The Scotsman
JANE FIELDS IN
HARARE
"NICE people," the policeman manning the roadblock in Nyazura, eastern
Zimbabwe, said. "Nice people, beautiful people."
The youth in a blue
uniform next to him sniggered. The policeman's tone
changed. "Nice people
carry lots of money. Where is your money?"
It was our third roadblock of
the day and we were beginning to learn the
ropes. Smile, but not so you look
guilty of carrying more than 100 million
old Zimbabwe dollars (about £100).
Open car window. Show wallet. Wave to
bags in the back of car. If told to,
get out of car and open boot. Get out
bags. Wait by bags on dusty highway as
they are searched. Proceed to next
roadblock and go through it all over
again.
Across Zimbabwe, police and youth militias - some apparently so
quickly
recruited that they haven't had time to collect uniforms - have set
up
roadblocks to catch people president Robert Mugabe's government says have
been hoarding heaps of thin paper banknotes known as bearer
cheques.
Last month the Reserve Bank governor, Gideon Gono, who has been
waging a
losing battle against soaring inflation rates of about 1,000 per
cent,
announced people had just 21 days to exchange their old bearers for
"heroes", new banknotes with three zeroes shorn off.
There was a
catch. No-one was allowed to hand in more than 100 million old
Zimbabwe
dollars. Any more and the money would go straight into
"anti-money-laundering-zero-coupon-bonds" with the holder obliged to prove
he wasn't guilty of economic crimes.
Mr Gono's announcement triggered
a wave of panic among not just cash
hoarders and black marketeers, but
ordinary Zimbabweans who are terrified to
deposit their money in banks after
Mr Mugabe's government closed at least
four of them without warning two
years ago. So thousands of people embarked
on a desperate shopping spree,
trying to spend all their cash before Monday.
The problem is that
shoppers have to somehow get their money to the shops -
and that's where the
roadblocks come in. At least 3,200 people were arrested
in the first eight
days of the clampdown, some of them after they smuggled
back cash through
Zimbabwe's borders with Zambia and Mozambique. State media
triumphantly
reported on the seizure of cash stashed in car bonnets and
boots.
Sometimes the police have been a little too enthusiastic.
Officials at
Harare airport announced they had seized ten trillion dollars
from three
financial institutions that were now under investigation. The
banks hit
back. The central bank had "seriously misunderstood" the
day-to-day business
of banking, said a spokeswoman for Barclays: the haul
was simply cash being
transferred between banking institutions in Zimbabwe,
"as is normal business
practice".
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights
is mounting a court challenge to protest
the use of unlicensed youth
militias who, in some cases, have stripped
people in their search for hidden
cash. But it's not just Mr Mugabe's
traditional opponents who are seething.
Some top ZANU-PF officials were
believed to be making heady cash profits
from parallel market deals in fuel
and government-provided fertilisers. So
angry are they that Mr Gono's life
is now believed to be in
danger.
Back in Nyazura, we were waved on. There were seven roadblocks on
our
160-mile journey. In the town of Rusape, traders had spied a business
opportunity, selling ice-creams to motorists waiting their turn. "We are
catching lots of people," a female police officer told me near Harare's
Chikurubi maximum security prison. "Lots of money."
VOA
By Irwin Chivera
Harare
15 August 2006
The
Internet news site ZimOnline has quoted Zimbabwe Grain Millers
Association
Chairman Thembinkosi Ndhlovu as saying the country is out of
maize meal
because the state monopoly Grain Marketing Board has no grain to
provide to
millers
Supermarkets in Harare, the capital, were out of maize meal on
Tuesday and
said no deliveries of the national staple food had arrived in
the past two
weeks.
The Grain Marketing Board's acting chief
executive officer, Samuel Muvuti,
could not be reached for comment on the
ZimOnline report saying the GMB had
no maize.
Grain and Cereal
Producers Association President Denford Chimbwanda said,
though, that most
farmers have yet to transport their maize to state
granaries because of the
severe shortage of fuel needed to process maize on
the cob and take it to
market.
GMB and other officials have announced the start of maize
collection. But
others say producers in districts like Murehwa and Mtoko, in
Mashonaland
East province have become unhappy about the GMB's failure to
collect maize
and pay on time.
The government estimates a maize
harvest of 1.8 million metric tonnes in the
current market season, but
independent sources put the figure at just
800,000 tonnes.
Zimbabwejournalists.com
By Toridza Ngoma
HARARE - A major health
disaster looms at Harare's White Cliff suburb
along the Harare-Bulawayo Road
where the Zimbabwe government built basic
houses for people affected by the
much-criticised Operation Murambatsvina.
The core houses, built
under Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle, were
occupied before basic
infrastructure such as water and sewage systems were
put in place as the
government ran out of money.
A visit to the scheme by
zimbabwejournalists.com revealed a few
families had heeded a government call
to build blair toilets with most
people preferring to use the bush for
toileting.
"Most of those who heeded the call to build toilets only
dug shallow
pits which are already filling up, while the rest are using the
bush," an
official with the ministry of construction said
yesterday.
"With people fetching their domestic water from open
wells, a health
disaster is imminent, especially with the coming of the hot
season."
Epidemics like cholera and TB thrive in such unhygienic
conditions but
the government is not taking any notice, said the official
source.
A resident who spoke on condition she was not named said:
"Everything
in Zimbabwe is expensive that is why most of us have resorted to
using the
bush as toilets. The houses were just shells when we got them and
we needed
money to finish them up and on another hand we need money for
toilets, we
just cannot afford it - it is a luxury for now."
Billions of dollars in cash and building materials which included
bricks,
cement, roofing sheets, door and window frames, donated by people
who
sympathised with victims of Operation Murambatsvina, are reported to
have
been stolen by senior government officials in charge of the project.
This
consequently brought the scheme to an abrupt end after the construction
of
474 houses. No investigations are known to have been instituted into the
thefts.
However, Harare Metropolitan Provincial Administrator,
Justin
Chivavaya has since appeared before a Harare Magistrate for allegedly
allocating 300 houses and 115 residential stands to undeserving people, who
have since turned out to be Zanu PF supporters, at Whitecliff
Farm.
Chivavaya, 41, became the second senior government official
to be
arraigned before the courts in connection with the case after Harare
West
acting district administrator Nelson Mawomo also appeared in court
facing
similar charges.
The two were formally charged with
contravening section 4(a) of the
Prevention of Corruption Act and their
cases are still with the courts.
Government sources say there are divisions
over their arraignment before the
courts since the majority of the houses
have been allocated to Zanu PF
members.
According to a
government employee who cannot be named for security
reasons, civil
servants, who, like victims of Operation Murambatsvina, had
been promised
houses under the scheme, have also lost out as it is most
unlikely that more
houses will be built following the rampant theft of
building materials meant
for the scheme.
Chivavaya and Mawomo, who are also senior Zanu PF
officials, allegedly
allocated the houses to their relations and Zanu PF
members and pocketed
more than Zd$3 billion (not revalued) after collecting
Zd$10 million from
each of the tenants before they moved in.
An
undisclosed number of civil servants have since lost the Zd$615 000
they
each deposited with the City of Harare as administrative fees after
being
promised houses under the scheme.
"At the time we paid the money,
$615 000 was a lot of money, but now
it's not even worth following as it has
been eroded by inflation," said a
civil servant who had expected to benefit
from the scheme.
When Harare governor, David Karimanzira discovered
that the houses had
already been allocated to the wrong people, he tried to
reverse the process,
but failed as the Zanu PF supporters refused to move
out. They argued they
had paid Zd$10 million each and had invested heavily
in the houses as some
had already plastered, floored, painted and put window
and door frames on
the houses using their own money.
After the
intervention of Local Government Minister, Ignatius Chombo
and Manyame MP,
Patrick Zhuwawo, Karimanzira eventually agreed to let the
occupants stay
because they were ruling party members and had invested a lot
in the
houses.
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
For most Zimbabweans, leader's new home is proof that government
profligacy
starts with the presidency.
By Dzikamai Chidyausku in
Harare (AR No.74, 15-Aug-06)
Unperturbed by the plight of millions living
in poverty around him in a
country with a battered and failed economy,
Zimbabwe's president Robert
Mugabe has moved into a multi-million dollar
retirement palace that has been
built over the past five years.
The
spread, with 25 ensuite bathrooms, has cost in excess of 26 million US
dollars to build in a country where most people earn less than the
equivalent of eleven dollars a month. But the move into the palace - three
times the size of the official presidential residence, State House - could
be a sign that 82-year-old Mugabe is finally preparing for retirement. He
has said he intends retiring in 2008, though speculation has been intense
this year that he will amend the constitution to extend his rule until
2010.
The mansion is also indicative of the corruption and extravanganza
of good
living Mugabe's ZANU PF government has indulged in as the country
crumbles
around them.
University of Zimbabwe political scientist John
Makumbe, a member of the
anti-corruption group Transparency International,
said the palace
demonstrates Mugabe's "insensitivity to the plight of the
people he leads .
He is happy to live like a monarch while the rest of the
country is mired in
poverty. It just shows that corruption begins at the top
of the government
because Mugabe's salary of roughly 57,000 dollars a year
and allowances for
the past 26 years he has been in power cannot build such
a house.
"But also that could show you that he is preparing for his
retirement."
Apart from the costs of building the palace, many millions
more have been
spent on decoration and furniture and landscaping its
lake-strewn grounds.
Arab artists brought to Zimbabwe spent a year
decorating the arching
ceilings.
For most Zimbabweans, Mugabe's
relocation to the mansion is proof that
government profligacy starts with
the presidency.
"It pains me. That house has no place in country were
millions are starving
and jobless," Jonathan Nhekwe, who barely survives by
selling cigarettes on
the streets of Harare, told IWPR.
His pain is
shared by millions of other Zimbabweans who struggle to survive
each day in
a country where inflation reached 1200 per cent in May and where
80 per cent
of people of working age are unemployed. It is a slap in the
face for the
more than one million people still living in the open after
their homes were
destroyed a year ago in Mugabe's Operation Murambatsvina
(Operation Clean
Out the Filth), an alleged urban renewal scheme which is
believed to have
been aimed at supporters of the Mugabe opposition.
The palace, 26
kilometres north of central Harare in the plush suburb of
Borrowdale, has
been built by Energo Projekt, a Serbian company with a long
history of
construction in Zimbabwe and which also built ZANU PF's
skyscraper party
headquarters in Harare. Glazed midnight blue tiles covering
the roof have
been donated by China, a major investor in Zimbabwe following
the retreat of
western businesses.
Mugabe has said the palace is a gift to him by ZANU
PF out of gratitude for
leading the country to independence and then
governing it since independence
in 1980.
In a rare interview with
Britain's Sky News, Mugabe admitted there were
corrupt individuals in his
party, but when asked if he himself was corrupt
replied, "Oh come on, come
on, come on. We have had assistance, of course.
Some countries have donated.
They have got some timber from Malaysia, thanks
to my good friend, former
prime minister Mahathir [Mohamad]."
Set on several acres of land,
independent newspapers and political
commentators estimate that the money
used to build it would be enough to
construct four hospitals in a country
where the health delivery system has
collapsed, or to build more than 2000
low-cost houses to begin to replace
the hundreds of thousands of homes of
the poor destroyed in Operation
Murambatsvina.
Mugabe admitted in the
Sky News interview that the palace project was
profligate, but he justified
it by saying, "It is lavish because it's
attractive."
The area of
Borrowdale where the palace is located has been declared a
security zone
with a 24 hour guard provided by the state police and the
army, who, sources
say, are under instructions to shoot to kill any
suspicious people
approaching the complex.
This is the third luxury residence that Mugabe
has built and the fifth he
has owned since he came to power.
In the
early 1990s, Mugabe caused a public uproar after he used taxpayer's
funds to
build a magnificent mansion at Kutama, the village 80 km northwest
of Harare
where the president was born.
In the late 1990s, Mugabe's wife Grace, 40
years his junior, used government
funds meant to construct houses for the
poor to build a 30-bedroom house
that came to be known as "Graceland" and
which was later bought by Libyan
ruler Muammar Qaddafi.
The first
family also has a 29-room farmhouse house 64 km northwest of the
capital on
the magnificent Iron Mask Estate, allocated to them during the
wave of
expulsions of white commercial farmers from their properties from
2001
onwards. The luxury farmhouse and its rich pastures were confiscated
from
Eva and John Matthews, both in their seventies, who were given 48 hours
to
leave after a visit by Grace Mugabe, accompanied by police, soldiers and
youth militiamen.
Mugabe also has a country retreat in Nyanga, a
resort area in the Eastern
Highlands guarded all-year round by the
army.
It is, however, the Borrowdale house that has most irked ordinary
people and
attracted the fiercest criticism. Mugabe is not leaving his
security to
chance. The government is giving notices to people with houses
around the
palace to sell up and find homes elsewhere.
One couple
living in the area told IWPR that they were served with eviction
letters in
May this year. "They said it was a security zone and we had to
move," said
the husband. The couple, who have lived in the area for the past
seven
years, are however refusing to move and, with other residents, are
challenging the order in court.
Clearly Mugabe is not banking
necessarily on a peaceful retirement in his
palace. One report says that, in
addition to marble imported from Italy and
jacuzzis brought from South
Africa, it includes concrete reinforced
underground rooms.
Dzikamai
Chidyausku is the pseudonym of an IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
Banknotes have so many zeros that calculators and computers can no
longer
cope.
By Benedict Unendoro in Harare (AR No.74,
15-Aug-06)
Zimbabweans are suffering more chaos and confusion as they try
to spend or
deposit their savings before their cash becomes worthless in
late August.
Central Bank Governor Gideon Gono announced at the beginning
of the month
that three zeros are to be chopped off the country's banknotes,
which have
spiraled to unreal levels by horrendous inflation that reached
1200 per cent
in May this year.
Individuals can deposit only 100
million Zimbabwe dollars (200 US dollars) a
day in bank accounts, in
exchange for newly denominated notes, in an effort
to flush out money
launderers and other alleged criminals.
Anyone carrying in excess of that
amount is having the money confiscated
unless they can show good reason for
having it - for example, a legitimate
transfer of company wages. Companies
are limited to changing 5 billion
Zimbabwe dollars (10,000 US dollars) per
day.
Police and much-feared youth militiamen are manning the borders and
roadblocks across the country to confiscate excess cash. The searches are
draconian, with regular reports of women being stripped by militia members.
Many trillions of Zimbabwe dollars in old notes are being
confiscated.
With the country's banking system subject to red tape,
corruption and
frequent closures as a result of bankruptcy, it is estimated
that 90 per
cent of Zimbabweans choose to keep their banknotes at
home.
Most people, especially the rural poor, simply do not have bank
accounts.
The relatively well off with lots of old dollars feel compelled to
spend
them before the new ones, minus the three zeros, become the legal
currency.
The spending spree is fuelling inflation, which the Central Bank's
reform
was, in part, supposed to curb. One Harare man splashed 100 billion
old
Zimbabwe dollars in cash on ten luxury cars. Petrol prices in Bulawayo,
the
country's second city, increased one hundred per cent in real terms in
just
a week following Gono's announcement of his reform.
People
scrambling to dispose of old notes are buying houses, cars and
fridges -
anything that has concrete value. Small-scale farmers are being
inundated
with astronomical bids for their cattle as hot money seeks
conversion into
real assets.
Rates on the black market, which long ago supplanted
official financial
channels as the public's chosen way of dealing, are now
impossible to
determine because they move by the hour. The only thing
certain is they are
not going down.
"The reason given for the removal
of the three zeros includes the much sung,
but abused, word 'convenience',"
wrote Webster Zambara, a columnist for the
weekly Zimbabwe Standard. "We are
told that we no longer need to carry
wheelbarrow loads of cash to buy an
item that fits in a pocket."
In fact, the currency was so inflated that
people carried "bricks" of money
in boxes, satchels, suitcases and all
manner of containers in order to carry
out transactions: a loaf of bread can
cost more than one million Zimbabwean
dollars.
The re-denomination on
August 21 is seen as purely a cosmetic cleanup of a
runaway currency, which
gave birth to so many noughts that computers and
calculators could no longer
cope.
Trevor Ncube, publisher of the Zimbabwe Independent and the
Standard, said,
"It [the lopping off of the three zeros] is semantics. It is
like
rearranging the chairs on the Titanic." Ncube said Gono had not
addressed
fundamental issues and that inflation would again take off in a
big way.
"What Gono has done is going to buy him a bit of time because
one reason
he's done this is that banks are coming to him saying, 'We cannot
cope with
the zeros anymore,'" said Ncube. "'The accounting packages we
bought from
South Africa, from the UK, can't accommodate the zeros anymore.
We need to
get rid of the zeros.'
Leading Harare economist John
Robertson said, "The re-denomination is a
non-event. It doesn't address the
underlying causes of the economic problems
here. In other parts of the world
where re-denominations have worked, they
have been preceded by major policy
overhauls."
A decade ago, the biggest real money denomination used to be
the 1000
Zimbabwe dollar note, with which you felt extremely rich. But
ravaging
inflation took off from 1997, and Zimbabwe became the country with
the
world's fastest declining economy, rendering the note
useless.
Cries to devalue the Zimbabwe dollar since 2003 have met great
resistance
because, according to the thinking of political leaders, it would
be a
signal to the world that the economy really has failed. But
transactions
using the runaway currency became almost impossible as prices
rose in tandem
with inflation. President Robert Mugabe's land reform
programme, because of
its chaotic nature, destroyed the major pillars of the
economy.
Commercial agriculture collapsed as experienced farmers were
quickly
replaced by people, mainly members of the ruling ZANU PF party, who
had no
experience of farming. The production of money-spinning crops such as
tobacco and flowers declined immediately and for the first time Zimbabwe
became a net importer of maize, the staple food of ordinary people. All the
other formal sectors of the economy, including financial services,
manufacturing and mining, began to collapse as well.
With the
disintegration of the formal economy, the informal parallel market
strengthened, fuelled by the government's obstinacy in keeping the official
exchange rate at an artificially high level. As inflation climbed, the
government of an increasingly impoverished country pronounced its budgets in
trillion dollar terms. Computer accounting programmes had not been designed
with so many zeros in mind. Companies were increasingly unable to release
financial statements because computer printouts went haywire. The sheer
number of digits began to defeat the understanding of executives and board
members.
Something had to be done. Hence Gono's surprise announcement
of the lopping
off of three zeros, giving citizens three weeks to exchange
old currency for
new.
Eric Bloch, economic adviser to Gono, cited
neighbouring Mozambique as an
example of how re-denomination can work.
"Mozambique has demonstrated a
capacity to apply a practical, viable
solution to a critical, economically
debilitating problem," he
said.
Mozambique eliminated three zeros from its currency on July
1.
Mfandaidza Hove, an economics spokesman for the opposition Movement
for
Democratic Change, chastised Bloch for his specious "mischief". He
pointed
out that the Mozambican economy at the time of the lopping of its
zeros was
ticking along healthily, unlike that of Zimbabwe whose gross
domestic
product has contracted every single year since 1998.
Since
2000, said Hove, Mozambique's economy had maintained an average annual
growth of seven per cent and was expected to continue this expansion by
between seven and ten per cent for the next five years. Mozambique's growth,
he went on, had been "achieved through prudent macro-economic policies
against a backdrop of a stable political environment".
The Mozambican
inflation rate had continued to fall and the currency to gain
against major
currencies.
"It is against this background of a growing and well-managed
economy with
low inflation that Mozambique took the decision to remove the
zeros from its
currency. In contrast, the Zimbabwean economy has shrunk by
44 per cent
since 1998 and is expected to decline by as much as 6 per cent
this year,"
concluded Hove.
Many analysts, in addition to Ncube, say
Zimbabwe's zeros will soon be back
with a vengeance. They argue that, in the
context of a dying economy like
Zimbabwe's, chopping off zeros is actually
inflationary.
Phoebe Goremusandu, a senior markets analyst in Harare with
Old Mutual Asset
Managers, said, "A [re-denominated] currency can create an
illusion of lower
prices, hence a tendency to increase prices even higher.
This would see
inflation increasing to levels beyond current expectations."
She added that
it was important there be initiatives to address inflation at
a much more
fundamental level.
"The truth is that month-on-month
inflation has continued to rise at an
alarming rate," said another analyst,
predicting that this would be the
trend for the foreseeable
future.
The relief the new family of banknotes will bring relates only to
the
portability of the money. People are taking old-fashioned purses and
wallets
out of storage to put them to work again. But the message is that
this will
be only a passing luxury. The cardboard boxes, sacks and suitcases
should
not be thrown away.
Benedict Unendoro is the pseudonym of an
IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.
Institute for War and Peace Reporting
Employers can do little to keep skilled personnel when salaries
constantly
lag behind astronomic inflation rate.
By Josphat Gumbo in
Harare (AR No.74, 15-Aug-06)
Amid Zimbabwe's deepening economic and
political crisis, the country's
skills base is shrinking fast in the face of
an exodus of hundreds of its
nationals who leave the country each week in
search of better working
conditions.
Business analysts say the Great
Trek to greener pastures is wrecking any
chance of future economic
recovery.
The mass departure, mostly to the West and to South Africa and
Botswana, has
rendered ineffective efforts by both the government and the
private sector
to prop up the sick economy. Both have sunk billions of
Zimbabwe dollars
into new skills training - but most who complete the course
or re-training
quickly depart for a better life elsewhere.
"Some 70
to 90 per cent of Zimbabwean university graduates are working
outside the
country," said Community Development and Women Affairs Minister
Eunice
Chitambira at a recent conference on labour migration. She said the
heaviest
losses were among teachers, doctors, nurses and pharmacists. Most
health
professionals head for the United Kingdom.
According to the Southern
African Migration Project, funded by Canadian and
British government aid,
more than 50 per cent of skilled Zimbabweans
surveyed said they intend
emigrating either indefinitely or permanently.
More than four million
Zimbabweans, just under a third of the population,
have fled into exile
since the country was plunged into deep economic and
political crisis from
2000 onwards. Some 80 per cent of those who've
remained are
unemployed.
Figures obtained from the government's Central Statistical
Office, CSO,
suggest that among the general exodus, some 2600 highly skilled
people left
Zimbabwe between January and June this year. But employers and
business
analysts dispute the official figures, saying they are not a true
reflection
of the real situation. They note that hundreds of thousands of
Zimbabweans
have streamed out of the country unofficially, especially into
southern
Africa, while others have left on the pretext of going on holiday
never to
return.
According to the CSO, 540,000 locals officially
travelled abroad last year
compared to 375,000 in 2004, and analysts say a
sizeable number of these
people never returned. Huge numbers of Zimbabweans
fled the country
illegally, mainly to South Africa.
John Mufukare,
the executive director of the Employers Confederation of
Zimbabwe, said the
country's economic and political crisis was the major
force fuelling the
brain drain. He said although it was difficult to
quantify the latter in
terms of losses to the economy, the human resource
base is clearly shrinking
at an alarming rate.
Mufukare said there is a high demand both regionally
and internationally for
Zimbabwe's skilled workers. Employers could do
little to keep skilled
personnel when salaries constantly lagged behind
Zimbabwe's astronomic
inflation rate, which surged to a record 1195 per cent
in May and is
predicted by the World Bank to hit the 2500 per cent mark next
year. "The
figures of the departing Zimbabweans, particularly the unofficial
figures
which are the real ones, are a barometer of the performance of the
economy,"
said Mufukare.
The CSO figures show that in the first half
of this year, 955 highly
qualified Zimbabweans emigrated to Botswana, 532 to
the United Kingdom, 324
to South Africa and 114 to New Zealand. Immigration
of skilled people was
minimal.
While the public health sector has
been the hardest hit by the brain drain,
private businesses have also been
badly affected. "Zimbabwe's human capital
is simply draining away," said one
economist.
Emcoz's Mufukare said that until the government reined in
runaway inflation
there is nothing it can do to stop the brain drain.
Spiralling price rises
had somehow to be contained before any meaningful
economic recovery plan
could be implemented.
An official at
international courier service Federal Express, now handling
visa
applications of all prospective travellers to Britain, said the company
had
been inundated by thousands of applications. It is believed that more
than
3000 Zimbabweans who
entered Britain alone last year did not return to
Zimbabwe, with most of
them claiming to be attending schools
there.
Harare economist John Robertson said that, with the local currency
in a
tailspin, working abroad had become highly attractive because exiled
Zimbabweans repatriated their hard cash to trade it on the thriving parallel
black market to support their families.
Rugare, not his real name, a
26-year-old nurse working in London, said he
uses an informal network of
friends to send money home, "I rely on them
because I do not have proper
documentation." He says he sends the equivalent
of a minimum of 142 US
dollars each month.
Rugare says he obtains three times the official rate
on the black market,
and there is no doubt that these remittances make the
difference between
extreme hunger and having food on the table for relatives
still in Zimbabwe.
Robertson said while ordinary Zimbabweans are enjoying
the benefits of money
sent from abroad via the black market, the Central
Bank, desperately in need
of foreign currency to plug holes in a ruined
economy, is not.
Zimbabwe is in dire need of any source of foreign
exchange since the
withdrawal of financial support by the International
Monetary Fund, IMF, and
the World Bank a few years ago because of the
political crisis and economic
mismanagement that have engulfed the country
following a series of rigged
elections since 2000.
Desperate to tap
funds held by some four or five million of its citizens in
the diaspora, the
Central Bank two years ago launched the Homelink money
transfer system,
offering favourable interest rates to exiles to remit money
home through
official channels.
But interest in the scheme has been lukewarm because
the "preferential" rate
remains far below what can be obtained on the black
market, which has almost
become the official dealing medium. When Gideon
Gono, the Reserve Bank
governor, visited South Africa to explain to
Zimbabwean exiles the Homelink
system he was shouted down at meeting after
meeting. One exile, Joshua
Rusere, said, "To add salt to injury, Mugabe
sends his messenger to ask me
to send my money to bankroll his regime when
its policies drove me into
exile."
Zimbabwe has been in political
turmoil since February 2000 when the people
voted in a referendum against a
government-sponsored constitution that would
have widened and entrenched the
powers of President Robert Mugabe. The head
of state reacted by sanctioning
violent invasions by his supporters of
commercial farms, mostly white-owned.
Mugabe's decree, dressed up as land
reform, triggered a collapse of the
economy as agriculture, the main source
of foreign exchange earnings, went
into a precipitous decline. There has
been a mass exodus of white
Zimbabweans, who once numbered nearly 300,000.
According to the last census
in 2002, there were just 46,743 remaining
whites: 10,000 of these were aged
65 or more, and fewer than 9000 were under
15.
Mass deaths from AIDS
and the exodus of both blacks and whites prompted
Didymus Mutasa, a senior
minister and head of the government's much-feared
Central Intelligence
Organisation, to say, "We would be better off with only
six million people,
with our own [ruling party] people who supported the
liberation struggle. We
don't want all these extra people."
Josphat Gumbo is the pseudonym of an
IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.
VOA
By Patience Rusere
Washington
15 August
2006
Civic activists from the Southern African region were
preparing to protest
in Maseru, Lesotho, over Zimbabwe's record on human
rights, among other
issues, as the heads of state of the Southern African
Development Community
gathered for a summit.
More than a dozen
nongovernmental organizations were represented in Maseru.
Spokespersons
for the dozen or so NGO groups in Maseru said they would
present a
communique to the summit, which they hoped would be taken up on
Thursday.
Zimbabwean civic groups were set to meet with former
president Benjamin
Mkapa of Tanzania, named by President Robert Mugabe to
mediate between
Zimbabwe and Britain, to focus instead on mediating an
internal resolution
of the national crisis.
SADC heads of state were
expected to give their endorsement to Mkapa's
nomination as Zimbabwean
mediator - though it is unclear what direction his
mission will take now
that British offiicals have made clear they are not
interested in the
proposed talks reviewing historical disagreements over
Zimbabwe's land
reform program.
For the NGO perspective, reporter Patience Rusere of
VOA's Studio 7 for
Zimbabwe spoke with Crisis Coalition in Zimbabwe
Coordinator Jacob Mafume,
in Maseru.
The Herald
Herald
Reporter
SOME hospital mortuary stewards, working in cahoots with private
funeral
parlours, could have swindled the City of Harare of millions of
(revalued)
dollars through under-declaring the number of bodies and time
spent in the
council's mortuaries.
The city's internal audit
department has launched investigations into the
operations of private
funeral parlours following reports that Vineyard
Funeral Services kept
bodies in a backyard room at a city building or in
cars
overnight.
Workers at one funeral parlour last week said one council
mortuary steward
was getting kickbacks from their employer each month for
tampering with
documents and under-declaring the number of
bodies.
The suspicious underhand dealings involving bodies brought to the
city's
mortuaries by private undertakers could see some private parlours
denied
operating licences.
In an interview last week, the city health
acting director, Dr Prosper
Chonzi, said investigations into operations of
council mortuaries and
private funeral undertakers had been
opened.
"It is true that our internal audit division is investigating the
operations
of our mortuaries for possible connivance between our employees
and the
private funeral undertakers," Dr Chonzi said.
He said one of
the council's mortuary stewards was last week picked up by
the
police.
"We are still waiting for a full report on the reasons behind the
three days
he has been away from work assisting the police with their
investigations,"
Dr Chonzi said.
He said investigations into the
licensing of private parlours and the
possibility of underhand deals in the
admittance and release of bodies is
also ongoing.
Investigations
carried out last week showed that there was a possibility
that normal
procedures might not have been followed when parlours brought in
bodies
owing to poor security mechanisms at both Beatrice Road Infectious
Diseases
Hospitals and Wilkins Hospital mortuaries.
At Wilkins there are no
municipal security officers stationed at the
mortuary section, a few metres
away from the main hospital.
Lack of surveillance has made Wilkins
Hospital mortuary a target of some
parlours wishing to cut costs and
hoodwink the council.
Dr Chonzi confirmed the non-existence of tight
security, particularly at
Wilkins, and said this was a cause for
concern.
Council was working towards tightening the security.
Dr
Chonzi said he was still waiting for a preliminary report on Vineyard
Funeral Services from city health officials who inspected the
premises.
"We are also interested in knowing if the parlour was involved
in any
illegal activities."
Vineyard has denied the allegations that
it kept bodies in a room not
designated for that purpose and in vehicles
overnight, but investigations
show that Vineyard would collect some bodies
at night and book them at
Wilkins the following morning.
For example,
the funeral parlour collected the body of a pregnant woman at
8pm on June 1
in Borrowdale and only booked it into Wilkins Hospital
mortuary the
following morning at 8am.
The mother of Oppa Nkomo, who died last
November, said the body of her
daughter was collected by Vineyard at 8pm but
records at Wilkins showed that
the body was admitted the next
morning.
The body of Mbakurerwa Rodger was collected at 1am on July 18
this year and
was only registered to have been admitted at Wilkins at
8:20am.
Rose Dube, whose body was collected at around 2am on April 18
this year, was
taken to Wilkins at 9.20am.
Wilkins Hospital mortuary
has a holding capacity of 24 bodies and does not
operate beyond 5pm while
Beatrice Road Infectious Diseases Hospital, which
operates for 24 hours, has
a holding capacity of 18 bodies and gives first
priority to patients who die
from their hospital.
The Herald
Business
Reporter
WITH six days to go before the old bearer cheques cease to be
legal tender,
some businesses are refusing to accept them, claiming they no
longer comply
with their newly configured systems.
The businesses
further claim that they want a smooth transition from the old
currency in
line with Reserve Bank Zimbabwe (RBZ) Governor Dr Gideon Gono's
2006
Mid-Term Monetary Policy Review Statement.
In interviews with Herald
Business, some supermarket, bottle store and
service stations managers
complained that they had been encountering
problems with the old currency
over the past two weeks and had resolved to
accept the new currency
only.
Motorists queueing for fuel at Bobby Service Station in Chitungwiza
were
left stranded after being turned away simply because they did not have
the
new currency.
"Our systems have been upgraded to suit the new
currency and we are no
longer accepting the old bearer cheques. We are no
longer accepting the two
currencies," said an attendant at the service
station.
"We were given this directive last Friday and we notified all
our customers
in time to avoid inconveniencing them," he added.
One
of those turned away was Mr Bezel Nyamakari, a transport operator, who
said
the unilateral decision was negatively affecting his business.
"This is
illegal and the relevant authorities should chip in to help us. We
have been
here since morning and only those in possession of new cheques are
being
served.
"Dr Gono made it clear that the old bearer cheques cease to be
legal tender
on the 21st of this month, yet some operators are already
refusing the old
bearer cheques.
Some supermarket and bottle store
operators interviewed said they are
refusing to accept the old cheques after
encountering problems when
depositing the old cheques.
"We have had a
lot of problems in depositing old bearer cheques and to avoid
such problems,
we have decided not to accept the old cheques.
"I don't think it's
illegal, the customers have to change their old bearer
cheques at the bank
and bring the new currency to make life easier for us,"
said a bar attendant
at Zvido Nightclub in Unit O, Chitungwiza.
However, while some businesses
are refusing to have anything to do with the
old currency, others have put a
ceiling of $20 million on payments in the
old bearer cheques. Customers must
fork out the balance in the new currency
for any purchases above
that.
This comes at a time when most banks are still giving out the old
bearer
cheques, making the new bearer cheques a scarce commodity.
Xinhua
www.chinaview.cn
2006-08-16 07:46:52
HARARE, Aug. 15 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwean
President Robert Mugabe
said Tuesday the government remains committed to
supplying the defense
forces with modern military equipment in order to
sustain their military
capability for defense purposes.
By
blending the new techniques with their own, they can develop a
robust hybrid
defense system that will enable them to achieve higher levels
of military
excellence, Mugabe said when officiating at the Zimbabwe Defense
Forces Day
at Rufaro stadium.
Mugabe said the experience of the defense
forces and understanding
of varied military systems also enhances their
performance in international
peace-keeping missions where they work with
soldiers of different
orientation and doctrine from other
countries.
He said in an effort to limit reliance on the
foreign market where
some western suppliers have adopted the British led
illegal sanctions
against the country, the Defense Forces embarked on a
program to substitute
some of the foreign sourced spare parts with locally
manufactured ones.
He said that the government will continue to
review the conditions
of services of the defense forces by constantly
reviewing their salaries and
allowances to cushion them against the ever
rising cost of living, hence
their last review in May. Enditem
New Zimbabwe
By Daniel Fortune Molokele
Last updated:
08/16/2006 08:53:32
THIS past weekend I was privileged to be a part of
a lively Heroes Day
social braai held for Zimbabweans at Braamfontein in
Johannesburg.
The public event was organized under the auspices of
the Zimbabwe
Diaspora CSOs Forum. The Forum is a loose network of at least
25 different
Zimbabwean formations that are operative in South
Africa.
The event was also part of the Forum's monthly public
meetings that
the Forum will be hosting in the run-up towards the proposed
Zimbabwe
Diaspora Global Conference. The historic gathering is due to be
held
sometime in mid-2007.
At the braai event I managed to meet
and relate with some of the key
figures in the pro-democracy community of
activists here in South Africa.
Indeed there was a good turnout of some of
the most recognizable faces among
the locally based Zimbabwean
activists.
The afternoon started with a video screening of the
latest documentary
to be produced by the Reverend Doctor Martine Stemerick.
She is from the
United Kingdom and works as an ordained priest of the
Methodist Church in
London. However, over the years, she has increasingly
become known as one of
the leading campaigners for a new democratic
Zimbabwe.
The almost half an hour long documentary also features
one of the most
outspoken critics of the Zimbabwean regime, the award
winning head of the
Roman Catholic church in Bulawayo. His Grace, Archbishop
Pius Ncube plays
the integral role of being the main narrator of the
production. It is simply
entitled, Everything Must Change! The title is
derived from the
controversial hard hitting song by one of Africa's global
music icons, Hugh
Masekela of South Africa.
The documentary is
a definite must see for all the friends of a new
Zimbabwe. It was well
received by the Braamfontein audience. As the Forum,
we also pledged to help
publicise it by undertaking to screen it whenever
there is any public
gathering of Zimbabwean activists based here in South
Africa.
After the documentary, the focus was shifted to a series of solidarity
messages from some of the leading activists who attended the event. The
resonating tone in most of the speeches was that while it was good to
celebrate our past heroes such as Joshua Nkomo, Josiah Tongogara, Herbert
Chitepo, among others, the time has come for Zimbabwe to raise a new breed
of heroes and sheroes. These will take Zimbabwe to the next level of
national development and democratization.
Among those who spoke
were Granny Joyce Dube (SAWIMA), Solomon
Chikohwero (ZVTSP), Luke Dzipange
Zunga and Jay-Jay Sibanda (Concerned
Zimbabweans Abroad), Steven Paradza
(ZIPOVA), Philani Khumalo (ZHRLG), among
others.
There were
also some speeches from some Crisis in Zimbabwe (SA) office
representatives
such as Reverend Nicholas Mkaronda (Co-ordinator) and
Sifisosami Dube.
Nkosinathi Tshuma, one of the officers was also in
attendance. The Forum is
determined to forge a mutual working programme
partnership with the Crisis
in Zimbabwe Coalition in the quest for a new
democratic
Zimbabwe.
I was also pleased to see that among other speakers were
former
student leaders like Gabriel 'Marechera' Shumba (Zimbabwe Exiles
Forum),
Nixon 'Mao the Comrade' Nyikadzino) and the dynamic Givemore Chari
(Bindura
University SRC). Also in attendance were such comrades who have
also made
their mark in the Zimbabwean student movement like John Briggs
Bomba (NUST
SRC), Danford Damba (UZSRC) and Sibanengi Dube (Harare
Polytechnic SRC)
After the inspirational round of speeches, focus
then turned to some
dramatic presentations from some of the locally based
Zimbabwean artistes.
These included among others, Kenneth Tafira (poet), the
Spice Girls (dance
trio) and the mother-daughter combination of Nora Tapiwa
and Kundai.
Thereafter the event's participants were treated to
some sumptuous
braai packs consisting of beef, chicken and boerwors
sausages. There was
also a choice between rice and sadza/isitshwala, our
traditional staple
food. There is no doubt that everyone enjoyed their
meal.
On my part, I also enjoyed taking some photos and video
shoots of the
event whilst doubling up as the MC of the event. Anyway, I
hope I did a good
job of it even though I know that I have never been good
at multi-tasking.
At the end of the day, I also had the honour of
giving the vote of
thanks to all those who made the braai event such a huge
success. In my
brief remarks, I took the chance to pledge the Forum's
commitment to work in
partnership with both the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition
(SA) office and the
Zimbabwe Solidarity Forum which is a loose network of
all the South African
organizations that are concerned about the worsening
situation of things
back in Zimbabwe.
In particular, it is our
hope that we will work together with these
formations in order to organize a
very successful global Zimbabwe Diaspora
conference here in Johannesburg in
2007.
Daniel Molokele is a Zimbabwean Human Rights Lawyer who is
based in
Johannesburg. He can be contacted at zimvirtualnation@yahoo.com
Zimbabwejournalists.com
By
Alois Phiri Mbawara
LONDON - I have always admired and
respected our Chimurenga history
starting from the First Chimurenga how our
Ancestors Ambuya Nehanda and
Sekuru Kaguvi played a massive role in
protecting our Sovereignity and their
resistance against minority
rule.
These political figures, Nehanda and Kaguvi, will always be
remembered, respected and will be a silver-spoon which will be passed on
from one generation to the other - they are icons. So as the Second
Chimurenga to a certain extent.
I strongly agree with a recent
letter that said the liberator had
turned monster. We all had respect for
our liberators after independence
till they started to take Zimbabwe as
their personal property.
Mugabe has managed to mislead the region,
the African Union and others
that the economic and political meltdown in
Zimbabwe was due to economic
sanctions imposed by the European Union due to
his controversial land
reforms. Mugabe used the land reform as a political
gimmick not only as a
way of propaganda to gain support from the Zimbabwean
electorate but to
spread controversy among Africans.
It is 100%
true the land question has always been a driving force for
independence for
us as Africans. But the way it was done in Zimbabwe was
with no logic and
unconstitutional. Mugabe failed to address the Land issue
according to the
Lancaster House Agreement. He tolerated corruption,
Kumbirai Kangai being
the first minister to be accused of graft, within the
government leading to
the drastic meltdown of the economy. As a result many
have lost their trust
in Mugabe's government. I strongly believe the
Zimbabwean solution lies in
the southern African region.
It is our civic right and
responsibility to strive hard and expose to
our African counterparts that
the Zimbabwean situation is due to one's
misrule not a racial issue. We need
to expose to our African brothers that
the economic meltdown in our
motherland is due to one who has jeopardised
the agricultural system which
was the backbone of the economy, one who has
with no logic taken farms from
commercial farmers (from a economy which is
based on Agriculture) giving
them to subsistence farmers. Differences
between the two farming systems -
commercial farmer produce for commercial
bases and subsistence farmer does
for his own consumption. We need to expose
to our African brothers how it is
impossible to campaign or win any election
with the present Constitution. We
need constitutional reforms.
Why some African countries are not
criticising Mugabe it's because
Mugabe's propaganda tactics have worked in
selling the Zimbabwean situation
as a bilateral dispute between Harare and
London taking Africans back to the
start of Pan Africanism hence the land
reform in Namibia, South Africa
giving Mugabe the Fidel Castro image. Castro
has a long bilateral dispute
with the West, mainly America, for his
undemocratic style towards his
people.
Even though I don't
fully support America's influence towards Havana,
its pledge of US$80m to
fund anti-Castro organisations in Cuba to spearhead
the end of the Communist
rule is wrong, it is very crucial for Cubans
themselves to be on the centre
stage of pushing for a democratic transition
not a direct involvement of the
Bush Administration this will give Castro
support from his other communist
allies China,Venezuela, Russia, Korea,
Mugabe and libya (but now reforming).
No wonder why he is celebrated as a
hero throughout Latin
America.
In conclusion we Zimbabweans need to work with our African
counterparts for them to acknowledge the Zimbabwean crisis. I think its high
time we respect and follow the fundamental principles and rules of art of
war, our attack formation has to change lets study and learn our opponents
so as to win them, I think I have mentioned it before but now I mean it,
Mugabe has succeeded regionally in using the colonial card to dismiss any EU
interference and the more pressure given to Mugabe the more he gets regional
support, that is why Kofi Annan is failing to openly criticize Mugabe
because of Annan's Ghanian roots, the birth place of
Pan-Africanism.
But it is a shame the original ideology of
Pan-Africanism by Kwame
Krumah was to serve the will the people but now it
has been catastrophed by
self interest it is now used to serve the will of
African leaders. It's high
time we put pressure on our African brothers not
to turn a blind eye on the
escalating situation in Zimbabwe and to criticize
them to save and
sympathize with Zimbabweans not Mugabe. We Zimbabweans we
should be in a
position to dismiss and react to Sam Nujoma's notion. He
recently threw a
baseless defence of Zimbabweans from British invasion and
educate them. What
Zimbabweans need liberation from is the Mugabe regime.
Let's all try and
stop this African Fidel Castro before it spreads in the
region. Zimbabwe
should be an example for Africa of emancipation from
so-called liberators.
It is important for us young Africans to
realise and recognise the
fall of prideness and oneless as Africans and push
for a reform of African
Union for the sack of our future and our unborn
children. And as we always
say our criticism is liberty, why because the
Mugabe regime has never done
anything for us the youth with our whole nation
being denied their civic
rights.
Alois Phiri Mbawara is one of
founding members of Free-Zim Youth, a
youth organisation based in the
UK.