Zimbabwe news

"THOSE who seek to govern, do so by the consent of the majority," said Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe on June 27th, with a straight face. His party, ZANU-PF, had held on to a slim majority of the seats contested at a grossly unfair election on June 24th and 25th. This was quite an achievement, given the party's record. After 20 years of ZANU government, the average Zimbabwean is a third poorer and can expect to die more than 15 years younger. But the party still managed to win 62 out of 120 contested seats. A nine-month-old opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), won 57. A small party won one. The remaining 30 seats in the 150-member parliament are reserved for chiefs, provincial governors and others appointed by Mr Mugabe. Thus, ZANU will have a comfortable majority to continue wrecking the country.

Monitors from the European Union noted that there were "serious flaws and irregularities in the electoral process". That is putting it mildly. In the weeks before the election, voter intimidation was blatant and systematic. In rural areas, roving gangs of ZANU thugs set up road-blocks, stopped cars and buses, and beat up passengers who failed to show ZANU membership cards. Suspected MDC supporters had their property ransacked, their identity cards burnt, and their bodies beaten with farming tools or seared with molten plastic. At least 30 people were killed and several thousand were forced to flee their homes.

The intimidation eased during the actual ballot-casting, but it did not stop everywhere. In Mberengwa East, a rural constituency 400km (250 miles) south of Harare, truckloads of youths waving ZANU flags and iron bars drove around warning voters not to vote for the opposition. Their leader, Big Chitoro, a knife-juggling karate expert in combat trousers and a cowboy hat, swaggered into polling station after polling station, brandishing a steel cane.

Mr Chitoro agreed that he had been an officer in the army's Fifth Brigade, which killed several thousand dissidents in Matabeleland in the mid-1980s, but insisted that he deplored violence. The MDC claimed that he orchestrated it. Hlupo Nkomo, an MDC polling agent in Mataga, a small town in the constituency, blamed Mr Chitoro for the fact that his house and welding shop were burnt down on May 31st. Mr Nkomo's family is still in hiding.

His story is typical. The MDC candidate for Mberengwa East, Sekai Holland, reported over 100 assaults on her campaign workers to the police, but the police did nothing. One of her supporters was beaten to death; 20 are in hospital. Several of Ms Holland's observers were prevented from reaching polling stations, and some fled into the bush for fear of their lives. In at least one polling station, voters were handed their voting slips by alleged torturers. Ms Holland lost heavily to her ZANU rival.

Mberengwa East was more violent than the average rural constituency, but not much more so. The MDC said it would contest the results of at least 20 constituencies, where it suspected that it had lost because of intimidation or fraud. Although most outside monitors said that they had observed almost no irregularities in the count itself, an exit poll by the Helen Suzman Foundation, a liberal South African think-tank, concluded that the MDC should have won at least 87 seats, which would have given it a majority.

On the bright side, Zimbabwe is no longer a de facto one-party state. Before the election, there were only three non-ZANU members of parliament, and the legislature did nothing to curb Mr Mugabe's excesses. Now the president can no longer change the constitution at will. And at the presidential election in 2002, the MDC's leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, will have a reasonable chance of supplanting Mr Mugabe, despite his failure to win his home constituency this time.

But Mr Mugabe has shown that bullying works, at least to a degree: it saved him from defeat. His tactics raised barely a whimper of protest from his African neighbours. A South African parliamentary observer mission gave the poll a hearty thumbs-up. Perhaps they were being diplomatic.

The responsibility for reviving the sick economy still rests with Mr Mugabe and ZANU. Half of the workforce is jobless. Inflation is eating Zimbabweans' savings at a rate of almost 70% a year. An unrealistic exchange rate has led to shortages of fuel and other imports. Mr Mugabe's plans to seize white-owned farms without compensation, and his contradictory statements about whether he will do the same to mines and factories, have scared off both foreign and domestic investors. Despite having some of the most fertile land in Africa, Zimbabwe could need food aid this year.

The government's plans for coping with the crisis are confused. Mr Mugabe has promised price controls and measures to promote black ownership of businesses. Both ideas have been tried before, but with little success. Price controls broke down, and affirmative action was an excuse for Mr Mugabe's friends and relatives to demand a share of the fruits of other people's labours. There are no serious plans to curb government spending "the main cause of inflation" by, for instance, pulling the Zimbabwean army out of Congo's civil war.

Foreign aid could keep the country afloat for a bit longer. Donor countries, including Britain, have said they will stump up substantial sums if Mr Mugabe brings in some reforms. That is a big if. He may promise to liberalise the economy in order to secure loans from the IMF, but in the past he has always broken such promises.

Mr Mugabe has appealed for national reconciliation. MDC leaders see it differently. They hope that they will be able to forge informal coalitions in parliament with those ZANU members who understand the seriousness of the economic situation. If this happens, they may be able to pass corrective legislation. It is a hope, but don't count on it.

Court Reporter

War veterans’ leader Wilson Kufa Chitoro, 60, accused of leading a deadly terror campaign in the run-up to last weekend's parliamentary election in Mberengwa, appeared in the Zvishavane magistrates’ court yesterday afternoon charged with kidnapping and murder.

Prosecutor, Edison Chidhumira said Chitoro, also known as Biggie Chitoro, directed six ex-combatants to kidnap and brutalise three supporters of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in Mberengwa on 4 June, resulting in the death of Fainos Kufazvinei of Masaga village.
Chitoro, whose address was given as Timire village, Chief Maziofa's area, Mberengwa, is the chairman of the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans' Association and a senior Zanu PF officer in the Midlands province. He is the leader of a group that invaded Texas Ranch in Mberengwa where most ex-combatants from the area are staying.
Chitoro, who was unrepresented, was remanded to 13 July and asked to apply to the High Court for bail. He has a previous conviction arising from a politically-related offence at Madzora Range in Mberengwa in 1995.
The State alleged Chitoro incited his colleagues Shadreck Makoni, Francis Ncube, Sam Kid Ganyau, Morgan Gumbo, Nhamoinesu Dziva and Elias Zhou to visit Masaga village and kidnap the late Kufazvinei, Elia Mapaire, and James Zhou.
Makoni, Ganyau, Ncube and Zhou are on the run, while Gumbo and Dziva have already been charged and are on remand.
Soon after Chitoro's alleged order, the group moved onto Mapaire's home and ordered him to wake up. They first assaulted and handcuffed him before forcing him to lead them to the homes of Zhou and Kufazvinei.
“On arrival at the homes of the second complainant and the deceased, the group surrounded the homestead,” according to the State outline. “They beat them up with sticks, open hands and fists before they removed handcuffs from the first complainant. They then handcuffed the second complainant and the deceased together.”
They used a fibre rope to tie Mapaire's hands together before force-marching their hostages to the home of Obedia Zhou, who they also wanted to kidnap.
“The group failed to kidnap him because he shot one of them with a .303 rifle.”
They then proceeded to Elias Mashingaidze's homestead, leaving Kufazvinei, Mapaire and Zhou at the roadside, but under guard. The group then marched the three towards Rengwe and Vutika schools.
On arrival at the Mundi River, the war veterans forced their MDC hostages to swim before they beat them all over their bodies with whips, sticks, clenched fists and booted feet.
“The group then further force-marched the three to Mwembe, where they waited after sending one of them to Mnene to inform the accused about what had happened,” alleged the State.
They then headed for Texas Range where the war veterans took turns to assault Zhou and Kufazvinei. The onslaught went on for two days until Chitoro arrived at the Ranch. He released Mapaire on 6 June and started his own round of beatings. He accused Kufazvinei of supporting the MDC and kicked him several times in the stomach with booted feet.
After a three-day onslaught, Chitoro then approved their release. They were escorted out of the Range and commandeered out of the area. But Kufazvinei was badly injured and unable to walk. The MDC supporters decided to rest at the home of Byron Hove, the late nationalist, lawyer and Member of Parliament.
On 10 June, Kufazvinei died and doctors at the United Bulawayo Hospitals confirmed the cause as a severe assault. Zhou is still in hospital.
His story and a photograph showing the injuries he sustained were published in The Daily News on Saturday.
Yesterday, Chitoro was not asked to plead, but was quick to inform the court that a group of about 40 people wanted to assault him soon after his arrest.
Chidhumira told the court the State had lined up 44 prosecution witnesses.

MANDISHONA Mutyanda, 60, a ward chairman for the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in Kwekwe's Amaveni suburb, died at the Avenues Clinic in Harare yesterday morning from head injuries inflicted on him by about 30 suspected Zanu PF supporters.

Blessing Chebundo, the newly-elected MP for Kwekwe, yesterday said the Zanu PF supporters were in a motor vehicle allegedly used by the ruling party in its election campaign. Zanu PF candidate and Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Emmerson Mnangagwa lost to Chebundo.
Chebundo said the same car, a Mazda pick-up truck, was used in attacks on his house and on the Mbizo house of another MDC member, Abraham Mudenga. The car was burnt by MDC youths in Amaveni on Wednesday morning.
Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena yesterday confirmed the car was being used by Mnangagwa in the run-up to the election.
Mutyanda's son Gayle said: “He collapsed on his way to the theatre for an operation at 10.00 am.”
Gayle's sister, Mercy, near to tears, had failed to comment.
Mutyanda's death brings to 31 the number of politically-motivated deaths since April. Thirty people, mostly MDC supporters, have died in what the opposition says is State-sponsored violence in the run-up to the election.
Gayle said Mutyanda, a salesperson with Sables Chemicals Company, was attacked on 18 June by alleged Zanu PF supporters.
The gang, he said, first telephoned Mutyanda's house and spoke to one of his children.
“They asked the little girl who else was at home”, said Gayle. “The girl unknowingly told them that her parents, two sisters and two MDC youths guarding the house, were present.”
When the Zanu PF supporters arrived, said Gayle, they chased away the MDC youths and beat up Mutyanda.
“They left him for dead,” said Gayle. “He lost his speech until Wednesday last week.”
The attackers broke windows and destroyed the back door, before taking away a television set, a radio, blankets and a telephone receiver, he said.
Gayle said his father was taken to Kwekwe General Hospital that evening, but was transferred to Harare Central Hospital the following day. Mutyanda was moved to the Avenues Clinic three days later, for security reasons.
This was after the South African Broadcasting Corporation had broadcast an interview with his father at the hospital, said Gayle.
Mutyanda is survived by two wives and 11 children.
Meanwhile, Zacharia Rioga, the MDC candidate for Masvingo South, is recovering at Harare Central Hospital from serious head injuries after he was assaulted by suspected war veterans at Nyikavanhu business centre on 21 June.
The war veterans went on to burn his pick-up truck. Isaac, his son, yesterday said the previously delirious Rioga was improving.
“Although his speech is now coherent,” said Zacharia, “it is still slurred and he forgets what would have been said a few minutes ago. He has to ask people to repeat themselves. Doctors have said he might be alright in a few weeks' time.”
Rioga, 53, challenged Eddison Zvobgo, the Minister without Portfolio.
Pearson Tachivepi, a candidate for the MDC for Hwedza, was still in hiding by yesterday after allegedly receiving threats from a named senior army officer. He fled the country before the weekend election.
His campaign manager, Toendepi Shonhe, yesterday refused to reveal his whereabouts for security reasons.
He said they would contest the result of the poll and were compiling cases of political violence against their supporters.
Chebundo yesterday said he hoped a meeting between the police, Zanu PF and MDC officials in Midlands province yesterday would bring the continuing violence in the town to an end.
He said his movements in Kwekwe were limited, despite having won the seat.
His family were still staying with friends, after his house was burnt down by suspected Zanu PF supporters.
In Macheke, MDC co-ordinator Musekiwa Matute suffered huge losses when suspected war veterans and Zanu PF militias set his house on fire on Saturday night, the first day of voting in last weekend's poll.
Matute, 30, a tobacco farmer at Percyvale Farm, about a kilometre from Macheke business centre, lost farming equipment and household property valued at nearly $10 000 in the fire which gutted his two-roomed house. He was away in Harare with his family at the time of the attack.
Macheke is under the Murehwa South constituency where Zanu PF's Biggie Matiza beat Ward Nezi of the MDC.
Chief Superintendent Francis Mutaurwa, the officer commanding Marondera province, confirmed the attack on Matute's house and said investigations were under way.

MUGABE’S CABINET CRISIS—•Party stalwarts against Mnangagwa’s reappoint

MDC ends Zanu PF’s political dominance

Zimbabwe Standard: 2 July 2000 - Chengetai Zvauya

THE resounding defeat of several Zanu PF provincial chairmen and senior members of the women’s league in last week’s general election may have signalled an abrupt end to their political careers and the lifespan of the ruling party.

Out of Zanu PF’s 10 provincial chairmen, four fell in the wake of the Movement of Democratic Change’s (MDC) onslaught in urban areas. Once the dominant force on the Zimbabwean political landscape for the past two decades, Zanu PF is no longer popular with the urban electorate, especially in Harare and Bulawayo where the party was whitewashed.

Zanu PF’s chairman for Harare province, Tony Gara, was given a good hiding by MDC’s candidate, Tichaona Munyanyi, in the Mbare East constituency. Munyanyi embarrassed Gara by polling 10 754 votes against the latter’s 4 265.

Masvingo’s provincial chairman, Dzikamai Mavhaire, was another Zanu PF stalwart who succumbed to the MDC juggernaut after he lost to the labour-backed party’s Silas Mangono.

Once pardoned by President Robert Mugabe after the infamous ‘Willowgate scandal’, Frederick Shava, the ruling party‘s Midlands chairman, could not be saved by Mugabe this time around as Bethel Makwe-mbere of MDC booted him out of the Mkoba constituency.

Another party chairman falling by the wayside was Bulawayo’s Jacob Mude-nda, who was ousted by Peter Nyoni of the MDC. Nyoni polled 15 271 votes to Mudenda’s paltry 3 617.

Members of the Zanu PF women’s league who suffered defeat included the league’s chairperson, The-njiwe Lesabe, who having lost the Mzingwane primaries was to be imposed on the Gwanda North constituency, where she overwhel- mingly lost to MDC’s election director, Paul Themba Nyathi.

Her deputy in the women’s league, Oppah Muchinguri, lost to Giles Mutsekwa in the Mutare North constituency by almost 10 000 votes. Going the same route was the women’s league legal secretary, Mavis Chidzonga, who lost her Mhondoro seat to Hilda Mafudze of MDC.

The majority of the candidates have conceded defeat but are hoping that President Mugabe will include them in his list of the 12 non-constituency MPs he is entitled to choose under the current constitution. Also relying heavily on Mugabe when he selects the 12 and, perhaps, the cabinet, will be fallen senior party members such as Dumiso Dabengwa, Emerson Mna-ngagwa, Simon Khaya Moyo and Richard Hove.

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Election result devides Zanu PF

Zimbabwe Independent - Dumisani Muleya

THE knives are out in the ruling Zanu PF after the party suffered massive reversals nationwide at the hands of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in the just-ended parliamentary election. Observers believe that the defeat could be a forerunner to the party’s demise or splitting into its various ethnic components.

In separate interviews yesterday defeated Zanu PF heavyweights expressed uncertainty about their political future. Those who spoke to the Zimbabwe Independent had no clue as to what they would do next. What was clear in the interviews was their humility and the sense that their aura of invincibility had vanished.

This came as calls for heads to roll in Zanu PF began making themselves heard again. There were similar calls after the party’s referendum defeat in February but, apart from a couple of token court cases, things remained much the same.

At a politburo meeting on Wednesday sources said the party heard gripes over its poor performance in the election. Sources said Mugabe was in a “sullen mood” and his lieutenants visibly “subdued” as they licked their wounds and pondered the future.

Before the election Zanu PF luminaries refused to contemplate defeat of such proportions and insiders say the poll outcome was a bitter pill to swallow.

Zanu PF won 62 contested seats while the MDC secured 57. Zanu (Ndonga) got one seat. The ruling party, however, has a block of 30 more MPs appointed by Mugabe even though in overall terms a majority of voters supported the opposition.

The ruling party meets today to continue discussions on its poll perfor- mance and sources said fireworks were expected. Insiders said radical corrective measures were likely to be taken and those who fared badly faced the chop.

Highly-placed sources said while President Mugabe has maintained a brave face in public, he had lashed out in private at some cadres whom he thought misled the party into a badly-conceived election campaign.

“Those heavyweights who lost and the provincial chairs of Harare, Bula-wayo, Matabeleland North, Matabeleland South, and Manicaland are in real danger because we want them removed,” said a Zanu PF central committee member yesterday.

“There should be no room for squatters in our party,” the source said. Notable losers include ministers Emmerson Mna-ngagwa, Dumiso Dabengwa, and Simon Moyo as well as several ministers of state. A host of senior party members were also defeated.

Mnangagwa said he was currently not in a position to know what the future holds for him.

“It’s too early to determine what I will do in future,” Mnangagwa said. “I lost and I accept defeat but I don’t know at the moment what I will be doing in future. I will tell you when the time comes but not now,” he said. Asked about the possibility of him being appointed to parliament by Mugabe, Mnangagwa, who is the Minister of Justice, said that question would better be answered by Mugabe himself.

Contacted for comment yesterday morning, Dabe-ngwa, Home Affairs mini- ster, asked the Independent to phone him in the afternoon. Efforts to get him later proved fruitless.

Moyo, the Minister of Mines and Tourism, was extremely reticent about his defeat. “I have no comment,” is all he would say.

Zanu PF chairman John Nkomo, who avoided defeat by claiming to be above the electoral fray, was unable to comment. “I’m in a meeting,” he said.

Obert Mpofu, deputy minister of Industry and Commerce, said he was down but not out of politics. Mpofu said the MDC won a lot of seats because it had a good strategy.

“They had a good strategy. Whatever strategy they used it was good,” he said when asked what exactly he was referring to.

Insiders said dumping the heavyweights could prove a problem for Mugabe and would not solve the party’s deep-seated problems.

“That means he will leave himself exposed to challenge. The heavyweights want to take over from him, that’s true, but they can’t challenge him directly.

“The Young Turks will now challenge him,” a party member said. Sources said the other issue complicating matters was that Zanu PF leaders knew the root cause of problems and scapegoating had impressed nobody. The party’s recourse to failed economic policies had cost it the election. Insiders said Mugabe had to shoulder most of the blame for the party’s virtual defeat.

“It’s not an easy problem because some of us are saying we have collective responsibility and let’s stop blaming each other. We all know what the problems are and censuring people will not help anything,” a party member said.

Others feared that in-fighting would precipitate Zanu PF’s disintegration. The future of the party was said to be uncertain and with the succession debate resurfacing a potentially damaging conflict was looming. Insiders said there was nothing holding the party together anymore.

Essentially the party had failed to transform itself from a liberation movement to a party in government with a clear set of goals and programmes to implement.

Observers doubt Zanu PF would be able to survive in the new democratic political dispensation. But they say while the party could be resuscitated it was nearly impossible to re-invent Mugabe. Repackaging Zanu PF has so far proved to be an exercise in futility. After Mugabe, analysts believe, the party would split into factions.

Mugabe was set to come under severe pressure to leave. After government was defeated in the referendum in February, he was told by his central committee to quit but he declined. But sources said his court now believes his days were numbered.

Industry and Commerce minister Nathan Shamu-yarira said in a BBC interview this week that since Mugabe is now 76 years old and had ruled for 20 years it was possible that he could be facing the exit. Shamuyarira was once one of Mugabe’s closest confidants.

A few days before the election, Mugabe had summoned Zanu PF Harare provincial chairman Tony Gara and other cadres to explain the poor turnout at his “historic” Zimbabwe Grounds rally that left the president shaken. But yesterday Gara — whose future in the party was said to be bleak despite being a Mugabe loyalist — insisted he tried his best to mobilise people.

“We did our best to mobilise people and our last rally (at Chitungwiza) was more exciting. I don’t know who is complaining,” Gara said.

However, insiders confirmed there had been serious complaints about his performance in Harare province where Zanu PF was not simply beaten, it was crushed.

Minister’s car linked to political death
Daily News: 6/30/00 8:24:03 AM (GMT +2)