressing for a just educational system
at colleges and
universities.
--=E 2------------------
NATIONAL
VISION INSTITUTE
http://nationalvision.wordpress.com
http://www.zimonline.co.za/
by Own Correspondent
Wednesday 15 October 2008
JOHANNESBURG - South Africa's
ruling African National Congress (ANC) party
leader Jacob Zuma on Tuesday
said the country must intensify efforts to
transfer land to blacks if it is
to end poverty among rural communities.
Thousands of poor blacks are
still waiting for the ANC government to deliver
on its promise on coming to
power in 1994 when it set itself an ambitious
target of redistributing 30
percent of all agricultural land to the black
majority by 2014.
With
six years before the delivery date the South African government has
only
acquired 4 percent of land from private owners for redistribution, and
says
it needs to accelerate the process amid growing unrest among the poor
landless blacks.
"We would not be transforming our country if we do
not end the
marginalisation of rural areas. That is why we will work to
intensify our
land reform programme," Zuma said in a speech at a metal
workers union
conference.
South Africa - just like Zimbabwe -
inherited an unjust land tenure system
from previous white-controlled
governments under which the bulk of the best
arable land was reserved for
whites while blacks were forced to crowd on
mostly semi-arid and infertile
soils.
But South Africa, which has one of Africa's biggest farming
sectors and its
biggest economy, has repeatedly said it will not follow the
example of
Zimbabwe where President Robert Mugabe has seized most of the
farms owned by
that country's about 4 500 white commercial farmers and gave
them over to
blacks.
Zuma said the land reform programme should be
expanded beyond simply handing
land to blacks, to include the development of
rural areas.
"Land acquisition should be linked to clear rural
development programmes,
which will include infrastructure development to
produce thriving rural
economies and ensure sustainable development," Zuma
said.
Harare refused to pay for land, saying whites had in the first
place stolen
the land from blacks. The Zimbabwe administration said it would
only pay for
improvements on farms such as buildings, boreholes, dams and
roads - and
that it would determine the levels of compensation to be paid to
farmers.
Farm seizures are blamed for plunging Zimbabwe - once a net
exporter of the
staple maize grain - into severe food shortages since 2001
after black
peasant farmers resettled on former white farms failed to
maintain
production because the government failed to support them with
financial
resources, inputs and skills training.
The United States
Agency for International Development's (USAID) Famine
Early Warning Systems
Network (FEWSNET) said last week that Zimbabwe could
run out of food by
early November because the southern African country had
failed to import
adequate quantities of basic cereals to make up for a poor
harvest in the
2007/2008 season.
South Africa said last month that it was developing an
emergency plan to
help revive the farming sector of its northern neighbour.
- ZimOnline