Army enforces new monetary policy

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

HARARE, 7 Aug 2006 (IRIN) - Zimbabwe's new monetary reforms have managed to
court the ire of nearly everyone - the struggling poor, the middle class and
the rich ruling elite, who were caught off guard and are feeling the pinch
most.

Reserve Bank Governor Gideon Gono's announcement last week that citizens had
three weeks to exchange old currency for new denominations had a catch:
individuals were only permitted to exchange Z$100 million (US$1,000 at the
official rate) each working day, which meant the most any individual could
exchange was Z$16 million (US$16,000) before the 21 August deadline.

"Most of the corruption that was taking place, like market manipulation and
forex deals, were done by the ruling class, and the new monetary policy is
going to affect them the most," said independent economist James Jowa. "What
Gono has done is to create animosities. A lot of senior people were caught
with their pants down and they are very upset."

Unlike in the past, when the entire cabinet was privy to monetary policy,
this time only President Robert Mugabe and security ministers were
forewarned of the currency reforms.

In an apparently conciliatory approach to cabinet ministers, Gono recently
told business leaders that "it was not out of disrespect that you were not
informed, but when you are in a war you don't climb on a mountain and inform
the enemy that you are going to war."

Zimbabweans with little or no confidence in the banking system kept money at
home, with some reports claiming that people were keeping as much as Z$15
billion (US$150,000).

The target of the currency reform was informal traders, parallel market
foreign currency dealers, and the corrupt, who kept trillions of dollars
outside the banking system in order to buy scarce foreign exchange.

Police, assisted by youth militia of the ruling ZANU-PF party, set up
roadblocks to confiscate money from people carrying more than Z$100 million
(US$1,000). Over 2,000 people have been arrested and more than Z$20 billion
(US$200,000) confiscated in the nationwide blitz.

Soldiers have also appeared on the streets of Harare, the capital, in the
last three days and there are reports of random beatings by soldiers
accusing people of sabotaging the economy.

In another recent address, Gono, who has been said to have aspirations to
the presidency after Mugabe leaves office, told the audience that senior
government officials were deliberately sabotaging the economy. "As we speak,
there are Zimbabweans in positions of authority who are saying they will
make sure that our policies will never work because their deals will be
frustrated."

Gono's polices and bold statements appear to have the backing of Mugabe, who
said in recent luncheon speech, "Mr Governor, there are some circles that do
not like you, to the extent that they wish you dead. They are saying you are
destroying their business empires. But I am sure that without the work done
by the reserve bank, we would not be where we are now."

Lawyers for Human Rights, a legal aid nongovernmental organisation (NGO),
said their offices had received numerous complaints about the conduct of
officials at roadblocks. "Generally, the complaints that we have received
are about the fact that people are being stripped by the militia, who do not
have arresting powers. They say the type of searches that are being done are
no different from being sexually molested. Their goods and money have been
seized from them," said Jacob Mafume, an organisation official.

"What is actually bizarre is that people are being arrested while on their
way to put the money back into circulation," he said.

After Gono announced that three zeroes would be struck off the country's
temporary currency of bearer cheques, Zimbabwe's new exchange rate is Z$250
to US$1. Before the devaluation last week, the official rate was Z$250,000
to the US dollar, and Z$555,000 on the parallel market.

Zimbabwe, Subtracting Zeros, Adds to Discontent

New York Times

By MICHAEL WINES
Published: August 8, 2006
JOHANNESBURG, Aug. 7 - For years, ordinary Zimbabweans have stoically
accepted the convolutions of government economic policies that, most experts
agree, have led to quadruple-digit inflation and impoverishment.

Zimbabwe's moneyed classes, however, may not be so agreeable.

Only days after the government devalued its currency last week, the suburban
Harare plantation of Gideon Gono, the chief of Zimbabwe's reserve bank,
suddenly went up in flames on Friday. Mr. Gono is the public face of the
drastic new policies imposed last week and a close adviser to President
Robert G. Mugabe, Zimbabwe's leader since the nation became independent in
1980.

The fire, which the police have called suspicious, is seen as one sign of
the bitter opposition to the latest economic moves among the wealthy - who,
uncharacteristically, have much to lose this time.

The most visible change announced last week was a revaluation of Zimbabwe's
currency, which has been rendered almost worthless by years of inflation
that now exceeds 1,200 percent a year. The revaluation knocked three zeroes
off the bank notes, changing the $20,000 Zimbabwe bill into a $20 bill, for
example. The bill's actual value - 10 American cents at official rates, less
than 3 cents at current black-market rates - remains unchanged.

Weary Zimbabweans, who must lug satchels of money to make even ordinary
purchases, might applaud the move, which would lessen their burden. But Mr.
Gono gave holders of the old bank notes only three weeks to exchange them
for new ones. And he placed draconian limits on the amount they could trade:
individuals can exchange less than $150 a day at black-market rates, and
companies are limited to a bit over $7,000.

That struck directly at those who hoard large stacks of bank notes -
principally, the wealthy who have benefited hugely from trading in Zimbabwe's
black market in currency and other goods, and who cannot expose their riches
by placing them in banks. Since the policy change last week, according to
news reports, Zimbabwe has seen an explosion in purchases of automobiles,
appliances and other luxuries as hoarders seek to convert their dollars into
hard goods.

The police have confiscated billions of dollars at roadblocks set up outside
Harare and other big cities, and scores of people have been arrested for
violating currency laws. Border guards were reported to have confiscated
more than $100 billion in old currency being smuggled back into the country.

But the greatest fallout, perhaps, has been political. Stunned members of
Mr. Mugabe's cabinet, many of them wealthy by Zimbabwean standards, were
reported to have sat on their hands when Mr. Gono announced the new currency
policies in a July 31 speech. Zimbabwe's few independent newspapers have
reported bitter infighting in Mr. Mugabe's inner circle between supporters
of Mr. Gono and opponents who suspect that the new policies, dubbed
"Operation Sunrise," are aimed at crippling them financially and
politically.

"It has aroused much bitterness and resistance in the upper classes," said
Eldred Masunugure, the chairman of the political science department at the
University of Zimbabwe in Harare. There is talk, he said, that Mr. Gono "may
be strategically locating himself for succession to President Mugabe," who
is scheduled to retire in 20 months.

Mr. Mugabe has made clear his support for Mr. Gono's policies. His state
security minister, Didymus Mutasa, warned this week that anyone who
attempted to harm Mr. Gono would be "acting against the interests of the
government and its people," and would be brought to justice.

Once one of Africa's richest nations, Zimbabwe was recently nominated by a
panel of United Nations experts for the status of a "least developed
country," a badge of economic failure.

John Robertson, a Harare economist, said the currency change was mostly
cosmetic. "You might say we've moved from millimeters to meters," he said,
referring to the 1,000-to-one revaluation. "But the rest of the world is
still using kilometers. We have a long way to go."

Zimbabwe: Shadows And Lies

AfricaFocus (Washington, DC)

August 6, 2006
Posted to the web August 7, 2006

Washington, DC

"There is no reason why Zimbabweans today should watch our country go down
the drain. Look at the time it took to build it up. That one can just
destroy it overnight is something very painful. It was not about creating
another dictatorship, creating another oppressive system, where you cannot
exercise your rights." - Margaret Dongo

Unlike much Western press coverage on Zimbabwe, a new Public Broadcasting
System feature on "Zimbabwe: Shadows and Lies," features not critiques by
Western leaders contrasted with defiance from Zimbabwean leaders, but rather
voices from inside Zimbabwe and from opposition leaders including former
colleagues and supporters of Zimbabwe's leaders from earlier more optimistic
periods.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from two of the interviews and
from an opinion piece by series editor Stephen Talbot from "Zimbabwe:
Shadows and Lies." The Frontline/World website has the video of the program,
full versions of these interviews, and more features, including links to
other resources (see http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/zimbabwe504).
The interviews are also available on http://www.kubatana.net

Another AfricaFocus Bulletin sent out today contains a visit report from
South Africa's Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition, a recent report on meetings in
Harare of the Combined Harare Residents Association, and a report of a
survey of Zimbabwean asylum seekers in South Africa by the South
African-based Zimbabwe Torture Victims Project.

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Zimbabwe, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/zimbabwe.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end +++++++++++++++++++++++

Shadows and lies: Interview with Margaret Dongo

PBS Frontline/World (US)

June 28, 2006

Margaret Dongo, one of Zimbabwe's most famous freedom fighters, took up arms
at the age of 15 in the chimurenga (or liberation war) against colonial
rule. In 1980, when Zimbabwe gained independence, Dongo joined Mugabe's
ruling Zanu-PF Party, and she held a number of government posts. She
eventually became disillusioned with the ruling party, and in the 1995
elections, Dongo ran for parliament as an Independent, but lost to the
official Zanu representative.

She challenged the results in court and won, becoming the first Independent
member of parliament in Zimbabwe. Dongo served until 2000.Today she is
president of the Zimbabwe Union of Democrats and continues to advocate for
democracy and human rights. ...

(This interview took place in Harare in February 2006. It has been edited
for clarity.)

Alexis Bloom: You've had many different chapters in your life. What was your
involvement in the liberation struggle?

Margaret Dongo: I was one of the former freedom fighters. The liberation
struggle was in 1975. And I was 15 years old. I got training at one of the
military camps.

I was trained as a medical assistant, the equivalent of a nursing assistant.
In every section platoon, there has to be someone with a nursing background
who could render immediate assistance - be it in the battlefield or inside
the camp. You were giving first aid to the victims of the struggle. It was a
very good experience because it strengthened me both mentally and
physically....

Bloom: Why did you join the struggle?

Dongo: The reason that I joined the liberation struggle, my dear, was that I
wanted to remove the discrimination, the imbalances in terms of economy, in
terms of land distribution, in terms of social life.

I remember very well my dad. I grew up in a highly political family. I
remember the early 1970s, when I could hear my dad talking about the
discrimination, how they were not allowed to move in the apartments and so
forth, ...

We were fighting against lack of equal access to education, lack of equal
access to employment, lack of equal access to distribution of wealth. The
same thing as if it's happening under a black government, people have to
fight it. ,,,

Bloom: What about Zimbabwe today?

Dongo: There is no reason why Zimbabweans today should watch our country go
down the drain. Look at the time it took to build it up.

That one can just destroy it overnight is something very painful.

There are people who perished, people who fought a genuine fight, people who
wanted genuine change. It was not about creating another dictatorship,
creating another oppressive system, where you cannot exercise your rights.

Today most people have to leave as a result of instability in the economy -
some to Mozambique, to Tanzania, to Zambia, to Britain, some to America. If
you look at the political environment, people aren't allowed the freedom to
speak their views. As long as fear of the unknown exists, it becomes
difficult. Where is the liberation now? We talked about exile back during
the political movements - the ANC, the Zanu, Zapu times - and yet today,
again, exile is an issue on the table.

Bloom: You were a member of Zanu. What were the early days like?

Dongo: As a former freedom fighter, there was a lot of hope and a lot of
excitement. And people were willing to work toward rebuilding their country.
One thing you need to understand is that in the early 1980s, Zanu achieved
political power without economic backing. If you look at the developments
made by Zanu PF during the first five years, those are the developments that
you can talk about today. The first five years show that they were still
eager to work for the people, they were working toward the promises that
they'd made and they still had in mind how they had suffered in the
liberation struggle. At that time, they were trying to build a political
power base - they wanted the people to know they were the right people -
that they could actually bring about change...

From 1980 to 1985, a number of changes came in - to the agriculture sector,
the health sector, the education sector - in terms of black people,
indigenous people coming into business. When Mugabe came in, he was a
different man. He came in with this reconciliation policy. It was something
that was envied by the whole international movement. This guy was regarded
as one of the best and strongest African leaders....

Bloom: When did things start to fall apart?

Dongo: The time when he [Mugabe] moved to creating a one-party monopoly, a
one-party state, that's when everything started falling apart. When the Zapu
Party - which was the strongest opposition party to Zanu PF - was swallowed
up by Zanu, this was the end of the multiparty democracy because it created
and strengthened a dictatorship.

I'm saying this because I was in that parliament. I endured a lot of
hardship under a one-party monopoly. You stand up and try to reason with
him, and one tells you, "You are a bitch, go and cook in your house." Or
tells you to sit down, that you are a minority...

There are certain individuals in Zanu who can't distinguish between "self"
and the role they are supposed to be playing. ...

Bloom: Can you talk about the reasoning behind the razing of thousands of
home recently around Harare? [Operation Murambatsvina, or "Operation Clear
Out the Filth," was a government clearance program that destroyed thousands
of homes outside the capital.]

Dongo: The majority of the people opposing Mugabe are disadvantaged people -
people who have been created because of the economic fall in this country,
the unemployed. The country can no longer create employment.

All the investors have left, and there are no investors coming in.

Harare has become overpopulated because of migration from rural to urban,
looking for greener pastures. But people are living in the shantytowns that
have been created - the backyards and high fields of Harare. This is where
it was easy for opposition to grow. Mugabe realized that the opposition
controls the cities and thought, "How can I dilute that?" ...

Shadows and lies: Interview with Trevor Ncube

PBS Frontline/World (US)

June 28, 2006

Trevor Ncube is a prominent Zimbabwean newspaper publisher living in
Johannesburg. He bought the Mail & Guardian, a South African newspaper,
in 2002. He also publishes Zimbabwe's last two independent newspapers. All
three publications have heavily criticized President Robert Mugabe's
government. In December 2005, Mugabe drew up a list of government critics
and announced that those who "go around demonizing the country" would have
their passports seized. ...

[This interview took place in February 2006 in Johannesburg.]

Alexis Bloom: How would you characterize the Mugabe government at the
moment?

Trevor Ncube: What's very distinct about the Mugabe regime at the moment is
that you have what appears to all intents and purposes to be a regime whose
back is against the wall. A regime that has become politically bankrupt.
They've painted themselves into a corner and they don't know how to get out
of that corner. They're desperate. And in their desperation, they are trying
to find scapegoats; they're hitting out at anybody, mostly their citizens,
and blaming the Americans and the British for the problems that Zimbabwe
currently experiences. It's a terrible place, Zimbabwe, at the moment. .,,
Tyranny is an everyday thing; people fear for their lives. ... If you recall
that only seven years ago, Zimbabwe was one of the best places in southern
Africa to be in and that all that I've just outlined has taken place inside
six and a half to seven years - it's quite alarming. It's a sad story of
what happens when a regime gets so punch drunk with political power and
there's nothing to restrain them. ...

Bloom: Why do you think Mugabe is so driven to stay in power?

Ncube: ... he's dug himself into this big hole; there's no getting out of
this hole. But I think he's also made up his mind that he's not getting out
of power; he's made up his mind that he's going to drop dead in office. ...
Is he going to be called to account for the things he's done? For the matter
of more than 20,000 people [who died] in Matabeleland in the 1980s? The
abuses that have taken place over the past six years? ...

Also at play is the whole issue of power corrupts, too much power corrupts
absolutely. That's the situation with Robert Mugabe. He has created a
situation where he and his party and those around him are the only people
standing at the present moment. He's bludgeoned everybody into submission.
... He's arrived at a place where he genuinely and seriously thinks that
Zimbabwe can't do without him.

And it's easy to arrive at that place where all that you have around you are
sycophants. He's killed the media; he has created a situation where people
are afraid to express themselves. There's over 4 million Zimbabweans that
have run away - literally in exile - people who cannot stand the political
situation, the economic situation and the social situation that is in
Zimbabwe. And he doesn't care about that; ...

... Scholars say in theory that the power of propaganda is such that you end
up believing your own lies. But I think in Zimbabwe, we are seeing that
actually happening. We are seeing Robert Mugabe telling lies, big lies; and
he and his officials end up believing their propaganda. They actually
believe that the Americans and the British are out to get them. And they
actually believe that people like me are tools and stooges of the Americans
and the British. ...

It's like watching a man go crazy and you really don't know what to do with
him. You read the kind of things that are coming out of Zimbabwe and say,
"Are these people out of their minds? What's the point of destroying your
own country? Because you want to make a point to the Americans and the
British?" ...

Bloom: I've heard people say things like, "Under Smith the laws were bad,
but under Mugabe they're worse."

Ncube: You understand why a lot of people feel Zimbabwe was better under Ian
Smith than it is at the present moment. I think in all honesty, the
situation in Zimbabwe has degenerated to the extent that comparison between
Ian Smith and Robert Mugabe becomes fair game. I'm embarrassed to actually
admit that. But what's the difference between Ian Smith and Robert Mugabe?
I'm saying now that because there are 4 million Zimbabweans who are in
exile. There are in excess of 2.5 million Zimbabweans who are in South
Africa. Were there that many Zimbabweans during the liberation of Zimbabwe
who are outside Zimbabwe during Ian Smith's regime? The extent of poverty
that you experience at the present moment - can it not be compared to the
extent of social destitution that there was during the Ian Smith regime?
Sentiment aside, let's look at what Ian Smith did and let's look at what
Robert Mugabe has done. What makes this whole thing criminal is that this is
another black man doing this on his own black people. To me, that just
worsens the crime. ...

Bloom: Would you say that Mugabe is as much a brilliant strategist as he is
a political thug?

Ncube: Robert Mugabe is a very bright man, very streetwise. He has
outmaneuvered the Brits, the Americans and the South Africans again and
again. They don't know what to do with him. The man understands politics,
knows how to manipulate African leaders, render South Africa totally
ineffective. ...

From Liberator to Tyrant: Recollections of Robert Mugabe

Stephen Talbot, PBS Frontline/World (US)

June 29, 2006

Frontline/World series editor Stephen Talbot interviewed Robert Mugabe twice
in the late 1970s. In this personal essay, he looks back on that pivotal
time, just before independence, when he met "an eloquent, direct and
impressive man" who promised to turn Zimbabwe into a model for African
democracy. ...

When I first met and interviewed Robert Mugabe, he was still the exiled
leader of an African nationalist movement trying to end white-minority rule
in what was then Rhodesia. It was July 1977 at the Kilimanjaro Hotel in Dar
Es Salaam, Tanzania. I was a 28-year-old freelance reporter, he was a
53-year-old "terrorist" or "freedom fighter," depending on your point of
view. He had recently spent 10 years in a Rhodesian prison, now he was
commander of a guerrilla army. In the United States he was virtually
unknown.

My first impressions, jotted in a yellowing notebook: "Mugabe:
straightforward, eloquent, direct, to the point; ironic, barbed sense of
humor. Impressive. Not in the least bit jive or phony, no posturing." "We
are fighting for a democratic state, for self-determination, for an end to
exploitation," Mugabe told me.

"All countries should help us. There is no reason why the American people
should not come to our aid." ... A formal man, dressed casually in an
African print shirt, he conveyed the dignity of a well-educated teacher, his
previous profession. ... After all these years, it's still difficult and
painful to reconcile my memory of this man with the tyrant he became.

Today, Mugabe is one of Africa's longest-reigning dictators, routinely
denounced by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch for abusing his
people. "A disgrace to Africa," says Wole Soyinka, Nigeria's Nobel
Prize-winning author. "A caricature of an African dictator," says Desmond
Tutu, South Africa's Nobel laureate. And Pius Ncube, the Catholic archbishop
of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, says he prays for "a popular uprising" to topple
Mugabe's regime. Of all the depressing statistics about Mugabe's broken
country, the one that gnaws at me the most is that life expectancy has
declined in the last two decades from 62 years to a mere 38 years. It wasn't
supposed to be this way. When he came to power in 1980, in a landslide
election victory after a negotiated settlement of the war, Mugabe was
greeted as a national hero, at least by Zimbabwe's black majority. And at
first, Mugabe delivered on promises of peace, reconciliation with the white
minority, and social development. Yet even as early as the 1980s, there was
an ominous turn of events [when thousands were killed in Matabeleland by
Zimbabwean government troops]. ...

Frontline was one of the few media outlets in the United States to sound the
alarm, in the 1983 documentary Crisis in Zimbabwe, reported by Charlie Cobb,
an African American journalist, who, like me, was dismayed to see Mugabe
acting as brutally and repressively as the white-minority rulers he had
replaced. Should I have seen signs of what was coming? Had Mugabe deceived
me? ...

... the authoritarian impulse was probably there in Mugabe from the
beginning, but I chose to see his pragmatism and his political skill. After
that first meeting with Mugabe in 1977, I interviewed him again in 1979 at
an Organization of African Unity conference in Liberia (just before Liberia
descended into civil war) and filmed him later that summer at his exile
headquarters in Maputo, Mozambique. Looking at that old interview just now,
I am immediately struck by Mugabe's apparent sincerity, his baritone voice,
his reassuring manner. At the time, the fighting across the border in
Rhodesia was fierce. Ian Smith's white-minority regime was aided by a crude
assortment of white mercenaries from around the world, and there was always
the threat that South Africa's apartheid leaders might intervene to save
their ally to the north.

But Mugabe seemed cool and calm, even in the midst of his rundown guerrilla
compound.

The offices of Mugabe's Zanu Party were located in a funky high-rise
building. Mozambique had only recently emerged from its own war of
independence against Portuguese colonial rule and was a poor, struggling -
if momentarily euphoric - country. The offices were spartan, the elevator
not functioning. We lugged our camera equipment up many flights of stairs to
the roof of the building, where we interviewed Mugabe against the city
skyline. He joked that having to climb the stairs kept his staff in shape.
"In the West, many consider you a terrorist," I began. "We are fighting an
unjust system," he replied. "We are not fighting the whites as whites. ...

We are not terrorists. ... We are fighters for democracy." Political
rhetoric, of course. Even in my 20s and sympathetic to his cause, I could
recognize that. But it also meshed with my own experience. Back home, I had
become friends with a number of Zimbabwean students studying in the States
who were members of Mugabe's Zanu. The thing I remember about them most was
how nonracist they were. For people engaged in a struggle with Ian Smith's
notoriously racist government, they were themselves almost incomprehensibly
free of animosity toward whites. Of course, the guerrilla war in Rhodesia
was brutal, with atrocities on both sides. But the Zanu people I knew in the
United States and those I was meeting in Mozambique defied the Mau Mau image
prevalent in much of the West. ...

Mugabe's 26 years in power have turned out to be a textbook example of Lord
Acton's famous dictum, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts
absolutely." ... When Mugabe felt firmly in control, he was relatively
benign, running Zimbabwe like a ward boss in old Chicago, handing out
patronage to his friends. But whenever Mugabe felt that his power was
threatened -- by Nkomo, by white farmers, by the Movement for Democratic
Change -- he lashed out. Usually his brutal crackdowns were timed to
upcoming elections he thought he might lose. Mugabe's confiscation of
white-owned farms in the last six years has been highly political. Zimbabwe
inherited an inequitable agricultural system from colonial Rhodesia. A
quarter of a million whites owned most of the fertile, productive farm land
in a nation of what was then 7 million blacks. The farms were efficient and
bountiful, producing tobacco as a cash crop and more than enough corn to
feed the country and to export. African demand for land reform was strong,
but Mugabe did not want to jeopardize the economy, and despite some militant
talk, he did almost nothing to redistribute land until he was challenged in
the polls. ...

Mugabe, now 82, has virtually achieved his one-party state. Zanu controls
most of the seats in parliament. When Mugabe needs to, as in 2002, he rigs
elections. His party, which only needs a 75 percent majority (which it has)
to change the constitution, does so on a whim. He has silenced what used to
be a robust and free press, jailing and torturing reporters. And he has
become increasingly mercurial and brutal. Last year he launched his own
version of slum clearance, called Operation Murambatsvina ("Clean the
Filth"), evicting some 700,000 people from their homes in Harare and other
cities -- mostly desperately poor people who, he feared, might support the
opposition or stage food riots. When condemned by the international
community, Mugabe hisses back, claiming he is the target of a Western
conspiracy. Paranoia has replaced the openness with which, 30 years ago, he
solicited international support for his rebel cause.

All of this has caused me, and others, to wonder what exactly transformed
Mugabe from a promising national hero to a tyrant. Is it simply that he has
remained in power far too long? Or was there some other trigger? ..

I have pondered the enigma of Robert Mugabe countless times - and questioned
my own na<vet, in taking him at face value. It's unnerving when you misjudge
someone so profoundly. ... I can still remember my excitement at meeting
Mugabe and filing my first radio story about him. This was history - a man
leading one of the last anticolonial struggles in Africa. He seemed to
measure up - a tough, university-educated African leader with British
flourishes.

When I asked him how he would describe U.S. policy toward Zimbabwe, he
deadpanned, "A mixed grill." What happened to the Mugabe I knew in the late
1970s still bewilders and disturbs me. Even if he lacked Mandela's
transcendent humanity and compassion, Mugabe could have been an esteemed
statesman and a popular president. Instead he has run his country into the
ground, one more tyrant on a long-suffering continent, his people waiting
for him to die.

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication providing
reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a particular focus
on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus Bulletin is edited by
William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please write to
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Zimbabwe to buy 250 conventional buses from China

People's Daily

      The Zimbabwe United Passenger Company (Zupco) will in the next few
months acquire 250 conventional buses from China at an estimated cost of 11
million U. S. dollars, local newspaper The Herald has said.

      The minister of local government, public works and urban development
Ignatius Chombo was quoted by the newspaper as saying that the procurement
of the buses was part of a deal signed by Vice President Joice Mujuru when
she visited the Asian country in June.

      The minister said the buses were part of the government efforts to
increase the Zupco fleet and provide affordable transport to people who are
at the mercy of unscrupulous bus operators who are increasing fares
unilaterally.

      "My ministry is negotiating with the ministry of finance for the
release of money to buy more buses from China," Chombo said.

      He said there was need for Zupco to increase its fleet in urban areas
as more people were now preferring the transport utility's service because
it was cheaper.

      Source: Xinhua

Zimbabwe: A prelude to genocide the world continues to ignore

Zimbabwe: when politicians employ judges

New Zimbabwe

By Lloyd Msipa
Last updated: 08/08/2006 10:27:42
THE hype in Zimbabwe today is that a high profile so and so has been
arrested for corruption, a high profile so and so has been bailed to appear
on such and such a day.

After that and a few court appearances down the road we hear the matter has
been withdrawn before plea and the state will proceed by way of summons
should new evidence come to light.

However, when a nobody is arrested within a short space of time we are told
he has been convicted and he is ready to do time, that is, if he does not
take off before he is sent of to the gallows.

This is the symptom in our nation today. Power politics is at play in all
facets of our lives including the judiciary. Politicians have destroyed the
dichotomy between law and politics. Judges, Magistrates and Prosecutors are
reminded constantly to tread carefully as the law, as they know it,
manifesting itself in statutes or statutory instruments, is a product of a
political process called legislation.

In other words, they are reminded that it is the politicians that actually
engage in the law making process to which they have the privilege of
adjudicating over. The decisions they arrive at in the legal process of
litigation takes place in the courts staffed by Magistrates, Judges who are
ultimately appointed by politicians. Their removal from office is decided by
the same politicians. The judges are reminded of this in a virtually
uncomplicated process, never mind the security of tenure rules. The whole
process is entirely executive driven. This is what happens when the
judiciary becomes politicised. Never mind the principle of separation of
powers.

Recent events in the judicial system in Zimbabwe have made a complete
mockery of our legal system. These events have shown that that Prosecutors
and Magistrates do not act in a political or social vacuum. The more
prominent and powerful the figures being investigated the stronger the
constraints. Prosecutors and Magistrates dealing with high profile cases
have had to be prepared to undergo sometimes very intense institutional
psychological pressures.

The fundamental principle of equality before the law is of no use in helping
the Magistrates, Prosecutors and the Police when the suspects are wealthy
businessmen or prominent politicians. The conviction rate against high
profile government politicians and corporate executives has been very low in
our courts. This is the case despite the excellent anti-corruption
legislation in place. In addition, when investigating high profile cases,
the police often have had to contend with interference from other government
departments and high-powered individuals, not to mention their superiors
whom they are obliged to obey as they are close to the political power
structures and therefore influence the outcome of any prosecution.

We need to instil confidence in our legal system in order to attain a higher
level of success in the prosecution of high profile corrupt officials and
individuals in position of authority. Barring convicted corrupt officials
from entering political positions may be a start. The system in place today
whereby a politician has to wait a few months or years and then re-enter
politics makes a complete mockery of our legal system. There are numerous
examples in this category. The independence of the law enforcement agencies
may also be an important premise to start.

Another possibility is to focus on the financial angles in corruption cases,
especially being able to confiscate ill-gotten money, property and other
assets. The fact that a corrupt official is more afraid of losing his
ill-gotten wealth than go to prison can be used to the advantage of the
prosecution.

It is also vital to introduce legislation along the lines of the aborted
leadership code, only stricter. Legislation that will allow authorities to
legally seize ill-gotten assets without being obliged to prove if these
where gained through crime, if the defendant is unable to explain the origin
of the assets.

To win this battle it is imperative for Prosecutors and Magistrates to work
in teams and share vital information that is not widely known. This is vital
in light of the personal risk they face in high profile cases. Judges,
Magistrates and Prosecutors must be exemplary in their professional conduct.
Things like asking for favours and committing minor legal infringements
cause public exposure. The lack of success in prosecuting and securing
convictions in high profile cases is to a large extent due to the influence
on these individuals and the institutions they represent by politicians in
what has come to be known as the politicisation of the judiciary.

Lloyd Msipa is a Lawyer and writes from London in the United Kingdom. He can
be contacted at lloyd.msipa@ntlworld.com

MISA Remains Unshaken in its Mission and Vision in Zimbabwe

zimbabwejournalists.com

      By a Correspondent

      HARARE - MISA-Zimbabwe remains unshaken in its struggle to regain the
democratic space that has been eroded by restrictive legislations such as
the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) and the
Public Order and Security Act.

      Addressing delegates during the organisation's Annual General Meeting
held in Harare over the weekend, MISA-Zimbabwe Chairperson Thomas Deve said
the rights of Zimbabwean citizens had been seriously compromised through the
banning or "draconian handling" of strikes, demonstrations, boycotts and
other related civil disobedience actions otherwise deemed normal in other
democracies.

      The closure of the Daily News, Daily News on Sunday, The Tribune and
Weekly Times by the statutory Media and Information Commission had dealt a
severe blow on the citizens rights to alternative views and media freedom in
the wake of the constant curtailments posed by laws such as AIPPA, the
Public Order and Security Act, Broadcasting Services Act and the Official
Secrets Act, said Deve.

      "We reiterate that AIPPA is a bad law. It remains one of the major
hindrances to the development of the media in Zimbabwe. While acknowledging
the need for an access to information law for the benefit of citizens,
MISA-Zimbabwe notes that in its current form, AIPPA is contrary to its name
and preamble. The shutting down of four newspapers and the arrests of
journalists is enough evidence that the law has nothing positive to offer.

       "MISA-Zimbabwe believes that the controversies over AIPPA are enough
evidence that this law is bad. Its form and spirit are not shared by many
people in Zimbabwe hence incessant calls to overhaul it alongside many other
laws including the Official Secrets Act, sections of the Public Order and
Security Act. The combined effect of theses laws is to stifle media
development, the exercise of media freedom and other such rights," he said.

      Deve said an access to information law should unambiguously provide
for efficient and transparent procedures on how citizens can access public
information and that which is held by private bodies in order to protect and
advance other related rights. An access to information law is premised on
the principle of government subjecting its activities to scrutiny by
citizens and that its operations are on the basis of mutual trust and shared
responsibility with all sectors in society.

       AIPPA, however, has the adverse role of perpetuating a culture of
secrecy and unaccountability on the part of the government and private
bodies through its numerous exemptions on information that cannot be
accessed or disclosed.

       "Further restrictions placed on media organisations and media workers
as a result of registration and licensing conditionalities serve no positive
purposes in the work or operations of media organisations, a critical sector
that keeps citizens informed on developments in a given country and the
world at large," Deve said.

       It is against that background that MISA-Zimbabwe in line with the
regional and international instruments such as the Banjul Declaration on the
Principles of Freedom of _Expression in Africa, had come up with an
alternative draft model of an ideal Access to Information Law. The
Declaration clearly states that everyone has the right to access information
held by public bodies in terms of clearly defined rules established by law.

      "For this reason MISA-Zimbabwe supports calls for a new constitution
for Zimbabwe. MISA-Zimbabwe acknowledges that an access to information law
should be supported by the relevant constitutional changes, especially an
express constitutional guarantee for the right to freedom of _expression and
also the right to media freedom. The current constitution, while
acknowledging freedom of _expression rights, however, fails to guarantee
express media freedom rights."

      In addition to the production of the alternative access to information
law, MISA-Zimbabwe is also working with the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists,
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe National Editors Forum and
Zimbabwe Association of Editors towards the establishment of an independent
media council.

      MISA-Zimbabwe's National Director Rashweat Mukundu briefed the meeting
on the organisation's mission and vision, activities undertaken during the
year under review, progress towards the establishment of the Independent
Media Council and the Community Radio Initiatives under MISA-Zimbabwe's Free
the Airwaves Campaign.

State Gazettes Finance Bill 2006

The Herald (Harare)

August 7, 2006
Posted to the web August 7, 2006

Harare

GOVERNMENT has gazetted the Finance Bill 2006 which seeks to amend different
sections of the Finance, Income Tax, Value Added Tax, Capital Gains Tax,
Customs and Excise, General Law Amendment and the Africa Export-Import Bank
Acts.

On income tax, the Bill seeks to increase from $84 million to $240 million a
year, the minimum level of income that will attract tax.

The new bands would apply for the period from September 1, 2006 to December
31, 2006.

The proposed law also seeks to increase the rate of tax payable on cash
withdrawals effected through an Automated Teller Machine (ATM) from $500 to
$10 000 per withdrawal.

The Bill also seeks to increase the National Oil Company of Zimbabwe
(Noczim) debt redemption levy from $110 per litre to $25 000 per litre of
petroleum products purchased by oil companies from Noczim or imported by an
oil company.

The Noczim debt redemption levy was introduced by the Finance Act in 2003 to
assist the State oil procurer in amortising its accumulated debt.

Meanwhile, the Appropriation (Suppleme-ntary), 2006 Bill that seeks to apply
a further sum of money for the service of Zimbabwe during the year ending on
December 31, 2006 was also published in the Government Gazette.

The Consolidated Revenue Fund was charged with $211,8 trillion as may be
required for the service of Zimbabwe during the year ending December 31,
2006.

Of the expenditure to be defrayed from the Consolidated Revenue Fund, the
Ministry of Finance has the highest share of $73 trillion, followed by
Education, Sport and Culture with $30,9 trillion and Ministry of Home
Affairs with $21 trillion.

Will Mugabe Reward "Venomous" Mouthpiece?

Institute for War and Peace Reporting

Zimbabweans fear president's vicious spin-doctor, George Charamba, will
become new information minister?

By Hativagone Mushonga in Harare (AR No. 73, 07-Aug-06)

With the recent death of Tichaona Jokonya, who had been minister of
information in Robert Mugabe's government for a short period since last
year, Zimbabweans have been speculating intensely about who will take over
one of the most powerful ministries in the land.

Many fear the successor might be George Charamba, the ministry's venomous
permanent secretary.

Those who have had close dealings with him talk of an easy-going and
humorous man, but Charamba's acerbic tongue and policies speak only of a man
of spiteful character.

Charamba had remained quietly in the background until 2000 when he acquired
a new and very aggressive boss, Jonathan Moyo, appointed information
minister as Mugabe sought to revive his fortunes after seeing his popularity
plunge in the midst of a debilitating national economic meltdown.

The 43-year-old Charamba, who used to get on well with journalists, has
lately become a grumpy spin-doctor battling hard to please his political
masters in the face of growing resentment by Zimbabwe's citizenry against
the ruling party's corruption and increasingly destructive and disastrous
policies.

"He seems not to be his own man," said Farai Mutsaka, former chief reporter
of the Daily News, Zimbabwe's only independent daily until it was closed
down in 2003 by Moyo, who sent in armed police to expel staff from their
offices and seize computers and other equipment. Two years earlier,
operatives from Mugabe's much-feared Central Intelligence Organisation
planted a bomb that destroyed the paper's printing presses.

"Charamba was friendly and a nice guy before Moyo came, but he's now vicious
to the private media and has not even made life easier for the journalists
in government media," said Mutsaka.

International figures, too, are frequently subject to his verbal lashings.

Charamba accused a western diplomat of wandering in parts of Harare's
Botanical Gardens where "so many of our youthful citizens have been
deflowered, lured by the greenback from generous and flaunting foreigners
not given to enjoying sex the conventional way".

When he further told United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan recently
that he was no longer welcome to the country to pursue a "stale" mediation
mission, it became abundantly clear that Charamba was intent on proving
himself Mugabe's most robust and loyal propagandist.

In June, Charamba contradicted his superiors - Jokonya, Moyo's successor,
who died on June 24, and his deputy Bright Matonga - when he announced the
government's withdrawal of its invitation to Annan to visit Zimbabwe. Mugabe
had invited the secretary-general to personally assess the impact of the
government's widely condemned Operation Murambatsvina (Operation Drive Out
the Filth) - the mass demolition of the homes of opposition supporters in
urban areas that the UN said had left more than 700,000 people homeless.

The increasingly paranoid ZANU PF government decided that Annan's visit
might be used to pile pressure on Mugabe to quit.

"As an information permanent secretary, Charamba has managed to confuse
journalists and ministers alike by pretending to espouse the views of Mugabe
when in effect he is given to talking in his personal capacity," an
executive member of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists, who asked not to be
named from fear of victimisation, told IWPR

Charamba was a close collaborator with Moyo, whose full-blooded propaganda
war against the private media was credited with saving Mugabe and his ruling
ZANU PF party from the jaws of electoral defeat in 2002 and 2005 at the
hands of the opposition.

Charamba and Moyo together are notorious for having crafted the Orwellian
2002 Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act, AIPPA, which
dictates that journalists who work without the approval of a
Mugabe-appointed media regulator - a notorious Mugabe ally named Tafataona
Mahoso - can be imprisoned for two years. Opponents of the government allege
that AIPPA and the equally draconian 2001 Broadcasting Services Act and the
2003 Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (Commercialisation) Act were
specifically designed to silence private media critical of the increasingly
autocratic Mugabe.

When Moyo brought the AIPPA to parliament, the chairman of the parliamentary
legal committee, the late Dr Eddison Zvobgo, a senior ZANU PF deputy and
long-serving government minister, said, "I can say without equivocation that
this bill, in its original form, was the most calculated and determined
assault on our liberties guaranteed by the constitution in the 20 years I
served as cabinet minister."

Charamba has boasted that he is proud to be associated with AIPPA, although
the law has seen four newspapers - the Daily News, the Daily News on Sunday,
The Tribune and the Weekly Times - being banned since 2003 under the act's
provisions. In addition, AIPPA has been used to harass and arrest hundreds
of journalists who have been branded "ignorant" and "unpatriotic" by
Charamba.

"Charamba, like Moyo and Tafataona Mahoso, believes the current crop of
journalists cannot [produce stories] in sync with the thinking he
misconstrues as national interest," a veteran journalist based in Harare
told IWPR.

Another local journalist added, "He is not different from Moyo and Mahoso,
since all three of them display evil characteristics, worrying [little]
about the impact of their actions on Zimbabweans."

Charamba's ministry, especially during Moyo's five-year ministerial reign,
wasted no time in setting the police on journalists and filing huge lawsuits
over seemingly harmless stories. But for now he seems to have decided to
confine his war against the media, government critics and opposition
politicians, as well as the West, to press statements and articles in the
state media as he builds his own political profile in search of ministerial
office.

Moyo, now an independent legislator since Mugabe fired him, said in a recent
newspaper column that Charamba "regularly violates his civil service oath
[of independence] and obligations" by writing the virulent Nathaniel Manheru
column in the government-owned Herald newspaper.

Moyo warned that if Charamba repeated attacks on him in the Nathaniel
Manheru column he would reveal many things, "including how Charamba
attempted to murder his wife in cold blood and how that attempted murder has
been covered up . This is not a threat but a promise".

In recent columns, Charamba/Manheru has labelled Mavis Makuni, an
intelligent and trenchant critic of the Mugabe government with the weekly
Financial Gazette, a "menopausal columnist".

And in an extraordinary attack on the country's non-government
organisations, on whom the populace is increasingly dependent for survival,
Charamba/Manheru said they are "depressed bipeds who crave, feed and fatten
on human tragedies, much the same way maggots grow white-fat on decaying
carcasses . Their mission for governance pits them against the governors of
this land on behalf of bitter Blair [British prime minister Tony Blair,
President Mugabe's top foreign hate figure]".

Charamba's political ambitions are among Zimbabwe's worst kept secrets, but
he will find it hard to rise through the ranks of ZANU PF where the old
guard is now wary of "young Turks" after Moyo's meteoric rise nearly
destroyed the veterans' stranglehold on power.

However, Charamba seems not to be as shrewd and calculating a schemer as
Moyo was. He has clashed with senior ZANU PF officials, and this will hamper
his political ambitions. Moyo has also implicated him peripherally in the
so-called "Tsholotsho declaration", a meeting in Moyo's rural Tsholotsho
constituency in western Zimbabwe where the possibility of a coup against
Mugabe is alleged to have been discussed in December 2004. The meeting led
to Moyo's sacking and to that of several other high-ranking ZANU PF
officials.

"Charamba emerges as a government official stung by his failure to land a
substantial ministerial post in the post-Moyo era," said one analyst. "He
tries hard to build a profile of an individual capable of defending Mugabe's
policies to the hilt, expecting due notice from the president for his
efforts."

In the early 1980s, Charamba was a protégé of the late Canaan Banana,
Zimbabwe's former ceremonial president when Mugabe led the country as prime
minister. They met at the University of Zimbabwe where both were taking
karate lessons. After Charamba graduated with a Bachelor of Arts honours
degree in English, Banana recruited him into State House as a press and
information officer. When the titular presidency was abolished and replaced
with the executive presidency, Charamba remained at State House when Mugabe
moved in.

Hativagone Mushonga is the pseudonym of an IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.

Outrage at Zimbabwe Prison Squalor

Institute for War and Peace Reporting

Malnutrition, disease and overcrowding await those doing time in the country's
failing penal system.

By Dzikamai Chidyausike in Harare (AR No. 73, 07-Aug-06)

Inmates of Zimbabwe's prisons are suffering appalling levels of chronic
illness and high mortality rates.

Packed into squalid and overcrowded cells, the majority of those in the
prison system are HIV positive, with many suffering from AIDS-related
illnesses like tuberculosis.

Malnutrition worsens the plight of those who are already sick.

"I saw at least three bodies a day being taken out," said former inmate Roy
Bennett, an opposition parliamentary deputy who was imprisoned in Harare's
notorious Chikurubi prison for eight months after he shoved Justice Minister
Patrick Chinamasa on the floor of parliament. "The poverty in the prisons is
terrible. Sometimes food is only a cup of porridge, with no sugar or salt,
served in the morning.

"The prison guards plunder the oil, sugar, salt and other goods meant for
prisoners because they are too poorly paid to survive."

Bennett - whose farm had been confiscated and his workers killed and raped
before the attack on Chinamasa - said he was given an excrement-soiled
uniform when he arrived at Chikurubi with the crotch of the shorts torn out
so that he had no personal privacy or dignity.

But he said that the situation of others was infinitely worse, saying the
average age of his fellow prisoners was between 20 and 25 and that they were
serving long sentences for comparatively petty offences like stealing a
chicken or groundnuts in a country with acute food shortages. Bennett was
released earlier this year.

"Ninety per cent of the young prisoners never receive visitors," he said.
"Their parents cannot afford the bus fares to visit them."

Torture is also common. Bennett said he saw people crippled by beatings on
the soles of their feet, "If you are too slow in sitting down or squatting -
because you can't talk to the guards standing up, you have to grovel on the
floor to talk to them - you are beaten."

Beatrice Mtetwa, the country's leading human rights lawyer, said that once
someone has been arrested anything could happen. "You can get beaten up. You
can be tortured," she said in an interview with the Public Broadcasting
Service of the United States. "It's just so dehumanising. It's not enough
that you've been put in custody. They really, really want to break your
spirit."

Nixon Gandanzara, 42, developed tuberculosis while in Chikurubi serving six
years for armed robbery. "I began coughing while in prison," Gandanzara told
IWPR. "I slept on cold dusty floors for the six years I was at Chikurubi."

He said he shared a cell measuring three-square metres with 33 others. A
hole in the floor served as the communal toilet. It was flushed only
intermittently because the flush handle was outside the cell. Guards wanting
to impose punishment would refuse to flush it.

A parliamentary committee whose members recently visited the country's 42
prisons say they were designed for 16,000 but currently house more than
25,000. The committee reported cooking pots and other kitchen equipment so
filthy they were "not fit to carry food for human consumption". Toilets and
other sanitation facilities were in urgent need of repair, and they said
prisoners must go for weeks without soap or toilet paper.

"Some inmates have resorted to using pages ripped from Bibles to wipe
themselves clean," the report said.

Gandanzara said prisoners were permitted to wash their fraying uniforms only
twice a month, while they were able to clean their lice-infested blankets
even more rarely.

He has had chest pains and a persistent cough since he was released in June,
and doctors have advised him to take an HIV test since TB is an
opportunistic infection that sometimes takes hold as a result of AIDS.

A report by Zimbabwe's independent Institute of Correctional and Security
Studies estimates that 52 per cent of the country's prisoners are
HIV-positive. However, Blessing Mukumba, a doctor who works with former
prisoners in Harare, said he believed the true HIV infection rate of
released prisoners is nearer 60 per cent. Detainees are denied condoms,
though homosexual activity is widespread in prison.

While no figures are available for AIDS deaths, prison authorities host a
daily five-minute programme on state radio appealing to relatives to collect
the bodies of their loved ones. Gandanzara estimates that a dozen men died
of the disease in his cell during his stay at Chikurubi.

Many who do make it out bring the HIV virus and other serious illnesses with
them back into society - a virtual death sentence because of the country's
catastrophic economic decline and endemic corruption.

Zimbabwe's economic crisis also means that women with small children who are
sent to prison often have no choice other than to bring their children with
them.

The Zimbabwe Association of Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation, an NGO that
deals with the welfare of prisoners, estimates there are more than 300
children in the country's prisons, the majority who are less than
two-years-old.

The prisons department's budget does not cater for the hundreds of children
also doing time, and they have to share their mothers' own paltry rations.
That includes a breakfast of maize porridge, an early afternoon meal of more
maize with a boiled vegetable. Meat and beans are given only on national
holidays.

The babies cuddle together with their mothers beneath one blanket on
concrete floors - even in the depths of southern Africa's short but sharply
cold winter, with night temperatures dipping below zero

Programme officer Charles Mudehwe from the Zimbabwe Association of Crime
Prevention and Rehabilitation told IWPR, "It's shocking that children under
the age of two could be living in prisons with their mothers. The conditions
are dangerous to say the least. The quality of food is not suitable for
children."

"I had no clothes for my baby," Thenjiwe Ncube, the mother of a
three-week-old child in Mlondolozi Prison, near Bulwayao, told workers with
the Prison Fellowship of Zimbabwe, PFZ, the local chapter of an
international Christian alliance for rehabilitating and assisting inmates.
Sympathetic prison officers chipped in and donated what they could because
there are no provisions to provide baby clothes at the prison.

Prison regulations stipulate that children must be released into the custody
of relatives or the Department of Social Welfare once they reach the age of
two. But PFZ administrator Emmanuel Nyakasikana said, "The extended family
concept is dead as people struggle to obtain the basic necessities." He
added that social welfare homes were stretched beyond limits by the influx
of tens of thousands of children orphaned by AIDS.

Justice Minister Chinamasa has dismissed all international and national
concerns about Zimbabwe's prison conditions. "Prison by its nature is not
supposed to be a cosy place," he said. "It should not in any way bear
resemblance to a hotel. These places should at least teach offenders that
committing a crime can burn their fingers."

Dzikamai Chidyausike is the pseudonym of an IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.

Opposition in Disarray

Institute for War and Peace Reporting

Mugabe sits backs as his opponents squabble amongst themselves.

By Tino Zhakata in Harare (AR No. 73, 07-Aug-06)

Many Zimbabweans have been hoping to reverse the steep decline of their
country by supporting the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, MDC,
and a civil society movement, the National Constitutional Assembly, NCA -
but both have let the public down.

This year the MDC declared war on itself instead of the main enemy,
President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU PF party. A serious, and sometimes
violent, split opened up which left two separate factions both claiming to
be the "true" MDC. The opposition infighting left the electorate confused,
while Mugabe and his supporters were delighted with the turn of events.

Hope for sustained opposition switched to the NCA which was launched back in
1997 by a wide alliance of trade unionists, church groups, human rights
activists, lawyers and journalists to gather public support for a new and
more transparently democratic constitution.

However, the faith the public vested in the NCA has been dashed because its
own leadership has begun behaving in the same dictatorial way as the man the
NCA set out to topple - Mugabe.

Mugabe decided that the best way to counter the activities and ambitions of
the NCA was to initiate his own programme for constitutional reform. In
April 1999, the ZANU PF government set up a constitutional commission, which
was given the job of drawing up a new constitution to be put before the
electorate in a national referendum.

The commission was dominated by ZANU PF. Most of its 400 members, or
commissioners, were Mugabe's personal nominees from the ruling party,
including every one of ZANU PF's members of parliament.

Seeing its project hijacked, the NCA urged the public to boycott Mugabe's
commission and the MDC also spurned it, for its proposals left the vast
powers and patronage that Mugabe had acquired as president over two decades
and through seventeen major constitutional amendments untouched while giving
him the additional right to hold office for another decade.

The commissioners approved the draft commission and Mugabe added yet another
clause allowing him to expropriate land without consultation or
compensation, believing it would be popular and help to secure the rural
vote in coming elections.

Mugabe miscalculated. The referendum campaign on the draft constitution in
January-February 2000 came at a time of mass unemployment, increasing
poverty, fuel shortages, factory closures, power cuts, crumbling public
services and an unpopular war in the Congo. Public attention focused more on
the government's record and the result was a stunning referendum defeat for
Mugabe and a short-lived triumph for the NCA and MDC.

Mugabe responded furiously with a series of decrees that led to ZANU PF
gangs armed with axes and pangas invading white farms across the country, in
defiance of the law and numerous court rulings, to expel, and sometimes
kill, farm-owners. The invasions destroyed agriculture, the source of
Zimbabwe's main foreign exchange earnings, and triggered a meltdown of the
entire economy.

Never were a resolute NCA and MDC more badly needed.

But, first, the MDC split and became politically impotent. And now, to
widespread shock through wider civil society, NCA chairman Dr Lovemore
Madhuku has emulated Mugabe and manipulated amendments to the pressure
group's constitution to give himself an extended tenure in office beyond the
two mandated five-year terms he has already served.

"This is a tragedy for Zimbabwean democracy," Douglas Mwonzora, a senior NCA
official who opposed Lovemore's constitutional amendments, told IWPR. "It
appears as though Madhuku has been secretly admiring the very man we have
been fighting."

NCA sources said Madhuku began campaigning quietly for key amendments that
entrenched his power long before the recent crucial annual general meeting
where the movement's constitution was changed. Officials at the NCA's head
office handpicked delegates, leaving out anyone suspected of being opposed
to the changes. With control of the organisation's finances, those who
opposed Madhuku said he was able to mobilise support much as Mugabe does at
national level.

Opponents of the changes realised too late the degree of preparation and
manipulation by Madhuku and his supporters. When they raised objections from
the floor at the annual general meeting they were threatened and manhandled
by the chairman's followers. Brilliant Mhlanga, a journalist on the weekly
Zimbabwe Independent, wrote, "Everyone has chosen to be quiet on the
violence at the NCA's annual general meeting. No one from civil society had
the temerity to stand up and remind Madhuku that violence is violence .

"Civil society is showing double standards [while] Madhuku is twisting the
NCA constitution inside out. They seem to be confirming the view that elites
give way to elites. What a shame for democracy."

Journalist Pedzisai Ruhanya commented, "The bitter paradox of Lovemore
Madhuku's political expediency is that he has done what he wants Mugabe and
the president's government to stop doing."

Madhuku justified his Mugabe-style coup by saying "the people" want him to
continue in power at the NCA until a new national constitution has been
achieved. Only then will he step down - an echo of Mugabe's declaration that
he will leave office only when "the people" say so.

"What is going on in the NCA is not what we wanted when we formed it," said
senior MDC parliamentary deputy Welshman Ncube. "As one of the founding
members of the NCA, I am totally dismayed that the leadership is refusing to
hand over power to a third generation under the excuse of having been asked
by 'the people' not to step down."

Since its formation nearly a decade ago, the NCA has been the leading light
in Zimbabwe's struggle for democracy. Countless times its activists have
defied draconian legislation that outlaws demonstrations and public
gatherings of more than two people.

But the recent palace coup has, for the time being, left civil society with
no moral high ground from which to challenge Mugabe's autocratic rule.

Speaking for many, Joseph Jemwa, a vegetable vendor in the poor Harare
township of Mbare, told IWPR, "What we need now is divine intervention
because we have failed to solve our problems on our own. I don't believe
anyone will remove Mugabe and our suffering will just continue."

Tino Zhakata is the pseudonym of an IWPR journalist in Zimbabwe.

RBZ Blitz - 2 036 Nabbed

The Herald (Harare)

August 7, 2006
Posted to the web August 7, 2006

Isdore Guvamombe
Harare

AT least 353 people were arrested yesterday, bringing to 2 036 the number of
those caught in the net over money-laundering since the Mid-Term Monetary
Policy took effect seven days ago.

Yesterday's arrests saw the recovery of $20,1 billion in old bearer cheques,
giving a cumulative figure of $453,3 billion seized as the clampdown on
money launderers continues countrywide under Operation Sunrise/Zuvarabuda.

The operation is being jointly conducted by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
(RBZ) and security agents.

Matabeleland South, where Beitbridge Border Post -- the busiest of all
border posts countrywide-- lies, topped the number of people arrested
yesterday with 88, followed by Matabeleland North with 67.

Masvingo had the lowest number of arrests with seven people. Harare had the
highest amount of cash recovered at $6,4 billion although only 26 people
were arrested, followed by Bulawayo with $6,2 billion from 32 people,
Masvingo ($2,2 billion) and Midlands ($2,1 billion). Mashonaland East had
the lowest amount recovered at $215,9 million.

Cumulatively, Harare has the biggest cash seized since the clampdown started
with $181,8 billion having been confiscated so far from 207 people while
Manicaland has the least amount of cash recovered at $3,4 billion from 260
people.

Last night, the RBZ reiterated its commitment to thwarting money-laundering
and said it was aware of some syndicates that were splitting money in excess
of the stipulated $100 million to cheat their way past roadblocks.

"The Reserve Bank is aware of attempts by some rogue elements of society to
beat the system by converting excess cash to assets or splitting such monies
amongst several individuals to facilitate passage through security
checkpoints.

"All individuals and corporate entities carrying bona fide business proceeds
in excess of stipulated limits must provide current and authentic evidence
at all security check points relating to the nature of the business they are
in," said the RBZ.

The central bank said people carrying their cash have a right to question
the identity of any suspicious-looking law enforcement agent to avoid being
cheated.

"These measures seek to consolidate the momentum attained so far in
Zimbabwe's currency reform process while safeguarding the public from undue
prejudice.

"For the avoidance of doubt, members of the public have the right to ask for
the identification of law enforcement agents manning the various checkpoints
nationwide," the RBZ said.

Under the 2006 Mid-Term Monetary Policy Review Statement, individuals are
barred from carrying amounts of more than $100 million in the old currency,
which is equivalent to $100 000 of the new bearer cheques.

Thereafter, other methods like cheques or bank transfers should be used.

The measure is meant to combat money-laundering under the Bank Use Promotion
and Suppression of Money-Laundering Act.

Chombo's Mutare election call vetoed

New Zimbabwe

By Staff Reporter
Last updated: 08/08/2006 11:12:38
LOCAL Government Minister Ignatius Chombo has lost the battle for the
control of Mutare after the powerful Zanu PF faction led by Vice President
Joice Mujuru forced the postponement of mayoral elections scheduled for
August 19.

Mujuru's ally, Manicaland governor Tinaye Chigudu, has repeatedly clashed
with Chombo in Mutare, refusing to recognise a commission appointed by
Chombo to run the city.

The Zanu PF's Mutare District Co-ordination Committee initially sought to
have the elections postponed but was overruled by Chombo who set August 19
as the date for the polls.

In a replay of the political power struggle between Chombo and Zanu PF
Harare province over the management of the city, Chigudu and others in
Mujuru's camp have repeatedly told Chombo to re-instate an earlier
commission chaired by Kenneth Saruchera.

The elected opposition mayor for Mutare, Misheck Kagurabadza, was ousted by
Chombo in a country-wide purge against councils run by the opposition.

Chombo's announcement of the election date in June met resistance from the
Zanu PF Mutare DCC which tried to enlist the help of the Manicaland
Provincial Coordinating Committee, which includes women's league boss Oppah
Muchinguri, another Mujuru ally.

The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission said Monday that it would not be possible
to hold the elections on August 19.

ZEC spokesman Utloile Silaigwana said: "We are still consulting on the date
and it would not be this month. We have not yet come up with any date."

Zanu PF supporters have turned every scrap for political office into a
faction war, with various groups competing to position themselves in
readiness for President Mugabe's exit from political office.

Saraki - We'll Sustain Agric Revolution

Daily Champion (Lagos)

August 7, 2006
Posted to the web August 7, 2006

Jide Bakare
Ilorin

KWARA State Governor, Dr. Bukola Saraki, has promised to sustain the present
agricultural revolution in the state, even as he listed some gains of
commercial farming.

Dr Saraki spoke weekend, when a delegation of Champion Newspapers Limited,
led by Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief, Mr Ugo Onuoha visited the governor
in Ilorin, the state capital.

He listed the creation of 3000 new jobs, increasing budgetary allocation to
agriculture and provision of infrastructure as some of the gains of
commercial farming in the state.

He said the tremendous achievements made by the white farmers within a short
time have had multiplier effects as new foreign investors now want to
participate in the scheme.

This, he disclosed, had been put on hold to enable his administration
provide basic amenities that will boost agricultural production.

No fewer than 13 farmers from Zimbabwe relocated to the state in 2004
following incentives extended to them by Kwara State government, after they
were displaced in their country.

The trail blazing move generated mixed reactions.

However, reviewing the impact of the programme so far, the governor said the
size of farms increased from 2000 to about 4,800 hectars while over 3000
people have been fully engaged.

Besides, he said commercial farming had boosted public confidence in the
sector while commercial banks are now more favourably disposed to granting
loans to farmers.

Said he: "Today, whether you like it or not, people are talking about
agriculture in Nigeria. So in the next three or five years there would be
greater interest.

"We are seeing for the first time under the administration of President
Olusegun Obasanjo tremendous funding for the sector. The president has
announced N50 billion even if the whole allocation is not attained.

"I know hopefully in the next two weeks, we are being promised by the banks
that we will be able to get between N1 to N2 billion that would go into the
sector"

The innovation in the sector he said had been accompanied by improved
infrastructural development including provision of electrical, water and
telephone, adding that the lifestyle of farmers has changed for the better.

Gov Saraki reaffirmed the stand of the North to produce the next president
even as he allayed fears over possible violence in 2007 general elections.

He predicted that forthcoming polls would be less acrimonious than the 2003
elections since most state governors would not seek re-election because they
would have served the two terms of eight years allowed by the 1999
constitution.

"I believe that if we can make the process very very clear, if the parties
can show some transparency, it would limit the problem," he said.

According to him, political parties have a duty to reduce the number of
aspirants as part of measures to ensure peaceful elections.

Besides, he charged security agencies to resolve cases of assassination in
the country stressing that those who make false accusation that some people
are after them should also be investigated and dealt with.

Senior Cop Accused of Receiving Bribe

The Herald (Harare)

August 7, 2006
Posted to the web August 7, 2006

Tsungirirai Shoriwa
Harare

A GWERU-BASED police Senior Assistant Commissioner allegedly got payment
from a white commercial farmer to bar settlers from entering the farmer's
designated property in Kwekwe.

A sworn affidavit before the High Court has implicated the Officer
Commanding Midlands province Assistant Commissioner Charles Mufandaedza for
allegedly receiving cash, meat and an assortment agricultural inputs and
equipment from farmer Nicco van Rensburg of Dunlop Ranch in Kwekwe.

It is further alleged that Snr Asst Comm Mufandaedza subsequently barred
settlers from moving into the designated farm until the farmer failed to
meet his last demands -- those of giving him a tractor and a bulldozer.

The sworn affidavit was written by the farmer's wife Mrs Sylvia van Rensburg
and filed at the High Court.

The farmer, van Rensburg is currently in remand prison awaiting trial on
charges of corruption and theft.

In the affidavit, van Rensburg's wife, Sylivia, said Snr Asst Comm
Mufandaedza used to get loans, seed and meat from the farm as assurances
that he would facilitate van Rensburg's continued stay at the farm.

Mrs van Rensburg said she strongly believed that her husband was now being
persecuted after refusing to give in to Snr Asst Com Mufandaedza's last
demands to be given a bulldozer and a tractor.

"I am aware that some of these officers, particularly Officer Commanding
Midlands, Mufandaedza used to obtain meat from the farm. He used to use
police vehicles and manpower for this purpose. Some of the meat was given on
credit.

"At times he was given cash loans interest free. He obtained fertilizer and
seeds. He always stated that he needed these favours to allow Nicco to
remain on the farm in light of the land reform programme," Mrs van Rensburg
said in the sworn affidavit.

Mrs van Rensburg said at one time, Snr Asst Comm Mufandaedza insisted that
he be given a bulldozer and a tractor but her husband refused.

"The said officer at one time insisted on being given a tractor and a
bulldozer from the farm. He (van Rensburg) refused. It is perhaps from that
this present acrimony arises," Mrs van Rensburg added.

The revelations give a new dimension to the ongoing saga about the farm,
after sports personality and farmer Mr Temba Mliswa, last week sought a High
Court order allowing him to move farm equipment and livestock he bought from
Mr van Rensburg.

Mr Mliswa, who cited Asst Comm Mufandaedza both in his personal and official
capacity in the application, said Snr Asst Comm Mufandaedza barred him from
moving the equipment saying the property was subject to police
investigations after one Graham Davis claimed ownership of the property.

Mr Mliswa, in his founding affidavit, said Snr Asst Comm Mufandaedza's
actions were in breach of a provisional order issued by Justice Samuel
Kudya, authorising him to move the equipment and livestock to his farm in
Karoi. Davis, who is the complainant in van Rensburg's matter, has so far
lost two bids to have the property declared his, after the High Court
dismissed his applications.

The High Court is expected to hear Mr Mliswa's application today.

JAG Open Letter Forum No 436

Please send any material for publication in the Open Letter Forum to
jag@mango.zw with "For Open Letter Forum" in the subject line.

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Letter 1

Dear Family and Friends,

As early as nine in the morning at least two hundred and fifty people stood
in snaking lines waiting to be searched on the road side. Three buses, one
minibus, one haulage truck and 14 cars had been ordered to stop at the
roadblock. This is not a description of a scene in war torn Lebanon or Iraq,
but of a simple single lane highway coming into the Zimbabwean town of
Marondera on Friday morning. The passengers from all the buses had been
ordered to get out line up and open their suitcases, hold-alls and even hand
bags so that they could be searched. The driver of the haulage truck had
been ordered to undo all the tie downs and remove the huge tarpaulin that
covered a full load of freight on his trailer. Most of the people in the
string of cars that grew ever longer were having to get out and open boots
and push seats forward.  The interrogations and searches were being
conducted by youngsters in their late teens and early twenties. And what
where all these young "officials" looking for - it wasn't guns or bombs or
drugs it was money - our own money. If people were carrying more than was
"allowed" by the Governor of the Reserve Bank, it was being confiscated at
road blocks by pimply faced youths until you could prove where you got our
own money from.

It has been an utterly shambolic week in Zimbabwe, which began on Tuesday
when the Reserve Bank Governor knocked three zeroes off our currency and
introduced a new set of notes which are to be used as money. He called them
"a new family of bearer cheques." The Reserve Bank Governor said that we
have three weeks to change all our old dollars into new dollars and that
from the 21st August our existing bank notes would no longer be recognised
as money. But it isn't really three weeks because there are two public
holidays, three Sundays and three half working days in the change over
period. The Governor then set limits for the amounts of money people and
companies could change at a time - with maximum amounts being set per week.
He barred all retail outlets from selling goods worth more than 100 million
dollars ( 100 Pounds Sterling) in cash to one customer and said no one could
move around with more than 100 million dollars in cash on them. If there was
petrol to buy - which suddenly there isn't - 100 million dollars would only
just be enough to fill a standard fuel tank of a family car. Cheques were
being rejected by banks if they were written in the old denominations, ATM
dispensers were shut down, most shops did not have the new notes and the
banks were still giving out old notes for withdrawals. Everyone I met was
panicking. Most do not have bank accounts so if the banks haven't got the
new notes to exchange for the old, they are sunk and have no option except
to frantically spend whatever money they have on things they can't afford,
just to get rid of the old money.

And then, worst of all, came the typical threats and intimidation so
characteristic of life in Zimbabwe. Just two days after making his
announcement, the Governor of the Reserve Bank said he was considering
shortening the time period even further - to stop the crooks. He did not say
what happens to the plain, ordinary, desperately poor people who aren't
crooks. People with just a few million dollars in remote dusty villages who
would have to use most of their money just to get to a town with a bank.
There are apparently no exceptions for the weak, the frail or the elderly,
for those who are in hospital, incapacitated or unable to travel - there is
not a glimmer of compassion for the common man and woman.

Zimbabwe this week feels closer to a revolution than at any other time in
the last six years. The rage on people's faces as they stand waiting to be
searched at the road blocks, waiting to have their own money taken from
them, is palpable.  Until next week, thanks for reading, love cathy.
Copyright cathy buckle 5th August 2006.  http://africantears.netfirms.com
My books "African Tears" and "Beyond Tears" are available from:
orders@africabookcentre.com

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Letter 2

The Sword of Damocles.

For those who are not familiar with the above saying, it is used to describe
a situation where a heavy fighting sword is hung by a thread from the roof
over the head of a person who was strapped down underneath it and awaiting
death. The Zanu PF regime is in just such a position and during the Minister
of Finance's address to Parliament last week, he held a knife against that
thread and threatened to cut it and in so doing, in my view, he would signal
the death of Zanu PF and his own regime. The issue he was talking about was
one that I have addressed several times before - the price of maize.

Maize is that stuff the Americans call corn and feed to their hogs and cows.
In Africa - certainly southern Africa, it is the primary food staple and we
eat huge quantities of it every day. It is cooked as porridge and eaten with
some form of "relish". Perhaps oil and vegetables, a bit of meat with some
gravy or sour milk, sometimes even rough peanut butter. The great majority
of Zimbabweans have not "eaten" if they have not had "sadza" at least once a
day. Most poor families would have cold sadza for breakfast (left over from
the evening meal) and then at least one large meal at lunch or in the
evening with hot sadza as the main course.

We eat 115 kilograms of maize meal per capita per annum. It is therefore a
very important component of daily life and the key to the tenuous stability
of Zimbabwe lies in the fact that it is cheap and reasonably available. But
there is a price to pay for this and no one - except poor old Herbert, dares
to talk about it.

The facts are as follows: -

1. We need 1,2 million tonnes of maize a year for human consumption -
assuming no cross border activity.
2. We need another 600 000 tonnes for animal consumption as stock feed.
3. We need about 100 000 tonnes a year for industrial use - the production
of breakfast cereals and snacks, starch and alcohol.
4. We produced last year, about 700 000 tonnes of maize in Zimbabwe, we
imported over 1 million tonnes and maize was constantly in short supply.
5. This past season the government claims a crop of 1,7 million tonnes but
most observers think the actual crop is less than 900 000 tonnes and the
expectation is that we will again have to import over a million tonnes.
6. The Grain Marketing Board has a total monopoly over maize grain imports,
purchases and sales. The Police and the military enforce this.

The economics of this trade are astonishing - even in a country and a
continent where politically inspired skewed economic policies are rife. The
South African grain industry grew a crop last year of over 10 million tones
and with domestic consumption at about 7 million tonnes, had a significant
surplus for export. This gave rise to price levels in South Africa at import
parities and generally below R1000 per tonne. At one stage the price was as
low as R700 per tonne and this threatened the viability of the whole
industry.

This past year, South African farmers have cut back on their maize plantings
and will produce less than 6 million tonnes - output will be below
consumption for the first time in many years. As a result prices have risen
sharply and are now running at about R1500 per tonne. South Africa is now
importing grain from abroad (mainly yellow maize for stock feed) and is
continuing to export white maize to the region.

This price translates to a landed cost of maize imported to Zimbabwe of
R1750 per tonne. Transport charges from silos in South Africa to the closest
silos in Zimbabwe have to be paid in foreign currency. This suggests a local
landed cost of Z$60 million at bank rates and Z$140 million at parallel
market rates. Local producer prices are currently set at Z$31 million per
tonne.

These price profiles must be set against the selling price that has
prevailed now for a considerable period of time of Z$600 000 per tonne or
R17,50 per tonne - 0,1 per cent of the actual cost of imports and 0,2
percent of the local producer price.

This enormous price differential (administrative costs at the GMB are 10
times the selling price) leads to massive market distortions - cross border
trade is huge as the cost of maize meal in Botswana and South Africa is
equal to about Z$280 000 per kilogram compared to Z$18 000 to Z$28 000 per
kilogram in Zimbabwe, depending on source and quality. Technically there are
no reasons why a local farmer should not sell to the GMB. On paper the
retail price of maize meal is so low that the GMB price should be very
attractive. In practice this is not happening - deliveries to the GMB have
been less than 100 000 tonnes total so far this year. With stock feed
compounders paying the full price for imported maize and sourcing all their
foreign exchange to do so in the parallel market, they offer high prices to
producers even though this is illegal. Roadblocks are routinely manned by
GMB staff to prevent this trade, but it happens - the differentials are just
too great.

But the main impact lies with the GMB which, even though the World Food
Programme is importing food to feed up to a third of our population, must
itself import about 50 000 tonnes of maize a month to meet domestic needs
for human consumption. The numbers are frightening: -

1. At official foreign exchange rates of 250 to 1 for new dollars to the US
dollar, the cost of imported maize to the GMB is Z$62 500 new dollars per
tonne. Add to this handling charges of Z$10 000 per tonne and the cost out
of a GMB silo is Z$72 500 per tonne.
2. The GMB recovers only Z$600 per tonne from sales leaving a deficit of
Z$71 900 per tonne or Z$3,6 billion new dollars a month. (US$14,4 million).
3. The cost of these direct imports will be US$150 million a year resulting
in combined losses of Z$43,2 billion new dollars.

With total foreign exchange availability to the Zimbabwe government via the
Reserve Bank at about US$560 million per annum - all at about Z$250 to 1, it
is most unlikely that the hard currency for these essential imports by the
GMB will be available - competing demands for fuel and electricity and other
essential imports will consume most available resources. I still think it
likely that someone or another government is in fact funding the supply of
maize to the GMB at present. Traders tell me they have no idea where the
money is coming from. One local maize importer says he knows but will not
tell me who it is. Whoever it is should take note that a new government here
will never repay such loans - designed, as they are, to simply extend the
life of a bankrupt and repulsive regime.

For the rest, it's back to that statement by old Herbert and his threat to
"review" the selling price of maize to millers. When he said that I bet
every Zanu PF leader in the country shivered. Can you imagine what would
happen if a 10 kilogram bag of this basic essential suddenly rose in price
by 10 times. There would be a revolution. Herbert knows that time is running
out - such distortions in prices simply cannot be sustained indefinitely and
there are limits to the pockets of foreign donors. But for Zanu PF, the
sword of Damocles hangs by a slim thread, rubbed day-by-day, hour-by-hour,
by the winds of inflation.

E G Cross
Bulawayo, 5th August 2006

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Letter 3

More Chaos.

Since I sent out that initial brief on Monday, things have gone from bad to
worse. This morning one filling station in Bulawayo is asking Z$1 165 000
for a litre of fuel! That is up 100 per cent in 7 days. Yesterday the
Reserve Bank clearing system rejected all cheques made out in the old
currency. The banks also say now they were not consulted by the Reserve Bank
prior to the changes announced by Gono on Monday - they say his statement
was the first intimation they had apart from rumors the previous week. When
they asked the Bank about the rumors they were told to wait for a statement.

Major firms across the country have been closed for trading for some days
now. At our own factory we have run out of materials and this morning our
staff were simply seated at their machines. We have had to close our
accounts as at the 31st July and open a new set of accounts with zero
opening balances. When we are able to wrap up the period ending the 31st
July (a process that will take weeks) we will then be able to open our new
set of accounts with balances calculated manually. Our accountant was waving
a fistful of returned cheques for today - she expected more as time went by
throwing our cash flow into a complete mess.

Till operators in stores are being asked to deal in cheques at the new
currency values, old prices on the goods, mixed new and old currencies from
customers and all electronic banking systems are still in the old currency -
ATM's are closed down as are all point of sale equipment. Just to compound
the problems, no bank is yet able to handle the new currency on its systems
and they are adding three zeros to all figures being credited to accounts in
the new form! So I wrote a cheque last week in the old currency - the bank
rejects this and I now write a new one in the new currency and the bank must
round up what I have rounded down, in order to credit or debit my account!

On top of this the authorities have thrown up roadblocks across the
country - yesterday it took one of our drivers 15 hours to travel from
Beitbridge to Harare through 21 roadblocks. Gwanda to Bulawayo, a short run
of 137 kilometers has 9 roadblocks. I am sure that some of the motivation is
the capacity to loot travelers on the road - they are arbitrarily
confiscating cash from people. The limit for cash coming across the border
is Z$5 million per person - anything over that is confiscated and the bearer
runs the risk of being detained. Internally you can only carry Z$100 million
and even this small sum (10 litres of petrol) can get you into trouble - two
pastors were arrested and held for two nights and their funds confiscated
(they were each carrying the domestic limit of Z$100 million). It took a
lawyer to get them out and to recover their money.

One major wholesaler in Harare was raided and they found nearly Z$40 billion
in cash at his home. He was arrested and the money taken. The legal basis
for this is not apparent, as we have seen no actual notices in the
Government Gazette. Anyway, a load of flour for a bakery costs Z$3,8 billion
and many firms will not accept Cheques or any other form of payment.

The limit a company can draw per day is Z$750 million - when it comes to
wages, let alone creditor payments or fuel purchases that will go nowhere!

Then finally there is the new currency itself - we have seen very little. I
drew cash from my bank for fuel and they gave me the old currency - right
now I am trying to draw out Z$780 million and they tell me that I need
Reserve Bank clearance and are not sure they can give me new currency - I
refuse to take the old as it is just too bulky. In 15 days time the old note
will cease to be of value and I simply cannot believe that they have enough
of the new notes to meet demand. We will stop accepting the old notes on
about the 18th as that then gives us two working days to deposit the money
in a bank. 7 days later we will need Z$40 million in the new notes to pay
staff - if that is not available, we will have riots.

I said on Monday that the stock market would take off into the
stratosphere - in fact equities rose 56 per cent in a week!! Parallel market
rates are impossible to ascertain, as they are moving by the hour. However
it is clear they are not going down! The new official rates and rules for
the use of funds from exports and service charges will exacerbate this and
further increase domestic inflationary pressures as the price of everything
imported rises rapidly.

At present inflation rates I estimate 8 months before we are back to where
we were 5 days ago - piles of useless money to do anything with and would be
looking again at chopping three zero's off our currency. In fact Gono has
said as much - he has promised a new currency altogether - and said this
week that we would get no notice of the change and only 7 days to swap the
old for the new. I guess he really thinks that practice makes each operation
easier! I hope that they will learn something from this complete shambles,
but if our recent experience is anything to go by - they will not learn
anything at all.

Finally fuel is again very short in the City - in fact today we could not
find a fuel station with fuel except for one selling at that monstrous
price. I suspect traders simply do not know what to sell fuel at and are
holding their stocks in the ground until the dust clears.

Eddie Cross
Bulawayo 4th August 2006.

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All letters published on the open Letter Forum are the views and opinions of
the submitters, and do not represent the official viewpoint of Justice for
Agriculture.