I'm a political victim: Kuruneri

Zim Independent

Clemence Manyukwe

FORMER Finance minister Chris Kuruneri has launched a full
frontal attack on Zanu PF political commissar Elliot Manyika and Harare
magistrate Mishrod Guvamombe, accusing them of involvement in a political
conspiracy against him.

In a statement submitted to his lawyer Jonathan Samkange,
Kuruneri, who is on trial for allegedly contravening the Exchange Control
Act, said he quarrelled with Manyika and "clashed almost violently" with
provincial magistrate Guvamombe over a farm in Mazowe.

Kuruneri said Manyika backed Guvamombe in the dispute. He said
this was the source of his current problems.

Samkange confirmed yesterday that Kuruneri authored the
statement in which he described his trial as a "political prosecution".

Kuruneri said despite the fact that the Criminal Procedure and
Evidence Act requires that a magistrate or judge should have reasonable
suspicion that a crime has been committed, Guvamombe signed a warrant for
his arrest in 2004 without any incriminating evidence.

"But even more important was what brought magistrate Guvamombe
into the conspiracy. The answer is that Mr Guvamombe clashed with the
accused (myself) almost violently over Harmony Farm in Mazowe West," he
said.

Kuruneri said Guvamombe claimed that he had been allocated the
farm in Kuruneri's former Mazowe West constituency by Manyika. However,
Kuruneri and the Mashonaland Central provincial administrator wanted the
property allocated to displaced farm workers.

"Minister Manyika clashed with the accused (myself) over the
allocation of Harmony Farm to Mr Guvamombe with the Member of Parliament
(Kuruneri was MP for the area at that time and also Finance minister)
insisting that priority should be given to his electorate from Mazowe West.
The matter before this court is a political prosecution pitching a local MP
trying to protect his electorate's rights," Kuruneri said.

Manyika said yesterday: "I will only comment if his (Kuruneri's)
lawyers approach me."

Guvamombe said he had no problems with Kuruneri because he did
not want the farm in the first place.

"It is not true. I was allocated an adjacent farm, but as you
would appreciate, there were a lot of emotions regarding the land issue," he
said.

"I can't remember signing the warrant (for Kuruneri's arrest)
because at the time there were three provincial magistrates."

Kuruneri has also accused prosecutor, Joseph Jagada, and the
investigating officer, Assistant Commissioner Samson Mangoma, of suppressing
evidence exonerating him. He has made a report to the police over the
alleged misconduct of the two and the issue is in court.

On Tuesday Justice Susan Mavangira ordered a trial within a
trial to deal with the allegations against Jagada after the defence applied
to have him removed from the case.

The trial within the trial continued yesterday. Jagada and the
Attorney-General Sobusa Gula-Ndebele, cited as respondents by Kuruneri, were
represented by prosecutor, Lawrence Phiri.

In his defence, filed on Wednesday, Jagada dismissed the claims
saying Mangoma never alleged that he had removed the affidavit.

"It appears the applicant has actually managed to create an
impression already that indeed there was a statement which was removed from
the docket whereas there is no evidence to this effect neither was it said
by any one of the state witnesses," Jagada said.

Zisco report vanishes

Zim Independent

Dumisani Muleya

GOVERNMENT appeared to be succeeding this week in its effort to
bury a report which alleges massive corruption by senior politicians at
state-owned steel-making enterprise, Zisco.

A parliamentary portfolio committee dealing with the issue
failed to get the report, with ministers
giving excuses as to why the report could not be released.

This confirmed widespread fears that government was now
determined to cover-up the issue which could claim prominent political
casualties.

Committee chairman Enock Porusingazi said this week the report
had vanished. He said efforts by his committee to get it had been blocked by
responsible authorities.

"Mystery now surrounds the report. (Anti-Corruption minister
Paul) Mangwana says he doesn't have it. (Industry and International Trade
minister Obert) Mpofu can't produce it either," Porusingazi said.

"But someone will have to produce that report. People want to
know what happened at Zisco. Our mandate as a committee is to exercise
oversight on such issues and hold the executive accountable."

Mangwana, who two weeks ago threatened that those involved would
be arrested if there was enough evidence to prosecute them, was quoted this
week on the Voice of America saying he could not discuss the report because
it was an "intelligence" document. "That is an intelligence report, I can't
discuss it with the media," he said.

Mangwana said investigations were going on into the issue but
sounded noncommittal when asked when they would end and action taken. He
said he did not know.

There seems to be a retreat by Mangwana and Mpofu who were at
the forefront of the issue two weeks ago. Although Mangwana initially said
those involved - be they ministers or MPs - would be arrested, he is no
longer pushing that line.

"Very soon we will take action and police will make arrests of
those who were involved in corruption at Ziscosteel irrespective of their
political or social status," Mangwana said two weeks ago.

"It doesn't matter if they are ministers or MPs. As long as they
were involved they will be arrested. If we find that a crime was committed
by whoever we will call in the police and provide evidence for prosecution."

Sources said members of Porusingazi's committee this week tried
in vain to secure Mangwana's cooperation on the issue. Mpofu did not
cooperate either, MPs said.

Mpofu, who was widely quoted two weeks ago as saying
"influential people" had pillaged Zisco through "underhand dealings that
have left the company bleeding", has been trying to backtrack on his
remarks.

Mpofu's new line now appears to be that ministers and MPs did
not loot Zisco but their companies benefited from
contracts, while the state firm made huge losses.

Sources said government has intimidated ministers and others who
were privy to the findings of the report - compiled by the National Economic
Conduct Inspectorate which is controlled by the Ministry of Finance and
state security agents - not to release the report or its contents. The few
copies that were handed out have now been recalled, it is understood.

The report is understood to contain names of influential
politicians and their cronies who practically milked Zisco dry. The
steel-making firm has been sustained through taxpayers' funds as a public
enterprise. About $2 trillion (in old currency) was poured in recently to
save it from collapse.

Observers say attempts to suppress the report clearly shows
government is not fully committed to combating corruption in its ranks where
it is apparently rampant.

'Why more MPs?'

Zim Independent

Ray Matikinye

PRESIDENT Mugabe's disclosure at the weekend that the
constitution will be amended to increase parliamentary seats has raised the
stakes in Zanu PF's highly-divisive succession struggle.

Mugabe said the objective of increasing the number of seats was
to cater for the country's growing population, although the last census
showed the population was in fact going down owing to migration and the
ravages of Aids. His remarks came as he warned party members against
fighting over his job.

Opposition parties yesterday said they would mobilise against
such an amendment if they discover that it is meant to serve Zanu PF's
succession politics rather than national interests.

Mugabe's remarks provided a further insight into how the party
is anxious to find ways of managing its problematic succession issue by
extending patronage to those now needed to support constitutional amendments
providing for transitional mechanisms.

Zanu PF last year re-introduced a senate, apparently as part of
efforts to deal with Mugabe's succession.

Movement for Democratic Change (Mutambara faction)
secretary-general, Professor Welshman Ncube, who heads the Parliamentary
Legal Committee, said his party would resist such self-serving manoeuvres.

"We will oppose that within the parameters of parliament," he
said. "We will mobilise against such an amendment until government realises
Zimbabweans should decide on the constitution together."

Ncube said while the idea could be justified for large
constituencies such as Insiza that stretches at one point for 200km, Zanu PF's
intentions should be taken with a pinch of salt.

"If we have to amend the constitution we need a whole spectra of
NGOs, civic society and political parties to achieve a national consensus.
These piecemeal amendments do not help our situation at all," he said.

Chorus of disapproval grows as Sexwale speaks out on Mugabe

Zim Independent

ONE of South Africa's most prominent politicians and business
tycoons, Tokyo Sexwale, has expressed open disapproval of President Robert
Mugabe's leadership, saying he is a freedom fighter who has lost his way.

Addressing South African expatriates in London last week, the
former African National Congress (ANC) bigwig and Gauteng premier, said
Mugabe is a "freedom fighter" who has now taken "a wrong step".

Sexwale, who spent 10 years on Robben Island with the likes of
former South African president Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu as political
prisoners under apartheid, suggested Mugabe's leadership was misguided.

"When a freedom fighter takes a wrong step, it is time for other
freedom fighters to stand up and say 'we know you are a great man, but we
cannot support what you are doing'," Sexwale said.

Sexwale, who is now a high-powered magnate heading the
Mvelaphanda conglomerate, appeared to be indirectly referring to the failure
of African leaders, including South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki, who have
so far remained hushed despite Zimbabwe's political and economic crisis.

He said it was important that South Africa observed the rule of
law and human rights, values which Zimbabwe disregards with impunity.

Drawing an undisguised contrast, Sexwale said South Africa is "a
country where the deputy president gets dismissed. It's a country where
Winnie Mandela stands trial. It is a country where the chief whip, Tony
Yengeni, goes to jail. That is the country that I want to live in - where
Mbeki, Mandela, all of us are not above the law.

"In my country the judges are not interfered with. In my country
we do not seize land. In my country we do not incarcerate and torture our
people."

Despite Mugabe's assertions that African leaders and former
nationalists support him, there is a growing chorus of criticism of his
authoritarian rule.

One of South Africa's leading anti-apartheid crusaders and ANC
stalwart, Cyril Ramaphosa, has said the Zimbabwean situation is making it
very difficult to attract investment to the region.

South African Reserve Bank governor Tito Mboweni has also
criticised the situation in Zimbabwe.

Nobel Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a strong
anti-apartheid activist, a few years ago described Mugabe as "a caricature
of an archetypal African dictator".

Mugabe hit back at Tutu, saying he was a "bitter, evil little
bishop".

Tutu, who has attacked Israel for its "apartheid" against
Palestine and the United States over Guantanamo Bay detentions of terrorist
suspects, has also criticised Mbeki's policy of "quiet diplomacy" towards
Zimbabwe.

Respected Nigerian writer and Nobel Prize laureate, Wole
Soyinka, has also hauled Mugabe over the coals for his leadership failures,
showing there is a growing continent-wide criticism of his 26-year rule.

Regional leaders showed concern over what is happening in
Zimbabwe during a Southern African Development Community summit in Lesotho
in August, leaving Mugabe, who left the meeting in a huff, even more
isolated. - Staff Writer.

No operating licence for training purposes, BAZ tells institutions

Zim Independent

Lucia Makamure

THE Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) has no mandate to
issue licences for training purposes. This followed applications to operate
community radio stations by three media training institutions, the Harare
Polytechnic, Midlands State University and the National University of
Science and Technology.

The institutions, which train both print and electronic
journalists, want to operate radio stations at their campuses for academic
purposes but BAZ said the Broadcasting Services Act did not give it power to
issue licences for training purposes.

The Harare Polytechnic made its application to BAZ on July 20
last year.

The institutions wanted to set up transmitters at their campuses
to broadcast to students and their environs. The BAZ, a statutory body
tasked with licensing broadcasters, this week attacked the three
institutions for failing to acquaint themselves with the law.

BAZ board member Pikirayi Deketeke said the Broadcasting
Services Act did not have provisions to issue licences for training
purposes.

"It's actually surprising that people who are training
journalists have absolutely no clue on the laws or what they are teaching,"
Deketeke, who is also editor of The Herald, said in an interview.

"How can BAZ create something that is not there? The fact that
the Act is silent does not mean that any mad man from the streets can
operate a radio station on the basis that it is nowhere written that a mad
man cannot operate a radio station."

Deketeke said BAZ licences operate on categories that are
stipulated in the Act and if an application did not fall in any of the
available categories then it did not qualify.

In its application, the Harare Polytechnic said it trained radio
journalists for the local and international markets. It said it had at its
disposal "a radio studio which enables the trainee journalists to practise
what they are taught".

He advised the institutions to apply for diffusion licences.

Unlike community radio broadcasting where one is allocated a
signal and frequency range that can transmit from a certain point, diffusion
involves broadcasting without a signal.

Diffusion uses internally-connected speakers from a broadcasting
point to other points as an intercom, similar to what is done in banks and
hospitals.

Lack of planning could blight farming season

Zim Independent

ZIMBABWE faces another poor harvest even if it receives good
rains in the coming season because of a critical shortage of fertiliser.

An official from the Zimbabwe Fertiliser Company (ZFC) told the
Zimbabwe Independent this week that domestic fertiliser production had been
hampered by critical foreign currency shortages, power cuts, inefficient
rail transport, shortage of fuel and a major breakdown at the only
manufacturer of ammonium nitrate in the country.

"There is no fertiliser as we speak. There is no guarantee that
it will be made available," the official said. "There is a lot of chaos
which ranges from a few individuals benefiting, the product being
over-priced and people importing the same type over the past month," he
said.

Information at hand suggests that the beneficiaries from the
limited fertiliser are mostly senior government officials on A2 farms.

However, most of them have a lesser need for the fertiliser at
this time of the year as they are mostly maize growers who depend on
rain-fed cropping than tobacco farmers who have already started planting and
are facing fertiliser shortage.

Zimbabwe Association of Tobacco Growers chairman, Julius
Ngorima, told the Independent this week that the unavailability of fertliser
could affect production as the amount of hectares planted depends on the
quantity of fertliser available.

"Most tobacco farmers are at the ridging stage, where compound C
fertiliser should be applied for about two weeks, before being transplanted.
Once transplanted, ammonium nitrate fertiliser is immediately applied,"
Ngorima said.

"Farmers are stranded as they do not know what to do as
fertiliser is not available on the market. Indications are that the
situation might not improve soon."

The country requires about 650 000 tonnes of fertiliser every
cropping season. According to agricultural experts, Zimbabwe is capable of
producing about 300 00 tonnes.

The price rose by almost 100% last month triggered by a sharp
rise in the cost of transporting ammonium.

A 50 kilogramme bag of ammonium nitrate now costs $4 900, from
$2 200, while farmers must fork out $6 000 for a 50 kg of Compound D. The
same quantity is selling for about $12 000 on the parallel market.

The country's major fertiliser manufacturing plants have been
operating below capacity due to problems which include lack of foreign
exchange to import raw materials like sulphur, potash and anhydrous ammonia.

Tardy service by the NRZ has resulted in substantially increased
costs especially when road transport has to be used as an alternative.

A transformer that blew up at Sable Chemicals, the main supplier
of most inorganic compound fertilisers used in Zimbabwe, has crippled
production.

Minister of Agriculture Joseph Made accused a monkey for the
breakdown.

"Our investigations have shown that a monkey caused damage to a
transformer, thereby sabotaging our preparations for this coming season,"
Made was quoted as saying last week.

According to the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (Fewsnet)'s
latest report, Zimbabwe is in desperate need of US$42 million to import raw
materials and machinery to produce the required amount of fertiliser.

Fewsnet however said even if the money was made available it was
no longer possible for local firms to import raw materials and meet national
requirements in the little time left before the onset of the rainy season.

"In the time left, domestic fertiliser manufacturing capacity is
inadequate to produce the required fertilisers even if all the required
foreign currency was to be secured," Fewsnet said. "Fertiliser imports will
have to be undertaken to augment locally available stocks," it added.

Fertiliser shortage is a perennial problem in Zimbabwe, and
farmers have warned the farming season starting next month will be bad if no
imports of the commodity are made urgently.

Agricultural production in Zimbabwe has plummeted in recent
years due to controversial government polices, shortages of inputs and
drought. This has forced the country to import food in the last four
years. - Staff Writer.

Parly committee censures Mahoso

Zim Independent

MEMBERS of the Transport and Communications portfolio committee
have been infuriated by the Media and Information Commission (MIC) for
insinuating that last week's media law reform workshop was a "regime change
activists' gathering". Committee members say the meeting, organised by the
Media Alliance of Zimbabwe (MAZ) in the capital last week, was a genuine
engagement for the improvement of media in Zimbabwe.

Speaking at the workshop in Harare over the weekend, committee
chairman Leo Mugabe censured MIC chairman Tafataona Mahoso for gross
misrepresentation of facts.

"I was part of this meeting," Mugabe said on Saturday.

"Over the past two days, I have not seen anything of regime
change in nature as alleged by Mahoso, which makes his story a complete
fabrication.

"In fact, I urge the convenors of this workshop to take issue
with Mahoso and my committee will back you," he said.

Mugabe was responding to Mahoso's statement, published in The
Herald last Friday, alleging that the MAZ clandestinely organised the
workshop under the guise of media law reform, to push a regime change
agenda.

Mahoso was formally invited to the workshop but did not attend.
A day before he was supposed to make a presentation he issued the statement
attacking the organisers of the workshop for pursuing a regime change
agenda.

Portfolio committee members who attended the workshop included
Mugabe, the Zanu PF MP for Makonde, Zhombe MP Daniel Mackencie Ncube (Zanu
PF), Zengeza legislator Goodrich Chimbaira (MDC), Pumula-Luveve MP Esaph
Mdlongwa (MDC), Chitungwiza senator Forbes Magadu (Zanu PF), and
Hwange-Tsholotsho senator Josephine Moyo.

Magadu said he was baffled by Mahoso's statement and said he
should be made to explain his comments.

"He should be taken to task for his statement," Magadu said.

"We cannot lead you into that action but you can be assured of
our support," he said.

Mdlongwa said the committee should examine the comments closely
and make an appropriate response to Mahoso's scurrilous attack.

Mahoso's statement was issued at the start of a two-day
parliamentary lobbying conference organised by MAZ to push for the repeal of
the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (Aippa), Public
Order and Security Act and Broadcasting Services Act, among others.

The Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ), Misa-Zimbabwe and the
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe form the media alliance.

Mahoso said the purpose of the meeting was to create "a stilted
platform from which the activists may engage in an orgy of anti-Zimbabwe
diatribe intended to coincide with other recently staged events".

By "recently staged events" Mahoso was apparently alluding to
the September 13 marches organised by the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
(ZCTU) which resulted in a brutal police assault on the ZCTU leaders and
other members.

In a statement MAZ said the MIC chairman's reference to
"clandestine" meetings was baffling because Mahoso himself was invited.

"Mahoso, as has become the norm, will go to any lengths to
protect his supper which comes by way of the contentious Aippa that created
the statutory MIC he chairs," MAZ said.

At a recent ZUJ workshop in Redcliff, acting Information
minister Paul Mangwana encouraged journalists and other media personnel to
come up with an all-inclusive voluntary media council.

"Show me a media council and I will show you a new MIC,"
Mangwana said.

Observers said Mahoso's accusation could stem from deep-seated
fear that government would emasculate his MIC as soon as stakeholders in the
media come up with a voluntary media council. - Staff Writer.

Temporary relief for spy agency bosses

Zim Independent

Clemence Manyukwe

THE High Court has set aside proceedings in the case of
attempting to defeat the course of justice against heads of the Central
Intelligence Organisation (CIO) in Manicaland and Rusape, Innocent Chibaya
and Denford Masiya respectively, after granting an application seeking the
recusal of a Rusape magistrate.

The CIO officers together with Rusape district administrator
Eric Charinga and two others were initially being charged with Justice
minister Patrick Chinamasa but their trials were separated.

The separation came after Rusape magistrate Loice Mukunyadzi
recused herself from trying Chinamasa saying magistrates had been
intimidated by National Security minister Didymus Mutasa.

Mukunyadzi said she was prepared to preside over the cases of
five other accused persons.

The separated cases emanate from allegations that the accused
persons pressured war veteran James Kaunye, a key state witness in the
matters, to withdraw his testimony in another politically motivated matter
initially linked to Mutasa, where he was also the state's star witness.

Chibaya and the his co-accused applied for Mukunyadzi to recuse
herself from their case arguing that their trial would be unfair due to her
utterances on the alleged intimidation of magistrates.

The magistrate dismissed it, prompting an appeal in the High
Court.

In an order made available to the Zimbabwe Independent on
Monday, High Court judge Bharat Patel granted the application filed by
advocate Depark Mehta on behalf of the accused persons.

"Proceedings before first respondent who is magistrate Loice
Mukunyadzi under Rusape case reference 21419/06 is hereby set aside," reads
the order.

The order added that the matter must be heard by another
magistrate outside the jurisdiction of Rusape.

Mutasa, who has denied threatening magistrates, has given notice
to sue Mukunyadzi for the claims as well as Manicaland area prosecutor,
Levison Chikafu, for saying his wings "must be clipped to the greatest
extent". Mutasa has also threatened to sue the Independent for reporting the
utterances.

Mukunyadzi and Chikafu have refused to apologise to Mutasa.

Last month, a retired magistrate acquitted Chinamasa on charges
of attempting to obstruct the ends of justice but the Attorney-General's
Office has since lodged an appeal.

Govt backing for toll manufacturers

Zim Independent

Loughty Dube

THE government has embarked on a project to support companies to
venture into toll manufacturing to avoid collapse and has so far identified
18 firms for a start, a report compiled by the Ministry of Industry and
International Trade has revealed.

The report shows that 72% of manufacturing companies in Zimbabwe
are operating below capacity.

Titled Report of the Taskforce on Import Substitution, Value
Addition and Toll Manufacturing, the report was compiled by the permanent
secretary in the Ministry of Industry and International Trade, Retired
Colonel Christian Katsande.

The report was presented at a National Economic Development
Priority Programme (NEDPP) report back meeting last Friday.

The meeting was organised by the Zimbabwe National Chamber of
Commerce (ZNCC) in Bulawayo last week.

The concept of toll manufacturing, according to the report,
involves a company outsourcing or subcontracting a manufacturing function to
a third party within or outside the country.

The manufacturer will then perform the contracted job for a fee.

"Already we have 18 companies that have been approved for toll
manufacturing. Of these, nine companies have started the programme with the
remainder scheduled to commence production very soon," the report said.

The report reveals that the manufacturing sector has been
declining drastically and that 72% of companies are operating at below 70%
of capacity.

"Available statistics indicate that the manufacturing sector has
been declining drastically. Between 2004 and 2005 only 13% of the
manufacturing sector was operating above 75% of installed capacity," the
report says.

"Currently about 40% of the manufacturing sector is operating
between 50 and 70% while 32% of the sector is operating below 30% of
capacity," it says.

Zimbabwe's manufacturing sector has been weighed down by a
myriad problems ranging from shortages of raw materials to a foreign
currency squeeze.

Despite efforts by government to revive falling companies
through the Distressed Companies Fund, not much has been achieved as
companies continue on a downward trend.

"It is hoped therefore that toll manufacturing will enable
growth of the manufacturing sector, increase capacity utilisation, save jobs
and earn foreign currency," the report said.

"Opportunities exist for our companies to enter into toll
manufacturing agreements with internal and third parties because we do
possess the requisite skills base . This can also be an opportunity for
technology transfer from the customer to our companies," the report says.

The main challenges facing the initiative, the report said, was
old and obsolete machinery.

"Toll manufacturing faces operational challenges that need to be
overcome for successful implementation of the programme. Among the
challenges that need be addressed are the state of the plant and machinery
in the companies. Some of our companies are operating with antiquated
machinery or using inefficient technology," reads the report.

The largest manufacturing companies that include Sable
Chemicals, Dunlop, Ziscosteel, and Craster International are facing collapse
due to viability problems.

Government appeals to NGOs to feed poor

Zim Independent

Augustine Mukaro

GROWING food shortages have forced government to eat its words
and allow non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to resume distributing food
aid. They were banned last year.

The decision has been viewed as an admission that the country
embellished production figures last season and that the army-led Operation
Maguta has been a flop.

Highly placed sources said government has ordered all provincial
governors and administrators to allow NGOs to resume food distribution with
immediate effect.

In a circular issued last month, government instructed
provincial officials to ignore a directive against NGOs last year.

"Please be advised that despite an earlier directive barring
NGOs from giving food aid to the people four months ago, it has emerged that
the government has not enough food to feed its citizens," reads the
circular.

"You are therefore advised to liaise with the traditional NGOs
in your area, which used to assist us in times of such need. Those NGOs
willing to assist should be allowed to start work immediately since the
situation is desperate in some areas."

The National Association of NGOs (Nango) confirmed that its
members had been allowed to resume general food distribution to starving
Zimbabweans. "The circular was sent through provincial governors," Nango
spokesman, Fambai Ngirande, said.

Last year about 22 food assistance agencies operating in the
countryside were forced to stop relief activities based on Agriculture
minister Joseph Made's projected bumper harvest for the 2005/6 season.

Only a limited number of donors were allowed to carry out
targeted feeding aimed at vulnerable groups such as the old, orphans and
people living with HIV/Aids.

NGOs that were forced to stop food aid and move out of the areas
they were operating in included Goal Zimbabwe, Concern, Christian Care, and
World Vision among others.

Government expressed suspicion that relief activities by food
agencies exposed deepening hunger in some parts of rural Zimbabwe, rebutting
the state's insistence on a bumper harvest.

The directive coincides with the World Food Programme (WFP)
urgent appeal for about US$61 million to buy 97 000 tonnes of food to feed
vulnerable groups in the country.

In an emergency report issued last week, WFP said it is
currently facing significant supply shortfalls in cereals, pulses and
corn-soya blend.

"As a result, food distribution for October 2006 will be cut by
66%, affecting some 364 000 school children and 190 000 chronically ill
people and orphans" the report said.

"In addition, beneficiaries of the urban feeding programme will
receive half rations. The pipeline is expected to slightly improve in
November through to January 2007, after which stocks will be depleted."

Made's 1,8 million tonnes harvest projection was proved to be a
mirage. Local and international farming experts calculated that Zimbabwe
harvested between 700 and 800 tonnes of maize in the 2005/06 season. The
harvest falls far short of what is required to see the country through to
the next harvest.

In a rare admission, Made told the Masvingo Agricultural show
over the weekend that the country did not harvest enough food last season
and that the army-led programme to produce food had flopped.

NRZ keeps lid on train disaster report

Zim Independent

THE National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) says it will not publish
a report on the inquiry into the Dibangombe train disaster that claimed the
lives of eight people, it emerged this week. Soon after the accident,
speculation was rife that more people might have died and were not recovered
after their bodies were consumed by the fire.

Reports from people on the ground indicated that as many as 30
people could have died in the train disaster although the official figures
put the number at eight.

The rail parastatal's general manager, Retired Air Commodore
Mike Karakadzai, had promised journalists at a press conference after the
train accident that the report would be made public. Speaking to journalists
last week, Karakadzai said the inquiry would now not be made public to avoid
any finger pointing.

"When an accident happens, the first person who wants to know
how the accident happened is the office of the general manager. It is
important for me to know what happened before releasing the information to
anyone as there will be a lot of finger pointing," Karakadzai said.

He said the report would be brought to his office and that the
NRZ would use the information for internal use as provided for in rail
regulations. Sources who visited the accident site indicated that more than
eight people might have perished, as the damage was extensive. Six coaches
were burnt beyond repair in the accident.

"There is definitely something that the NRZ is trying to cover
up. There is a general feeling that more than eight people might have died
in that train disaster," said a source, who requested anonymity. "Most of
the coaches were totally burnt and some bodies might not have been
recovered."

"The report might have uncovered the truth on what actually
happened. I think the NRZ has a strong case to answer," the source said.

Karakadzai warned that those responsible for the accident would
be dealt with according to the law.

"If the report finds any NRZ employees on the wrong side of the
law then a disciplinary committee will be set up to hear any evidence before
culprits are charged," Karakadzai said. - Staff Writer.

Daily News hearing on Monday

Zim Independent

Clemence Manyukwe

THE hearing by the High Court of the Associated Newspapers of
Zimbabwe (ANZ) application to be deemed registered after an earlier judgment
declaring the Media and Information Commission (MIC) biased is expected to
kick off on Monday.

The case was supposed to start yesterday.

High Court judge Anne-Marie Gowora moved it to next week after
MIC lawyer Mercy Chizodza said she needed to take instructions from the
media regulatory body on some issues.

The lawyer said the issues included ANZ's intention to amend the
order sought to include an alternative one requiring that they be allowed to
publish pending the application for registration.

"We would be prejudiced if we are to proceed today. I am
comfortable with a longer period - Monday," said Chizodza.

Earlier this year the High Court ruled that the MIC was
compromised by bias from hearing the ANZ's case.

The late Information minister Tichaona Jokonya made a filing in
the court, saying he was unable to appoint another committee in line with a
court judgment as the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act
did not provide for that. He said the Act should be amended first.

However, in response the ANZ said the minister was able to
appoint the committee because the MIC in its present form constituted an ad
hoc committee appointed for a six-month term after the expiry of its three
years in office.

"I do not accept that second respondent is disabled from
appointing another membership of the first respondent ad hoc or otherwise to
deal with this matter," said John Gambanga, the ANZ's acting chief
executive, in court papers. "Effectively the current membership of the first
respondent is ad hoc in that its term of office has in fact expired and was
only extended for a limited period."

Gambanga said government and MIC's conduct had led him to
conclude that they wanted to ensure that "the Daily News and the Daily News
on Sunday are never printed and published in Zimbabwe again".

The two papers were banned by the MIC in 2003.

Bulawayo proposes 50% rates hike

Zim Independent

Loughty Dube

THE Bulawayo City Council has proposed a $400 billion budget
that could see rates hiked by about 50% and residents in high density
suburbs paying monthly supplementary charges as high as $35 000.

The council is consulting residents on the way forward but
sources said this was a formality as the local authority was hard-pressed to
raise cash to fund capital projects and service delivery.

The council has scheduled 29 meetings with residents to discuss
and get input from ratepayers on the budget.

This week city treasurer, Middleton Nyoni, met with stakeholders
at the council chambers, where he tabled council proposals for the 2007
budget and said there was need to consider the hyperinflationary
environment.

"This year we set a budget of $3,8 billion which later went up
to $6 billion. Even after a supplementary budget in July the budget is not
enough to take us through the year as a result of the hyperinflationary
environment," Nyoni said.

The local authority said the 2007 budget would cater for service
delivery, poverty alleviation, HIV/Aids programmes and the upgrading of
street lights among other projects.

The Bulawayo United Residents Association (Bura) in response to
the proposed budget said the environment council is operating in was
difficult and that residents should support the budget so that service
delivery can improve.

Bura deputy chairperson, Effort Nkomo, said council should take
advantage of the rates hike in the budget to offer a better service to
residents.

"We know that the new rates will be very difficult for residents
in the city but we are saying there is no way council can survive with the
current rates and we expect council to deliver a service even in the
difficult hyper-inflationary environment," Nkomo said.

This is the first time in the history of budget consultations in
the city that the main residents association has accepted rate increases
without putting up a fight.

Under the proposed rate increases supplementary charges in high
density areas will go up from $289 to $7 459 while those in the low density
areas will fork out $3 014, up from $117.

Water fixed charges in high density will increase from $258 to
$5 866 while in low density areas the rate will go up to $11 002 up from
$426.

Other charges that were increased are sewer and solid waste
management fees.

No direct power imports, Zerc tells firms

Zim Independent

Shame Makoshori

THE Zimbabwe Electricity Regulatory Commission (Zerc) has
rejected requests for direct power imports by several private firms, fearing
this could harm revenue streams for the beleaguered state-owned power
utility, Zesa, businessdigest established this week.

The private companies are understood to have sought permission
from Zerc, a new power sector regulatory body established in 2005, to import
power directly from suppliers in South Africa, Mozambique and the Democratic
Republic of Congo (DRC).

This had been prompted by unreliable supplies from Zesa which
has dismally failed to meet local power demand due to low generation
capacity at its own plants and lack of foreign currency for imports.

However, sources indicated that their requests had been thrown
away by Zerc after establishing that the companies would be importing from
the same sources as Zesa, and that Zesa could lose significant revenue since
the companies form the core of the utility's key customer base.

Businessdigest could not establish the number of companies that
had applied for direct import permits from Zerc, but sources indicated there
was a significantly high number, most of them in the manufacturing and
mining sectors.

Businessdigest understands that Zerc is of the view that if it
allows major power consumers to directly import power, potential investors
might be dissuaded from injecting capital into local power generation.

Zerc was established to regulate the sector and promote
competition in electricity generation by encouraging private sector
participation.

It is working on a restructuring programme to woo foreign
investors, but sources said government policy was working against these
efforts.

Businessdigest understands that Zerc is now proposing that if
the firms are willing to commit foreign currency resources towards power
imports, they should be able to pay for their electricity supplies from Zesa
in foreign
currency.

This, Zerc believes, would enable Zesa to import enough power to
meet local demand since its import obligations had been constrained by lack
of foreign currency.

"Major companies such as Sable Chemicals are said to have asked
for permission to directly import electricity from Eskom and other regional
exporters that are also supplying Zesa but that will kill Zesa," said a
source from the Ministry of Energy, under which Zerc and Zesa fall.

"They were told that this is not possible," the source said.

Firms that have previously complained about power supply
problems include Zimbabwe Stock Exchange-listed mining firms Falcon Gold,
Bindura Nickel Corporation and RioZim, formerly Rio Tinto Zimbabwe.

Zesa is going through serious viability problems that have been
triggered by acute foreign currency shortages, a parallel tariff structure
where it sells electricity at a lower cost than the production and
distribution costs.

Utility companies in the region have increasingly become
reluctant to supply Zesa with power because of its increased default risk on
foreign currency-denominated obligations.

Requests for a comment from Zerc commissioner general Mavis
Chidzonga were unsuccessful.

Growing unease over Gono's authority

Zim Independent

Clemence Manyukwe

A PARLIAMENTARY committee has taken a sharp aim at both fiscal
and monetary authorities, saying both have "gloss(ed) over the real
challenges facing the economy" and evaded tackling inflation.

In a clear rebuke of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) and
government, the budget, finance and economic development portfolio committee
said inflation continued to rise and remained "untamed" despite government
and the central bank declaring it "number one enemy".

The committee, chaired by businessman and Zanu PF MP for Guruve
North David Butau, said the central bank, whose governor Gideon Gono has
been appointed the agent of economic reform, had undertaken numerous
projects that had fuelled inflation, yet Gono's monetary policy had "no
clear measures for bringing down the galloping inflation" levels.

The committee accused government of reckless spending, saying
this was fuelling inflation.

In what amounted to a veiled disapproval of the current central
bank's operations, the committee said the central bank's quasi-fiscal
operations should be brought under a quasi-fiscal coordinating committee to
be chaired by Finance minister Herbert Murerwa "to protect the legality of
quasi-fiscal operations".

This seemed to suggest that the legality of Gono's current
quasi-fiscal operations, which have been a source of strong disagreements
between Gono and Murerwa, were questionable.

Gono has clashed with several of President Robert Mugabe's
cabinet ministers over perceived encroachment into their operations due to
his quasi-fiscal activities which have seen him disburse large sums of money
to government departments and parastatals.

The committee said the operations should be accounted for in
Murerwa's budget proposals "so that all funds are accounted for".

The committee also expressed grave concern over growing
government spending.

It said it had "noted with alarm, the minister's announcement of
a supplementary budget" which had brought total expenditure for 2006 to
$450,2 trillion.

"The supplementary budget exceeds the original budget for the
year 2006 by an astounding 164%. The pronouncement of the supplementary
budget that is thrice the size of the original budget strains the already
constrained government expenditure. The Minister of Finance admitted that
government deficit financing is the major source of money supply growth and
consequently inflation," the committee said.

The committee said: "Fiscal restraint should be exercised as
much as possible to minimise government borrowing. Ministries should confine
themselves to spending what was budgeted for and not carry out tasks that
will necessitate government borrowing because this inevitably fuels
inflation."

What a bountiful third quarter for ZSE investors

Zim Independent

By Admire Mavolwane

Since the light rains, which as the Meteorological Department
cautioned is not a signal that the rainy season is now upon us, there has
hardly ever been so much running around in the capital with many a farmer
organisation representative urging members to start preparing their fields
for maize, soya beans and tobacco crops.

As usual there were shrill calls for government to provide, or
at least make sure that all the necessary inputs are available. GMB on its
part reassured stakeholders that, in line with its national mandate, all its
depots' personnel are psyched up and ready to distribute the inputs once
they are to hand.

Following the rollover of the $19,5 billion Aspef funds
announced during the mid-year monetary policy review more good news awaited
the farmers. The Minister of Agriculture reminded wheat farmers that their
obligations to the state in terms of funding advanced do not fall due this
season, but only after the next. In the meantime, they should use their
bumper $217 913,40/tonne producer price to prepare for the next summer
farming season.

Hopefully, all the incentives and goodwill provided farmers will
be repaid in the form of grain self sufficiency for the nation and increased
tobacco output.

It was not only the wheat farmers - and tobacco growers after
they received their back pay -- who could be seen sporting broad smiles, as
stock market investors also had every reason to be smug.

The quarter opened with a lot of promise for share punters as
July recorded gains of 76,85% with investors taking positions ahead of the
June reporting period as well as betting against both the half year fiscal,
and monetary policy statements. Investors who had the nerve to buy ahead of
the monetary policy statement reaped the rewards for having the courage of
their convictions. Even those who were somehow late to the party and bought
after the monetary policy review statement which was delivered on July 31
have also done well.

The governor, in his half year review, not only changed the
currency by introducing a new family of bearer cheques without three zeros,
but also re-affirmed the adoption by the central bank of a low interest rate
policy. The overnight accommodation rate was reduced from 850% to 300% for
secured lending. Subsequently the 91-day treasury bill yield was reduced
from 525% to 200%, before the issuance of this short dated paper was
suspended in favour of six months and one year treasury bills. The yields on
these sovereign assets also came off significantly to 100% and 150%,
respectively. A single tender for 91-day treasury bills was held
mid-September, probably for purposes of realigning the yield curve at which
the yield came out at 66,33% per annum.

The quarter also saw an unparalleled amount, of $126,3 billion
in treasury bill maturities. This injected so much liquidity into the market
that banking institutions were turning away short term deposits, by either
not paying or by quoting interest rates around 10% per annum.

Even for the relatively longer deposits of over 30 days
investment interest rates were very discouraging. With the money market
having been removed from the list of investment options focus turned on the
stock market; motor vehicles and real estate.

The stock market whose gains are easily quantifiable returned
87,53% in August and 114,06% for September, bringing the overall gains for
the quarter to 608,30%. All the counters currently trading on the Zimbabwe
Stock Exchange recorded uplifts of more than 150%. Those investors who had
the good fortune of having taken the wise counsel of probably one or two
analysts in the market and bought into First Mutual, Bindura and Falgold,
owe their investment advisor a thank-you card.

All the above counters have some kind of story behind the share
price movement, in some instances not justifiably correlated to
fundamentals.

At the other end, investors were giving Gulliver, Edgars, and
Tedco a wide berth and thus the trio returned the least amount of capital
appreciation. It is probable that the quantum of the differential in returns
between First Mutual and Gulliver - 4 344,4% vs 181,3% - were Zimbabwe a
litigious society, would have resulted in a number of lawsuits in the
investment industry.

In our quest to find out why analysts almost invariably fail to
pick winners, we stumbled upon a piece in The Spectator written by a Merryn
Somerset-Webb, which although focusing on unit trust returns would apply to
the entire investment management/advisory industry. The writer says:

"It was a massive failure in forecasting but, I am sorry to say,
far from an unusual one: fund managers are, in general, hopeless
macroeconomic forecasters - and even worse at predicting the direction of
the stock market in order to make money for their investors.

"Why? Simple. They tend to base their market views and their
stock-picking on their economic (earnings) forecasts - predicting the
unpredictable by looking at the probably wrong."

RBZ still to act on exchange rate body

Zim Independent

Paul Nyakazeya

THE Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe has not yet established the
much-talked about Exchange Rate Impact Assessment Board (ERIAB), an
institution that was expected to monitor and review the exchange rate since
a devaluation made two months ago.

The development had raised serious concerns in the market where
dealers said foreign currency holders were becoming reluctant to dispose of
their foreign cash holdings because of uncertainty over the establishment of
the board.

Gono had promised to introduce the ERIAB after ditching the
lifeless volume-based exchange rate system that had kept rates stagnant due
to lack of volumes.

The volume-based system, under which rates could move by a
certain margin only after a prescribed amount of transactions took place on
the market in a single day, had been adopted on January 24. Market analysts
said there was growing apprehension in the market as foreign currency
holders felt the local currency was now significantly overvalued.

One analyst said the currency might now be overvalued by about
30% if the last devaluation was considered to have been the appropriate rate
for the local currency.

A bank economist who declined to be named said since 21 days had
elapsed in August, the market had begun losing confidence in the monetary
policy in respect to the management of the exchange rate.

The economist said the market was expecting a more significant
devaluation that would bring the exchange rate somewhere near parallel
market levels where sellers were receiving a premium of close to 80% on the
official rate.

But sources said that there were no indications the central bank
was likely to set up the board anytime soon, with insiders saying the issue
had not been a subject of discussion ever since Reserve Bank governor Gideon
Gono made the announcement in July.

Gono, who devalued the Zimbabwe dollar from $101 to $250 against
the greenback during his monetary policy review on July 31, said the ERIAB
would meet every month to review developments in the foreign exchange
market.

The central bank would act on advice from the ERIAB, Gono said,
reviewing the exchange rates to levels recommended by the board.

Gono said the board mandate would be to monitor and review the
exchange rate monthly "under a new flexible policy".

Sources told businessdigest that the Reserve Bank "had not moved
an inch" in setting up the board.

Gono, they said, felt under no pressure to establish the board
as the foreign currency situation was showing no sign of improvement.

"It is difficult to manage a commodity that is not available,"
said David Mupamhadzi, a bank economist, responding to concerns over the
possibility of a properly functional exchange rate board.

Zim to host IMF team

Zim Independent

Dumisani Ndlela

MONETARY and fiscal authorities are understood to have agreed to
host an International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission expected in the country
this month, ending months of bickering between the two state institutions
seen as disagreeing widely over measures to turn around the country's
faltering economy.

The IMF visit, part of Article IV consultations, is routinely
conducted on IMF members, but Zimbabwe had been understood to be digging in
its heels on the planned visit, insisting its membership to the Fund is only
nominal.

The mission's findings, together with any attempts by the
country to clear outstanding arrears, are meant to establish Zimbabwe's
cooperation with the Bretton Woods institution's demands for an overhaul of
economic and structural policies.

The IMF, which upheld a decision to keep Zimbabwe's voting
rights suspended during its board meeting in March, had said it would meet
again in September to review the country's outstanding arrears.

Zimbabwe cleared its overdue financial obligations to the IMF's
General Resources Account (GRA) but still remained with arrears amounting to
US$119 million under the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility
(PRGF)-Exogenous Shocks Facility Trust (ESF).

Zimbabwe is however unlikely to win back its voting rights in
the IMF.

The country will require a 70% weighted vote of the IMF
executive board to restore its voting rights and eligibility to use
resources of the Fund, a senior IMF official revealed last week.

This is because it took a similar vote margin to suspend the
country's voting and related rights with the IMF.

Businessdigest, which has reported extensively on the dispute
between Finance minister Herbert Murerwa and Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
governor Gideon Gono over the planned visit, understands that the two
institutions are now working on an itinerary for the IMF team that will
involve several meetings with central bank and government officials.

Dates for the visit are likely to be fixed in a few days with
the agreement of the IMF team, sources indicated.

An IMF spokesperson said no dates had been agreed between them
and Zimbabwe's authorities for the mission but insisted the board meeting on
Zimbabwe was still scheduled for the first week of November.

Zimbabwe is anxious to restore full membership rights to the IMF
after clearing its outstanding arrears in the IMF (GRA) in February, but
sources indicated that the IMF board was likely to maintain present
sanctions and rebuke the country for its flawed policies aimed at reviving
the struggling economy.

Indications are that recent economic policies had failed to win
support of the IMF, suggesting that Zimbabwe could be censored for
non-cooperation with the multilateral institution's demands for broader
market-related reforms to take the country out of its economic abyss.

The IMF mission was initially scheduled to have visited the
country in early September, the same month the IMF board had determined it
would convene to review the country's membership.

However, Harare administrators blocked the planned mission,
partly due to a dispute over policy issues between Murerwa and Gono.

Government and central bank authorities had been unhappy with
the pending review, which should have taken place exactly six months after
an IMF board meeting that maintained censure on the country after payment of
the GRA arrears.

Hippo pressures EU to wind up investigation

Zim Independent

Shame Makoshori

SUGAR producer Hippo Valley Estates has piled up pressure on the
European Union (EU) to wind up a three-year investigation into the export of
sugar into the EU by companies using Hippo's quota.

The companies, believed to be domiciled outside Zimbabwe, were
falsifying certificates of origin and taking up Hippo's quota under the
African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) arrangement.

The fraudulent exports are believed to be part of a well
orchestrated scandal that has seen several other African companies being
robbed of their quotas by dubious firms generating fake certificates of
origins.

Businessdigest could not immediately establish the identity of
the companies involved in the scam, believed to have taken place over a long
period of time.

Hippo Valley, which has had a long-standing dispute with
government over Mkwasine Estates which was listed for compulsory acquisition
under government's land reform programme, said in a notice to shareholders
that 6 858 tonnes of sugar had been exported to the EU through the illegal
trade.

Hippo says the dispute over Mkwasine remains unresolved,
although government has already resettled A2 farmers on 90% of the estate.

The company however said government was backing it in its
efforts to resolve the dispute of stolen quota supplies, and was, in fact,
lobbying to get the companies involved in the scandal exposed.

"Despite continuing pressure from the Zimbabwe authorities, the
European Commission has still not finalised its investigations into the
fraudulent import of 6 858 tonnes of Zimbabwe's ACP quota under false
certificates of origin," Hippo said.

Without giving details, the EU's Zimbabwe press and information
officer Josiah Kusena confirmed that a series of meetings had been held
between the EU, the government of Zimbabwe and Hippo officials in the past
few months over the dispute.

He however referred businessdigest to the organisation's head of
food security who had not yet responded to questions submitted to his office
on Monday.

Hippo, whose failure to supply its prescribed sugar quota to the
EU had been widely perceived to be a result of the disruptions caused to the
country's farming sector by government's chaotic agrarian reforms, said it
was still capable of supplying all preferential quota export markets to the
EU, the United States of America and bilateral regional export markets
during the current marketing season.

The company did not, however, say how it had failed to supply
its prescribed quotas which had been fraudulently taken over by the
unidentified companies against which it has launched a complaint with the
EU.

The fraudulent exports were direct results of Hippo Valley's
failure to meet its export quota to that region after A2 farmers invaded
part of its estates, resulting in a slide in production and output.

Cane throughput at Hippo's mill was below target during the
current marketing season due to a combination of critical mill spares
shortages, caused by foreign currency deficiencies, Hippo said.

Sources indicated this week that commodity companies in
Mauritius had experienced similar problems involving companies taking up
their quotas for the supply of timber to the EU market.

Most of the companies stealing Mauritius' quotas were from South
America.

The dubious exports by the fraudulent companies deprive the
owners of the relevant quotas with potential revenue.

Mawere accuses state of 'criminal intent'

Zim Independent

SOUTH Africa-based Zimbabwean tycoon Mutumwa Mawere has reacted
with anger to government's latest claims that he ran down his seized mining
companies and siphoned millions in rands from them.

Mawere's counter this week to the allegations intensifies the
protracted battle for control of the country's largest asbestos-producing
company, Shabanie Mashava Mines (SMM Holdings).

Government took over the mines from Mawere in 2004 under a
specially promulgated legal instrument, Reconstruction of State-Indebted
Insolvent Companies Act, claiming they were indebted to the state.

Authorities also accused Mawere of siphoning money -US$300
billion at the time - out of Zimbabwe in breach of Exchange Control
regulations. Now he is being accused of running down the company through
"gross negligence".

SMM Holdings is incorporated in Zimbabwe but wholly-owned by SMM
Holdings based in England, which in turn is owned by Africa Resources Ltd
registered in the British Virgin Islands.

In a recent Government Gazette, SSM Holdings administrator
Afaras Gwaradzimba said Mawere and others were personally liable for the
company's current liabilities.

He said Mawere owed the mines $66,6 million, R53 million,
US$56,5 million, 625 000 Canadian dollars and 138 000 British pounds. Part
of the money were debts incurred during the mines' reconstruction.

Government claims to have injected $100 million ($100 billion in
real terms) as working capital after it took over the mining group.

Mawere, who has taken the issue of the seizure of his mining
group to the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, said government
claims against him raised "legal, institutional, political, extra-judicial,
corruption, and extra-territorial issues that need to be tackled head on".

"Why would a government that had failed to establish a case
against me in South Africa, a foreign jurisdiction, proceed to target me
under Zimbabwean law when it knows I'm no longer President Mugabe's
subject?" Mawere said. "I have repeatedly said there is an ulterior motive
to this."

Mawere said government was doing all this to secure
nationalisation of his companies.

"To justify the illegality of actions of the government the
decree was crafted on the basis that my companies were indebted to the
state," he said.

"However, the reconstruction is not only faulty in that there is
no persona that exists at law called the state but also in that my companies
were not indebted to the state as claimed. But in Zimbabwe today the end
justifies the means as long as the great leader or the deal leader
dictates."

Mawere said it was irrational that the Zimbabwean government was
also now trying to seize his companies registered outside the country.

"Under what construction would an administrator appointed by
Mugabe be responsible for affairs of companies registered outside the
jurisdiction of Zimbabwe?" he queried.

"How does Zimbabwe law end up having extra-territorial
application as if South Africa is a province of Zimbabwe? Is it the role of
government to take over private companies? It is high time that we expose
these barbarians who present themselves as a Salvation Army with an
underlying criminal intent." - Staff Writer.

SA's complicity in MDC, Zanu PF crises

Zim Independent

By Pedzisai Ruhanya

HAVING observed the pre- and post-Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC) squabbles and the succession crisis rocking Zanu PF leading to the
Tsholothso incident, I felt it necessary to advance a theoretical analysis
of the role of South African President Thabo Mbeki in both crises.

The South African government led by Mbeki sought to effect
leadership, not regime change in both the MDC and Zanu PF by making sure
that President Robert Mugabe was removed from the leadership of Zanu PF by a
faction led by Emmerson Mnangagwa while Morgan Tsvangirai was also toppled
by the Welshman Ncube group. This, in my view, would lead to a government of
national unity without Mugabe and Tsvangirai in a new political dispensation
in Zimbabwe.

Mbeki's government has failed to influence a return to
democratic legitimacy in Zimbabwe. More so, in its analysis of the crisis in
Zimbabwe, the South African government has dismally failed to appreciate
that any account of human rights protection in Zimbabwe must critically
examine the overlap between the domestic and international spheres of
politics, law, institutions and norms.

Such an appreciation could assist the authorities south of the
Limpopo River to see how the government of Zimbabwe and its citizens could
be constrained in actions that may or may not lead to the violation of human
rights in the country that has become the order of the day without any
public condemnation from Mbeki's government.

The succession debate in Zanu PF that led to the so-called
Tshotsholo Declaration had all the ingredients of attempting to oust Mugabe
from the leadership of Zanu PF using proper democratic and lawful means as
enshrined in the Zanu PF constitution if followed properly. There was
nothing amiss about that process because it was both legal and legitimate.

Those in the other camp, led by retired general Solomon Mujuru,
were the ones who violated the Zanu PF constitution by refusing to abide by
its dictates and by firing the elected provincial chairpersons on the eve of
a crucial congress.

What I saw as the South African role in the Zanu PF succession
debate was the apparent interest of the South African intelligence in
gathering information about the succession war on the eve of the ruling
party's congress in 2004.

It is important to realise that it was during that period that
some Zanu PF employees including party intelligence workers and a diplomat
were arrested and charged with espionage. It was reported that the Zanu PF
employees were supplying information about the succession wrangles to a
foreign country that was not mentioned. Apparently the diplomat, Godfrey
Dzvairo, was based in South Africa.

Most importantly, the South African Intelligence minister Ronnie
Kasril this year negotiated with State Security minister Didymus Mutasa the
release of a South African spy who was arrested by the Zimbabwean
authorities in Victoria Falls in 2004. The arrest took place at the height
of Zanu PF succession battles on the eve of its December 2004 congress.

Such kind of undertakings by a member of the intelligence
services in a friendly neighbour could not have happened without the
knowledge of the presidency of that country.

On the part of the MDC, questions should be raised why a
president of a neighbouring country enjoying good relations with the
Zimbabwean incumbent and has done everything to make sure that Zanu PF
remains in power including endorsing two bloody and controversial election
outcomes in Zimbabwe in 2000 and 2002 would want to reconcile the two
feuding MDC groups.

It is also in the public interest to understand why the MDC
group led by Ncube rushed to consult Mbeki before they exhausted their
internal conflict resolution mechanisms. Such things need to be interrogated
in order to find out the interests of Mbeki in opposition politics in
Zimbabwe and why it should be the brief of a foreign president to organise
the opposition.

Suppose Mbeki had a genuine interest to have a formidable
opposition in Zimbabwe, the next issues to appreciate could be whether Mbeki
is also organising the opposition against himself in South Africa. More
critically, it would be very crucial to understand whether Mbeki had severed
ties with Mugabe. If not, then what was he trying to do with the MDC feuding
parties?

Further evidence of Mbeki's involvement in the Zanu PF and MDC
crises could also be seen from media reports that he was given a draft
transitional constitution by Patrick Chinamasa and Ncube who represented
Zanu PF and the MDC respectively in the failed talks between the two
political parties although this was denied by both parties.

What is interesting about this scenario is that both Chinamasa
and Ncube belonged to the camps that in my view Mbeki wanted to deal with in
a new political dispensation in Zimbabwe. These two neither belong to the
Mujuru nor Tsvangirai groups.

I take issue with Mbeki particularly on the transitional
constitutional arrangement allegedly given to him by both Zanu PF and the
MDC. I further question the democratic credentials of both Zanu PF and the
MDC for allegedly crafting a secret constitution for Zimbabweans without
their participation and sending it to a foreign leader to approve such a
critical document without the authority of the governed.

This is a serious matter because the South African constitution
itself was negotiated in a transparent manner with all South Africans
represented by their political and civic formations. If South Africans
deserve such transparency in the political governance of their country, why
should Zimbabweans deserve less?

Given what I see as the South African government's involvement
in the Zanu PF succession crisis and the MDC squabbles, it is therefore
prudent to view the Tsholotsho saga and the MDC's October 12 2005 fallout as
separate incidents
whose agendas and goals were the same.

The goals of both processes were to sideline Mugabe and
Tsvangirai from Zimbabwe's political scene. In the view of the South African
authorities, the two were impediments to the resolution of the crisis in
Zimbabwe.

The plot almost succeeded in Zanu PF rather than in the MDC. The
Zanu PF champions of Tsholotsho were crafty and had the structures that
matter to legally and legitimately defeat the Mujuru camp. Moreso, the
Mnangagwa faction sought to use the legitimate platform in the form of the
Zanu PF congress to effect a lawful leadership change in Zanu PF. They had
the support of more than six of the party's 10 provinces.

The MDC group led by Ncube lacked the grassroots support and
party structures to effect a leadership change hence their failure to topple
Tsvangirai. The group also used the wrong platform to topple the leader.

* Pedzisai Ruhanya is a journalist based in Harare.

Mugabe nets own goal

Zim Independent

Ray Matikinye

JUST when everyone thought President Mugabe was beginning to be
pragmatic in seeking to build bridges with the international community, he
has dusted off his manuals on how best to cow Zimbabweans.

Quite how Mugabe managed to attract unwelcome international
attention by turning what was initially an apologetic explanation of police
brutality into a condemnation of the victims in such a short space of time
could set its own record in double-speak.

That recent feat dredged up his inherent violent streak again.
His remarks absolving the police for their brutal assault on trade unionists
attempting to stage a street parade on September 13 has not endeared him
even with his colleagues.

And few doubt his penchant for the adage: "What you cannot get
by persuasion and reason, use force," popularised by Adolf Hitler.

Yet, Mugabe had the benefit of plum guidance from a struggle
icon, South Africa's Bishop Desmond Tutu who advised him that it takes very
different skills to direct a guerilla war and to manage a national economy
or pluralist democracy in the globalised 21st century.

Since Mugabe began retailing incredible conspiracy theories
about opponents wanting to oust him, a strange desire to maintain his grip
on power has transformed him from a coy but shrewd politician into a crude
despot.

Unlike other leaders of his ilk who never advertise their
unstatesmanlike callousness, Mugabe has never been slow in unsheathing his
sword from its scabbard. He appears to relish the bad boy image.

Almost two decades after an estimated 20 000 civilians in
Matabeleland lost life and limb for "supporting dissidents", the target
switched to supporters of opposition parties and civic groups seeking an
overdue change.

Through inflammatory speeches, Mugabe has whipped up his party
supporters' emotions in a brand of amoral belligerence that is only possible
from a person who is always somewhere else when the trigger is pulled.

"We have men and women ready to pull the trigger," Mugabe said
in praise of the army during Defence Forces Day commemorations in Harare on
August 16. The warning came as the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions was
planning to stage street parades to hand over a petition.

Using fiery rhetoric to arouse nationalist sentiments has become
Mugabe's trademark.

For instance, in February1982 while in Marondera, Mugabe accused
the late Joshua Nkomo of buying more than 25 farms and 30 business
enterprises throughout the country as havens for concealing weapons to start
another war against his leadership.

"Nkomo is trying to overthrow the government," Mugabe said.

"Zapu and its leader, Dr Joshua Nkomo, are like a cobra in a
house. The only way to deal effectively with a snake is to strike and
destroy its head."

What followed was a brutal campaign against innocent civilians
in both Matabeleland and the Midlands.

Zimbabweans cringed when in 1998 President Mugabe threatened:
"We have degrees in violence."

An independent observer remarked that the university of violence
"only leaves scars that dehumanise and debase" in response to the threat.

In an open letter to President Mugabe that same year, Amnesty
International (AI) reminded him of the guarantees of freedom of expression
in Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
and Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights.

AI said in the letter: "There appears to be a climate of fear
developing, created by violence, harassment and intimidation which is
hindering the free expression of political opinions and undermining the
possibility of free and fair elections. Amnesty International is concerned
that this climate of fear is preventing all but the most courageous citizens
of Zimbabwe from freely expressing themselves."

But Mugabe has paid no heed, particularly when the advice runs
against the grain of his growing victim mentality or threatens his
privileged ruling party.

At one time Mugabe urged his supporters to unite against whites
and strike fear into their hearts while opening a crucial party congress at
the Harare Sports Centre.

"Our party must continue to strike fear in the heart of the
white man, our real enemy," Mugabe told about 7 000 of his party adherents,
urging them to continue their violent takeover of white-owned commercial
farms at the start of what became known at the Third Chimurenga and Zimbabwe's
accelerated descent into chaos and hunger.

That phase opened a second installment of violence after the
Gukurahundi atrocities.

"The violence carried out will not only destroy any remnants of
democratic freedom we have painstakingly built, but violates almost every
right of the human family, ultimately eroding our dignity and almost ensures
a future of misery and bankruptcy," remarked an observer, Chaz
Maviyane-Davies.

For a party leader who had exhorted his supporters to "uproot
the stumps" in reference to the opposition MDC, Mugabe has not disappointed
in coming up with new ideas to inflict pain on his perceived enemies. In May
last year, government launched Operation Murambatsvina, in which soldiers,
police and government militias used extreme violence to destroy the homes of
hundreds of thousands of poor Zimbabweans throughout the country's towns and
cities.

Mugabe presented the blitz on the urban poor as a renewal scheme
to "clean up" urban slums but it later emerged that this was in fact a
preemptive strike against a feared uprising by urban dwellers long
traumatised by poverty and economic decline.

Mugabe has often abused the police and the army to carry out
brutal attacks on the opposition.

In the latest saga that drew worldwide condemnation, police
attacked trade union leaders and other activists in the back of Land Rovers
and in police holding cells. Their only offence was to try to petition
government to ameliorate the conditions facing the majority of the
population reeling under severe economic hardships.

This episode, carried widely in the world media, will only have
confirmed the regime's reputation for violent suppression of opposing views.
It was by any account an own goal coming as it did as government is planning
to set up a human rights commission.

No end in sight as parastatal woes deepen

Zim Independent

Paul Nyakazeya

WHEN Central Bank governor Gideon Gono raised his hackles last
week accusing permanent secretaries from various ministries of undue
interference in haemorrhaging parastatals, many people wondered where he had
been all along.

The more discerning took the remarks as at an attempt by Gono to
give himself more leverage in controlling the state enterprises that have
been feeding from the central bank's financial trough.

The RBZ chief has doled out large sums of money to these
quasi-government organisations in the hope of breathing life into them while
at the same time ensuring that they become beholden to the central bank's
largesse programme.

President Mugabe has mandated his two vice-presidents to
supervise and coordinate operations of the parastatals, with Gono sitting as
a member of all the committees.

Presenting oral evidence before the parliamentary portfolio
committee on Transport and Communications last week, Gono said gross
interference by permanent secretaries was scuttling efforts by parastatals
to contribute to the economic turnaround.

"There is no role clarity between parastatals and the line
ministries. In some cases, permanent secretaries are acting as chief
executives of parastatals and the boards are sidelined," Gono was quoted as
saying.

"When boards are appointed they should be given room to deliver
and if they don't fire them. This business of doing it half-heartedly is a
recipe for disaster."

Gono said 90% of the policy advice that was given has either not
been implemented or considered and that 80% of the advice did not need any
money but commitment.

"We are wondering whether this is just a culture of not wanting
to implement advice," Gono lamented.

Parastatals and local authorities have over the past decade been
taken as the missing link in enhancing quick productive sector supply
response to fiscal and monetary policy incentives.

Analysis of the country's supply side response rates has shown
that the fight against inflation (1 204,6% for August) and productivity
reversals can be much longer if there is no radical transformation among
parastatals.

Most of parastatals have a common thread that runs through them.

Other than being state-owned, the companies are known for their
ever-shrinking accountability, lack of transparency, inefficiency,
disastrous financial performance, choking debt and corruption.

These state bodies have been run down due to managerial
shortcomings and government interference, with some perennial loss-makers
enjoying state-protected monopoly positions.

Last year alone, power utility Zesa Holdings, the National
Railways of Zimbabwe, the Grain Marketing Board, the few state enterprises
where a shroud covering their financial statements was lifted, recorded
massive losses, while Air Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe United Passenger Company
(Zupco), Zimbabwe Broadcasting Holdings and Zimbabwe Iron and Steel Company
(Zisco) relied on grants from treasury to remain afloat.

Presenting a synopsis of the impact of the central bank's
interventions in the economy in July, Gono said local authorities and
parastatals contributed about 40% to gross domestic product and that they
had forward and backward relationships with other sectors of the economy.

"The involvement of parastatals in the turnaround equation took
into account their virtual existence in every sector of the economy and the
critical nature of the inter-linkages with broad sectors of the economy,"
Gono said.

"There is therefore need for radical surgery because the status
quo is simply untenable in an economy whose survival has depended on an
accidental combination of circumstances."

No matter how much money is poured into parastatals, their
performance will not improve unless there is a complete overhaul of
management and how operations are done, analysts say.

Parastatals have been a breeding ground for patronage, nepotism
and corruption. Government directives and persistent interference have
crippled their viability.

Senior appointments that are not advertised are made on the
basis of political affiliation.

Finance minister Herbert Murerwa however sees things
differently. Earlier this year he said some parastatals would be listed on
the stock exchange before the end of the year.

Up to last year, the last time for which figures are available,
the central bank had sunk a staggering $12 billion (revalued) into these
bottomless black holes to re-capitalise their operations at a time when
central government was finding it difficult to balance the books.

Despite such cash injection, production at Zisco declined
sharply from 14 200 tonnes in July last year to 1 000 tonnes in July this
year.

The iron and steel giant continues to be hobbled by inadequate
working capital to service key creditors, particularly Zesa and Hwange
Colliery.

This has often caused supply disruptions over non-payment. Zisco
also fell prey to government officials and managers who were, according to
Industry and International Trade minister Obert Mpofu, involved in corrupt
activities. Fearing a political backlash, Mpofu retracted his statements
last week.

Hwange's coal production has also declined by over 20%, with
total coal sales for the interim period to June declining to 883 311 tonnes
from 1 405 960 during the same period last year.

Zesa Holdings is saddled with a foreign debt of US$330 million.
The power utility's wage cost consumes in excess of 55% of its revenue.

Its operating losses as of February 2006 stood at $8 trillion
(old currency). The Cold Storage Company was reportedly failing to pay its
workers for three months from January to March due to financial problems.

Analysts have partly blamed the different policies by Murerwa
and Gono for the problems of parastatals. The two are said to have clashed
over policy in parastatals.

Murerwa has accused Gono of acting outside his mandate by
venturing into quasi-fiscal activities instead of confining himself to
monetary policy issues. The two have also clashed on how to handle issues
relating to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and payment of the
institution's debt.

Gono said he was battling with a problem that started under
Murerwa in the late 1990s. Murerwa has stood his ground and insisted that
Gono, now accused by some in government of acting like a prime minister,
stop interfering in the Finance ministry's remit through his quasi-fiscal
activities.

Gono warned that the economy would not recover in "a thousand
years" if government officials and the generality of Zimbabweans continue to
work at cross purposes.

"Until as a country Zimbabwe uses the same ladder of development
other states used to get where they are, this economy would never turn
around in the foreseeable future," Gono wrote to Murerwa on February 13 this
year.

"Not with the current mentality. Never and not in the famous 1
000 years."

In June this year parastatals, which have remained an impediment
to economic growth and a drain on the fiscus, were saddled with delinquent
loans totalling an incredible $76, 4 billion (old currency).

Thus the central bank has all along been chasing its own tail.

The events make it clear that hoping to revive these debt-laden,
underperforming, unaccountable and non-transparent parastatals through
extending loans at concessionary rates is the wrong tack.

In his fourth quarter monetary policy statement in January Gono
said: "We will use the first six months to prepare a comprehensive roadmap
for privatisation which allow implementation in the second half year of
2006."

Ten months down the line no developments or statements have
suggested that the central bank was working on the privatisation of
parastatals.

One analyst said privatisation was now the only way to go to
restore parastatal viability.

"The move should be informed by a genuine realisation on the
part of government that its role is to create an environment that is
conducive to doing business, rather than being a major player in business
itself," said the analyst who preferred not to be named.

He said privatisation could also be an effective tool to bring
down the high rate of inflation by transferring control of the greater part
of the economy from government to the private sector.

The $10 trillion (old currency) Parastatals and Local
Authorities Reorientation Programme which was disbursed to parastatals last
year has not improved parastatal's operations.

Analysts said the intervention was noble because state
enterprises had been enmeshed in costly mismanagement and inefficiency and
drained the fiscus, but it was illogical for the central bank to throw money
at this problem without addressing its root cause - government itself.

"While this was a positive and long overdue move by the central
bank, it would have been logical to undertake extensive restructuring of the
management structures at some of the parastatals first in order to eliminate
managerial deficiencies, which have often led to the underperformance of
these enterprises in the past," an analyst said.

Analysts said both parastatals and local authorities should also
be allowed to charge economic prices and tariffs for the goods they produce,
otherwise they will continue to post huge operational losses and hence
continue to place a huge burden on the fiscus.

Day of reckoning coming for Mugabe's foot soldiers

Zim Independent

FOLLOWING the declaration by President Mugabe that the police
were only doing their job when they assaulted ZCTU members on a peaceful
protest march, the police have effectively become his storm troopers.

This scenario has effectively turned us into a police state. But
what these foot soldiers do not realise is that they are being used by a
regime that is on its last legs.

President Mugabe is merely using them as a buffer so that we
dare not muster courage to oppose him. He gives them the greenlight because
he knows that they are blindly loyal to him. Some of the police officers
perpetrating violence do so reluctantly, but this will not save them from
jail when the day of reckoning arrives, as it surely will.

They can run, but there won't be anywhere to hide. Their
devotion to him will cost them dearly. There shall be gnashing of teeth!

They can flee to other countries but they will be hunted down
eventually.

What they don't realise too, is that when the day of reckoning
comes, they are the ones who will be arrested, tried and jailed, and not
Robert Mugabe, who will likely get amnesty.

No amount of "we were only doing our job" will save them. What
they should know is that their actions are not escaping notice. They are
being hoodwinked into believing they are doing their duty even when they
commit crimes against humanity.

The victims of police brutality know the names of their
assailants. With the help of witnesses and other victims, their time shall
come as surely as the sun rises from the east.

The perpetrators need to be disabused of the notion that it is a
remote possibility that they will be tried. The dates when crimes were
committed and names of the victims are being systematically recorded and
kept for future reference.

The police have a lot of informers who know who their
accomplices are. These will be too keen to distance themselves by providing
information.

To the police I say, enjoy yourselves while you can!

* Mwana Wevhu is a pen name for a Harare-based writer.

Snoop and get it right!

Zim Independent

Editor's Memo

By Vincent Kahiya

SOCIALISM is back!" the Zanu PF official mouthpiece, The Voice,
screamed in its edition last Sunday. In an exploration of new depths of
naivety, the party expects Zimbabweans to celebrate the return of this
denizen of yesteryear's politics.

The Voice article does not however directly quote Mugabe
announcing the return of socialism. In the story, the president lamented the
demise of the Soviet Union. He said the party had been misled by the
International Monetary Fund to embrace capitalism.

".The impact of the demise of the Soviet Union, and with it, the
socialist ideology it embraced, was keenly felt by our party, its outlook
and foundational principles.

"We therefore lost our ideological guidelines and became a
victim of rampant capitalism," Mugabe is quoted as saying.

This is an admission that Zimbabwe never developed its own
political ideology. The Zanu PF government tried to ape the communists in
the early years of Independence.

By Mugabe's admission, when Eastern Europe embarked on reform
with the fall of the Soviet bloc and the Berlin Wall, the next plan
available was an IMF inventory of prescriptions, which Mugabe has always
said he accepted reluctantly. This was after they had failed. This was the
fashionable route to go. Everyone was doing it.

Then followed a period of embarrassing confusion, characterised
by a myriad economic reforms, which were neither communist nor capitalist in
outlook.

The government - never shy to mimic anything in vogue - told us
it was adopting policies which resulted in the almost magical revival of the
Asian Tigers in the 1990s. These "eastern" policies were then put in the
blender together with the fast-track land reform-at least a homegrown plan
this time-to create a poisonous cocktail that neither benefited industry nor
the public.

They only benefited the ruling elite which became very rich.
President Mugabe and his colleagues are suddenly surprised by how wealthy
they have become when all the voters are as poor as their grandparents were
in the 1950s.

The imitation game has continued. The quick-fix National
Economic Development Priority Programme has its roots in the Malaysian
models which were designed to deal with specific issues expeditiously.

The striking out of zeros on our currency has its roots in
Mozambique and South America. Now the Reserve Bank wants to establish rural
banks and teams have been dispatched to West Africa to see how it is done
there.

There is nothing wrong with drawing inspiration from models used
by other countries. This only becomes problematic when the student snooping
at a bright colleague's script in an exam copies the wrong information. That
is why the models we have tried to adopt have failed. It is commitment to
the application of the policies which has been a disaster.

President Mugabe has said a committee in Zanu PF is working on
defining a new policy the party should follow and this would be availed in
December at the Goromonzi conference.

I hope that President Mugabe's statement bemoaning the death of
Communism is not being used to map the course for another policy disaster. I
also hope that the presidential lament was just a hangover from rubbing
shoulders with socialist comrades at the Non-Aligned Movement summit in
Communist Cuba last month.

But this could be used as a feeble excuse to refocus party
ideology so that it falls in sync with those of the few remaining comrades
in Havana, Caracas and Pyongyang. But for goodness' sake, why should our
leaders make it their business to frequent the ideological scrapyard to
forage for what the world has discarded?

President Mugabe should look around in the region to see what is
working in those countries. It is definitely not the old Soviet socialism.
The countries are forward looking. They are not interested in "isms" but in
attracting investment and enhancing social development. When Zambia, South
Africa and Botswana are buoyant about reducing unemployment, we are busy
discussing ways of accelerating our regression and ensuring that we remain
the bad boys in the hood.

Zisco saga: fresh stern test of govt's vow to fight graft

Zim Independent

Comment

THE corruption at Ziscosteel is huge, so huge that there are
some in government who believe the rot should not be brought into the open
because it will tarnish the image of the country and scare away investors.

The quest to conceal the scam at the steelmaker does not however
discount the fact that the company has been crippled by government officials
dipping their fingers in the till. Any investor exploring business
opportunities in the industry will have to grapple with shameless graft at
the parastatal.

Indian firm Global Steel which tried to come into Zisco on a
management contract did not have to wait for the publication of a report
before taking flight two months ago.

In the past two weeks the bureaucratic mess around the
corruption saga at Zisco has created international excitement. Investors are
watching government's latest episode in its drama of blundering. The climax
of the plot could be exciting, perhaps heads rolling off the political
guillotine, resignations and arrests. That is for the optimists.

But in Zimbabwe, nothing is predictable anymore. The state could
be busy authoring a plot for an anti-climax if the nation tolerates the
antics of Industry and International Trade minister Obert Mpofu.

He has already indicated that he was misquoted by the media
claiming that his colleagues in parliament and government had looted Zisco.

The unfolding drama is a huge test of government's commitment to
fight corruption, which we feel has a major defect arising from the make-up
of institutions tasked with probing and rooting out the cancer.

President Mugabe last year set up a Ministry of State
Enterprises, Anti-Monopolies and Anti-Corruption. The broad scope of the
ministry is manifest in its expansive title, but that is not the major
handicap.

Parliament then enacted a law which gave birth to the
Anti-Corruption Commission, a statutory body that does not however have
total independence from the executive as Anti-Corruption minister Paul
Mangwana has a keen interest in its activities.

The minister's position in the anti-corruption drive raises
serious ethical questions. He is also in charge of parastatals; institutions
where corruption is fostered by Zanu PF's persistent interference. Here is a
minister who has every right to require from parastatal heads information
regarding their operations. He has to execute a delicate balancing act.

He is holding a basket of corrupt parastatals on the one hand
and brandishing a weapon to deal with corruption on the other.

The question that arises here is whether Mangwana can extract
incriminating information on corrupt parastatals and then pass it on to the
Anti-Corruption Commission to investigate. But he cannot pass on such
information without being accused of violating confidentiality clauses. If
he then elects to look the other way, there is every reason to accuse him of
aiding and abetting corruption.

His role as minister also responsible for the anti-monopolies
portfolio raises more questions of conflict of interest. Most parastatals
are in themselves hopeless monopolies that have failed to serve the nation.
State enterprises such as Zesa Holdings, Tel*One and the Grain Marketing
Board come to mind here. Does he support the existence of monopolistic
parastatals when he is advocating - through the Anti-Monopolies Commission -
fair trade practices in the private sector?

The minister's invidious position is a product of the Zanu PF
government's interest to create control processes which normally function
more efficiently when they are independent of government.

Mangwana's portfolio was perhaps relevant at the time when
President Mugabe first pronounced it but it has become a basket of
contradictions. The executive's hands are all over the anti-corruption drive
because the minister constitutes the link between the commission and his
political comrades.

The Zisco saga is therefore a stern test of the current
arrangement where the Parastatals minister also has links to the commission
which is supposed to investigate bleeding state enterprises. Under normal
circumstances, Mangwana should know what is happening at Zisco and the work
of the commission should be cut out for it. Or is it? We watch with interest
how the situation is going to develop, especially the roles and input of the
ministry and the commission.

Dump the MIC before it discredits govt further

Zim Independent

Muckraker

WE were pleased to hear this week that one of South Africa's
most prominent politicians and business tycoons has spoken up on President
Robert Mugabe's recent record describing him as a hero who lost his way.

Tokyo Sexwale, who now leads the diversified conglomerate
Mvelapanda Holdings, was reported by Zim Online as criticising Mugabe while
addressing South African expatriates in London last week. Referring to
Mugabe's role in the liberation war, Sexwale said Mugabe was a man "who led
his people to freedom", but emphasised that the Zimbabwe leader's current
actions could not be supported.

"When a freedom fighter takes a wrong step, it is time for other
freedom fighters to stand up and say 'we know you are a great man, but we
cannot support what you do'," he said, in an indirect attack on president
Thabo Mbeki's much criticised quiet diplomacy on Zimbabwe.

Sexwale said that it was sometimes necessary to have tensions
within a country, but that the important thing was that solid human rights
and the rule of law prevail, Zim Online reported. On South Africa, he said:
"It's a country where the deputy president gets dismissed. It's a country
where Winnie Mandela stands trial. It is a country where the chief whip,
Tony Yengeni, goes to jail. That is the country that I want to live in -
where Mbeki, Mandela, all of us are not above the law."

But comparing South Africa to Zimbabwe, Sexwale said: "In my
country the judges are not interfered with. In my country we do not seize
land. In my country we do not incarcerate and torture our people."

Useful to have that on the record. Put it together with remarks
by Wole Soyinka and more recently African-American trade unionists and a
picture is emerging that the likes of Ankomah Baffour and other publicists
are going to have difficulty countering.

One of the hazards of being an editor is having contributors who
send their material to other publications. It therefore appears elsewhere
just when you thought it was exclusive to your own publication.

Of course most contributors understand the rules of the game but
not all, it would seem.

Here is Tafatoana Mahoso in his National Focus column in The
Voice of September 24: "On 13 May 2006 the Daily Mirror led with this
front-page story: 'Gloom for consumers; inflation shoots over 1 000%'. The
key sources for the story were the Central Statistics Office and the
Zimbabwe Chamber of Commerce."

Here is Mahoso in his African Focus column in the Sunday Mail of
October 1: "On May 13 2006 the Daily Mirror led with this front-page story:
'Gloom for consumers; inflation shoots over 1 000%'. The key sources for the
story were the Central Statistical Office and the Zimbabwe Chamber of
Commerce."

Apart from the change in the name of the CSO the two extracts
seem remarkably similar including getting the name of the ZNCC wrong.

Mahoso's Voice column of October 1 contains para after para of
material identical to his Sunday Mail column of the same date.

A note to editors: Say to your columnists: "Is this material
exclusive to us?" And only allow material to "continue next week" if there
is no other option. Ideally, a columnist should be confined to a specific
word allocation. And if they can't fit the space provided they should be
cut. You can't have a situation where the columnists decide how much space
they should occupy. Also, if your columnist is travelling with the president
he should get his material in before he leaves or find somebody else to
write it. You can't have an empty lot marked "No trespassers".

Zim economy could close for business

Zim Independent

By Eric Bloch

FOR a dismally great number of years many of Zimbabwe's
businessmen, numerous of its economists, much of its populace and a
multiplicity of entities of the international community have been
foreshadowing the total collapse of the economy.

That collapse could, they claimed, only be averted if there
would be a very radical change in the policies, actions and inactions of the
government. Some, including this columnist, have consistently believed these
prognostications of doom to be exaggerated, through conviction that
ultimately that radical change would occur, albeit belatedly, and thereby
the economic Armageddon avoided.

But, as yet that change has not occurred, has not even begun,
and government's repeated reactions to the disastrous economic degeneration
are to blame others and subject them to draconian abuses of law. As a
result, the prophetic predictions of absolute economic failure are rapidly
gaining probabilities of fulfillment. Unless government would now, without
further prevarication, finally abandon its economically-destructive
policies, and embark upon constructive economy-recovery policies, the
economy will very soon have to hang up a sign: "CLOSED FOR BUSINESS".

The evidence of the encroaching absolute economic collapse is by
now so pronounced, and the appeals to government to recognise that evidence
are becoming so greatly more and more audible that it is difficult to
imagine that even a government myopic and deaf to that which it does not
wish to see or hear can fail to recognise the imminent final destruction of
the economy in the absence of very real policy changes (instead of the
facades such as the current National Economic Development Priority
Programme, which government believes can delude the masses to believe in
forthcoming positive change, whilst in reality the governmental policies
remain unchanged).

The reality is that government has not been prepared to develop
or pursue any policies which did not emanate from a command economy module.
That is one where each and every significant factor of the economy is
subject to the infinite and total control of government. The government's
many years of mismanagement of the economy has proven, by the unmitigated
economic collapse, to be due almost entirely to gross authoritarian,
dictatorial and autocratic, sometimes tyrannical, governance of the economy.

The signs of the approaching final demise of the economy are
increasingly apparent.

Some of the most obvious ones are:

* Petroleum has become so scarce that, if sourced within the
unofficial markets, the price of a litre has risen within less than a month
from $660 to $1 100 and more. This contrasts to the official price of $335
per litre, but none but those supplied by the National Oil Company of
Zimbabwe (Noczim) can afford to sell at the official price.

However, the fuel supplied by the state through Noczim, heavily
subsidised, is hardly available to business and the man on the street. In
the last few weeks, the two service stations in Bulawayo supplying such fuel
were confronted by queues of motor cars (and desperate motorists) extending
over more than two kilometres. Many have expended almost endless days in
those queues, more often than not fruitlessly, for the fuel supplies are
exhausted long before they reach the petrol pumps.

The economic man-hours lost are immense, the demoralisation of
the motorists is cataclysmic, the forced recourse to black market fuel is
inflationary in the extreme. And the scarcity creating these circumstances
is due in the almost entirety to non-availability of adequate foreign
exchange caused mainly by insufficiency of exports;

* Other scarcities are equally great, or even greater, in the
main also attributable to insufficiencies of foreign exchange. Essential
medications are continuously on "back-order" at pharmacies unable to access
them, there is a nationwide inadequacy of antiretrovirals, most of Zimbabwe's
hospitals, clinics and other healthcare providers cannot maintain equipment
operational continuously due to lack of spares.

Bakeries have been unable to obtain adequate supplies of flour
because the millers could not obtain sufficient wheat supplies (which have
to be imported in the absence of adequate domestic production, caused by
government's appalling continual mismanagement and destruction of
agriculture), and there has not been sufficient foreign exchange for wheat
purchases in adequate quantities.

Inevitably, government has tried to lie its way out of blame,
with repeated false allegations of bakers withholding production pending
price increases whilst supposedly holding mountains of flour. Most factories
are reduced to production of less than 25% of capacity, be they manufacture
of textiles, clothing, furniture, engineered products, pharmaceuticals, food
products or other goods, owing to failure to obtain required production
inputs in the absence of regular access to foreign exchange;

* The surging exchange rates in the alternative foreign exchange
markets, the minimal levels of industrial production, the inadequacies of
agricultural production, the gargantuan spendings of government in excess of
its means, the extent of printing of money by the Reserve Bank, albeit out
of desperation, and numerous other factors directly or indirectly occasioned
by government, have driven inflation to over 1 200%, and it is still rising
(to such an extent that the International Monetary Fund has forecast
inflation at 4 279% in 2007!)

* In panic at the soaring inflation, and reinforced by its
long-prevailing, considerable paranoia, government has spewed vitriol upon
the business sector, spuriously accusing it of profiteering, exploitationism
and other dire "crimes". (Apparently it is now a crime not to operate
business at a loss!)

It has accompanied that vitriol with catastrophically
unrealistic price controls and has sought to enforce those controls with
tyrannical enforcement of law, including excessive arrest and detention of
company directors.

The Minister of Industry and International Trade has threatened
withdrawal of trading licences, notwithstanding that the issue of such
licences is within the perview of local authorities, and not of government.
It is also government's intent to be more and more authoritarian on private
sector pricing, with the establishment of a Price Monitoring Commission and,
pending its creation, through the operation of an Interim Administrative
Price Stabilisation Mechanism Committee.

In the process, businesses are closing down, more people are
becoming unemployed, new investment is increasingly naught but wishful
thinking, scarcities are intensifying, the black market becomes evermore
virile and inflation continues to rise;

* Parastatal services to the economy and the populace are, with
rare exception, declining steadily. Tel*One was unable to fund a US$700 000
debt for satellite services, resulting in extensive deterioration in
telecommunication and electronic mail services crucial to the economy's
operations.

The Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (Zesa) announced less
than three weeks ago that load-shedding would diminish. Since then, this
columnist's residential area has witnessed an increase in load-shedding from
a norm of once a week to four times a week!

So much for the credibility of Zesa statements! The National
Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) has experienced an increased frequency of
accidents and is unable to convey coal output from Hwange on those
intermittent occasions when Hwange Colliery Company manages to produce it;

* The state's domestic debt has risen, in less than nine months,
from $14,3 billion to $127,4 billion;

* New investment is continuously talked about by government, but
there is little real evidence of such investment. Not only are investors
deterred by the autocratic state control of the economy, but also by
repeated declarations of intent to achieve indigenous economic empowerment
by expropriation and dictate, instead of by facilitation, motivation and
incentivisation.

They are also discouraged by the recurrent refusal of government
to respect international standards of justice, law and order, and respect
for human rights. Most recently that governmental stance was reaffirmed by
President Mugabe, he not only condoning, but virtually commending police
actions of beating up peaceful demonstrators and onlookers, and of
physically abusing those arrested for demonstrating.

If the demonstrators were guilty of breaking the law, or
believed to be so, the police had the right and duty to arrest them and
bring them to trial, but not the right to "bash" them up and "knock" them
about, and to inflict hurt and injury upon them. But the state, instead of
disciplining the offending police and taking requisite disciplinary action,
commended that abuse of power and disregard for human rights. (Shades of
Operation Murambatsvina revisited!)

That is not an environment that attracts investment. Government's
approach to the economy and its economic policies need a dramatic immediate
transformation from a command economy into one that is deregulated,
market-force driven, facilitated and enabled, or it will very shortly be
faced with a country that has no economy at all.

How Mwanawasa 'stole' the election

Zim Independent

Candid Comment

By Joram Nyathi

I DON'T know how it happened that the eccentric Michael Sata
lost the Zambian presidential election. Crackpots often win elections. I had
already betted that he would win, what with his promise to poor Zambians
that he would boot out the Chinese for exploiting workers and his support
for President Mugabe's land reform programme!

Here is a veritable contradiction, at once fascinated by Mugabe
and appalled by his Chinese friends. His Patriotic Front made him sound like
a real pal of Zanu PF. He said Zimbabweans were "happier now" and that it
was "imperialists" telling lies about the situation in Zimbabwe. He lost.

His percentage tally with incumbent Levy Mwanawasa was 27%
against 43%. He claimed the vote had been stolen but that he would not waste
his time challenging the result in court. African Union and Comesa observer
missions predictably pronounced the election free and fair, and a true
reflection of the people's will.

What was not clear is whether people were appalled by Sata's
brazen assertions that Zimbabweans are happier now or the threat of
expropriating farms Mugabe-style. In Zimbabwe it was claimed that Zanu PF
won in rural areas because people wanted their land back. This apparently
didn't work for Sata's Patriotic Front if he was going to adopt the same
chaotic approach used by Mugabe. His populist antics boomeranged big time.

His biggest support reportedly came from the urban poor. That
has a familiar ring locally. His attack on Chinese merchants must have
resonated with the workers who are underpaid. But like his Zimbabwean
counterparts in the MDC, numbers count a lot and those numbers are
concentrated in a few constituencies in urban areas. The lesson is that when
about 70% of the population resides in rural areas, it makes sense to get
those votes first before you can hope to get to State House.

In Zimbabwe the MDC has been coy about venturing into what are
foolishly called Zanu PF strongholds in communal lands while Sata's PF must
have alienated a lot of voters by hawking Mugabe's catastrophic land reform.
Many of them are already experiencing rising employment on the farms that
have been opened up by white commercial farmers chased out of Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwe is importing maize from Zambia grown by Zimbabwean farmers.

Mwanawasa's style was described derisively as staid while Sata
passed for a charismatic leader with a huge following - oh that fickle,
flattering and deceptive lot.

What I found edifying in their campaigns was their focus on
substantive issues of economic revival, employment creation and health.
While Sata promised to "lower taxes, (and create) more jobs and (put) more
money in your pockets", Mwanawasa was modest, refusing to make
"sugar-coated" promises.

Instead he talked about what he has achieved and where he was
going. He has reduced Zambia's poverty levels from 80% to 65%, maintained
inflation at single digits and secured debt cancellation for his country.
The savings are being directed to education, health and employment creation.
His anti-graft drive has endeared him to both Zambians and the donor
community. He didn't attack his opponents as agents of imperialists but
fellow Zambians who only saw things differently. That should have earned him
people's respect and dignified the entire electoral process.

Sata was full of charisma but proposed policies that reminded
people of a political ogre called Idi Amin and President Mugabe, men who
will for a long time be remembered for the ruin they wrought in their
countries. It is not surprising that he lost the poll although he was decent
enough to concede defeat. He should take time to re-examine his fatal
tactical errors. What the Zambian voters told him was that they want to move
forward, way beyond international brinkmanship of people like Mugabe and
Hugo Chavez.

However, Mwanawasa's re-election spoilt my column. I had
expected Sata to win so that I could pen a short encomium for our
redoubtable leader who has managed to outpace and outlive every other leader
in the region whether they came before him or after.

While people like Nelson Mandela, Benjamin Mkapa, Bakili Muluzi,
Sam Nujoma and Joachim Chissano managed only short relays and then passed on
the baton, Mugabe has done it all by himself for the past 26 years and there
are no indications that his energy is flagging. I hear there is a plan afoot
for him to out-rule Kaunda and even see Mwanawasa out.

Nevertheless, there are salutary lessons for Zimbabwe.

Zambia has set a discernible pattern of qualitative
transformative change of leadership since Independence in 1964. Despite
staying in power for 27 years, Kaunda can boast that he brought Independence
to his country, Frederick Chiluba entrenched multipartyism with his Movement
for Multiparty Democracy in 1991 while Levy Mwanawasa has turned around the
economy.

For all their individual limitations, there is no denying that
Zambia is maturing as a democracy on a scale we didn't anticipate when we
got our own Independence in 1980. To say Zimbabwe has been on a steady
decline is an understatement. The sad record of that blight goes to only one
man who has decided no one else could run this country better.

Could this seriously be called a sacrifice for the love of one's
country or is it for the love of oneself - self-interest that brooks no
other interest? For there are times when one is tempted to believe rumours
that there are bigger forces keeping Mugabe in that ceremonial position for
their own interests. This might partly explain the convoluted and
irresoluble succession debate in Zanu PF.

Whatever the truth might be, the Zambian election should teach
us one or two lessons as a nation. That includes opposition parties as well.
So far we have missed the possibilities that come with a change of guard, a
new vision and fresh ideas on the way forward. It is ungodly for any one
individual to arrogate unto himself a messianic status over the affairs of a
whole nation.

Zim Independent Letters

New struggle the answer

EVERY now and then I read with utter disgust the brutality meted
out to peaceful demonstrators in our beloved country.

I have always been a firm believer in the doctrine of
non-violence and peaceful resistance. However, faced with a brutal,
intransigent, uncompromising and repressive Zanu PF, I believe time has come
to rethink our strategy.

Let's face it President Mugabe will not suddenly realise that
what he is doing is wrong and that we do not like the way he is governing
the country.

So frankly speaking, I do not see the point of dialogue at this
point. Mass protests appear a plausible action but they will never work
because they will be brutally thwarted before they even begin.

Elections? Well, we've been down that route many times. It just
hasn't worked. Remember that in the 70s we tried all these tricks with the
Ian Smith regime and none yielded the desired results.

In the end we realised that smiling at the dictator will not
make him nice.

There is no record in history of any dictator converting to the
doctrine of democracy. Mugabe will certainly not be the first!

I therefore believe it is now time to do to Mugabe and his
regime what we did to Smith and his regime. It is the only way forward now.

Bhekimpilo,

UK.

      ---------

Good riddance French envoy!

SO the French Ambassador Michel Raimbaud is leaving at the end
of his tour of duty, "Envoy bids farewell", (Herald, September 29).

How strange!

He's been here for two years and I don't recall him making any
substantial comment on the conduct of the Zimbabwe government, on Operation
Murambatsvina, the recent ZCTU officials' torture, white farmers' continued
evictions, the government's senior members' blatant thefts - anything.

He promised to strive to improve relations between Harare and
Paris; no doubt he did that by keeping his mouth shut when good men were
opening their diplomatic mouths and becoming unpopular.

Goodbye and good riddance! No doubt your successor will continue
in the same way in the three wise monkeys format - hear no evil, see no
evil, speak no evil.

There was a time in 1789 when proud and true Frenchmen stood up
for liberty.

What happened to French courage, Ambassador Raimbaud?

PNR Silversides,

Harare.

      ---------
      When will we wake up to being taken for a ride?

      ZCTU leaders got what they deserved, so President Mugabe
told embassy staff in Cairo recently. He is the head of state and does not
want any unruly behaviour in his country.

       We said OK, he knows what he is saying. He repeated these
remarks on arrival at Harare International Airport to a host of party cadres
and those picked up from Mbare Musika to give him a resounding welcome. He
said labour leaders who break the law and disregard police orders would be
beaten up. Of course, he is the head of Zimbabwe, and we said OK, he knows
what he is saying.

      Do the police have the right to assault people under any
circumstances, worse still those in their holding cells?

      We are a peace-loving nation, we do not ask questions.
What happened is unfortunate, the president condoning brutality!

      Some members of the army tortured the late Mark Chavunduka
and Ray Choto, formerly with the Standard, in state custody in 1999 for
writing a story on an alleged coup. President Mugabe appeared on television
warning the private press of further military retribution if they published
such type of a story.

      We blamed the two reporters for poking their noses
unnecessarily and said what the president said was OK as he was the head of
state.

      During the 2000 elections, many people were killed at the
hands of the state (one-man state) security machinery. Some victims
disappeared while some well-known perpetrators still walk scot-free on the
streets. We are a peace-loving nation for God's sake, it is very OK not to
raise any dust even on the farm invasion murders.

      Remember the famous Gukurahundi atrocities?

      The Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace report was
suppressed and we said, oh boy, they want to open old wounds. Let the wounds
remain so, for we love peace. The Shonas and Ndebeles are one; sow no seeds
of hatred among them, you enemy of the state! It is very OK, let the report
remain suppressed.

      When MPs Fidelis Mhashu and Gibson Sibanda on September 28
agitated for an enquiry to investigate the perpetrators of brutality on
labour leaders and some people in Chitungwiza we still felt it was OK.

      Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, Reuben Marumahoko, wanted
to know whether the women Mhashu claimed to have been beaten up had shown
him their buttocks. We said it was OK for they were debating serious
business in parliament.

      Church leaders who are supposed to be the conscience of
the people - including the government - have since been silenced. We said
OK, let the church remain on the pulpit and leave real political issues to
the party. It is OK, ours is a sovereign nation.

      Sekesai Makwavarara and company have run down Harare. It
used to be a city remember! We say nothing, for she is appointed on merit by
the "Monster" of Local Government and Urban Development. What merit? It is
OK as long as the monster is satisfied.

      The VID personnel clandestinely ask for bribes from
whoever wants a driver's licence. Of course they don't ask openly. It is
done through the instructors at the driving schools. Since we cannot get
them arrested, it is OK, as long as I acquire the document and drive along
the potholed roads of the city Sekesai runs.

      The public sector employees call for all kinds of tokens
of appreciation before service is offered to an extent that is has become
the norm. We say it is OK, even doctors are doing it.

      Some other "monsters" are on record for working against
the course of justice. Who are we to complain? Silence is the best
medication. It is OK for them, remember one is a law man and the other one
can get his men trailing you with the capacity to make you history in no
time.

      The other "monster" made mention that his fellow men and
women were responsible for the brutal fall of Zisco. He was cautioned and
his mouth has been shut since then. It is OK since he has to keep his job.

      Needless to mention Kondozi farm, all is OK with the
people of Zimbabwe. Needless to complain too against anyone except the
international community for not coming to smoke our "monsters" out.

      History will judge those who do not give the final push to
our autocratic regime.

      Recent events in Thailand are quite telling with the
people having stretched their patience beyond break point. We could probably
be waiting for some genocide like that which ensued in Rwanda in 1994 for us
to realise that we have been taken for a ride.

      Clydez Chakupeta,

       Harare.

---------
            It's politicians, not Zinwa who failed Harare
residents

            A STORY in the Herald of September 28 carried the
headline: "Zinwa fails to end water woes".

            This was with respect to the current water supply
problems (not challenges please!) facing residents of the Harare
metropolitan region. The editor would do well to go back in history.

            Zinwa was established only two to three years ago.
It is our short-sighted and self-serving politicians that have failed the
residents of Harare, not Zinwa which only inherited the problem.

            As far back as the early 1990s, the Department of
Water Development (DWD) in the then Ministry of Lands, Agriculture and Water
Development, put forward plans for the construction of a new reservoir -
Kunzwi Dam - on the Nyagui River to supply the northeastern parts of the
city, including Mabvuku, Tafara and Ruwa, areas worst affected by water
shortages today.

            The affected communities in Mangwende and Rusike
communal areas were informed that they were to be relocated to make way for
the dam.

            At the time, DWD anticipated that demand for water
in the metropolis would match the full supply capacity of the reservoirs on
the Manyame River in the west (Lakes Chivero and Manyame plus the smaller
Harava and Seke Dams) by 1996.

             Thereafter, the region would increasingly face water
supply shortages due to growing demand.

            We are now in 2006 and paying for our politicians'
inaction.

            It is also worth noting that the last storage
reservoir for Harare - Lake Manyame - was constructed in the late 1970s
under the Ian Smith regime. For the past 30 years, our liberators have done
nothing to ensure continued water supplies for the city despite all the
evidence of rapid population growth.

            Instead of providing the necessary funds for new
dams and associated infrastructure, they were more concerned with keeping
the late Chenjerai Hunzvi and his merry men happy. Then came the ZNA
misadventure in the DRC. And, as the saying goes, the rest is history.

            As the recent advert by Zinwa suggested, the Harare
metropolis needs another source of water first and foremost. Otherwise our
current water problems will only get worse.

            Angry Resident,

            Harare.

       -----------
                  We know him better

                  AS much as our president would like us to
believe that he is a very courageous man who can stand up to the Western
world on his own, we believe otherwise.

                  When asked by journalists at the recent UN
conference about the beatings by police of members of the ZCTU during their
peaceful demonstrations, he meekly replied that it was the overzealousness
of one or two policemen.

                  But as soon as he landed in Africa (Egypt) he
felt safe and started his rantings which got worse when he arrived in
Harare.

                  Prior to that, I had some respect for
Vice-President Joice Mujuru, but alas it is all gone.

                  To my horror, with a big grin on her face, I
saw her nod her head in agreement as her boss was condoning the beatings of
the demonstrators.

                  Talk of a mother figure, what a shame!

                  M Pfupajena,

                   Harare

             --------
                    Made should resign

                    I THINK Agriculture minister Joseph Made
should just resign because he has failed to deliver.

                    Why does President Mugabe spare him when he
reshuffles his cabinet? His predictions to date have been way of the mark as
these seem to be done from the comfort of his
                     office.

                    It beats me why Made branded his permanent
secretary Simon Pazvakavambwa a liar when he revealed that our grain
reserves would not take us anywhere.

                    Doesn't it make sense to suspend GMB boss
Samuel Muvuti until the finalisation of his corruption case? As things
stand, his hands appear dirty yet Made seems to protect him.

                    Only this year Made said there was enough
wheat to take us to 2007 only to discover that we had to import from South
Africa. The best advice to Made is - resign!

                    A humble resignation would pave the way for
those able to do the job.

                    Lovemore Maseko,

                    Bulawayo.