http://www.zimeye.org/?p=1974
By Moses
Muchemwa
for ZimEye.org
Published: February 9, 2009
Bulawayo
(ZimEye)
President Robert Mugabe has fired 10 provincial governors to pave
way for the sharing of the provinces with the MDC.
According to top
government officials Mugabe sent out letters to dismiss the governors on
Thursday advising them that they have been relieved of their duties.
Zanu-PF
and the formations of the MDC are set to form a new government beginning with
the swearing-in of MDC president Morgan Tsvangirai as prime minister on
Wednesday.
A total of 31 ministers from both parties will be sworn-in on
Friday.
The government sources said the governors were caught unawares and
were “greatly disappointed by the unexpected move.”
Bulawayo governor Cain
Mathema is said to be depressed by the termination of his term of
office.
Mathema who used to commute between Bulawayo and Tsholotsho is
reportedly ‘buried’ in his rural Tsholotsho home following the
dismissal.
Equally disappointed are Matabeleland South governor Angeline
Masuku and her counterpart Sithokozile Mathuthu of Matabeleland North who also
used to commute over 150km to their offices.
Mathuthu is well known for her
lavish expenditure after she spent over three months staying in a top Bulawayo
hotel, courtesy of tax payers’ money.
Sources said the MDC and Zanu-PF agreed
to share the provinces equally with the Tsvangirai led getting five, Zanu-PF
four and another splinter group of the MDC led by Arthur Mutambara receiving
one.
The MDC got the big share of the provinces because it won elections in
the relevant provinces last year, according to sources close to the formation of
a new government.
Zanu-PF and the MDC signed the Global Political Agreement
on 15 September 2008 but the implementation was delayed due to serious bickering
over the sharing of key ministries, provincial governors and top civil
servants.
(ZimEye,
Zimbabwe)
_____________________________________________
http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-02-06-a-pothole-in-the-pocket
Ray
Mwareya - Feb 09 2009 06:00
Potholes along Harare's roads have achieved
dam-like proportions. While residents cry for the city engineers to repair these
death-traps, scruffy touts pray that the holes will get wider and deeper.
Few
drivers have escaped the attentions of the "slow jams" - local lingo for the
creative unemployed youths who have taken to manning the CBD's crumbling roads.
It's not that the slow-jams boys are legally mandated to look after them, but in
the absence of a functioning roads department, these township toutshave quickly
learnt the basics of engineering. In other words, they extort money for what one
weary motorist called "pot-hole filling".
"At least R10 today, baba,"
smiledone youth to the driver of a shiny Toyota SUV slowing down to navigate a
pothole at yet another "tollbooth" set up by school dropouts with shovels in
hand and torn overalls tied at their waists.
Since working out that the city
council is too broke to summons a single truck to fill the growing number of
potholes, the slow jams have taken on the job. Some seem to have a genuine sense
of civic conviction - quite rare in Zimbabwe these days - though such adventures
are not without rich pickings.
In the mornings they block the road when they
see a smart car coming. The driver is then pressured to leave behind Z$
5-billion (US20c) as a "thanks and passage fee." Harare's drivers may appreciate
the excellent civic work the pothole boys do, but they take strong exception to
the charges, especially when, as one harassed motorist said: "I'm expected to
pay again on my way home in the evening." Commuters also complain that the slow
jams fill up the potholes at snail's pace.
"If you fill up slowly you make
more money, shaaz [pal]," confesses Tonde, a slow-jams boy, as he frantically
waves down an approaching Gauteng registered Nissan Navara. "We really love the
GP cars - especially over Christmas and new year." GP cars just make good
business sense - for foreign registered cars the fee switches to South African
rands.
Having collected his fee from the Navara, Tonde continues the
interview. "I wake up every morning at4:30 and commute from Mufakose to man the
holes," he says, lighting up a Madison Toasted.
"What can I do?
I am
unemployed and the potholes are unattended by whoever still calls himself the
city council here."
On a good day the boys claim to make enough to buy a
week's worth of scarce beef and several six packs of imported Heineken lagers
.
Thanks to the boys a number of hideous potholes are getting a new look in a
city where council operations have ceased to exist. As trees and fish ponds
threaten to emerge from the potholes, Tonde and company pray that the council
stays shut.
Ray Mwareya is a local
journalist
_____________________________________________
http://www.newzimbabwe.com/pages/fees49.19361.html
REFORMS: David
Coltart set to be named Education Minister by Arthur Mutambara this
week
CHAOS: Pupils turned away from schools due to a teachers' strike
By
Lebo Nkatazo
Posted to the web: 09/02/2009 02:47:13
ARTHUR Mutambara has
chosen Senator David Coltart (Khumalo) as the man to overhaul Zimbabwe’s
education system, two Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) sources said on
Sunday.
As Education Minister, Coltart, 52, will play a central role in
reforming Zimbabwe’s declining education system, with the urgent task of getting
teachers to abandon work boycotts and ensuring schools which are still closed
open.
Coltart, a respected lawyer and former MP for Bulawayo South, joined
Mutambara’s MDC faction following a split from founding MDC leader, Morgan
Tsvangirai in 2005.
Mutambara’s MDC will nominate three ministers and one
deputy minister to the 31-member Cabinet which will be sworn-in on Friday, two
days after Morgan Tsvangirai and Mutambara are sworn-in as Prime Minister and
Deputy Prime Minister respectively.
Coltart would be a high profile pick for
Mutambara, who will also name Bulilima West MP Moses Mzila Ndlovu and the
party’s secretary general Welshman Ncube to the cabinet.
Ncube could be
handed the Industry and Commerce portfolio, with Mzila Ndlovu landing the
Regional Integration and International Trade ministry, according to two
officials who spoke to New Zimbabwe.com.
Tsvangirai will name 13 ministers
and 6 deputy ministers before Friday’s swearing-in ceremony, and Mugabe is
expected to name 15 ministers and 8 deputies in line with a power sharing
agreement signed on September 15 last year.
Writing in South Africa’s
Business Day newspaper, Dumisani Muleya, the news editor of the Zimbabwe
Independent newspaper said “the quality of ministers and the policies they will
generate will determine whether the government will be able to pluck Zimbabwe
out of the deep hole it is in."
Mugabe, who will remain President, is set to
include a number of his Zanu PF old guard officials in his list, raising doubts
about the political will and operational capacity of the new cabinet to
introduce much-needed political and economic reforms.
Zanu PF sources say
Mugabe’s list of 15 ministers includes his close confidants and party
strategists Emmerson Mnangagwa, Sydney Sekeramayi, Didymus Mutasa, Patrick
Chinamasa, Nicholas Goche, Ignatius Chombo, Joseph Made, Olivia Muchena, John
Nkomo, Kembo Mohadi, Obert Mpofu, Simbarashe Mumbengegwi, Paul Mangwana,
Sithembiso Nyoni and Webster Shamu.
Coltart (second from left) with German
Chancellor Angela Merkel (second from right), MDC-Mutambara vice president
Gibson Sibanda (far right) and MDC-Tsvangirai official Sekai Holland on a visit
to Germany last year
If confirmed, Coltart will take charge of an education
system which charities and teachers’ unions warn needs radical
transformation.
In a new report, the Save the Children charity says many
teachers have little choice but to spend their time scraping together enough to
survive rather than heading back to the classroom - two weeks after the new
school term opened. Many are on strike, demanding their wages be paid in United
States dollars.
At the end of 2008, only 20 percent of children were still
attending school, down from 85 percent a year earlier, and that figure is likely
to drop further, Save the Children warns.
The aid agency estimates that some
30,000 teachers dropped out of the education system by the end of 2008, a third
of which are now living in South Africa.
Among the 70,000 left - many of whom
have little training - morale is rock-bottom and desperate conditions are
driving them to inflict corporal punishment and exploitation on their pupils,
according to the charity.
"A generation is at risk of growing up without any
education in Zimbabwe, and that will have catastrophic consequences for the
country's recovery," said Rachel Pounds, the agency's Zimbabwe director.
The
U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF) plans to assess how many schools are functioning
in the coming days.
"If schools don't open, the fear is you'll see a lot more
people crossing the border (into South Africa)," said Shantha Bloemen, UNICEF's
spokesperson in
Johannesburg.
newsdesk@newzimbabwe.com
________________________________________
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/africa/article5689483.ece
From
The Times
February 9, 2009
Martin Fletcher in Harare
Morgan Tsvangirai
will use his inauguration as Zimbabwe’s Prime Minister this week to appeal to
the West to fund the rebuilding of his shattered country even though Robert
Mugabe remains the President.
The leader of the Movement for Democratic
Change will address tens of thousands of Zimbabweans in a Harare sports stadium
after a private swearing-in ceremony on Wednesday. He will outline an ambitious
100-day programme of reconstruction and democratisation and urge the West to
back it with desperately needed finance.
His appeal will put Britain, the US
and the European Union on the spot because they are deeply sceptical about the
“unity government”. They doubt that Mr Mugabe has any intention of surrendering
real power to the MDC and regard the new arrangement as a ploy to give his
regime a veneer of legitimacy.
“He’s walked into a trap,” one senior Western
official said of Mr Tsvangirai. An MDC source countered: “If the West doesn’t
back Tsvangirai and the new Government, then it’s dead in the water - and so is
Zimbabwe. “Without Western aid we can’t deliver and if we can’t deliver we can’t
overcome Zanu (PF)’s policies of corruption and repression.”
MDC officials
said that the party would attempt to use its parliamentary majority to repeal
repressive legislation and hold officials to account, its control of every city
council to restore basic services and Mr Tsvangirai’s huge personal popularity
to rally the people and eclipse Mr Mugabe. They expect Zanu (PF) to oppose Mr
Tsvangirai’s programme at every turn and are braced for two years of
“hand-to-hand combat” with a regime that has spent the past eight years beating,
torturing and killing MDC activists.
In a letter to Zimbabwe’s Standard
newspaper the British Embassy in Harare said that long-term funding would depend
on the new Government demonstrating a genuine commitment to the rule of law,
economic stabilisation, the democratic process and human rights.
It stated:
“It is unlikely that any Government involving Mugabe will inspire donor
confidence and attract the support it so badly needs.” Zanu (PF) has agreed that
Mr Tsvangirai can have an office in the same building as Mr Mugabe and that the
MDC can table legislation in parliament tomorrow to place the security and
intelligence services under a new National Security Council chaired by Mr Mugabe
with Mr Tsvangirai as his deputy. The two parties are thought to be close to
agreeing an equitable division of Zimbabwe’s ten provincial
governorships.
The regime has done little else to suggest that it will change
its ways, however. It has yet to accept the MDC’s demand that more than 30
opposition activists held for three months on spurious terrorism charges be
released from prison before the new Government is set up.
The police last
week arrested five white farmers who were part of a group that won a landmark
lawsuit in November when the Southern African Development Community tribunal
ruled that the seizure of their farms had been illegal. The regime ignored that
ruling and is apparently now gunning for the 78 farmers who brought the
case.
Zimbabwean newspapers report that Mr Mugabe is preparing to name Zanu
(PF) hardliners as ministers and that his henchmen are raising $ 300,000
(£200,000) to celebrate his 85th birthday on February 21 despite the fact that
seven million of his compatriots are starving.
Mr Mugabe recently reappointed
Gideon Gono, the Reserve Bank Governor responsible for Zimbabwe’s catastrophic
hyper-inflation, without consulting the MDC and last Tuesday Mr Gono preempted
the new Government by presenting his monetary policy statement.
The parties
have not even agreed whether Zimbabwe’s generals will have to salute Mr
Tsvangirai at the inauguration.
MDC officials said that the new Prime
Minister would not call for the lifting of Western sanctions against 178
individuals and organisations linked to the excesses of the Mugabe
regime.
____________________________________________
http://www.newzimbabwe.com/pages/farm83.19359.html
Posted to the
web: 09/02/2009 00:26:51
THE Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is set to
commence disciplinary hearings against seven MPs accused of abusing a government
scheme to support new farmers through the allocation of farm
inputs.
Zimbabwean authorities last week named the seven alongside two Zanu
PF legislators as involved in the corruption.
"We would want the legislators
to come forward and explain themselves so that we act decisively on anyone found
guilty of misappropriating government inputs," MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said
Sunday.
"We have no sacred cows in terms of corruption in our party and no
matter how senior you are in the party, we will deal with you
accordingly.”
The threat of sanction against the MPs could see them lose out
on cabinet appointments in a power sharing government later this week. Evelyn
Masaiti, one of the seven accused legislators, was hotly tipped to be named in
Morgan Tsvangirai’s cabinet nominees.
The other implicated MPs are Ramsome
Makamure (Gutu East), Edmore Mudavanhu (Zaka North), Hega Shoko (Bikita West),
Edmore Marima (Bikita East), Tichaona Maradza (Masvingo West) and Hamandishe
Maramwidze (Gutu North).
Chivi South MP Ivene Dzingirayi and Seke-Chikomba
Senator Gladys Mabhiza were the two Zanu PF officials publicly outed last week
by the chairman of the logistics sub-committee of the National Resource
Mobilisation and Utilisation Committee, Brigadier-General Douglas
Nyikayaramba.
Nyikayaramba said all the nine MPs received 20 tonnes of
Compound D fertilizer, enough to cover 80ha, and at least 1 tonne of maize seed
while one had an extra tonne of seed and diesel while two others received in
addition 10 tonnes of Ammonium Nitrate.
Masaiti received 10 tonnes of
ammonium nitrate on top of the other inputs, but planted just 6ha and could not
account for the rest of the inputs, Nyikaramba said.
Mabhiza is said to have
two tonnes of seed and 1 500 litres of diesel, but did not plant anything and
could not account for the inputs while Dzingirayi - MP Chivi South - was given
his allocation which he misused.
Mudavanhu planted about 5ha and could not
account for the remainder while Makamure planted 12 hectares and could also not
account for the remainder.
Shoko who beat musician Elias Musakwa in the
Bikita West elections last March is said to have planted 10ha and cannot account
for the other inputs while Marima planted 5ha and allegedly used the other
inputs to campaign in his constituency.
Nyikayaramba said Maradza planted 20
hectares while the other seed, enough to plant 20 hectares, was given to people
in his constituency to fulfil his campaign promises.
Maramwidze got Compound
D fertilizer, one tonne of maize seed and 10 tonnes of Ammonium Nitrate, but
could not account for all the inputs while Masaiti got 10 tonnes of Ammonium
Nitrate but planted just 6ha and could not account for the remaining
inputs.
Police say they have completed investigations into the corruption and
will soon press charges against the legislators.
The National Food Security
Programme was put in place to support farmers, many of them newly-resettled
under a controversial land reform programme executed by President Robert
Mugabe’s government since
2000.
newsdesk@newzimbabwe.com
___________________________________
http://www.newzimbabwe.com/pages/mawere157.19356.html
The Mutumwa
Mawere Column - (www.mmawere.com)
Posted to the web: 08/02/2009
23:09:37
ON WEDNESDAY, February 11, 2009, Zimbabwe will turn a new leaf just
like it did on November 11, 1965, a day that remains etched in the country’s
story as the beginning of the end of white minority rule.
Will they or will
they not?
Will it or will it not work?
How secure is Zimbabwe’s future in
the hands of three men?
Whose government is it anyway?
What is the
Zimbabwean promise?
Will they or will they not deliver on the Zimbabwean
promise?
How will it work?
As the new day approaches, conversations on
Zimbabwe continue to be shaped by the past and our collective inability to
locate the Zimbabwe story where it should be correctly located i.e. in the hands
of the people who have the ultimate responsibility to make it work.
The
inclusive government provides yet another opportunity for citizens to begin
serious discussions about democracy, government and the challenges of nation
building, with special attention on Zimbabwe’s contemporary
history.
Regrettably, in 1980 euphoria took precedence and citizens
squandered the opportunity offered by independence to engage in conversations
about what kind of Zimbabwe they wanted to create and whose responsibility it
was going to be to make it happen.
Many expected much from state actors who
in the pursuit of power promised too much and never took time to think about
what the Zimbabwean promise was all about. Free education was offered and taken
advantage of, and yet the resources to sustain such a promise dwindled by the
day.
The last 29 years have shown that the state has been an unreliable
partner or instrument of the people. Instead of serving the people efficiently
and effectively, the state has become a monster with a track record of dismal
performance.
The focus has rightly been on the head of the fish in the firm
belief that removing the head will terminate the life of the presumed toxic
asset. Zimbabweans and the rest of the world have come to accept that Robert
Mugabe is the toxic asset and any solution that leaves him in the melting pot
will not advance the Zimbabwean promise.
What should have been the touchstone
of Zimbabwe’s post-colonial society?
To the extent that post-colonial
Zimbabwe was born out of an unjust political, social and economic system, it was
the expectation that the new society will be informed by an acknowledgment that
freedom, responsibility and citizen participation were fundamental and
non-negotiable foundational principles.
However, as Zimbabwe travels the last
mile of Mugabe’s exclusive rule, it must be accepted that citizens abdicated in
their responsibilities to ensure that their freedom was never to be the business
of someone else. Many trusted state actors to guarantee their freedom refusing
to be the change they wanted to see. The mere fact that the focus is on Mugabe
confirms what is wrong with the country. People have been crowded out of the
solution market and the state actors with no better solutions have taken the
mantle with no defined end game.
A danger exists now as it did in 1980 that
citizens yet again will choose to surrender their sovereignty to elected (or
dubiously elected) individuals who will represent them in the inclusive
transitional government. The last 29 years have exposed the fact that citizens
failed to create their own institutional arrangements to hold their
representatives in the state accountable and responsible.
Zimbabwe faces
challenges and there remains no consensus on what is required to address such
challenges. SADC/AU, President Mugabe and Zanu PF are at one in holding the view
that sanctions ought to be removed as a starting point and this alone will
facilitate the turnaround. How accurate is the assessment that Zimbabwe is
solely a victim of the targeted sanctions regime?
If the priority is to
remove sanctions that have been imposed by sovereign government who are entitled
to their own opinion about what kind of Zimbabwe they want and should like to
support, it is unlikely that Zimbabwe will move forward in the short-term
without addressing the concerns of the sanctions imposers.
The Zimbabwean
promise can only be guaranteed and delivered by Zimbabweans working together.
How feasible is it that Zimbabweans will be inspired by the transitional
administration to take responsibility for the country’s future?
Over the last
29 years, citizens have rightly lost confidence in their representatives in the
state who saw their primary function as that of thinking for the people and
providing for the people. It must now be obvious that the future of Zimbabwe
lies in the hands of the doers and dreamers who do not necessary have to be
state actors.
To what extent was the Zimbabwean crisis caused by bad
decisions and the inaction of citizens?
Zimbabwe has been joined by even the
developed states that are also engulfed by an unprecedented economic crisis, a
response to which has had the effect of placing state actors as the drivers of
change and development. Only time will tell if state actors can substitute
private actors in driving the economic engine but history does not have good
examples of countries that have delivered on their promise without citizens
enjoying freedom, justice and liberty.
What is clear in the case of Zimbabwe
is that the state has now thrown the towel and has accepted that the power of
the market in allocating resources cannot be underestimated. For President
Mugabe to accept the dollarisation regime now in place knowing his views on the
West and neo-liberal economic theories exposes the fact that there is after all
no alternative plan in place.
Zimbabweans have no choice but to make hard
choices and deliberate urgently on issues that bring cohesion and invest in the
information required to make decisions that advance the promise. This
responsibility should lie less in the hands of state actors but citizens whose
future should never again be the business of a few minds in the state.
There
are many ideas that people have in their minds about what Zimbabwe needs to move
forward but such ideas must and should not be retailed but wholesaled through
organisation. Zimbabweans, whether in or out of the country, must be organised
so that they can have an effective mechanism to talk to their government. This
must be done urgently and such organisations must represent real interests that
determine the success or failure of the country.
Zimbabwe is a creature of
citizens and is an artificial person without the benefit of a human voice.
Citizens are the only people who can give this artificial person a voice. If
Zimbabwe were to speak, would it be satisfied with the actions of citizens in
advancing its interests?
Zimbabwe is at the crossroads and it can only move
forward by finding opportunity, common ground and leverage in its hitherto
divided society. It would be wrong for citizens to choose to be spectators of
history at this defining moment. It is important that citizens reclaim their
future by demanding from their representatives a new dispensation of
transparency and accountability.
Already, it is obvious that all is not well
in the state. Gideon Gono continues to make the case that he was as much a
victim of sanctions as he was a victim of the actions of a confused
administration. An understanding of the role of the RBZ and the state in
undermining the rule of law, property rights and human rights through a
commission of inquiry set up by the inclusive government has to be a good
starting point to allow citizens to know how far their government had been
imprisoned a by few wise (?) men and women.
Mutumwa Mawere's weekly column is
published on New Zimbabwe.com every Monday.
You can contact him at:
mmawere@global.co.za
newsdesk@newzimbabwe.com
_____________________
http://www.ctvbc.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20090208/bc_zimbabwe_vancouver_090208/20090208/?hub=BritishColumbiaHome
Updated:
Sun Feb. 08 2009 18:43:11
The Canadian Press
VANCOUVER - Ron Yaworksy sees
the arduous task of controlling Zimbabwe's six-month-old cholera epidemic -
which has left about 3,200 people dead and more than 64,000 sick - in manageable
terms.
"It's akin to saving lives 20 litres at a time," says Yaworksy, who
recently returned home to the Vancouver area after a month-long Red Cross
mission to the African country.
Each purification sachet Yaworksy distributed
in a rural region of eastern Zimbabwe produces 20 litres of clean water free
from the deadly bacterium that continues to spread faster than it can be
contained.
Along with the sachets, Yaworksy and his team distributed hygene
basics, like soap and went door to door educating people living near the
Mozambique border about the dangers of cholera and how to prevent it.
They
are seemingly simple solutions to a problem made more complex by growing
poverty, the collapse of the country's health and sanitation infrastructure, the
prevalence of HIV and AIDS and political uncertainty that has continued for more
than a year.
"In situations like this, I wouldn't characterize it as so easy,
it's an education process, it's awareness," says Yaworksy, who used his vacation
time from his job as a sanitation engineer to make the trip.
"You have to go
door by door teaching people, making them aware and helping them with the
resources. There's many challenges."
Zimbabwe's cholera outbreak, which began
last August, has surpassed the World Health Organization's estimate of 60,000
infections, a figure the agency considered a "worst-case scenario."
It's all
happening amid a political crisis that has deadlocked the government since last
year's presidential elections, as President Robert Mugabe and the country's main
opposition continue to work out the details of a unity government, which could
become a reality within weeks.
The political strife has left the country
unable to deal with the crisis and Yaworksy says it has drawn attention away
from the need to devote resources to the cholera epidemic.
"It is unfortunate
that the whole political debate, the story of the politics, is no doubt
impacting people's perception and the humanitarian response that's actually
required," says Yaworksy.
The first cholera cases started in the slums of the
country's capital city Harare but quickly spread into the Zimbabwe's rural
areas, where sanitation infrastructure can be non-existent and access to health
care scarce.
The country is also facing a hunger crisis, with the United
Nations estimating as much as 80 per cent of the population - about seven
million Zimbabweans - need food aid.
Yaworksy compares it to fighting brush
fires - bring one outbreak under control and even more cases sprout up
elsewhere.
"You would have an outbreak in an area of villages along a river,
so you would do a campaign there, we'd get it under control, get the cases way
down and then you'd get an outbreak perhaps 100 or 150 kilometres to the north,"
he says.
"It's not something that's just going to go away in one or two
weeks, it will probably take months to get totally under control and that needs
resources."
The Red Cross, through the work of international chapters, as
well as Zimbabwe's own Red Cross, continue work in the country and appeal for
donations.
"There's still a lot of Red Cross teams working very hard there,"
says Yaworksy.
"There's still resources that are needed and everybody is
providing what they
can."
_____________________________________________
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=11215
February 8, 2009
ZCTU
president Lovemore Matombo
By Our Correspondent
THE President of the
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions has said the formation of a unity government
in Zimbabwe will take the country back to the era of the one-party
state.
ZCTU president, Lovemore Matombo, said on Friday that there was no way
the two Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) parties and Zanu-PF could be in
opposition and be in government at the same time because they would have to find
common ground somewhere along the way.
He cited the unanimous passing of the
Amendment Number 19 Bill in Parliament last Thursday, saying it was only the
start of the drift back towards the one party state when Zanu-PF and Zapu merged
into one back in 1989. This resulted in Zanu-PF ruling the country since 1980
with an overwhelming parliamentary majority until in March last year when the
mainstream MDC party turned the tables.
“The unity agreement is merely an act
of consolidation of power taking us back to the era of the one party state,”
said Matombo in an address to an all stakeholders’ national civil society
constitutional conference held in Harare on Friday.
Matombo told the meeting
that his organisation was against the idea of a unity government and would have
preferred a transitional authority leading to the calling of free and fair
elections.
He said they had an all day meeting with the mainstream MDC whose
leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, is a former secretary general of ZCTU, after which
they decided to agree to disagree on whether his party should join the unity
government.
“We disagree with this unity government but unfortunately some in
the MDC are looking for employment. This is despite the fact that this unity
government does not care about the March 29 election results. It actually
recognises the loser, turning him into the winner while turning the winner into
the loser,” said Matombo in his address to the highly charged meeting.
He
accused the MDC of abandoning the principles which guided the formation of the
party at a National People’s Convention at the Women’s Bureau in Harare in 1999.
He said by agreeing to the dollarization of the economy the MDC had abandoned
the struggle for the workers.
“Zimbabwe has made its own piece of history
where doctors or university lecturers are just like Grade Seven graduates
because of the inflation and the decision to dollarize everything will only
serve to hit the poor hard and make the rich richer. So we want to tell this
unity government that we are going to call for a national strike next month so
that we can be paid in foreign currency,” said Matombo.
He urged the civil
society groups to take up the initiative of crafting the country’s constitution
saying relegating the duty to politicians will not result in the drawing of a
perfect constitution representative of all Zimbabweans.
He said, “The
constitution process is very algebraic in nature, if you don’t get the formula
right then you won’t get the answer right. Zimbabwe is under authoritarian rule
and the only sure way of providing a remedy is through the enactment of a new
people driven constitution.”
He said his organisation will continue to put
pressure on the new government particularly the MDC until the concerns of the
workers are addressed.
“We still remain fighting and we will continue putting
pressure particularly on the MDC which we have been working with. We want to see
restoration of people power not the opening up of the economy like what is
happening now. These are the same things that led us to the Economic Structural
Adjustment Programme (ESAP) which was the genesis of the problems that we are
facing right now,” said Matombo.
The civic society meeting was attended by
over 200 delegates drawn from several interest groups representing the disabled,
traders, lawyers, journalists, church groups, human rights groups and women’s
groups among
others.
______________________________________________
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hirrtHofAc5hZjfTXNg0QraCpO0A
2009
02 08
CAPE TOWN (AFP)
Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai appear to be
"getting along" as the dawn of their new unity government nears, South African
President Kgalema Motlanthe told media Sunday.
"They seem to be getting along
fairly well," Motlanthe said of the two Zimbabwe leaders, who are preparing to
formally share power under a regional-brokered deal after years of
feuding.
"We are optimistic that they can at least manage a transition period
until they are ready to hold fresh elections," Motlanthe said.
Tsvangirai is
set to be sworn in as prime minister on Wednesday under a power-sharing deal
South Africa mediated between the opposition leader and Mugabe in
September.
The pact aims to end almost a year of intense political turmoil
following disputed March 2008 elections, in which Tsvangirai's party seized a
parliamentary majority in the first round.
"Whether they like it or not, or
whether they like each other or not, they are bound to work together if anything
is to be passed by that assembly and if the country iself is to pull itself out
of poverty and disintegration of its infrastructure," said
Motlanthe.
Political analysts have said they doubt a union government will
work, citing a deeply-rooted lack of confidence between the two men.
Mugabe
has frequently referred to his adversary as a Western "lackey" or "puppet,"
while Tsvangirai has accused Mugabe, in power since 1980, of human rights
violations.
____________________________________________
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=11210
February 8, 2009
By
Our Correspondent
BULAWAYO
Striking teachers have vowed to defy the
government’s directive to report for work Monday.
Education of Ministry
permanent secretary, Stephen Mahere, announced on Thursday he would replace the
striking teachers by engaging student teachers on teaching practice, retired
teachers and other temporary teachers.
Takavafira Zhou, the president of the
Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ), however, dismissed the
government’s threats as laughable, saying teachers would not go back to work
until their grievances were met.
“The government is daydreaming if it thinks
teachers would be intimidated and rush back to work tomorrow (Monday),” said
Zhou.
“We are not going back until our grievances are met. They can fire us
all or throw us into jail. We cannot continue to work for peanuts. Enough is
enough.”
Schools failed to open for the start of the 2009 academic year on
January 27 after teachers refused to report for duty in protest at the
government’s refusal to pay their salary in foreign currencies.
Very little
learning took place at public schools in 2008 as teachers spent the better part
of the year striking for more pay or sitting at home because they could not
afford the bus fare to work on their meagre salaries.
The teachers are
demanding that the government pay them at least US$ 2,300 a month.
The PTUZ
said more than 35 000 teachers left the profession last year in search of
greener pastures in neighbouring countries, especially in South Africa and
Botswana.
The union says the country requires 150 000 qualified teachers for
effective teaching to take place but has plus or minus 75 000 teachers with
nearly half of them untrained.
Zimbabweans hope a government of national
unity between President Mugabe’s Zanu-PF, the Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC) led by Morgan Tsvangirai and an MDC breakaway party headed by Arthur
Mutambara, could pull the country out of its
crises.
______________________________________________
The Herald - 2009 02 09
THE Government has released the
list of basic commodities that can be imported duty-free for the six months
ending June 30.
This would, however, be reviewed depending on the expansion
of the country’s industrial capacity to satisfy the local market.
Acting
Minister of Finance Senator Patrick Chinamasa published the list in a Statutory
Instrument contained in last Friday’s Extraordinary Government
Gazette.
Presenting the 2009 National Budget late last month, Sen Chinamasa
said while it was critical that the country begins to restore domestic
production levels taking advantage of the liberalised currency and pricing
environment, there was need to support importation of basic goods as a
transitional arrangement.
"I, therefore, propose that we continue to
facilitate, over the short term, the uninterrupted availability of basic goods
in our markets by individuals and corporates.
"This will be reviewed taking
into account the developments and improvement in domestic industrial capacity
utilisation," he said.
List of Duty-Free Basic Commodities
* - Bath
soap
* - Beauty or make-up preparations and preparations for the care of the
skin (other than medicaments), including sunscreen or sun tan preparations;
manicure or pedicure preparations
* - Broken rice
* - Coconut cooking
oil
* - Cotton seed cooking oil
* - Flour of dried leguminous
vegetables
* - Flour of potatoes
* - Flour of sago or of roots or
tubers
* - Groundnut cooking oil
* - Husked (brown) rice
* - Laundry
bar soap
* - Liquid margarine
* - Maize (corn) flour
* - Maize cooking
oil
* - Margarine
* - Olive cooking oil
* - Palm cooking oil
* -
Palm kernel / babassu cooking oil
* - Petroleum jelly in other packings,
which is 5 litres and above
* - Petroleum jelly in packings not exceeding 5
litres
* - Rice in husk (paddy or rough)
* - Rye flour
* - Salt in
immediate packings of less than 5kg
* - Salt in other packing, which is 5kg
and above
* - Semi-milled/wholly milled rice whether or not polished or
glazed
* - Sesame cooking oil
* - Soyabean cooking oil
* - Sunflower /
safflower seed cooking oil
* - Toothpaste
* - Vegetable cooking oil
* -
Washing powder
* - Wheat/muesli
flour
______________________________________________
http://www.thezimbabwetimes.com/?p=11238
OPINION
February 8,
2009
By Tendai Dumbutshena
ROBERT Gabriel Mugabe has plenty to be thankful
for.
Next year he will clock 30 years in power - a feat in Southern Africa
only achieved by Angola’s President Eduardo dos Santos who got into power in
1979.
But the Angolan leader cannot derive much satisfaction from his record
since it was through naked force of arms that he attained it. Though imperfect
and blood-stained, Mugabe has the satisfaction of having subjected himself to
elections every five years since independence in 1980. Not even self-proclaimed
Life President Hastings Kamuzu Banda of Malawi achieved 30 years in power. Winds
of change which ended one-party rule in Africa in the early 1990s blew the
Ngwazi away.
It is indecent to predict when people will die. Suffice to say
if the Angolan leader kicks the bucket before Mugabe the record for longevity in
power in Southern Africa will be there for the Zimbabwean leader to take. Yet
only a few months ago, following his rejection by his people at the March 29,
2008 polls, the end seemed imminent.
Mugabe was on the ropes perilously close
to losing power.
His verbal outburst against a British journalist in Egypt
who questioned his legitimacy and right to attend an AU summit was evidence of a
man unhinged by realization that the end was near. With the brutality of his
regime laid bare for all the world to see and denied legitimacy by his African
peers, Mugabe’s prospects appeared bleak. At that moment of near death his
nemesis for the past nine years, the MDC, inexplicably came to the rescue. The
old warhorse was given a new lease of life to reign supreme for another five
years.
With the MDC hell bent on self-destruction and internal opposition
within Zanu-PF now non-existent, do not bet against Mugabe being in power for
the next ten years. Being of strong genetic stock and clean living habits the
octogenarian is likely to outlive his younger comrades in Zanu-PF touted for
many years as heir-apparents. These not so young princes are visibly ageing
fast. Timid and opportunistic they just play along hoping that one day Mugabe
will kick power their way.
Already there are desperate hopes that Mugabe will
announce his retirement at the Zanu-PF congress in December this year. Between
now and then these pretenders will do everything to curry favour with Mugabe to
put themselves in pole position to succeed him. It will all be in vain because
Mugabe is going nowhere. He is Zimbabwe’s undeclared Life President. In December
he will tell them that he has to see the unity government to its final stages.
He may even say the land revolution is still incomplete. He will say the
economic recovery programme needs his personal attention. In other words he is
not going anywhere.
As a Catholic Mugabe must thank God for his good fortune.
He must also thank his ancestral spirits for their benevolence. A huge party at
his home in Zvimba is necessary to thank his ancestors for their divine
intervention. His spirits thoroughly confused the MDC. The person he must,
however, thank most is an ordinary mortal like himself - Thabo Mbeki. There is
nothing Mugabe can do that can adequately reward Mbeki for saving his
presidency. This is even more so considering that Mbeki lost his political power
at home at a time when he was fully absorbed with saving a distressed
comrade.
From the year 2000 when Mbeki assumed the role of mediator in
Zimbabwe he only sought one outcome - Mugabe’s continued rule, He achieved this
on 11 September 2008 when the MDC - winners of the universally recognized March
29 combined elections - conceded power to Mugabe. Mbeki was so busy pushing
Mugabe’s agenda he could not see dark clouds gathering above him in his own ANC
party which ultimately consumed him. Had he sought to protect his power with
half the focus and tenacity with which he fought for Mugabe calamity would not
have befallen him. He drowned while trying to save a drowning comrade.
For
that Mugabe owes him big.
Here are a few suggestions on how Mugabe can show
his eternal gratitude to Mbeki. The starting point should be to grant full
Zimbabwean citizenship to Mbeki and his wife Zanele. Diplomatic passports for
the two would be in order. The Mbeki’s should have limitless free travel on Air
Zimbabwe wherever the national carrier can take them. Spending money should also
be provided with no need for them to account for expenditure.
These days no
self-respecting Zimbabwean has no farm. The Mbeki’s should be no exception. But
they will be no ordinary citizens so certain exemptions and privileges must
apply to separate them from the herd of A2 farmers. They should have title deeds
for their farm which will be managed by the Agricultural and Rural Development
Authority(ARDA). All farming costs will be borne by the state but gross untaxed
income will accrue to the Mbeki’s in hard currencies of their choice.
After
independence in 1980 the new Zanu-PF government showed its gratitude to various
leaders of frontline states by naming major roads and avenues after them. This
is simply not good enough for Mbeki. The least Mugabe can do is to name a city
after him. Bulawayo is the obvious choice. It is Zimbabwe’s second largest city
in a part of the country with close historical links with South Africa. Its
colonial name was not changed unlike other towns and cities. Name it after
Mugabe’s saviour and erect his statue in the city centre.
Sections of the
South African media have called Mbeki a philosopher king.
Zimbabwe must
recognise his stature as an eminent intellectual and scholar. Once the
University of Zimbabwe is restored to a decent institute of higher learning a
Mbeki School of Diplomacy must be established. It will be a veritable centre for
African scholarship. Intellectuals from all over the African continent and
Diaspora will present papers and theses on varied topics such as ; ‘Quiet
Diplomacy’, ‘Revolutionary Solidarity’, ‘ African Solutions For African
Problems’, and ‘Imperialism and its Running Dogs in Africa.’ Perhaps out of all
Mugabe can do for him this would be the gesture Mbeki appreciates most -
official recognition of his genius and towering intellect.
A national holiday
is also a universally acceptable way to acknowledge and reward greatness.
Declare 15 September ‘Thabo Mbeki Day’ to mark the occasion when the MDC
officially abandoned the struggle for democracy in Zimbabwe. On that day Mbeki’s
sacred mission to save Mugabe’s power bore fruit. It should be a holiday when
Mbeki is honoured in poetry song, dance and readings of his speeches on
Zimbabwe. School children must be taught about Mbeki’s immense contribution to
the defence of Zimbabwe’s sovereignty. As a personal and touching gesture Mugabe
should name Kutama Mission where his march to greatness really began after
Mbeki.
Even if more were to be done by Mugabe to show his gratitude to Mbeki
it would not be enough. Mugabe is now at the threshold of greatness in terms of
longevity in power. It is now conceivable that he can clock 40 years. Old age
makes it impossible for him to overtake Gabon’s Omar Bongo (42 years not out)
and Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi (40 years not out). But 40 years and a Southern
African record will do.
Viva MDC. Aluta
Continua.
______________________________________________
http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=526384
Published On
Sunday, February 08, 2009 11:46 PM
By Brighton Mudzingwa
To a mixed bag of
ululations and disappointments, Zimbabwe’s main opposition leader, Morgan
Tsvangirai, agreed to enter into a government of national unity (GNU) with
fellow opposition leader Arthur Mutambara and the controversial incumbent,
Robert Mugabe. Whatever the skepticism and whatever the argument, this deal is a
necessary evil.
This is not to say that those opposed to the deal are
misinformed. In fact, there is a very legitimate case to be made against this
deal. The power sharing deal was initially signed on September 15, 2008, between
Mugabe, Tsvangirai, and Mutambara after the disputed presidential election in
March of that year. However, Tsvangirai’s party has refused to implement the
agreement since September, demanding the cessation of human-rights abuses and
citing the unilateral and inequitable distribution of key cabinet positions by
Mugabe as a sign of insincerity. According to Tsvangirai, his party would not
have been treated as an equal partner under the original stipulations of the
agreement. The terms of the deal are somewhat improved with the opposition
obtaining control over the Finance portfolio and co-managing the critical Home
Affairs Ministry, among others.
In spite of these apparent improvements to
the deal, opponents argue that it provides Mugabe with a political lifeline and
could potentially sink Tsvangirai and the opposition into political oblivion.
Here, history is not on Mugabe’s side. For example, following catastrophic
political disturbances in 1987, Mugabe’s party, ZANU, signed a Unity Accord with
the then opposition leader Joshua Nkomo’s party, ZAPU. Although this accord led
to the end of political violence, many perpetrators went largely unpunished
while Nkomo and his party took largely ceremonial roles in the new government
setup. For these reasons, the opposition to the current deal is concerned
Tsvangirai may have been suckered into a deal with Mugabe not really intending
to give him real power. If this were the case, how then would Tsvangirai back
away and still remain credible?
There are legitimate concerns that perhaps it
would have been more advantageous for Tsvangirai to continue insisting on the
parity that this agreement does not achieve.
In our criticisms, however, it
is important to take note that Tsvangirai’s decision is consistent with the very
principle of democracy for which we clamor. After Tsvangirai had earlier yielded
to the current deal that was brokered by the Southern African Development
Community, it was up to the 60-member MDC national executive council to vote
either in favor of or against participation. After an intense and charged
internal debate that threatened to tear the party apart, the national executive
council voted for participation. This decision represents an immense ideological
shift by the MDC, a party that has always insisted on free and fair elections as
the highway to political office. Like it or not, the party’s decision has to be
respected. Simply, that is democracy.
At times, idealism has to take the
backseat and allow pragmatism to lead the way. This seems to have informed
Tsvangirai’s decision. The MDC and various pro-democracy forces have attempted
democratic change for over a decade. Yet these efforts have been brutally
thwarted by the Zimbabwean government through the introduction of draconian
laws, alleged human-rights abuses, and the skewing of democratic space against
the opposition, among other measures. Surely, the world should one day demand
accountability for these actions. Pragmatically, that time is not now. Mugabe
has no intention of exiting the political picture and forcing him out is simply
impractical.
Naturally, this left the opposition with very few alternatives.
The only plausible option was for the MDC to simply take the fight for
democratic change to a new scene, to a new platform: an imperfect unity
government. By agreeing to this compromise deal, Tsvangirai understood this.
Mugabe is as much a part of the solution as he is the problem.
Indeed, no
ruler should be allowed to mismanage a country and expect the world to fold its
arms. While the initiatives to address the Zimbabwe situation are very welcome,
one cannot overlook the fact that this deal rewards political violence and
repression at the expense of electoral popularity and acceptance. By endorsing
power-sharing agreements (first in Kenya and now in Zimbabwe), African leaders
have, in principle, set a dangerous precedent: dispute election results, hang
onto power, then negotiate into a compromise arrangement.
This arrangement
may be a painful pill to swallow, but history has shown again and again that, in
convoluted situations, compromise is sometimes bittersweet. Even Nelson Mandela
had to make painful concessions. If the opposition effectively capitalizes its
parliamentary majority and its dominance in various urban and rural councils
while remaining vigilant and principled in its delivery of duty, it will
certainly survive this arrangement and usher a new democratic disposition for
Zimbabwe. After all, this is a transitional government whose mandate is to
ensure socioeconomic stability and facilitate the country’s return to democracy
through free and fair elections-a means to an end.
This government will be
expected to expedite the crafting and adoption of a people-driven constitution
that restores both Zimbabweans’ freedoms and civil liberties while ensuring the
restoration of the rule of law, among other things. Will this inclusive
government succeed, or will it falter and betray the long-suffering
Zimbabweans?
Any guess is a good one- the jury is still out. In the meantime,
this deal should be given a chance. Zimbabweans have begun to dream
again.
Brighton Mudzingwa ’09 is an economics and African studies
concentrator in Adams House. He is co-founder of the Harvard College Africa
Business and Investment
Club.
______________________________________________
http://www.southerntimesafrica.com/inside.aspx?sectid=1919&cat=1
Southern
Times Writer/New Ziana.
Harare
All is now set for the establishment of an
inclusive Government in Zimbabwe after the country's Parliament on Thursday
passed Constitutional Amendment Number 19 Bill, which paves the way for MDC-T
leader Morgan Tsvangirai and MDC president Arthur Mutambara to be sworn in as
Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister respectively.
The Bill was expected
to be signed into law and gazetted by President Robert Mugabe on Friday. This is
part of the September 15 agreement entered into between Mugabe's Zanu-PF and the
two MDC formations.
Tsvangirai, Mutambara, MDC-T Deputy President Thokozani
Kupe, who will take up the other post of Deputy Prime Minister, plus members of
the new Cabinet are now expected to be sworn in this coming week.
The new
historic Government is expected to tackle social and economic problems that have
been bedevilling Zimbabwe for some time.
On Thursday, lawmakers from Zanu-PF
and the MDC, in both the lower House of Assembly and the upper house, the
Senate, unanimously endorsed the Bill in a rare show of unity across party
lines.
In the Senate 72 lawmakers who were in the House voted for its passage
with no votes cast against it.
The Lower House had earlier endorsed the deal
with all the 184 members who were present in the 210-member House supporting
it.
Under the SADC-brokered power-sharing deal, Mugabe will retain the
presidency, while Tsvangirai will be Prime Minister.
The parties will, among
other things, also share cabinet posts.
Presenting the Bill in the Senate,
Justice Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Patrick Chinamasa said the
passage of the deal would be historic as it ushered in a new era in the way
Zimbabwe was governed.
A lot of hurdles had been faced and compromises made
for the Bill to be acceptable to all parties, he said.
"It has been a long,
frustrating, erratic, bumpy and quarrelsome journey characterised by
animosities, disagreements, mutual dislikes, name calling, mutual demonisations,
vilifications of each other's policies and leaderships," Chinamasa told the
Senate.
"But notwithstanding the negatives, what is important and significant
is that we have managed to reach this far and for that we remain fore ever
grateful to our people and for their resilience, understanding and
support."
Chinamasa gave a brief account of how the negotiations between
Zanu-PF and the MDC began as way back as 2002 but had met various setbacks until
finally an agreement was signed last year.
Following the passage of the Bill,
"it was now time for the inclusive Government train to leave the station," he
said, to applause from Senators.
A representative of the Tsvangirai formation
of the MDC, Sekai Holland, chief's representative Chief Fortune Charumbira as
well as David Coltart of the smaller MDC faction told Senate it was vital for
all parties to the deal to support it, as it was one instrument which would take
the country forward.
Admitting that the Bill was imperfect, they all agreed
that it was the only viable solution to addressing the seemingly insurmountable
challenges Zimbabwe was facing.
"The Bill is flawed and has many potential
pitfalls but that is inevitable because what we are debating is a product of
compromise," said Coltart.
"This process will not work unless we listen to
each other."
The Bill has both permanent and temporary amendments of the
Zimbabwe Constitution.
The temporary amendments would only be in effect for
as long as the inclusive Government is in place.
Formation of the inclusive
Government has taken over five months after the initial signing of the
agreements as a result of hard line stances taken by both Zanu-PF and the MDC
over issues that the latter wanted addressed before joining the envisaged
government.
The Tsvangirai led MDC finally agreed to participate in the
Government last Friday. - Southern Times Writer/New
Ziana.
_____________________________________________
http://www.thezimbabwemail.com/Opinion/1509.html
By Don-Martin
Ropafadzo
08 February, 2009 11:43:00
By Don-Martin
Ropafadzo
OPINION
Zimbabweans have been swindled. And, to make matters
worse, the swindlers themselves are complaining that they didn't get a good
deal. The MDC is whining and complaining about its chosen partner as if they did
not know what ZANU-PF's intentions were from the very beginning.
I fail to
understand how these party people reach their decisions and if they discuss
anything at all.
Real grassroots people consultations, like we used to see in
Morgan Tsvangirai's old ZCTU days, have been discarded.
It appears as if the
MDC's national executive, its highest decision making body, seems to now be
rubber stamping decisions ZANU-PF style.
In September of last year, the MDC
carelessly signed an agreement without having covered or addressed all the
contentious issues that were paramount to the setting up of and the
implementation of a Government of National Unity (GNU). The agreement was
supposed to direct and safeguard the operations of the GNU. That agreement was
never implemented because those outstanding issues the MDC ignored when they
signed were the very same ones that caused problems; and they continue to do so
after yet another SADC Summit. At the Pretoria Summit, Tsvangirai was, once
again, quick to accept the SADC directive without the full information that came
with it and, apparently, without much consultation, causing mumblings from
within his negotiating team.
There were rumblings of discontent and rumours
started circulating to the effect that the main MDC was itself split in two over
the SADC directive. Then we cheered when we heard that there would be a meeting
of its national executive, but we became immediately discomfited when we were
told that the meeting would be taking place that very Friday, hardly three days
after the SADC meeting, meaning that there was not going to be deeper or
widespread consultations and the people's views over such a serious and
extremely important issue would not be given a chance to be heard.
MDC
national treasurer, Roy Bennett, whom we all believed was in great danger if the
ZANU-PF goons ever got close to him, surprisingly flew into Harare from exile in
South Africa like someone returning from a safari.
Yet, we, however, know
that in spite of this agreement, there are people who would never see tomorrow
if they so much as set foot in Zimbabwe today.
Bennett, like many senior MDC
officials, is free in Zimbabwe today but many MDC supporters and junior
officials are either in jail or underground, along with human rights activist
Jestina Mukoko and many MDC people who are being held for, among other things,
supporting a party whose National Treasurer Bennett is.
In simpler words,
ZANU-PF is giving freedom and protection to MDC leaders but continues to arrest
and incarcerate MDC supporters or those perceived to be such.
Is it not
ZANU-PF's slogan that mwana we nyoka inyoka chete?
(A baby snake is a
snake).
The MDC is being duped and those at the top of the MDC hierarchy are
smiling as they are treated as royalty because ZANU-PF wants sanctions lifted.
ZANU-PF wants MDC leaders minus their supporters. Am I missing something
here?
The SADC Summit, the MDC's reaction to the directive imposed on it and
the aftermath of the whole exercise prove beyond any doubt that the MDC thinks
as it walks instead of taking just a little time to chew an issue over,
searching for the right decision and giving people a chance to also offer some
input.
It continues to allow itself to be rushed and they make fatal
mistakes.
For a few days after the summit, the MDC was busy denying and
deflecting rumours of deep divisions within their camp. And then suddenly,
everyone was talking unity and reiterating their combined desire to join the
government of national unity, based on the September 15, 2008 agreement. In a
statement after the meeting of his national executive last Friday, Tsvangirai
himself said that, sadly, Zanu-PF was not the type of constructive and positive
partner that he envisaged when he signed the GPA.
"Let us make no mistake, by
joining an inclusive government, we are not saying that this is a solution to
the Zimbabwe crisis, instead our participation signifies that we have chosen to
continue the struggle for a democratic Zimbabwe in a new arena..." said
Tsvangirai.
This means that the MDC has always known that joining hands with
ZANU-PF offered no solutions but they are saying that they are choosing "to
continue the struggle in another arena". Apparently, an arena infested with
ZANU-PF and one in which we, the people, are not invited.
"We in the MDC are
convinced that there is no intention on the part of ZANU-PF to put all these
issues to rest," said Nelson Chamisa, Secretary for Publicity and Information,
hardly a week after jumping into bed with ZANU-PF.
Chamisa went on to concede
that there is no wish, on the part of ZANU-PF, to consummate an inclusive
government in line with SADC resolutions.
"In short, there is no wish to
tackle the outstanding issues as directed by the SADC Heads of State," he
said.
But they are the ones knocking and hammering on the door to be let into
their own house.
After being fooled by Mugabe and ZANU-PF and after being
duped into signing a fraudulent document and after Mugabe refused to implement
the agreement, am I to believe that there was ever a time that the MDC actually
believed they could trust and work with Mugabe and ZANU-PF?
Are these people
in MDC leadership like the rest of us?
Do they see what we see and hear what
we hear?
Just how can they be so naive?
Now the MDC is back to its routine
of always complaining as if SADC cares; as if the so-called African Union, now
under the 'leadership' of one Muammar Gaddafi, cares. Does the MDC expect any
one of these tyrants to hear their unceasing complaints against Mugabe and act
on them?
There is absolutely no way ZANU-PF and the MDC can jointly run a
ministry together, let alone a country. There are some who say the MDC did the
right thing so as to expose that it is ZANU-PF that is not willing to compromise
and show willingness to cooperate. That, of course, is nonsense. ZANU-PF made
its intentions public during the March elections and the MDC knows
it.
ZANU-PF refused to cooperate and it is the MDC that is always cooperating
with ZANU-PF and not the other way round.
The people knew all about ZANU-PF
and that is why they voted for the MDC.The MDC should have simply refused to
join this GNU thing. The MDC has clearly sold the people out.
It's called
treachery.
Is this what the people have been waiting for all these
years?
Is this the best the MDC can offer its staunch supporters many of whom
have died for it?
Apart from their well-known ability to complain, what does
the MDC offer the people now?
What does the MDC intend to do with Mugabe and
his war crimes?
The MDC cannot forgive Mugabe on behalf of the people, can
they?
Are they then going to protect Mugabe, Chiwenga, Mnangagwa, Shiri,
Chihuri and all the known murderers from not only the Zimbabwean people but from
the international community who are screaming genocide every day?
Is the MDC
going to tell the world that it has such a big heart that it can have hundreds
of its supporters killed by one man who has killed thousands of other citizens
that it can still forgive that man?
If, for example, because of joining this
government, Roy Bennett demands and gets his farm back, is he going to take it
knowing that 10's of others were killed for simply owning farms and not for
opposing Mugabe the way Bennett did?
The MDC must revise its sellout
decision. I thank Botswana's Ian Khama for his principled stand and support. I
hope he keeps supporting the people of Zimbabwe if, as it appears, they feel
betrayed by the MDC.
I thank Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania and Zambia's Rupia
Banda for trying to show African despots that the people of any nation come
before the leaders.
SOURCE: Mmegi
Online
______________________________________________
http://www.zimonline.co.za/Article.aspx?ArticleId=4223
by
Simplicious Chirinda
Monday 09 February 2009
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Harare
Zimbabwe Health Minister David
Parirenyatwa said on Sunday that a unity government would recall senior doctors
from private practice to government hospitals to try to revive the public health
sector.
President Robert Mugabe, opposition leaders Morgan Tsvangirai and
Arthur Mutambara will form a unity government this week to try to tackle
Zimbabwe’s unprecedented economic and humanitarian crisis.
"When the health
sector restarts we are going to recall all senior doctors and all those in
private practice to come and serve in our public health institutions for three
to six months," said Parirenyatwa, who was speaking yesterday at the funeral of
one of Zimbabwe’s first black surgeons, Abraham Harid.
The public health
sector, once among the best on the continent, has collapsed due to years of
under-funding and mismanagement while thousands of doctors, nurses and other
skilled professions have left the industry for abroad where salaries and working
conditions are better.
Those that have remained behind have spent
considerable time out of hospital wards, in the streets protesting for more pay
or sitting at home because they could not afford bus fare on the meagre
salaries.
The collapse of the public health - that services the majority of
Zimbabweans - has helped worsen a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 3
000 people since August, with many of the victims unable to get treatment either
because there were no drugs in state hospitals or because there were no nurses
and doctors.
In a bid to retain workers the Ministry of Health and Child
Welfare has allowed international donors to pay allowances to health workers in
foreign currency to try to lure them back to hospitals.
Health workers
started receiving allowances in hard cash from last
week.
ZimOnline
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http://www.thezimbabwemail.com/zimbabwe/1511.html
09 February,
2009 12:55:00
AFP
Morgan Tsvangirai and Robert Mugabe Harare - Zimbabwe's
new unity government looks hamstrung even before the new leaders take office
this week, analysts said on Monday, raising doubts over whether they can end a
crushing humanitarian crisis.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is set to
be sworn in on Wednesday as prime minister, with long-time ruler Robert Mugabe
remaining as president.
South African President Kgalema Motlanthe said that
so far the two rivals "seem to be getting along fairly well".
"We are
optimistic that they can at least manage a transition period until they are
ready to hold fresh elections," he told South African media.
But analysts
said the union was a shotgun wedding that Tsvangirai only agreed to after coming
under enormous pressure from regional leaders frustrated at the long months of
stalemate.
"The levels of mistrust between the two main principals will
remain irreversibly high, leading to threats of pulling out as well as
manoeuvres to get fresh elections as soon as is politically possible," said
Takura Zhangazha, director of the Zimbabwe chapter of the Media Institute of
Southern Africa.
Sealed deal
While African leaders are throwing their
weight behind the unity government, Western powers are reticent, with Washington
and London saying they want to see improvements in the running of Zimbabwe
before they will lift a travel ban and asset freeze on Mugabe.
"It will never
achieve total international support in its current form and therefore will be
unable to address the political and humanitarian crisis effectively," Zhangazha
said.
The deal was sealed on Thursday after nearly seven years of talks and a
series of disputed elections.
Tensions came to a head last March, when
Tsvangirai won a first-round presidential vote and his Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) captured a majority in parliament.
That unleashed a new wave of
the political violence that has shaken Zimbabwe since Mugabe's first defeat at
the polls in a referendum in 2000. Most of the victims have been opposition
supporters, leading Tsvangirai to pull out of the presidential
run-off.
Mugabe declared a one-sided victory denounced by Western powers,
sparking months of frenzied lobbying by South Africa to win the power-sharing
deal now finally set to take effect.
MDC lame ducks?
The Harare-based
independent political analyst Martin Tarusenga said that Mugabe has tried to
dictate the terms of negotiations throughout the years of talks, and that the
unity government would not last without international support.
"Judging by
statements made from the West so far, the international community is not seeing
it as an inclusive government," he told AFP.
"Tsvangirai and his MDC are now
looking like lame ducks so the international community will not support the
inclusive government," Tarusenga said.
"There is just no trust. Tsvangirai is
buckling from SADC pressure and the pressure from weaker MDC negotiators, those
people in the MDC who believe they have fought a good fight."
The Southern
African Development Community (SADC) has pushed for the deal as the best way to
end Zimbabwe's stunning economic collapse, with hyperinflation soaring to
astronomical heights.
Only six percent of the workforce actually has a job,
more than half the population needs emergency food aid, and a cholera epidemic
is raging unchecked, claiming more than 3 300 lives.
Political analyst
Bornwell Chakaodza said he feared that if the unity government failed,
Zimbabwe's crisis could still get even worse.
'A violent
uprising'
"Failure of the inclusive government will be an indication that
there can no longer be a negotiated and peaceful settlement to the Zimbabwean
political conflict," Chakaodza wrote in his weekly column in the Financial
Gazette on Friday.
"The alternative would be a violent uprising whose
consequences we dare not imagine," he said.
Zhangazha said he feared that
rivals within the government would spend more time feuding within the government
than working to solve the nation's problems.
The main issue "will really be
about the politics, and about outmanoeuvring each other, even at the expense of
the masses", he said. -
AFP
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http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=935438
Moses
Mudzwiti
Published: Feb 09, 2009
Prisoners sometimes get one meal a day.
There is not enough food so they mostly depend on visitors for food
Prison
warders at Zimbabwe’s Chikurubi Maximum Security prison are up in arms because
they have been turned into part time grave diggers.
Since October the giant
prison, which houses more than 2,000 inmates, has been burying dead inmates in
the prison grounds.
"Our bosses just tell us this week it is our turn to dig
graves," complained a warder at the prison.
Others said they were more
concerned about the high number of deaths at the prison.
Bodies wrapped in
blankets are placed in a disused storeroom on the floor.
"We don’t have a
mortuary so the bodies decompose badly before they are buried," said another
warder.
The fortress-like prison once held a group of South African
mercenaries arrested en route to West Africa, where they allegedly planned to
take part in a coup.
Presently, human rights activist Jestina Mukoko is being
held at there. The director for the Zimbabwe Peace Project, who faces charges of
recruiting a policeman to oust President Robert Mugabe, is being held in
solitary confinement.
Prison authorities took the decision to bury dead
inmates in the prison yards because of the long periods it sometimes takes to
communicate with relatives of the deceased.
Owing to food shortages and lack
of adequate medical care fatalities at Chikurubi have risen sharply in the last
few months. On average a prisoner dies everyday at the prison.
There were now
about 200 inmates buried at the prison. Privately prison officials are worries
and they are prepared to exhume bodies if relatives make such a request.
"We
can just keep bodies on the floor," said an exasperated official who only spoke
on condition he was not named.
Prison records indicate that the majority of
deaths were caused by severe malnourishment - a condition doctors have described
as pellagra.
"Prisoners sometimes get one meal a day. There is not enough
food so they mostly depend on visitors for food," said a warder who lives on the
prison premises.
Until a few weeks ago the prison had no water, but the Red
Cross moved in and saved the situation by bringing water tanks.
Chikurubi has
been spared from the cholera outbreak which has killed more the 3,700 people in
Zimbabwe since August.
"It’s traumatic seeing prisoners with severe scabies.
They have sores on their arms and backs."
He said grave digging duties were
driving his colleagues out of their jobs.
"They are leaving they can not take
it anymore."
Prison deaths are not limited to Chikurubi. Harare Central
prison was hit by the cholera outbreak which killed more than 20 inmates in
December.
In better days the Harare Central Prison had a compliment of about
240 warders, but a mass staff exodus has left seen numbers dwindle to less than
100.
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http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/09/2486274.htm
By
Marian Turner
2009 02 06
Pic: A Zimbabwean child suffering from cholera is
treated at the Budiriro Polyclinic in Harare. (AFP: Desmond Kwande)
At least
1,000 people a day are currently arriving at the border town of Musina on the
Limpopo River, attempting to flee the political violence in Zimbabwe and cross
into South Africa. Many of them are suffering cholera and over 5 per cent of
those infected are dying of the disease.
The river, the second-largest in
Africa, has become infected with water-borne cholera bacteria, and the disease
has spread into South Africa, Mozambique, Zambia and Botswana. This cholera
outbreak is an unfortunately apt example of how political instability can
undermine hard-earned progress in public health.
Zimbabwe has been in a state
of political and social turmoil since disputed presidential elections were held
in March 2008. There was local and international condemnation of the lack of
transparency in the voting process and the violence that accompanied the
elections. A power-sharing agreement between President Robert Mugabe and
opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was declared in September. Although brokered
with the aid of regional leaders, this agreement has been greeted with
scepticism by the international community and the political situation in the
country remains volatile.
The cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe began in August
2008 and remains ongoing. The outbreak is attributable to this period of
heightened political and social instability and the associated economic crisis.
Cholera was first reported in urban areas, where months of sporadic violence had
led to infrastructure collapse, resulting in a lack of clean water and basic
sanitation. By November, most hospital wards in the capital Harare were no
longer functioning. The disease has since spread to all of Zimbabwe's 10
provinces and humanitarian agencies are running 172 cholera treatment centres.
The current wet season is set to exacerbate this situation. The United Nations
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA) is presently
monitoring and reporting on the situation. Their estimate of the disease toll at
6 February 2009 was over 3,300 deaths, with approximately 70,000 cases of the
infection.
The Zimbabwean Government declared a state of national emergency
in December, in a grudging admission of the seriousness of the cholera epidemic.
The health minister called for international help, stating that the country
required drugs, medical equipment and financial assistance to draw striking
doctors and nurses back to work.
The situation in Zimbabwe is an example of
an infectious disease outbreak that should not have to happen. Such widespread
and lengthy outbreaks of preventable and treatable diseases simply should not
occur in any country in the 21st Century. Although cholera is endemic in much of
sub-Saharan Africa, adequate sanitation prevents most infections. Furthermore,
if treated with oral re-hydration salts and drugs, only approximately 1 per cent
of cholera-infected people die. However, these basic prevention and treatment
routines can collapse with frightening ease and rapidity. The World Health
Organisation estimates that the mortality rate during the current outbreak to
5.7 per cent, rising to 50 per cent in remote areas, as a result of the
combination of poor nutrition and sanitation, lack of access to treated water
and high rates of HIV infection in Zimbabwe.
Cholera is one of a number of
infectious diseases that were once widespread and devastating but are now able
to be much better controlled, under stable circumstances. Significant progress
is being made in combating infectious disease, with vaccine and drug
development, vaccine delivery programs and health education initiatives. This
progress has been expedited by the increasing contributions of corporate
philanthropists. These funding initiatives have the power to facilitate fast and
tangible changes to the health, expected life span and education level of people
in many developing countries, with positive ramifications for the economies of
these countries.
Yet just as control of some infectious diseases has
improved, other problems have emerged. Increasingly, aid efforts are being
focussed on vaccine and treatment delivery, health education programs and
management of emerging and re-emerging chronic infections such as HIV and
tuberculosis. However, these programs cannot operate effectively when people are
struggling to survive outbreaks of acute infections like cholera, and aid
funding and human resources are preoccupied with emergency responses to these
outbreaks.
Outbreaks of infectious disease like cholera will continue to
occur. Natural disasters also cause collapses of infrastructure that lead to
such events. This is always unfortunate and worthy of emergency aid responses.
However, while infectious disease outbreaks as a result of political instability
and war are equally regrettable, the futility of their cause is particularly
distressing. A civil population afflicted by preventable and treatable
infectious diseases does not further anyone's cause, even that of an
extraordinarily damaging regime such as Robert Mugabe's. Not only do these
epidemics cost lives and dollars, they also undermine ongoing efforts by
governments and aid organisations to implement vital programs that aim to
improve public health.
Civilian suffering as the result of political
instability is rightly condemned by the international community. However, the
role of infectious disease in this suffering is inadequately recognised. Further
progress in the prevention and treatment of emerging diseases cannot be achieved
without a stronger emphasis on the necessity of avoiding preventable outbreaks
of existing diseases like cholera. The link between politics and infectious
disease epidemics needs to be more definitively publicised if vital public
health programs are to succeed.
Marian Turner is a researcher in the
Immunology Division of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical
Research
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•••••••••••••••••••••••
From a Reader:- Laugh or Cry?
- Check out
this “journalistic gem” below for denial and real ‘applied intellectually
capacity’.
[ See Footnote:
]
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WESTERN METHODS OF FARMING
KILL AFRICAN
AGRICULTURE
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http://www.southerntimesafrica.com/inside.aspx?sectid=1924&cat=8
The
Southern Times ( aka - The Herald in Namibia )
Opinion &
Analysis
Sunday, February 08, 2009
By Olley Maruma
With a global food
crisis hanging over our heads, telling world leaders how urgent it is to
introduce radical land reform in the world's agriculture, particularly in the
developing world which needs to feed most of the world's 850 million hungry
people, has become a cliché.
With experts predicting that world demand for
food will double in the next 25 -50 years, the world needs a major paradigm
shift in the way it treats agriculture, especially in Africa and the rest of the
developing world. This is why what has been happening in Zimbabwe in the last
ten years is of such vital importance to so many people.
The biggest problem
with Zimbabwe's economy at the moment is that there are no reliable statistics
to give anyone an accurate impression of what is going on in some its key
sectors.
The consequences of this national deficiency are most glaringly
obvious in the agricultural sector which has become a political football for
people with conflicting political agendas.
Statistics on agriculture are
scanty and subject to manipulation by those who want to advance their political
objectives.
These days we are often told ad nauseam that Zimbabwe used to be
southern Africa's breadbasket and is now a basket case, a claim that, like all
propaganda spin, is not strictly true.
Yes Zimbabwe had large surpluses of
maize and other grains in the 1980s and 1990s, but the country has always been a
net importer of rice, wheat and other agricultural products.
On one side of
the propaganda war is the anti-Mugabe Zimbabwean white lobby, which has largely
been master minded by the country's former white farmers through the Commercial
Farmers Union and the Justice for Agriculture lobby group. Being well connected
and powerful, this group has been very adept at getting its message strategic
media exposure in all the crucial places in the world where global power is
exercised.
Since most of its strategists are foreign and white, to give its
face a veneer of credibility, it has enlisted in this crusade, black members of
Zimbabwe's opposition and other compliant blacks to provide what are supposed to
be the bones and meat of their arguments.
In this quest, one of its important
strategies has been to create the conventional wisdom that without major white
involvement in Zimbabwe's agricultural sector, it will never recover or prosper
again.
We are told that Zimbabwe's agricultural sector has shrunk by 50
percent in the nine years since its government embarked on its land reform
programme, which of course is given more derogatory names by its
detractors.
According to Deon Theron of the CFU 50-70 percent of the
reduction in output for most agricultural products in those nine years has taken
place in the former white large commercial sector.
Hit most by this massive
loss in output have been the production of food grains, small grains,
traditional exports and oil seed crops. In the beef sector, Zimbabwe has failed
to meet its export quotas to the EU for several years.
As agriculture has
declined jobs have been lost and industries once supported by the agricultural
sector have closed down or scaled down their operations.
What is interesting
about Zimbabwe's 2009 agricultural season is that the same people who have been
arguing that Zimbabwe's agriculture cannot prosper without the involvement of
its former white farmers began making predictions as far back as October 2008
that come April or May this year, the country would have no harvest to talk
about.
Considering that dry land farming depends on good rainfall, something
that is in the hands of God, it was either an act of desperation or extreme
courage to make such predictions.
The initial salvos of the propaganda
campaign were fired by the so called independent media in articles claiming that
Zimbabwe's 2009 agricultural season should be written off because it was going
to be a complete disaster.
Despite assurances from the government and Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe that they were lining up enough essential inputs and materials
to cultivate 500 000 hectares of land, Trevor Gifford, an official of the CFU
was reported in The Standard,
The Harare Tribune and Voice of America saying
that there was only enough seed to plant about 40 000 hectares of maize compared
to the 1 million hectares needed for national needs.
On January 10 2009, the
Zimbabwe Standard carried an article by Renson Gasela, the MDC's Deputy
Secretary for Publicity and Information and Secretary for Lands and Agriculture
in which the opposition politician wrote: "There has been a lot of talk about
the Champion Farmer programme where we have seen lots of distribution of so
called in-puts to supposedly many farmers across the country.
"We have been
told that 500 000 hectares were put under the programme and that this would
produce 2 000 000 tonnes of maize."
Gasela then predicted that less than 500
000 tonnes of maize would be produced this season, leaving a shortfall of 1.5
million tonnes for domestic requirements.
The question is who is lying,
Renson Gasela of the opposition or the Government of Zimbabwe?
And if so, why
would the Government lie and lay itself open to much condemnation if these
predictions turn out to be true.
Apart from the conflicting statistics of
what is happening on the ground, this is one of Zimbabwe's biggest problems.
Gasela is an opposition politician hoping to be put in a position where he might
one day have to spearhead the recovery of Zimbabwe's agricultural sector.
Yet
he refers to Government assistance to small scale farmers in the form of seed
packs, fertilizer, and farming implements as "so-called inputs" and the
recipients as "supposedly many farmers."
What proof does one need that these
are not the words of a man who sees himself a leader in waiting?
Going on
limb Gasela predicted: "Zimbabweans will continue to starve until at least April
2010. Nothing can be done to change this.
"The sooner this is realised the
better because plans need to be put in place now," to import food and plan for
better production in the future. If this is all the assurance Zimbabweans can
get from the "agricultural expert" of the opposition which seeks power to rule,
what hope do its starving masses have?
The problem with the predominantly
white lobby that has been trying to reverse Zimbabwe's land reform programme is
that knowing very well that at the Lancaster House Conference the leadership of
the Patriotic Front demanded from the British what was tantamount to a land
revolution in Zimbabwe after independence, they have simply buried their heads
in the sand and tried to pretend that the problem would simply vanish one day.
It hasn't. Perhaps, wisely or foolishly, they thought that Zimbabwe's war
veterans would be wiped out by Aids and the matter would simply cease to be a
hot political potato, one cannot say.
When the governor of Zimbabwe's Reserve
Bank decided to help in the mechanisation of the country's agricultural sector,
the same people were opposed to the progamme, arguing that what he was doing was
not sound monetary policy!
If one looks at the performance of the
agricultural sector from 1980-90, one will notice that the biggest increases in
maize and cotton production came from the communal farmers on poor soils in the
former tribal trust lands. So how can propagandists of the lobby against
Zimbabwe's land reform progamme try to argue that Zimbabwe has not produced
enough maize for domestic consumption in the last few years, not because of
droughts but ZanuPF's land reform programme?
This sort of naked lying and
deceit will not help these people's cause.
There is no doubt that Zimbabwe's
agricultural sector needs massive investment in order to for it to achieve its
full potential. Much of that investment is needed to mitigate the effects of
successive droughts and floods from climate change.
The future of Zimbabwe's
agricultural sector is inextricably bound up with the country's political
fortunes. Because of that a great deal of store is already being put on a new
inclusive government bringing agriculture back on stream. This is how one
blogger put it: "The new government will be offered advice from all quarters-
consultants from around the world will arrive by the plane load and the donor
community and foreign think tanks of all persuasions will forward their
preferred plans and programmes."
This is one the problems in the relationship
between the North and the South: the assumption that people in the North know
what is good for those poor destitutes in Africa. This has been one of the
impediments to African development for a long time. A while ago I gave the
example of the failed Lake Turkana fish project in Kenya which collapsed after
the Norwegians had ploughed in millions of dollars.
As it is African
agriculture has largely been destroyed by a wholesale adoption of Western
methods of farming which have not always been suitable for the places where they
are adopted.
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*
Footnote:-
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as
Mad-Cow Disease (MCD), is a fatal, chronic, neurodegenerative disease affecting
the central nervous system disease. It causes a spongy degeneration in the brain
and spinal cord and also causes red eyes. Mental capacity always diminishes.
Disorder of the mind is
typical.
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