Police Charge MDC Leader for Threatening to Commit Murder

http://www.radiovop.com

Harare, October 20, 2012- Police last Thursday charged Julius Magarangoma,
the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party chairperson for Manicaland
Province for allegedly threatening to commit murder, almost two years after
the offence was allegedly committed.

Detectives from the Law and Order Section at Mutare Central Police Station
on Thursday charged Magarangoma with contravening Section 186 (1) (b) as
read with Section 47 of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.
The police alleged that the MDC provincial chairperson, who reported to the
police station in the company of his lawyer Blessing Nyamaropa of Zimbabwe
Lawyers for Human Rights threatened to kill Mutizwa Mhondiwa for mobilizing
and sending some people to destroy his homestead in Buhera.
The police said the incident took place on October 1, 2010 at Manyadza
homestead, in Mhondiwa village under Chief Chitsunge in Buhera.
Magarangoma was released after the police recorded a warned and cautioned
statement and advising that they will proceed by way of summons if they
intend to pursue the matter.
Meanwhile, Beitbridge Magistrate Gwineth Drawo on Thursday acquitted 12 MDC
officials, who had been on trial for contravening the Public Order and
Security Act (POSA).
The MDC officials were arrested in February and charged with contravening
Section 26 of POSA after they held an internal party meeting at some private
premises in the border town of Beitbridge, which the police charged was
“unauthorized”.
Magistrate Drawo acquitted the MDC officials after their lawyer, Lizwe
Jamela of ZLHR applied for discharge at the close of the State case, which
had been opposed by State prosecutor Jabulani Mberesi.

Zimbabwe bans 15 for match-fixing

http://www.news.com.au

• AP
• October 21, 20125:08AM

Zimbabwe has slapped lifetime bans on 15 players, officials and journalists after an investigation into corruption. Above, Zimbabwe batsman Craig Ervine, hits a shot during a match against Kenya. Picture: AFP Source: AFP

ZIMBABWE'S football federation has given lifetime bans to 15 players, officials and journalists for match-fixing and corruption.

The Zimbabwe Football Association, or ZIFA, said its former chief executive Henrietta Rushwaya was among those banned after he was accused of masterminding match-fixing during Asian tours in 2009.

Others included former national team captain Method Mwanjale, and the country's most decorated coach Sunday Chidzambwa.

ZIFA said that 16 players and officials were cleared of any wrongdoing in matches rigged by an Asian betting syndicate linked to Singaporean Wilson Raj Perumal, who has been jailed in Finland.

During the Asian tours, Zimbabwe lost 6-0 to Syria, and 3-0 to Thailand.

Coltart asks AG to prosecute match fixers

http://www.newzimbabwe.com

20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Sports Reporter

SPORTS Minister David Coltart has called on Police Commissioner Augustine
Chihuri and Attorney General Johannes Tomana to initiate criminal
proceedings against football players and administrators involved in the
Asiagate scandal.

An official report said national team matches were fixed by ex-ZIFA
officials along with convicted match-fixer Wilson Perumal between 2007 and
2009.

ZIFA announced on Friday that 15 players and officials – including the
decorated former Zimbabwe coach Sunday Chidzambwa and ex-ZIFA CEO Henrietta
Rushwaya – had been banned for life from all football activities.

Over 50 other players and officials will, in the coming weeks, learn of
their punishments which will range from suspensions of six months to 10
years, say officials.

On Saturday, Sports Minister Coltart said prosecutions must follow.
“I fully support ZIFA's decision to serve life bans on various players and
administrators responsible for what is undoubtedly the most shameful chapter
of Zimbabwe's sporting history,” Coltart.

“I trust that the Police and the Attorney General will now act quickly to
investigate and prosecute those identified. If they don’t, then their
offices will also be tainted by this scandal.

“I have no doubt that the football loving public expects that those
responsible for criminal activity should face the full wrath of the law.”

An independent panel chaired by retired High Court judge Ahmed Ebrahim
identified systematic corruption after Perumal burrowed his way into the
heart of Zimbabwean football.

Justice Ebrahim said in Rushwaya and other senior officials including ZIFA
programmes officer Jonathan Musavengana and football agent Kudzai Shabba,
Singapore national Perumal found willing participants in his corruption.

Players – including the former captain Method Mwanjali now of Sundowns in
South Africa, former CAPS United goalkeeper Edmore Sibanda, Dynamos defender
Guthrie Zhokinyi, Kaizer Chiefs defender Thomas Sweswe and Danisa Phiri –
dragged their teammates along as they assumed a central role in the
corruption in which they were paid to lose matches. They will never play
football again, ZIFA said.

Journalists were not spared by the corruption. Robson Sharuko, editor of the
country’s biggest daily newspaper – the Herald – and former Sunday Mail
reporter Hope Chizuzu, who was now working for the Premier League side
Monomotapa, were also banned.

The Herald had previously said it would stand by Sharuko until Justice
Ebrahim delivered his final report. On Saturday, his weekly column was
missing from the newspaper, fuelling speculation he may have been suspended
or sacked.

ZIFA says it will, in the coming weeks, release the names of players who
will be suspended over the scandal in batches.
The next release will be for players and officials banned for 10 years,
followed by those who face a five-year layoff, then three years, two years
and finally those suspended for less than a year.

FIFA and the Confederation of African Football say ZIFA’s sanctions will be
given global effect, ensuring that the named individuals are blacklisted
worldwide.

LIFE BANS: Henrietta Rushwaya, Jonathan Musavengana, Kudzai Shabba, Sunday
Chidzambwa, Thompson Matenda, Godfrey Japajapa, Rodwell Dhlakama, Emmanuel
Nyahuma, Robson Sharuko, Edmore Sibanda, Danisa Phiri, Thomas Sweswe,
Guthrie Zhokinyi, Method Mwanjali, Hope Chizuzu

CLEARED: Gilbert Banda, Justice Majabvi, Richard Mteki, Energy Murambadoro,
Costa Nhamoinesu, Kingston Nkhatha, Washington Pakamisa, Edward Sadomba,
David Kutyauripo, Lincoln Zvasiya, Cuthbert Malajila, Willard Manyatera,
Brighton Tuwaya, Edward Chagonda, Cyril Mukweva, Solomon Makuvaro

MDC-T fights over candidate imposition

http://www.newzimbabwe.com

20/10/2012 00:00:00
by Chengetai Zvauya I Daily News

THE race for Parliament and council seats ahead of the forthcoming general
elections has ripped Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC-T apart, with
factions fighting for supremacy.

Factionalism in the party has resurfaced as jockeying intensifies with
different camps, fighting for supremacy. There is a camp which is fielding
young cadres and academics, which enjoys the support of younger leaders like
Tendai Biti while Tsvangirai is using his former trade union colleagues to
continue with his hold on the party, sources close to the ground say.

Women and youth assembly members are being roped in the factionalism.

According to sources, the factions have been fighting for turf for months,
as evidenced by the splits and violent clashes that characterised provinces
such as Bulawayo, Masvingo, Manicaland and Mashonaland East.

The party is yet to firmly deal with the issue of internal violence driven
by factionalism despite public promises to do so.

Sources said the infighting had intensified across provinces in recent weeks
due to the race to get the party ticket for next year’s elections.

A new front in the war has been opened as well.

A directive from the MDC-T’s national executive that incumbent councillors
and MPs will not be contested in primary elections to choose party
candidates ahead of the watershed polls that could be held in June 2013 has
raffled feathers in the young party.

Aspiring candidates are uncomfortable with the directive barring them from
contesting sitting MPs and councillors as they feel it protects failed and
corrupt office bearers.

They feel Tsvangirai’s band of top leaders is abusing high office to protect
themselves from internal democracy.

MDC-T deputy spokesperson Joel Gabbuza confirmed that sitting MPs will walk
to the general elections unopposed.

“In the constituencies where we have incumbent MPs and councillors, we will
delay the process of primary elections because we already have persons
elected by the electorate,” said Gabbuza.

“We do not want to disrupt the work they have done. So we are going to be
starting in the constituencies where we do not have representatives. In
those constituencies people can start running around canvassing for
support,” said Gabuzza.

The MDC-T’s decision not to hold primary elections has left the party that
was formed in 1999 deeply divided with some people who have been in the
trenches for the past 13 years feeling that this is a form of candidate
imposition — a phenomenon copied from Zanu PF.

Zanu PF, however, appears to be changing tact and has announced that apart
from President Robert Mugabe, every other official will have to fight it
out.

The move by the MDC-T not to hold primary elections in more than 90
constituencies has been picked by the party rivals as undemocratic but
Gabbuza said the party will not deviate from its “democratic” practices.

“We are not going to impose candidates on our supporters. What is happening
at the moment is that our election directorate is working on the procedure
to elect candidates. They are fine-tuning the resolution of our congress on
elections,” said Gabbuza.

Aspiring candidates say the majority of sitting MDC-T MPs and councillors
have failed to deliver and have joined the gravy train and therefore should
make way for fresh blood.

Even though Tsvangirai’s party has taken steps to bring sanity to towns it
leads by expelling councillors deemed to be corrupt, many feel the action is
incomplete and should net all councillors who are enjoying a rags-to-riches
lifestyle and targeting the small fish.

Gabbuza, who also has been an MP for more than a decade now, defended the
decision by his colleagues not to step down and allow others to take over.

“There is no provision in our party constitution which says a member should
have served a certain number of years for him to step down from being a
councillor or MP,” said Gabbuza.

U.S: Zimbabwe Minister Should Disclose Diamond Sales

http://www.voazimbabwe.com

Gibbs Dube
19.10.2012

Observers have dismissed as suspicious remarks by Mines Minister Obert Mpofu
that at least $20 million in diamond sales linked to companies on targeted
sanctions has been impounded by the United States and its allies.

They said there is no tangible evidence that diamond sales generated by
Mbada Diamonds and Marange Resources have been targeted by America, Britain
and other nations which imposed sanctions on President Robert Mugabe and his
inner circle.

Project manager Melanie Chiponda of Chiadzwa Community Development Trust
said it is difficult to prove Mpofu’s allegations due to lack of
transparency in the mining of the gems in Manicaland Province.

“There is a lot of activity in Marange and we believe that those companies
are making a lot of money through diamond sales,” said Chiponda.

Sharon Hudson-Dean, public affairs counselor of the U.S. Embassy in Harare
said companies mining diamonds in Marange are shortchanging Zimbabweans.

“We believe that Mr. Mpofu and the people that he works with in terms of
keeping trace of diamond sales and revenues should be transparent about the
process and should disclose exactly what the sales are,” said Hudson-Dean.

The minister said Zimbabwe is now unlikely to earn the projected $600
million in diamond revenues as a result of the sanctions and depressed
international prices of the gems.

UN: Southern Africa Food Shortages Worsen

Oct 20, 9:52 AM EDT

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- The United Nations deputy humanitarian chief says
food shortages are "a chronic problem" in southern Africa and more than 5.5
million people in eight countries need aid this year, a 40 percent increase
compared to 2011.

Catherine Bragg, winding up a five-day southern Africa trip Saturday, said
worsening food shortages are the result of drought or floods and rising
world food prices.

In Zimbabwe, 1.6 million people are affected by food shortages and many
rural families have begun selling village livestock, often kept as a symbol
of status and wellbeing, to cope with the "dire situation," Bragg said.

A decade of seizures of commercial farms has disrupted food production in
Zimbabwe, a former regional breadbasket.

Food shortages are also particularly acute in Lesotho, Malawi and Swaziland,
Bragg said.

Sekai Holland to receive Sydney Peace Prize

http://sydneypeacefoundation.org.au/

2012 Senator Sekai Holland
Senator Mrs. Sekai Holland Co Minister for Reconciliation Healing and
Integration in the Cabinet of President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister
Morgan Tsvangirai was announced as the recipient of the 2012 Sydney Peace
Prize, in a ceremony hosted by the Australian Embassy in Harare , Zimbabwe ,
April 30.

The Sydney Peace Prize jury’s citation reads: ‘ Sekai Holland: for a
lifetime of outstanding courage in campaigning for human rights and
democracy, for challenging violence in all its forms and for giving such
astute and brave leadership for the empowerment of women.’

The announcement of the choice of Sekai Holland was made by Dr Meredith
Burgmann at a reception hosted by Australian Embassy in Harare on Monday 30
April. Professor Stuart Rees, Chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation said, ‘In
addition to her work for the education of rural women and her founding of
Australia’s anti Apartheid movement fifty years ago, Sekai Holland has been
a significant leader of non violent, democracy campaigns, and is a key
figure in her country’s national dialogue on how to heal the deep wounds of
social conflict.’

In response Senator Holland commented, ‘This award comes as a wonderful
surprise but one which is so encouraging. I accept on behalf of the brave
women I have worked with for so many years and for my colleagues in our
present Organ for National Healing Reconciliation and Integration. I also
acknowledge the long term support and friendship which I have received from
Australian Aboriginal campaigners for human rights and for peace with
justice.’

Sekai Holland will travel to Australia in November to give the City of
Sydney Peace Prize Lecture in the Sydney Town Hall on Wednesday November 7th
and will receive the 2012 Peace Prize ($50,000 and a trophy crafted by the
artist in glass Brian Hirst ) at a Gala Dinner and Award Ceremony on
Thursday November 8th.

Senator Sekai Holland, Dr Meredith Burgmann and Professor Stuart Rees are
available for comment.

For media enquires: please contact Melissa McCullough –
melissa.mccullough@sydney.edu.au | +61 432 861 653

Tickets for the lecture: available via Ticketek
http://premier.ticketek.com.au/shows/show.aspx?sh=SYDNEYPE12#.UFaVYK5qwbr
($25/$35)

Tickets to the Gala Dinner: please contact Juliet Bennett at the Sydney
Peace Foundation – peace.foundation@sydney.edu.au | 9351 4468

Tapping on the windows

Dear Family and Friends,
There’s a constant tapping on the windows at night, now that the
first rains have fallen in Zimbabwe. The reappearance of millions of
insects after an absence of four months is an attack on the senses.
From the persistent whining of mosquitoes that turn sideways and
disappear when you look for them, to the silent ascension from the
depths of the earth of a million flying ants, the insects are back. A
vast array of airborne beetles, ranging from small shiny brown
creatures to large glossy black monsters with fearsome body armour,
horns and spiked legs, spend their nights pinging against lights and
tapping on windows. The natural aerial assault has added to the man
made surprises and uncertainty that has overtaken Zimbabwe this week.

It started with a visit from South Africa’s ex ANC youth leader
Julius Malema who had apparently come to Zimbabwe to ‘meet
progressive forces’ and also to attend the wedding of a Zanu PF
youth leader. Met at the airport by Zimbabwe’s minister of youth and
indigenisation, Malema was said to have been ‘whisked away,’ first
through the airport’s VIP section and then in a convoy of fast
moving vehicles. Later, when Daily News reporters tried to interview
Malema, his body guards whom the paper described as ‘heavily built
goons,’ manhandled the press photographer, forced him to delete
photographs of Malema and then confiscated the camera’s memory card.
Speaking at the wedding he’d come to attend, Malema had obviously
been taking lessons from us. He said that white South Africans must
give back land and minerals. Malema said that they would not pay for
the land in South Africa when it was surrendered and the only thing
they were scared of was defeat. ‘Seeing blood is not what we are
scared of as long as that blood delivers what belongs to us we are
prepared to go to that extent.’ It wasn’t clear who the ‘we’
was that Julius Malema referred to but they were frighteningly
familiar sentiments in a country that has witnessed at first hand just
how easily radical rhetoric becomes terrifying reality.

The next frighteningly familiar thing came in the form of newspaper
photographs and TV video footage of houses being knocked down by
bulldozers in Epworth outside Harare. Disturbing images were shown of
men, women and children standing amidst the rubble and ruins of their
homes with all their worldly goods jumbled in heaps around them:
furniture, bedding, clothing, kitchen equipment and food. Hundreds of
families were affected by the demolitions and said they’d been
allocated stands on the land a year ago by a couple of men they called
Zanu PF party leaders. Asked to comment on the allocation of stands on
privately owned land, Zanu PF’s Harare province chairman, Amos
Midzi, said: “we have no policy whatsoever to take over private
property anywhere in Harare.' It was the most ironic statement after
twelve years of private property seizures.

Then came the warning made by Zanu PF spokesman Rugare Gumbo who was
being interviewed by a South African TV channel. Gumbo said that if
Zanu PF lost the next election it would be ‘messy.’ Gumbo said
that events such as had taken place in Libya and were still taking
place in Syria, could happen in Zimbabwe. ‘There will be deaths.
People could be killed and maimed,’ he said. It wasn’t clear if Mr
Gumbo was representing his own position or that of Zanu PF but it all
adds to the fear factor that increases as we draw ever closer to a
constitutional referendum and election. Until next time, thanks for
reading, love cathy 20th October 2012. Copyright � Cathy Buckle.
www.cathybuckle.com

An unclear future creates an atmosphere of nervousness

http://www.cathybuckle.com

October 19, 2012, 1:23 pm

Robert Mugabe resorted to his old socialist rhetoric when addressing his
supporters last week. Predicting a ‘blatantly God-given victory’, he went on
to condemn the opposition as ‘corrupt from top to bottom’ but then he would
say that, wouldn’t he – anything to deflect attention from his own party’s
misdeeds. Looking in from the outside, it seems that the country is in a
state of moral decline and that applies not only to political parties.
Uncertainty about the country’s future may be the explanation for this state
of affairs. Whichever way you look at it, no one is quite sure what the
future holds; elections, whenever they happen, always create uncertainty and
at 88 years of age, Mugabe’s future is limited. Love him or loathe him, the
man has been in power for so long that a whole generation has grown up
knowing nothing else but Mugabe and Zanu PF. The prospect of change and an
unclear future creates an atmosphere of nervousness and that, combined with
the political patronage that Mugabe has actively promoted, makes for an
attitude of ‘every man for himself’ that is fertile ground for corruption in
one form or another. As Simba Makoni declared recently, “Corruption should
be declared a national disaster.”

The victory of his old friend, Hugo Chavez, in the recently held
elections, Mugabe told his supporters, was ‘a win for the people of
Venezuela’. That sounds like an endorsement of the democratic process from
the president, so it was oddly contradictory to hear one of his ministers,
Patrick Chinamasa, in a BBC interview saying that Zanu PF would not accept
an MDC win. “There will be trouble” Chinamasa prophesied and when asked what
exactly he meant by that, he eventually replied, “We will not accept it”. So
much for tolerance and acceptance of different political views that Mugabe
has recently been advocating; it seems that Mugabe’s Justice Minister is not
following the same agenda as his master. Like his master, however, Chinamasa
was careful to put the blame for any possible MDC victory on the
‘imperialists’ who are always blamed for any independent thinking on the
part of the ‘masses’. Clearly Zanu PF and its higher echelons have a pretty
low opinion of the ordinary Zimbabwean people’s ability to think for
themselves. In another interview, this time with a South African tv station,
the president’s spokesperson, Rugare Gumbo threatened a ‘bloodbath’ if Zanu
PF loses the election. These repeated threats of violence if they lose the
election show very clearly that Zanu PF’s belief in democracy is paper-thin:
violence is their preferred method of persuasion.

Right on cue, in comes another hothead, South African Julius Malema who
is given a red-carpet welcome by Zanu PF. (Incidentally the rumours of
personal corruption have not left Malema untouched either) He says he only
went to Zimbabwe to attend a wedding but that didn’t prevent him from making
a most un-wedding like speech! Zimbabwe under Zanu PF has been “an
inspiration to Africa” he said and went on to castigate whites who should
surrender their minerals and land without compensation. As for Tsvangirai,
declared Malema, he is an ally of imperialists. Once again we see that
anyone who disagrees with the party line is automatically condemned as a
lackey of the imperialists, not capable of thinking for themselves. In true
‘celebrity’ fashion, Malema brought his own body-guards with him and they
proceeded to beat up journalists who tried to photograph their boss. This
cult of celebrity is prevalent in Zimbabwe too, as the increasing number of
cases of people charged with ‘insulting the president’ reveals. Now, as if
to place him even higher in the ‘hero’ class, we hear that Mugabe’s original
house in Highfield is to become a National Monument where visitors will
presumably be treated to a lecture on Mugabe’s ‘heroic’ life; his burial
plot having already been reserved at Heroes Acre.

It was Malema’s attitude to white people that most closely chimed with
the Zimbabwean president’s own views. Mugabe’s latest comment about whites
may have been intended for a partisan audience at home but they reveal the
duplicity of a man who willingly takes funding from European based NGOs but
never fails to insult the owners of the white hands that feed his people. “A
lion eats flesh,” he said, “and you can never trust it with your sheep no
matter how passive that lion is. Trust white people at your own peril.”
Coming as it does from the head of state, this thoroughly racist remark
reveals the depths to which Mugabe will sink to win popularity, as he
believes, with ‘the masses’.

Constitution Watch of 20th October [Second All Stakeholders Conference Programme]