Reuters
Tue 2 Oct
2007, 14:39 GMT
By Madeline Chambers
BERLIN (Reuters) - German
Chancellor Angela Merkel visits three African
countries this week and will
press South Africa's Thabo Mbeki to take a
tougher line with Zimbabwe, in
the grip of an economic crisis critics blame
on the
government.
Merkel will stop in Ethiopia and Liberia as well as South
Africa on her
first trip to sub-Saharan Africa as
chancellor.
"Zimbabwe will be an important subject. Developments
there are still
massively problematic," a senior German government official
told reporters
before the visit, starting on Thursday.
Critics accuse
President Robert Mugabe of human rights abuses and of
presiding over the
collapse of Zimbabwe's economy, which has the world's
highest inflation rate
of about 6,000 percent and unemployment levels of
about 80
percent.
"The chancellor will talk about this with Mbeki and urge him to
exercise his
influence on Zimbabwe to change the developments of the last
few years," the
official said.
Some Western states have been
frustrated by Mbeki's "quiet diplomacy"
towards his neighbour which they see
as too soft.
The official said Merkel had no intention of following
British Prime
Minister Gordon Brown's example and threatening to stay away
from an
EU-African summit in Lisbon in December if Mugabe
attends.
"The chancellor will take part in the summit," said the
official. "EU-Africa
relations should not be held hostage to developments in
Zimbabwe. It is in
our interests to go through with the summit."
Last
month, Brown said it would be inappropriate for him to go, as Mugabe
would
distract from the main agenda and urged other countries to raise
pressure on
Zimbabwe. However, many African leaders want Mugabe there to
help tackle the
continent's problems.
Mugabe, 83, is subject to an EU travel ban but it
could be suspended to
allow him to attend the summit.
In power since
independence from Britain in 1980, Mugabe says the West has
sabotaged the
economy as punishment for his seizure of white-owned farms and
their
transfer to landless blacks.
Merkel put tackling poverty in Africa on the
agenda of the Group of Eight
industrialised countries during her presidency
of the grouping this year.
Merkel will meet Ethiopian Prime Minister
Meles Zenawi and African Union
Commission Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare on
Thursday, and Mbeki and his
predecessor Nelson Mandela in South Africa on
Friday and Saturday.
To round off her five-day trip, Merkel will be in
Liberia on Sunday to meet
President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and discuss the
prospects of post-conflict
countries and good governance.
Reuters
Tue 2 Oct
2007, 11:58 GMT
By Nelson Banya
HARARE, Oct 2 (Reuters) -
Zimbabwe's inflation could surge further on higher
state spending, deepening
a crisis worsened by shortages of basic goods and
thwarting the central
bank's efforts to revive the country's broken economy.
Analysts blame
President Robert Mugabe's policies -- such as the seizures of
white-owned
farms for blacks and, lately, plans to nationalise foreign-owned
firms --
for discouraging investment and worsening the economic meltdown.
Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe Governor Gideon Gono, who is leading government
efforts to
reverse the collapse, said in a monetary policy review on Monday
inflation
would ease in the medium-term as businesses raise production on
new
incentives.
He offered businesses special credit rates of 25 percent
interest and to pay
farmers in foreign currency for their
produce.
Gono also hiked the main lending rate to 800 percent and said a
new currency
was imminent in a bid to douse black market trade in foreign
currency, fuel
and goods. He gave no details of the new currency.
"It
is an expansionary policy to solve a problem which should have been
avoided,
but its assumption that cheap funds for producers will kick-start
supplies
is too optimistic," said David Mupamhadzi, Chief Economist at the
Zimbabwe
Allied Banking Group.
"There are major structural rigidities, such as the
erratic electricity,
fuel and water supplies...it's anyone's guess what will
happen to
inflation," he said during a meeting called by the Zimbabwe
National Chamber
of Commerce to review Gono's policy
statement.
Zimbabwe is grappling with the world's highest inflation rate
at around
6,600 percent and unemployment officially put at around 80
percent, with
analysts predicting further job losses from company
closures.
WESTERN PLOT
Business leaders said government
policies should not be focused merely on
short-term gains.
"Elections
are coming and the reality is that a lot of funds will be pumped
into the
rural areas, but we need policies that go beyond that," Laputa
Hwamiridza,
Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce vice president, said.
Zimbabwe
holds joint parliamentary and presidential elections in 2008 and
Mugabe's
ruling ZANU-PF is widely expected to win, partly due to its massive
rural
support.
Meanwhile, industrialists warned that an empowerment bill passed
by the
lower house of parliament last week seeking to transfer majority
control of
foreign-owned firms to black Zimbabweans would compound the
country's
economic woes.
While Gono urged caution on implementing the
proposed law, Mugabe told
supporters his government would press ahead with
taking foreign businesses
and that those unwilling to partner locals should
stay away.
Independent economic commentator Eric Bloch said of Gono'
statement, "It's a
mixture of good and bad. Good in that the governor's
given a timely warning
and provided a sober, forthright voice on the
empowerment plans."
"But I do not agree with him on what he says is the
impact of sanctions on
the economy," Block said. "The absence of offshore
lines of credit is not
because of sanctions. No bank, except the Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe, of
course, will lend to people who are not
creditworthy."
Mugabe has accused some foreign companies of stashing
profits abroad and
hiking prices without justification, and on Monday
reiterated threats to
seize defiant companies he says are part of a Western
plot to unseat his
government.
"At this point in time, we do not need
an indigenisation bill because there
are not many companies left to
indigenise," Hwamiridza said.
"What we need is to grow the cake, not to
fight over the small cake that
remains ... our urgent challenge is to bring
back food to the table in our
households."
Mugabe, 83 and in power
since independence from Britain in 1980, denies
charges of mismanaging one
of Africa's once model economies, saying Zimbabwe
is a victim of sabotage by
Western powers opposed to the land seizures.
Business Week
By ANGUS
SHAW
October 2, 2007, 10:54AM ET
HARARE, Zimbabwe
President
Robert Mugabe renewed threats to seize foreign mining interests
and
businesses accused of profiteering, state radio reported Tuesday. But
the
head of the central bank warned against hasty and disruptive seizures in
a
country in economic crisis.
Mugabe and Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono,
until recently seen as a
rising political force, appeared at odds after Gono
criticized new
legislation to force whites and foreign businesses, including
international
banks, to hand over a 51 percent controlling stake to black
Zimbabweans.
In a fiscal policy review statement Monday, Gono said
"excitable, overnight
changes" in policies could lead to unintended
production disruptions,
business closures and worsening shortages and could
be exploited by favored
cliques and cronies.
As the banker spoke of
the need to "return our dogs to the kennels" on
Monday, Mugabe returned home
from a trip to the U.N. General Assembly in New
York to what the state media
called "a thunderous hero's welcome" at the
Harare airport.
The state
media gave prominence to Mugabe's homecoming and unusually brief
coverage of
Gono's quarterly fiscal review.
Mugabe told thousands of ruling party
militants bused to the airport that
businesses that abused government price
cuts enforced since June 26 would
not be tolerated.
"We will have to
seize the companies," Mugabe said in a recording broadcast
by state radio
Tuesday.
Since the June edict ordering all prices slashed by about half,
cornmeal,
meat, bread and most staples have disappeared from the stores,
fueling a
thriving black market in scarce goods. Gasoline shortages and the
pegging of
commuter fares have crippled transport services.
Mugabe
said some goods reappeared at exorbitant prices and businesses would
not be
allowed to continue "fleecing consumers."
Under the new Indigenization
and Economic Empowerment Bill that Mugabe has
still to sign into law,
Zimbabweans will take over 51 percent of all mining
concerns. Mugabe said
investors in mines who were unwilling to abide by the
law should "ship out,"
the official media reported.
"The minerals are ours. We are offering
partners a share of 49 percent ...
If they won't take it, hard luck, we will
give it to our people," he said.
Gono on Monday said: "We must avoid
grab, take all and run ... foreign
investors must be given a reasonable
degree of flexibility."
Plans to "muscle in" on successful mining
companies and take over majority
control of international banks needed to be
handled with extreme caution,
Gono said. Profitable mines were a key source
of hard currency.
Gono said he advised the government not to "forcibly
push the envelope of
indigenization in the area of finance and banking. In
whatever we do, we
must guard against measures premised on emotion rather
than sense. Capital
is a very timid commodity. It will jump
ship."
The government's price cuts were meant to tame the world's highest
official
inflation of nearly 7,000 percent. Independent estimates put real
inflation
closer to 25,000 percent and the International Monetary Fund has
forecast it
reaching 100,000 percent by the end of the year.
Gono
called the blanket price cuts irrational and a threat to business
viability.
He cited the slashing of fares forced on the state
airline, Air Zimbabwe, in
June that made it cheaper to fly 2,000 kilometers
(1,250 miles) to
Johannesburg in neighboring South Africa than to buy scarce
gasoline and
drive 200 kilometers (125 miles) from Harare to the central
Zimbabwe town of
Kwekwe.
Gono said a taxi from Victoria Falls airport
to the resort town cost more
than a flight there from
Johannesburg.
"Such irrational measures cannot be sustained in our
economic turnaround
efforts," he said.
International Herald Tribune
The Associated PressPublished: October 2,
2007
LIVINGSTONE, Zambia: Every morning, Jacob Ncube Moyo
leaves his home in
Zimbabwe, crosses the bridge past Victoria Falls and a
line of nervous
bungee jumpers, and enters the Zambian town of Livingstone,
where he sells
trinkets to tourists.
With many Western tourists wary
of Zimbabwe's growing economic and political
turmoil, business is better on
the Zambia side, the 32-year-old said after
leaving the Zambian customs post
one morning.
Plus, Moyo can actually find groceries in Zambia. "Mealie
meal, cooking oil,
sugar, rice, candles, bread - even some clothes," Moyo
checked off a mental
list of the items he can no longer get in Zimbabwe,
where food shortages are
now the norm and inflation is officially estimated
at nearly 7,000 percent.
As economic woes have intensified, increasing
numbers of Zimbabweans are
crossing the border into neighboring Zambia, South
Africa, Botswana,
Mozambique and Namibia in search of business and basic
commodities - or
whole new lives. The situation has sparked fears of an
exodus and prompted
debate throughout the region over how to deal with
Zimbabwean migrants.
Many have blamed Zimbabwe's agricultural decline on
the government's
seizures of white-owned commercial farms, begun in 2000, for
redistribution
to blacks. The collapse of the farm-based economy has meant
severe shortages
of gasoline, food and other goods, and has been accompanied
by a crackdown
on political dissent.
This weekend, stores
throughout Zimbabwe - once considered the breadbasket
of Africa - were
telling customers that bread would not be available until
further notice.
Zimbabwe harvested only one-third of the wheat it needs this
year - a drastic
shortfall the government blamed on constant power outages,
official media
reported. Coal and equipment for power plants are among the
goods in short
supply.
There are few reliable figures on the total number of Zimbabweans
crossing
into bordering countries each day. Some trade or shop and then
return
quickly; others remain abroad illegally.
Alarmed Zambian
officials have seen perhaps the most dramatic rise. In early
August,
Zimbabwean visitors crossing at Livingstone went from 60 to 1,000
per day,
most shopping and then going home. Peter Mumba, permanent secretary
of the
Zambian Ministry of Home Affairs, told The Associated Press last
month that
number was still on the rise, and that the Zimbabweans were
stripping the
shelves.
"We are seeing the number going up every day," Mumba
said.
The South African government says that between March 1 and July 31,
some
351,000 Zimbabweans arrived legally in the country through the
main
Beitbridge border crossing and 292,000 Zimbabweans left through the
same
gate.
While the numbers have been fairly steady into South
Africa, senior
immigration officials in Botswana said the number of illegal
immigrants from
Zimbabwe had doubled from 16,629 in the first half of 2006 to
33,958 in the
first half of 2007.
South Africa and Botswana remain the
preferred destinations - in South
Africa, estimates consistently put the
number of resident Zimbabweans at 3
million, among the largest expatriate
Zimbabwean communities in the world.
But Livingstone is a shorter trip
for many in northwestern Zimbabwe.
Moreover, Zambia's looser borders and
trading environment, along with
reports of rampant anti-Zimbabwean sentiment
in South Africa, have made
Zambia an increasingly attractive
option.
Just a few years ago, it was Zambians entering more developed
Zimbabwe to
buy bread, fuel and other necessities in short supply. These
days, while the
majority of Zambia's population remains in poverty, modern
grocery stores
are fully stocked, and the government is democratic and
stable.
A slow and steady stream of Zimbabweans starts over the
Livingstone bridge
into Zambia around midmorning. Many come with day passes,
carrying crafts or
sacks of cheap Zimbabwean liquor and cigarettes on their
heads that they
will sell in Zambian markets. They leave with bags full of
food.
Some Zimbabweans use Western Union in Livingstone to send and
receive money
from loved ones abroad, in order to avoid the foreign exchange
hurdles
raised by Zimbabwean authorities, local officials
say.
Livingstone's town clerk, George Kalenga, is concerned about an
influx of
Zimbabwean commercial sex workers, as well as Zimbabwean
bricklayers and
plasterers working illegally in Zambia.
It is
uncertain how many Zimbabweans are entering and staying in Zambia
illegally.
Some sneak over the bridge at night, walk through the surrounding
gorges, or
use canoes or bush paths near the other Zambia-Zimbabwe border
posts in
Chirundu and at the Kariba Dam.
Charges that Zimbabweans are causing
crime and instability mirror complaints
in Botswana and South Africa. And
some Zimbabwean cross-border traders say
authorities are now making it a bit
harder to do their daily runs.
Fin24
Oct 02 2007 02:56 PM
Chimwemwe
Mwanza
THE OPPOSITION MDC's agreement to a number of constitutional
amendments
proposed by the ruling Zanu PF has provided the woolliest of
hints that an
end to Zimbabwe's political and economic impasse is almost in
sight.But much
gloom remains among sceptics. With attention from the
international
community focused mainly on finding a political settlement to
the country's
crisis, it is very hard to see any set of circumstances or
intervention that
could drastically rescue the country's economy from its
current battered
state. In fact, the future carries dark forebodings.After a
disastrous land
redistribution exercise that has seen the country's
agriculture industry
teeter on the brink of collapse, a Bill recently passed
by its parliament
suggests that foreign-owned firms - including construction
companies, mines
and banks - were next in line to face President Robert
Mugabe's ruthless
seizure campaign.Whereas economies of the SADC region have
consistently
maintained impressive GDP growth figures, Zimbabwe is holed up
in a
recession.Yet again, there's been a loud silence from the SADC
leadership
regarding the Zimbabwean government's imminent takeover of
foreign owned
businesses.That its economy - barring any meaningful
intervention - is
headed towards total paralysis is indisputable.
Inflationary pressures
(inflation is now estimated at 6500%) and a crunch on
hard currency have
taken a toll on the once economically vibrant southern
African state. Basket
caseUnable to import machinery, telecoms, mining and
parastatals - such as
energy utility ZESA - have borne the biggest crunch of
the forex crisis.
These companies cannot expand on existing
capacity.Unemployment at more than
70% is one of the highest in sub-Saharan
Africa. Once a breadbasket of the
region, it is no secret that the country
has been reduced to a basket case.
Yet the ruling elite maintain that the
economic woes are simply wishful
imagination of the West. Just how the
genius that's (Robert) Mugabe has
successfully managed to hoodwink even the
most astute of politicians in the
SADC region into believing that the US'
Bush and former British premier Tony
Blair were exaggerating the country's
economic crisis baffles the mind.
Whether it's borne out of their conviction
that the enfant terrible twins
had indeed contrived to drag Zimbabwe to its
knees or for other reason, the
SADC leadership's unwavering support to
Zimbabwe's ruling elite is
embarrassing - to say the least.After earlier
likening Zimbabwe to a sinking
titanic, Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa -
ostensibly the SADC region's
chairperson - recently backtracked from his
earlier pronouncements on
Zimbabwe. "Zimbabwe's economic crisis has largely
been exaggerated,"
Mwanawasa was quoted as saying in the Post Newspaper,
Zambia's most
influential daily. Land grabsWhatever transpired in the last
three months to
prompt him into a re-think is hard to tell, but it's this
sort of
camaraderie exhibited by the Zambian president that seems to have
blinded
the regional leadership concerning the economic realities in
Zimbabwe. And
Mwanawasa's latest outburst is that he will boycott next
month's economic
gathering of European/African leaders in Portugal as a show
of solidarity
with Mugabe if the Zimbabwean leader is excluded from the
summit. Surely,
the Lisbon summit ranks bigger than both Mwanawasa and
Mugabe? Politics are
different from economics so perspective is important
here. The reality is
that Zimbabwe's economy has hit extremely tough times.
Perhaps it's now time
that sober minds in the regional leadership are
reigned in regarding the
country's economic haemorrhage. Mugabe should be
reminded by the regional
leadership that his country's economic meltdown is
a culmination of a
disastrous land resettlement program. Intended to benefit
the poor, the
majority of beneficiaries have turned out to be his inner
cabal with each
helping themselves to the most arable pieces of land. In any
case how much
of the land grabbed is still economically productive?The
British are
possibly partly to blame for failing to fast track an orderly
land
redistribution exercise soon after the country attained independence in
1980, but should it have taken the ruling party almost 20 years to
kick-start the redistribution exercise? Worse to comeArguably, land holds
traditional value and has serious implications in the African context. It's
only in Africa where promises of portions of land and shelter can win you an
election albeit at the bottom of an economic slump.With none of it left for
electioneering purposes, stakes in majority foreign-owned companies -
including SA firms, Standard Bank, Old Mutual, Massmart, Edgars, Engen,
Metallon Gold, and Murray & Roberts - should prove alluring to the
Zimbabwean electorate in the forthcoming polls.All are set to become
political pawns in Mugabe's quest to hold on to power. Whichever way you
look at it, legislation empowering the Zimbabwean government to grab foreign
firms will drive its fragile economy into a much deeper crisis. As the
country heads towards elections, it is certain to get worse. I'd bet you
ain't seen nothing yet... - Fin24
New Zimbabwe
By Chido
Makunike
Last updated: 10/02/2007 21:25:19
ROBERT Mugabe's government puts
tremendous energy into blaming what it
refers to as "illegal sanctions" by
Western countries for the Zimbabwean
economy being down on its knees,
causing untold hardship to the majority of
Zimbabweans.
The claim is
that international aid, credit and investment have largely
dried up on the
orders of Western governments, unhappy with change which
took prime land
away from white farmers.
When the representatives of the accused
countries bother to respond to these
charges, it is usually to say that what
have been imposed are merely limited
"targeted sanctions" against members of
the ruling elite. They deny applying
any sort of general economic embargo,
or seeking to cause "regime change" by
trying to instigate popular rebellion
over the hardships. They also point to
how they continue to contribute
humanitarian aid to relieve the suffering of
the most vulnerable
Zimbabweans, despite the diplomatic impasse.
It is quite clear that
economically, things have completely spiralled out of
the control of the
government. There is little prospect of any change for
the better happening
before next year's expected elections, and it is not at
all far fetched to
imagine things might be much worse by then. Short of
improving the
situation, therefore, the government finds it convenient and
necessary to
latch onto sanctions as an explanation for its inability to
make living
conditions bearable.
The hope is that the electorate will find that
classic political explanation
("it is the fault of the Great Enemy") for
their economic plight, and the
government's seeming helplessness in the face
of it, convincing enough to
avoid a feared thrashing at the polls after
almost 10 years of steep
decline. It is not likely to impress a significant
number of the voters who
have been fed this line as they watched their lives
deteriorate
dramatically.
There are several perspectives from which
the Mugabe regime's idea to blame
sanctions for the economic state of
Zimbabwe today is weak.
One major problem of arguing "your suffering is
the fault of our enemies" is
to seem to absolve oneself of responsibility.
Yet whether or not there are
Western sanctions against Zimbabwe in place,
declared or undeclared; legal
or illegal, it is still the responsibility of
a government to reduce or
prevent the deprivation of its people, and to put
in place conditions for an
improvement in their standard of life. Sanctions
would certainly make this
difficult, but they would just be one more out of
many obstacles to success.
The quality of a government can to a large
extent be measured by how well
and hard it works to work around these sort
of obstacles.
A Zimbabwean voter cannot be expected to accept putting
primary
responsibility for his economic fortunes on governments in Europe or
North
America, over that of his own government. He or she would be quite
justified
to say at election time, "if you find that the sanctions you
allege are in
place are an insurmountable barrier to doing your job of
running the
Zimbabwean economy better than this, then I am exercising my
right to give
another group of people a try." This, of course, is exactly
what Mugabe &
Co. fear many voters will choose to do.
But instead
of working harder to have them lifted, or to more effectively
get around
them, the government merely moans louder about the unfairness and
"illegality" of those alleged sanctions. This merely entrenches the
appearance of complete helplessness and inability to deal with the issue,
which is what the average Zimbabwean cares about at the end of the day,
regardless of why and how it came about.
Screaming "illegal"
sanctions ever louder, as things get worse, suggests the
authorities have no
coping strategies, and have given up. This is not the
kind of image a ruling
party that has presided over almost a decade of very
dramatic decline can
afford to go into an election with.
You cannot boast endlessly about your
"sovereignty," and at the same time
whine about how your economy's fate is
not within your hands, but in that of
your enemies. It must be one or the
other. If we are as "sovereign" as
Mugabe never tires of reminding us we
are, then our economic performance
should not depend on what any other
countries do or don't do.
If, by crying "sanctions" every other minute,
Mugabe and his regime are
admitting that we are a small country whose
economic fate cannot be divorced
from the international diplomatic standing
of its government, then we are
not quite as "sovereign" as we imagine. In
the latter case, diplomatic
action beyond helpless whining is called for,
and yet silly bravado is all
we see and hear.
A question that is not
asked often enough: if our economic calamities are
because of sanctions
imposed over land reform, why didn't the government
foresee and prepare for
them? We are often reminded what tough
revolutionaries our rulers are. In
preparation for the wholesale takeover of
farmland, did none of these
revolutionaries think for a moment that it would
cause a ruckus, and
therefore have short, medium and long term plans to
prepare for it? Why has
the government seemed so surprised by the reaction
its actions have received
in Western capitals?
The point here is not that they should only have
done what the Western
countries approved of. It is, instead, that on having
decided to go ahead
with measures they knew would be disapproved of by
economically powerful
countries, they should have had a plan in place to
deal with the effects of
how that disapproval was expressed. Or was the
hoped for "plan" to talk
one's way out of the disapproval with fiery,
populist speeches at the U.N.?
What naiveté for self proclaimed
revolutionaries!
Then there is the issue of sanctions busting. Nothing
would have earned the
Mugabe regime the respect of even its detractors more,
than having shown
particular agility at the "sovereign" ability to get
around the claimed
sanctions; to keep things working fairly normally despite
them. Or to at
least show prospects of even slight recovery after an initial
dip, which
could then have been explained as merely a transitional hiccup as
"the
revolution" took hold.
This was especially important to show in
the agriculture sector, whose
overnight wholesale changes were the genesis
for all that has followed
since. If the government had been able to say,
"yes, we know things are
hard, but look at all the successes we are
beginning to score in the
agricultural sector, whose taking over caused the
imposition of sanctions in
the first place," people's reactions to it would
have been very different
from what they are today.
Comparing the
American sanctions on Cuba with those said to be in place
against Zimbabwe
is pathetic, and ill-advised for the Mugabe government.
Cuba has achieved
notable successes in areas like agriculture and health
despite decades of
declared, strictly enforced U.S. sanctions.
They have done this through
quite innovative approaches we have not seen our
government show in any
arena. Cuba's rulers at least give the appearance of
being real
revolutionaries, living modestly and wanting to be seen to be
sharing any
hardships with the people.
In Zimbabwe the rulership takes great pride in
showing off just how removed
from the general populace they are, as if to
goad them. So in Cuba one sees
some genuine "solidarity" between the
governed and the rulers; whereas in
Zimbabwe the rulers delight in
emphasising their lordship over the people,
"solidarity" being nothing more
than a cheap slogan.
It is a pity our opposition parties are so
distracted by so many peripheral
things. A more focused opposition could
have made mincemeat out of the
Mugabe government for its attempt to absolve
itself of responsibility for
the pathetic state of our country with the weak
official excuse of
"sanctions."
Chido Makunike is a Zimbabwean social
and political commentator. He can be
contacted on e-mail: chidomakunike@gmail.com
VOA
By VOA News
02 October 2007
A
media advocacy group says Zimbabwean police arrested two actors and a
journalist during the performance of a play that satirized the country's
political situation.
Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said
Tuesday that authorities stormed
the wings of Harare's Theater In the Park
on Friday and led the actors,
Sylvanos Mudzvova and Anthony Tongani, away to
a truck.
The group says independent journalist James Jemwa was also
arrested when he
asked police to explain why the actors were being
detained.
It says the three men are being held at Harare police
headquarters, without
charges, and have not been allowed to contact a
lawyer.
Reporters Without Borders and other rights groups have repeatedly
denounced
Zimbabwe's government for repression of the opposition and the
media.
The country has strict media and security laws that give
authorities the
power to shut down the expression of anti-government
viewpoints.
The play that was being performed, The Final Push, makes fun
of the lack of
communication between Zimbabwe's ruling party and the
opposition. The title
refers to protest marches by the opposition Movement
for Democratic Change
in 2003 that were violently dispersed by police.
Yahoo News
Tue
Oct 2, 7:54 AM ET
HARARE (AFP) - Zimbabwe's supermarkets have run out of
bread after bakers
were forced to suspend their operations due to a critical
shortage of wheat,
shop owners said Tuesday.
"I don't know when
we will have bread although we have been expecting
deliveries since last
week," said Kassim Ngorima, a manager in a supermarket
in Harare's Avenues
area.
"Maybe we will get bread next week or in two weeks. I now don't
know
anymore."
An AFP correspondent witnessed workers arranging
popcorn packets to fill
empty bread shelves.
"There is no bread and I
can't even tell you when to check again," said
Taurai Kativhu, a manager in
a supermarket in the capital.
"We are bringing our own food from
home."
A supermarket in the Borrowdale suburb had closed its own bakery
and moved
staff to other departments while one of the country's main bakers,
Lobels,
sent 1,500 workers on forced leave after it scaled down
operations.
Many Zimbabweans are turning to sweet potato, yam or the
traditional thick
cornmeal porridge, while some are bringing flour from
shopping trips abroad
and making their own bread.
Zimbabwe is facing
critical shortages of wheat blamed by farmers on erratic
power supplies.
Others say the grain deficit is a result of poor farming by
inexperienced
beneficiaries of the government's controversial land reforms.
A state
weekly reported Sunday that the country would harvest just over a
third of
its wheat requirements blaming the deficit on power shortages.
In recent
years Zimbabwe has resorted to importing the grain to augment the
local
yield amid a decline in production in agriculture, the former mainstay
of
the country's economy.
Zimbabwe is in the throes of an economic crisis
with the world's highest
rate of inflation and four out of five people
jobless. Some 80 percent of
the population live below the poverty
threshold.
At least 4.2 million people will be "food insecure" from the
lean months of
December to March, according to the UN World Food
Programme.
The Zimbabwean
(2-10-07)
HARARE - Reports of
politicization of food aid are intensifying in the run
up to next year's
synchronized general elections amid reports of opposition
supporters'
children being driven away from school supplementary feeding
schemes in
rural areas
An aid worker, speaking strictly on condition of anonymity, said
that in the
course of helping torture victims, she had been told that
children of
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) supporters were being
denied access to
school food queues in Mberengwa East, in the far south of
the country.
In her office on Friday was Sam Mlilo, district chairperson of
Mberengwa
East, who told The Zimbabwean he had seen children driven out of
the queue
for the supplementary meal at the Chamakudo Primary School , near
Mataga,
because of their parents' political beliefs.
"Children with
parents sympathetic to the MDC are denied access to food. In
each village
there are some MDC supporters and the villagers know MDC
supporters by name
and drive their children away," Mlilo claimed.
He said people had tried in
vain to complain. He added that Zanu (PF)
structures were being used to
distribute food and that traditional leaders
were also distributing food
along party lines.
Aid groups contacted by The Zimbabwean, however, said they
were not aware of
children being denied access to the school feeding
schemes.
A country director with a leading NGO said his field staff at school
feeding
points regularly checked the schemes registers, which was an
opportunity for
people to raise concerns.
"We would immediately raise it
with authorities and work to resolve it," he
said.
A top World Vision
official based in Bulawayo for the southern region, said:
"People on the
ground will have to get an understanding of the political
nature of food
distribution," he said, adding that so far there had been
"nothing to scare
us off".
An official with Christian Aid said many complaints stemmed from
agencies
not being able to "blanket feed" all schools in an area.
"If a
school three kilometres away is not fed, there are grumbles of
political
favours either towards government or the opposition. We find that
when we
get down to district level, people are down to earth, they are not
political
like at provincial level," he said.
Zimbabwe Human Rights Association
(ZimRights) director Kucaca Phulu said
his organization was concerned that
schools were closing down because of
acute food shortages spawned by the
price slash directive, denying children
access to the nutritional
supplements they would have received there.
Further afield in Gokwe, another
official said Zanu (PF) youths were trying
to control oil and maize prices
in shops and the prices the items were sold
at could vary according to
political affiliation.
The official said a report on the victimisation of the
children would be
compiled with information from various regions, and would
be presented to
the donor agencies.
Information and Publicity minister
Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said: "There's nothing
of the sort."
Meanwhile, the
central bank governor Gideon Gono announced in a monetary
policy that
Zimbabwe 's ailing economy received a boost of US$20 million for
unspecified
sources to bankroll fuel imports.
Also on Saturday, pre-election talks
facilitated by South Africa between the
MDC and Zanu (PF) progressed with a
meeting in Kariba. The MDC, which
narrowly lost the last elections, is
demanding a new people driven
consytitution, a cessation of political
violence and the repeal of
repressive security laws used by Zanu (PF) to
stifle opposition political
activity.
UN Integrated Regional
Information Networks
2 October 2007
Posted to the web 2 October
2007
Bulawayo
Despite help from relatives abroad, Zimbabwe's
elderly people are struggling
to cope with food shortages and high transport
costs, brought on by an
inflation rate of more than 6,000 percent, and a
lack of fuel and foreign
exchange that make it difficult for most to obtain
even basic essentials,
prompting charities to lend a helping
hand.
"Even if I have [money], where will I get the food I need?" asked
Theresa
Malunga, 74, who survives on remittances from her son overseas. "I
wish my
son knew what the situation here is like and would send me food
parcels
instead."
Louise Campbell of Supporting Old Aged People
(SOAP), a voluntary
organisation based in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city,
commented, "It is no
exaggeration to say that there is virtually no food
available at all."
Although vegetables are readily available in
supermarkets, "anything else is
a case of 'making a plan', if you have money
and transport," she said.
Empty shelves in the shops mean the elderly may
often have no other option
than to seek help, Campbell said. "We are now
finding that people outside
the country are ... [sending] food parcels for
their elderly relatives here.
Although they have the money, they are unable
to find food."
SOAP is part of a network of charity organisations that
help pay pensioner's
rates, water, electricity and sewerage bills. "At the
moment we are coping.
We don't know for how long, but people have been
kind," said Campbell.
It also helps aged pensioners who cannot survive on
their monthly pensions,
which keep dwindling in value: some get less than a
US$1 a month. The
charity delivers groceries and other basic items like tea,
coffee, cereals,
bath and laundry soap, as well as drugs purchased with
donations from
well-wishers, to the homes of 170 elderly people in
Bulawayo.
A number of pensioners living in homes for the elderly, but who
do not
receive food in these institutions, also benefit. "We are coping with
hope,"
said Campbell. Some relatives overseas also send parcels of drugs to
bridge
the shortage gap for those who need constant
medication.
Prices keep going up
According to a situation report
by the United States Aid agency (USAID) this
week, Zimbabwe is increasingly
unable to provide the fuel and maintain the
infrastructure necessary for
agricultural production, water and sanitation
services, and power
facilities.
Last month, the Central Statistical Office (CSO) reported
that inflation had
slowed to around 6,500 percent in August, from a peak of
about 7,300 percent
a few months before.
A few commodities are slowly
finding their way back onto city shop shelves
after government ended price
controls in August. Some shops stock imported
products like milk formulas,
chocolates, detergents and tinned foods, all
from neighbouring South Africa
and Botswana.
But the prices, denominated in the fickle parallel market
exchange rate for
the South African rand, are way out of reach for most.
According to a
USAID-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET)
report, most
staple foods can only be found in the informal market at prices
beyond
levels the majority of the population can afford.
"As a result
of the poor October 2006 to March 2007 agricultural season,
families in the
most drought-affected areas of western and southern Zimbabwe
have depleted
household food stocks, and have limited access to the markets
due to high
staple food prices," report said.
In meantime, pensioners like Malunga
rely on cross-border traders to bring
them basic commodities from Botswana
or South Africa.
[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of
the United Nations ]
politics.co.uk
Tuesday, 02 Oct
2007 12:13
The government was under pressure today to strip Robert Mugabe
of his
honorary knighthood.
Shadow foreign secretary William Hague
said Mugabe and his "parasitic
cronies" must be under no doubt they are
international pariahs, calling for
a raft of international sanctions and
diplomatic condemnation.
Speaking at the Conservative party conference,
Mr Hague said: "[Mugabe]
still enjoys an honorary knighthood from
Britain.
"It is time it was stripped from him."
The Zimbabwean
ruler was awarded the honour under John Major's government in
1994, despite
international condemnation for his role in the massacre of
Zimbabwean
citizens.
Today Mr Hague welcomed the prime minister's call to bar Mugabe
from the
EU-African summit, but said the EU must go further to widen
sanctions
against the Zimbabwe regime.
He also condemned African
nations for not doing enough to condemn Mugabe's
rule. Although Zimbabwe's
Commonwealth membership has been suspended, other
states oppose isolating
the regime.
Mr Hague said today Zimbabwe had become a "monument to the
truth that
although the power, even of a good government to do good is not
infinite,
the power of a bad one to do harm knows no limits."
Downing
Street has made clear the prime minister will not attend the African
summit
if Mugabe is allowed a seat at the table. However, Gordon Brown
would,
hypothetically, meet with other Zimbabwean representatives.
Mr Brown has
shown willingness to toughen sanctions against Zimbabwe through
the EU and
last month said the UK was preparing to table wider restrictions
on the
regime's travel and financial arrangements.
CommentaryMagazine
James Kirchick - 10.2.2007 -
10:05AM
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has set African leaders astir
with his
ultimatum concerning an upcoming European Union/African Union
conference in
Lisbon, Portugal. Brown has laid down a simple condition for
his attendance
at the December conference: that Zimbabwean dictator Robert
Mugabe not
attend. "We should not sit down at the same table as President
Mugabe,"
Brown told the Labour Party conference last week. He
elaborated
We will play our part also in helping all those people who
want to work
together to make sure there is social and economic justice, and
then
political justice, also for the Zimbabwean people. We are ready to play
our
part in the reconstruction and in the building of a democracy.. There
must
be democracy restored to Zimbabwe.
Many of Tony Blair's friends
in America were unsure of his successor's
commitment to global freedom, but
Brown's principled and uncompromising
stand on the Mugabe tyranny should
assuage most, if not all, of those
doubts.
African leaders, who have
done nothing of substance to assist Mugabe's exit
from power (and have
actually aided him whenever the democratic opposition
to his rule came close
to weakening his regime) are angry at Mr. Brown's
provocation. It is
expected that if the EU follows the British Prime
Minister's suggestion and
retracts Mugabe's invitation, the entire summit
will collapse due to African
states' boycotting the event. European
diplomats, unwilling to take any step
that would cause offense or discomfort
to dictators, are already busying
themselves condemning Mr. Brown to the
media.
I have a compromise
solution to this seemingly intractable quandary. Brown
should at once
rescind his opposition to Mugabe's attendance at the Lisbon
summit, and
instead express his giddy anticipation at greeting the
Zimbabwean president
in Portugual come December. The EU should officially
waive the travel ban it
placed on Mugabe in 2002 and ceremoniously grant him
a visa. When Mugabe
steps off his plane (AirZimbabwe's only international
jet, which Mugabe
regularly commandeers on a whim, throwing the national
carrier's schedule
into chaos), he will be greeted by a Hague-appointed
prosecutor serving him
an indictment for crimes against humanity. The
Portuguese police will then
take him promptly into custody. I hope this is
an idea Brown is already
contemplating.
UN
Integrated Regional Information Networks
2 October 2007
Posted to the
web 2 October 2007
Harare
Dire shortages of such essentials as
electricity and water are forcing
Zimbabweans living with HIV/AIDS to combat
the country's hardships with new
and novel approaches.
According to
the Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey, 18.1 percent of the
population
of about 11.5 million are infected with HIV - the sixth highest
prevalence
in the world.
Once one of the most prosperous countries in the
sub-Saharan region,
Zimbabwe's economy is in freefall, with an inflation
rate of more than 6,000
percent and international donor agencies predicting
that by the end of the
year a third of the population will require emergency
food aid.
A serious shortage of foreign currency to import chemicals for
treating
water, and spare parts for maintaining plants and reticulation
systems,
combined with inadequate rainfall, has brought basic services in
many areas
to a halt.
In this environment, organisations like the
AIDS Counselling Trust (ACT),
established in 1988 to complement and assist
government and international
aid agencies initiatives to provide care,
support and treatment for people
affected and infected by HIV/AIDS, have
developed innovative methods to
counter the erratic supplies of water and
electricity.
"Because of the high cost of electricity, erratic power
supplies and the
high cost of firewood, a large number of our clients living
positively with
HIV/AIDS were having problems accessing warm food, until
recently," Peter
Kamusiya, ACT's programme officer for Nutrition and Home
Based Care, told
IRIN.
The hay basket
The organisation, which
works mainly with HIV-positive people living in the
high-density suburbs of
Mabvuku, Tafara, Glen Norah, Mbare, Kuwadzana and
Highfields in the capital,
Harare, stumbled across a solution at a local
HIV/AIDS exhibition: a
low-tech basket, insulated with hay, that can be used
to cook and keep food
warm for several hours.
"We borrowed the concept from the exhibition and
we now reproduce the
baskets for the benefit of our clients located in
Harare and surrounding
farms, and the hay basket has been received with ...
[applause] by people
living with HIV/AIDS."
The basket is made from
local river reeds and then stuffed with hay, which
is then further insulated
with locally produced sacking. "It is very simple
to use. For example, when
cooking beans, they are soaked in water overnight
and then cooked for one
hour in a clay pot on a fireplace. The clay pot is
then transferred into the
hay basket, which is then closed to allow further
cooking for another two
hours before eating," he told IRIN.
Angeline Chiwetani, coordinator of
the HIV/AIDS non-governmental
organisation, the Youth in Development Trust,
said the hay basket was an
innovation to suit the times.
"In the face
of regular power cuts and the resultant high costs of firewood,
I quite
naturally welcome such an innovation. People living with HIV/AIDS
have to
eat warm food in order to kill any bacteria which may find its way
into the
food," she said.
The need for such an energy-saving device was identified
last year after a
survey of ACT's clients, when it was found that people
were no longer eating
dried beans because they took too long to cook. "This
forced us to move with
speed, because beans is one of the highly nutritious
foods which are cheap
and available locally," Kamusiya said.
"The
other advantage with the hay basket, other than the fact that it is
made
from locally available material, is that because the food is cooked in
a
sealed basket, no nutrients are allowed to escape." The organisation's
clients are now supplied with the raw materials to make their own hay
baskets.
Gardening innovations
Crippling water shortages,
which have left some of Harare's suburbs without
water for months, and bans
on the use of hosepipes to water gardens in
suburbs still supplied with
water, have made it extremely difficult to grow
vegetable and herb gardens,
depriving people living with HIV/AIDS of vital
nutrition and a source of
alternative medicines to treat headaches and
diarrhoea, or stimulate
appetites.
"We are training our clients in water management skills for
their nutrition
gardens, such as mulching, in which they are urged to spread
grass on their
vegetable beds to prevent evaporation of moisture," Kamusiya
said.
We discourage the use of chemicals and pesticides in preference for
natural
methods, and we encourage the use of compost and manure, while
inter-cropping ensures that insects cannot attack their
plants
"Another technique is the use of the 'Grow Bag', where a sack is
filled with
soil and compost, then perforated and vegetables grown on it.
This ensures
that there will be very little water lost after the bag is
watered, while
the high concentration of compost will ensure vegetables grow
much faster,"
he said.
Clients are also encouraged to use water from
washing and bathing for their
gardens, and inter-cropping techniques, in
which vegetables and herbs are
planted alternately.
"We discourage
the use of chemicals and pesticides in preference for natural
methods, and
we encourage the use of compost and manure, while
inter-cropping ensures
that insects cannot attack their plants, as they can
only do so when there
is one variety of crops planted on a vegetable bed,"
Kamusiya
said.
Should pests attack their gardens, clients are encouraged to use a
combination of ground garlic and chillies mixed with water, which is then
sprayed on the garden as a natural pesticide.
[ This report does not
necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]
The Herald (Harare) Published by
the government of Zimbabwe
2 October 2007
Posted to the web 2 October
2007
Harare
AIR Zimbabwe has increased airfares with immediate
effect for various routes
with passengers travelling to London now parting
with $439 million for a
return economy class ticket.
Before the
increases, travellers were paying $154 million for the same
ticket. Airzim
spokesperson Mr David Mwenga yesterday said the increases
were necessitated
by skyrocketing operational costs, which had seen the
national airline
failing to make meaningful profits.
"Yes we have increased airfares
owing to ever increasing operational costs
but the increases are also meant
to ensure viability of the national
airline," Mr Mwenga said. He said the
costs of Jet A 1 fuel, insurance,
spare parts, catering, handling and
over-flying charges were rising. Mr
Mwenga said 90 percent of the airline's
costs were in foreign currency
compared to only 30 percent revenue in
foreign currency and 70 percent in
local currency. Starting yesterday
international routes such as the Harare
to Dubai were increased from $142
million to $285 million while those flying
to Singapore will have to folk
out $423,8 million, up from $131,4 million.
An economy class ticket for the
Harare-Johannesburg route now costs $87,6
million up from $34,5 million
while a trip from Harare to Luanda is now $167
million up from $65 million.
A return ticket from Harare to Kinshasa is now
$174,5 million up from $67
million.
Increases were also effected on the domestic routes with
travellers now
having to pay $60 million for a return trip to Victoria
Falls, $48 million
to Bulawayo and $33,2 million to Kariba. Before the
increases, it cost $24
million to fly to Victoria Falls and $15,3 and $14,1
million to fly to
Bulawayo and Kariba.
Air Zimbabwe last increased
fares in August after the Cabinet Taskforce on
Price Monitoring and
Stabilisation gave it the go ahead to increase. The
airline incurs high
costs in fuel, insurance, spare parts, catering,
handling and over-flying
charges all of which are paid in foreign currency.
In October last year,
the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe said Air Zimbabwe like
all other parastatals
would no longer get State support and should charge
cost reflective fares
for it to continue to operate viably.