FinGaz
Clemence Manyukwe and Charles Rukuni
Staff Reporte
PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe last week tested the loyalty of
senior ZANU-PF
officials said to back Simba Makoni by approaching each one of
them to sign
his nomination papers that were submitted to the Nomination
Court last
Friday, The Financial Gazette can reveal.
The law requires
a presidential candidate’s nomination to be signed by at
least 10 people in
each of the country’s 10 provinces.
Anxious about reports that some of his
most senior lieutenants,
disillusioned with his decision to stand for another
term, secretly
supported Makoni, President Mugabe had each of the key figures
said to be
plotting his downfall specifically approached to put down their
signatures
to endorse his candidacy.
Vice President Joice Mujuru,
Mashonaland East governor Ray Kaukonde and
ZANU-PF national chairman John
Nkomo are among those who signed the
nomination papers.
Sources said
politburo members Dumiso Dabengwa and Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, the
Information
Minister, were also approached. However, they declined to affix
their
signatures to the nomination papers, in the latest show of defiance.
ZANU-PF
stalwarts in Matabeleland, angered by the President’s alliance with
war
veterans’ leader Jabulani Sibanda, have opted not to run in the polls.
Nkomo,
Dabengwa, Bulawayo governor and resident minister Cain Mathema,
former
cabinet minister Angeline Masuku, and Vice President Joseph Msika,
are not
seeking election, despite new legislation curtailing President
Mugabe’s
authority to appoint non-constituent legislators to the House
of
Assembly.
The President no longer appoints non-elected members to the
lower house,
although he can still make six non-constituency Senate
appointments.
It is widely expected that Msika will take one these six
seats.
“To establish where people stand, it was directed that politburo and
central
committee members in each province should sign. They were effectively
being
asked to state in writing that they were dumping Makoni and sticking
with
(President) Mugabe. What better way to do that than by signing your name
on
the President’s nomination form,” a source said.
“Between now and
election day, none of these will come out and back Makoni.
We are likely to
see more and more of them rallying behind (President)
Mugabe.”
This week,
the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission declined to release the list of
people who
had nominated presidential candidates, saying the documents
were
“confidential”.
In a related development, President Mugabe’s backers
have employed a media
campaign to smoke out his rivals, approaching each of
Makoni’s reported
backers to compel them to publicly declare their
allegiances.
This week, Kaukonde was quoted in The Herald as distancing
himself from
Makoni.
Last week, Manicaland governor Tinaye Chigudu was
forced into making similar
remarks, although a Herald columnist at the
weekend doubted his sincerity.
Last week, Makoni submitted his papers to the
Nomination Court as an
independent candidate to challenge his former boss, in
a poll also contested
by Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan
Tsvangirai.
Reports have consistently suggested that Makoni has the backing
of a ZANU-PF
faction led by Solomon Mujuru.
At the weekend, state media
sought to counter revelations made by Makoni, in
an interview with The
Financial Gazette last week, that he had told
President Mugabe during their
meeting on January 21 that there was growing
pressure within ZANU-PF for
fresh leadership.
Analysts said the failure by ZANU-PF heavyweights in
Matabeleland to stand
in primary elections would pose headaches for President
Mugabe.
ZANU-PF officials in Bulawayo confirmed that Vice-President Msika,
Nkomo and
Dabengwa were not contesting but could not explain why.
There
has been widespread speculation that all three had been expecting that
a new
party, the United Front, would be formed to challenge President
Mugabe. The
formation of the front, however, collapsed because both factions
of the MDC
were not prepared to accept someone without a party structure to
lead
them.
Supporters of Morgan Tsvangirai had vowed that they would not vote if
he was
not the leader of any new political formation while those from the
Mutambara
faction wanted a united front after the elections with everyone
bringing
what he or she had to the bargaining table.
While Makoni was
widely expected to lead the united front, some people in
Bulawayo were
lobbying for Dabengwa to lead it because of his
liberation
credentials.
Makoni was forced to go it alone as an independent
candidate. He was
expelled from the ruling party a week after announcing that
he would contest
the presidential elections but still insists he is a member
of ZANU-PF.
This has sparked speculation that some ZANU-PF candidates
contesting
parliamentary elections, especially in constituencies where there
are two
party candidates, are backing Makoni.
MDC die-hards, however,
insist Makoni is a ZANU-PF decoy brought in to give
the elections some
credibility after the opposition had threatened to
boycott the
polls.
Makoni says he is not aligned to anyone.
The presidential elections
are a four-way race pitting Makoni, Tsvangirai,
President Mugabe and little
known Langton Towungana.
Sources within ZANU-PF said there were a number of
reasons why Msika, Nkomo
and Dabengwa had opted not to contest the elections.
One of the main reasons
was that each one knew he could not win.
Another
was that it was better for them to sit on the fence, as they would
benefit
from either a Mugabe or a Makoni win because they had not abandoned
President
Mugabe but were, at the same time, sympathetic to Makoni.
Either of the two
could accommodate them, if they won, because the president
still had the
right to appoint six candidates as senators.
“Msika did not have to contest
as he did not want the humiliation of being
defeated by a junior,” a party
insider said. “Apart from fearing defeat,
Nkomo did not have to contest
because he is national chairman. He might lose
the post of Speaker, but he
will remain national chairman. More importantly
he will remain in the
Presidium and would therefore be dictating what
happens in Parliament until
at least the 2009 party congress. Dabengwa too
is happy just being in the
politburo. What they don’t want is to face
humiliation by their
juniors.”
Some of the senior ZANU-PF officials from Bulawayo have entered the
race
despite having been beaten in the last two elections. Information
Minister
Sikhanyiso Ndlovu is pitted against long time rival Milton Gwetu,
who has
already beaten him twice in Mpopoma.
Obert Mpofu, the Industry and
International Trade Minister, who won in 2005
has stayed put in Umguza while
Sithembiso Nyoni, a perennial loser, has
shifted to a rural constituency in
Nkayi.
The toughest and most interesting battle in Bulawayo, however, will
be
between Thokozani Khupe and Welshman Ncube who will fight it out
in
Makokoba.
Khupe is the vice-President of the Tsvangirai faction while
Ncube, who most
people believe is the de facto leader of the Mutambara
faction, is the
faction’s secretary-general.
FinGaz
Njabulo Ncube Political
Editor
ZANU-PF is in a serious quandary over how to deal with party
renegades that
submitted nomination papers to stand against candidates
endorsed by the
ruling party’s leadership.
The ruling party is anxious
to punish those who did not toe the party line
but fears any heavy-handed
response might exacerbate the chaos, dividing it
further and hand support to
unexpected rival Simba Makoni.
Up to six constituencies in Masvingo have
double nominations for ZANU-PF,
while there is more bickering in Manicaland,
as tensions in the fractious
party remain high.
The scale of open defiance
has taken President Robert Mugabe, who together
with other members of the
ZANU-PF presidency personally vetted aspiring
candidates to represent the
party in the March 29 polls, aback.
While such defiance under normal
circumstances would be punishable by
instant expulsion, President Mugabe is
being forced to bend his party’s own
rules to save it from further turmoil.
Elliot Manyika, the party’s national
commissar and national elections
director, this week held several highly
charged meetings at his offices at
the ZANU-PF headquarters in Harare to
consider the fate of the alleged
rebels, amid calls from hardline war
veterans to expel them the same way
Makoni was kicked out last week.
However, no solution had been found to the
crisis as of yesterday, save for
Manyika’s suggestion that the party hold
re-runs or “ask the unofficial
candidates” in affected constituencies to step
aside.
It is understood hardliners in ZANU-PF, specifically secretary for
legal
affairs Emmerson Mnangagwa and information and publicity chief,
Nathan
Shamuyarira, the two ruling party stalwarts who announced
Makoni’s
expulsion, want the rebels fired as per the rules and regulations of
the
central committee, the policy-making arm of ZANU-PF.
According to the
regulations, proclaimed by Shamuyarira as he announced
Makoni’s expulsion to
the media, any party member who elects to stand
against an “official”
candidate automatically “expels him or herself” from
ZANU-PF.
But the
party has not found it that easy to apply that rule.
The rebels had obviously
done their homework, registering themselves as
ZANU-PF candidates, and not
independents, which has only complicated matters
for the ruling
party.
Party secretary for administration, Didymus Mutasa, is said to agree
with
Manyika that outright dismissal of the renegades would hurt the
party,
facing the toughest threat to its unity in years.
“In areas where
the party feels there is minimum threat of mass defections
that could have a
bearing on the votes cast, people have been told to stand
down for candidates
officially endorsed by the presidium,” said a ZANU PF
insider who spoke on
condition of not being named.
Mutasa said in an interview with The Financial
Gazette yesterday: “We have
already mentioned that some had genuine
grievances. We are dealing with that
and I am sure we will find an amicable
solution. There is no need for people
to panic because there is no cause for
that. We know what we are doing.”
In Masvingo Central House of Assembly
constituency, Edison Zvobgo Jnr.
registered to contest against the official
ZANU-PF candidate, Edward Mhere.
Dzikamai Mavhaire and Maina Mandava both
registered to contest on a ZANU-PF
ticket for the Masvingo senate seat, while
Finance Minister Samuel
Mumbengegwi registered as a ruling party candidate to
challenge Josaya
Hungwe in Chivi-Mwenenzi.
Tranos Huruva and Clifford
Mumbengegwi were registered as the two ZANU-PF
contestants for the Chivi
North House of Assembly seat.
In Mutare, Eunice Mangwende-King openly defied
ZANU-PF when she stood to
challenge official candidate Oppah Muchinguri, the
Minister of Gender and
Women’s Affairs.
In Makoni West, former diplomat
Nation Madongorere, has been asked to stand
down for Joseph Made despite
thumping the Agriculture and Mechanisation
Minister in party
primaries.
Madongorere has registered himself as a ZANU-PF candidate, as did
Bongayi
Nemayire and Sheila Mahere in Makoni North.
The decision of Vice
President Joseph Msika, politburo member Dumiso
Dabengwa, and ZANU-PF
national chairman John Nkomo not to offer themselves
as ZANU-PF candidates in
the elections has not helped matters for a party
desperate to present a
united front.
Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, Obert Mpofu, Sithembiso Nyoni, Kembo Mohadi
and Tshinga
Dube, the chief executive of the Zimbabwe Defence Industries, are
the only
notable ZANU-PF politicians from Matabeleland contesting the
elections.
FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News
Editor
INFLATION has broken the 100 000 percent level, official data
showed
yesterday, marking a grim new low in Zimbabwe’s deepening economic
crisis.
The Central Statistical Office reported inflation rising 100
580.2 percent
in January, up from 66 212 percent in
December.
Month-on-month inflation in January slowed 119.3 percentage points
to 120.8
percent from December’s 240.1 percent, but this was not enough to
hold the
economy back from plummeting to new depths of hyperinflation.
The
new data reveals the depth of the economic crisis, which is a major
issue in
the campaign for next month’s elections .
The new annual figure is a massive
34 638 percentage point higher than its
level in December, but still lags
private estimates, many of which gauge
inflation at over 300 000
percent.
Official data on inflation is largely based on the prices of goods
and
services under price controls. Even though official prices themselves
have
surged over the past month, many believe official numbers remain
largely
understated.
In his monetary policy statement in January, central
bank governor Gideon
Gono pledged to curtail a range of subsidised lending to
industry and farms
critics say has fueled inflation.
He also lifted rates
225 percentage points to 1200 percent, but conceded
that wider economic
reform was needed to stem the tide.
Gono said the economy needed to “deploy a
combination of demand management
policies, supported by structural reforms as
well as deliberate strategies
to invigorate the supply side of the
economy”.
Late last month, the Reserve Bank issued a new range of notes, the
largest
of which is the $10 million note, hoping to end a four-month cash
crisis.
At the time, Gono put daily cash demand at between $7.5 trillion and
$10
trillion, and said $170 trillion was in circulation, “which by
Zimbabwe’s
economic standards is way too high”.
However, Gono’s most
telling revelation was that the printing press at
Fidelity Printers was
running at close to capacity, and yet still struggling
to sate demand for
cash.
There was no immediate official comment from government yesterday, but
a
senior government official conceded to The Financial Gazette that
he
believed “it will be very hard to slow inflation down any time soon,
given
the momentum it has picked up” over the last quarter.
But with
difficult elections on the horizon, economic affairs are likely to
be placed
on the back burner.
The inflation data come as the National Incomes and
Pricing Commission
(NIPC) is cracking down on manufacturers and retailers it
accuses of
diverting commodities to the thriving black market despite getting
“viable”
price reviews from the state-run pricing body.
Industrialists
yesterday said some NIPC crack teams were asking
manufacturers of cooking
oil, cement, sugar and maize meal to furnish them
with a list of retailers
they supplied with products and then make a follow
up on how they would have
traded the commodities.
NIPC chairman Godwills Masimirembwa yesterday
confirmed the blitz saying the
pricing body had dispatched its team of
inspectors to crackdown on four
industries namely cement manufacturers, grain
millers, oil expressors and
sugar producers it accuses of flouting the
country’s trading laws.
Masimirembwa charged that traditional hardware shops
were not receiving
cement supplies and accused cement manufacturers of
diverting cement to
traders who were charging prices above the government
controlled retail
price of $108 million per bag.
“There are some dubious
cement retail companies whose credentials you are
not able to identify. Those
are getting larger allocations. There is
something wrong with that,” said
Masimirembwa.
Meanwhile, the money market, which burst into an unprecedented
surplus last
week, remained awash with cash, pushing stocks higher and
punishing the
frail domestic currency on a thriving parallel foreign currency
market.
Money market dealers said there were huge cash injections, coming
mainly
from government expenditure related to the March 29 harmonised
elections, on
the money market.
As a result, investors were scrambling for
stock and foreign cash to hedge
themselves against the defenceless local
currency, under increasing pressure
from escalating inflation.
Although
the Zimbabwe dollar remained stuck at an exchange rate of $30 000
to the
greenback, it lost significant ground on the parallel market, where
it
plummeted to an all-time low of $10.1 million to a United States
dollar,
against $7,5 million to the greenback last week.
Other
international currencies had moved in line with the benchmark US
dollar rate
on the parallel market, where reports suggested some state-owned
enterprises
were scrounging for foreign currency to meet national
obligations.
The
parallel market remains outlawed in Zimbabwe, despite the fact
that
government agencies frequently resort to the market for foreign
cash.
In fact, the pricing of services in a number of state enterprises is
based
on the parallel market rate.
Stocks rallied during the week, with
the industrial index gaining by over 18
percent on Monday and adding a
further 3.46 percent on Tuesday to reach 2
790 473 067.35 points.
The
mining index lost gains registered on Monday, shedding 2.51 percent
on
Tuesday to 2 517 729 908.85 points.
However, it rebounded yesterday,
registering a 2.41 percent to touch 2 578
481 367.94 points
The industrial
index yesterday gained 0.16 percent to reach 2 794 964 291.65
points.
FinGaz
Stanley Kwenda Staff
Reporter
ZIMBABWE civil society organisations are exploring possible ways
of
detecting vote rigging in next month’s presidential, parliamentary
and
council elections.
The organisations, many of which prefer not to
be named at this stage, say
they might participate in a programme to come up
with a parallel vote
monitoring exercise in a bid to forestall electoral
fraud. The organisations
are weighing views on how Parallel Vote Tabulation
(PVT) can best be
implemented for the first time in Zimbabwe.
PVT is an
election–monitoring method for projecting voting results. It is
best known in
the United States as a “quick count”.
Under the system, all information or
election data comes from direct
observation of the election process.
Observers watch the voting and counting
processes at specifically selected
polling stations.
They then record key information on standardised forms and
report their
findings, including vote count at polling stations, to a central
data
collection centre.
This process can make independent monitoring of
election results possible as
the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC)
announces them.
Shupikai Mashereni, the ZEC director of public relations this
week said the
commission would not forbid any election monitoring done within
the confines
of the law.
Said Mashereni: “If the exercise they are
launching is about observing
elections, it is allowed, but they have to come
to us for accreditation. The
law doesn’t allow them to monitor the election
process without being
accredited and if they insist we just refer to the law
and the law, as it is
now, does not allow for that.”
Well–placed sources
within the civic society this week told The Financial
Gazette that
discussions on the possibility of implementing the system are
still at a
preliminary stage.
“There are discussions going on, though at this stage it’s
something still
at its formative stages,” said the source.
Since the
deeply flawed Nigerian election last year, the way elections are
conducted in
African countries has dominated the news, and the post election
violence in
Kenya where more than 1000 people have so far been killed will
draw more
global attention to other elections to be conducted on the
continent this
year.
Critics say the electoral field in Zimbabwe remains heavily skewed
despite
efforts by the Southern African Development Community to get ZANU–PF
and MDC
to agree on constitutional reforms.
According to sources, the
election–monitoring pressure group, the Zimbabwe
Election Support Network
(ZESN), has been touted to lead the process, which
will also involve a number
of other civic organisations and church groups.
ZESN co–ordinates election
related activities through member organisations.
But ZESN director, Rindai
Chipfunde, said the organisation has a different
mandate and will not commit
itself to this cause.
“It will be good to have such a programme, but as ZESN
we are not involved
because we have a different mandate. It is also a very
expensive exercise,
which needs a lot of manpower, such as election monitors,
observers and
enumerators to tabulate results,” she said.
“We only use
Sample Based Monitoring and communications. Once we have
decided to use PVT,
we will announce it publicly.”
African countries such as Kenya have used PVT
as an election–monitoring tool
with support from organisations such as the
Institute for Education in
Democracy, National Council of Churches of Kenya,
Catholic Justice and Peace
Commission. In Malawi the programme has been
spearheaded by the Church and
Non–Governmental Organisations.
A PVT is
basically conducted to thwart electoral fraud, which is detected
by
identifying inconsistencies between official results and observer
reports.
Crisis in Zimbabwe Coordinator, Xolani Zitha, says it would be a
good idea
to have in place such a mechanism before elections.
“It’s
important to put in place such electoral fraud minimisation systems,
we would
welcome any such initiative,” said Zitha.
The Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human
Rights (ZLHR), which has embarked on a
programme to ensure that all voters
and would- be voters are accorded their
right to vote says the media should
crusade for such programmes to be put in
place to minimise post election
disputes.
“It’s the duty of the media to help put in place such important
electoral
frameworks by highlighting their use in ensuring the dispensation
of
democracy,” said Irene Petras, acting ZLHR director.
FinGaz
Clemence Manyukwe Staff
Reporter
“WHEN we come back to this house, we will come back with a
package, which
includes resolutions of all the issues, which have divided us
over the last
eight or so years. That is our hope, Mr. Speaker, and it is in
that context
that we stand before this august house today, taking that step
into the
dark.”
The speaker was Welshman Ncube, a member of the
Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC)’s negotiating team in talks with
ZANU-PF, making a contribution
in Parliament in support of Constitutional
Amendment Number 18 on September
20 last year.
He added: “We believe that
we cannot continue to conduct politics for the
sake of politics. We believe
that we must begin to conduct our politics in
the service of the people,
otherwise it is meaningless.”
The amendment came about as one result of the
Southern African Development
Community (SADC)-brokered talks between ZANU-PF
and the MDC, mediated by
South African President Thabo Mbeki.
With
Parliament being dissolved on March 28, a day before the elections,
the
“package” Ncube envisaged that fateful day in September last year has
proved
elusive.
This week, Ncube said in addition to the breakdown of the
talks over the
government’s unilateral announcement of an election date,
ZANU-PF had
disregarded a string of pledges it made under agreements that
facilitated a
range of new legislation designed to ensure free and fair
polls.
Changes were made to the Public Order and Security Act (POSA), the
Access to
Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) and the
Broadcasting
Services Act (BSA).
“Whatever is in the AIPPA amendment has
not been implemented. Whatever is in
the BSA has not been implemented,” Ncube
said.
South African foreign affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma this week
said
free elections were possible if the reforms were “implemented
now”.
But today The Financial Gazette traces some of the key agreements
and
highlights how flagrantly they continue to be violated by ZANU-PF and
state
institutions.
The Electoral Process
The Electoral Laws Amendment
Act section 15A says of the provision of voter
education by the Zimbabwe
Electoral Commission (ZEC): “Not later than ninety
days before polling day in
any election, the Commission shall begin a
programme of voter education
directed at the electorate in the election.”
Last week, ZEC barred
independent groups from conducting voter education,
even though its own
education campaign is barely discernible on the ground.
On Monday, the
Christian Alliance said it was “concerned that ZEC appears
not to be
adequately prepared to handle the harmonised elections. The time
allocated to
the inspection of the voters’ roll has been inadequate.
Information has not
been properly disseminated and most of the electorate
has no access to the
media”.
Section 21 of the same Electoral Act says of the Inspection of
voters’
rolls: “Every voters’ roll shall be a public document and open to
inspection
by the public, free of charge, during ordinary office hours at the
office of
the Commission or the constituency registrar where it is
kept.”
However, last week, an aspiring MDC councillor for Mt Pleasant,
Brighton
Chiwola, was obliged to file an urgent court application to have his
rights
restored after being hindered from inspecting the roll.
Registrar
General (RG) Tobaiwa Mudede was forced to admit that what had
happened to
Chiwola was unlawful and explained that those who wanted to
inspect the
voters’ roll could do so at the constituency registrar, or at
the RG’s
office, even though the law does not allow Mudede to be involved in
the
process.
On demonstrations and protests, the amended POSA says “if a
regulating
authority receives credible information on oath that there is a
threat that
a proposed procession, public demonstration or public meeting
will result in
serious disruption of vehicular or pedestrian traffic, injury
to
participants in the procession, public demonstration or public meeting
or
other persons, or extensive damage to property or other public disorder,
he
or she shall forthwith advise the convener of the perceived threat
and
invite the convener to a consultative meeting at a time and venue
specified
by the regulating authority in order to explore options to prevent
the
threat, and shall afford an opportunity to the convener to
make
representations thereon to the regulating authority.”
This week,
police in Masvingo unilaterally banned rallies in the province.
On January
23, police cracked down on opposition activists as they walked to
the venue
of a court-authorised rally in Harare. Opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai
was seized from his home at 4am. Earlier, police had banned a
planned march
by the MDC.
Last week, Tsvangirai told journalists in South Africa that
Mbeki’s
mediation had failed as police in Zimbabwe still used trumped up
charges to
ban opposition rallies.
“Nothing has changed,” Tsvangirai,
said.
“Just this past weekend, an MDC rally, legal in any democracy and now
legal
in Zimbabwe, was broken up by armed riot police in Kadoma. Changes in
the
law, negotiated by President Mbeki, have not changed the behavior of
the
dictatorship.”
The process of the demarcation of boundaries and the
setting of the
nomination date have been chaotic and have shown that
government was not
prepared for the elections, as revealed in a suit jointly
filed by
independents Jonathan Moyo and Margaret Dongo.
Equal Access to
Public Media
According to the Electoral Laws Amendment Act, there should be
impartial
reporting by the public broadcaster.
The Act says in section 16C
(1) that public broadcasters shall ensure “fair
and balanced allocation of
time between each political party and independent
candidate”, and that “each
political party and independent candidate is
allowed a reasonable opportunity
to present a case through the broadcasting
service concerned”.
But far
from this happening, over the past week, the Zimbabwe
Broadcasting
Corporation (ZBC) has gone full throttle into campaigning for
ZANU-PF.
In its latest report, the Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe
(MMPZ)
observed that the state media’s news coverage remains slanted.
“As
in previous weeks, ZANU-PF electoral preparations continued to receive
more
attention in the government media than all its opponents combined.
For
example, of the 48 stories ZBC carried on the subject, 43 were on
ruling
party activities and only five on the opposition.”
Part one of the
BSA stipulates requirements for public broadcasters. It
says: “The
broadcasting service operated by a public broadcaster shall
provide news and
public affairs programming, which meets the highest
standards of journalism,
and which is fair and unbiased and independent from
government, commercial or
other interests.”
According to the MMPZ, “the government media carried little
information on
voter education. Their 26 reports on the topic (ZBC 11 and
press 15) were
piecemeal and failed to critically assess Zimbabwe’s capacity
to hold free
and fair elections on March 29.”
On the composition of a
broadcasting board, the BSA Amendment Act, section 4
says the BSA’s
operations shall be led by a board comprising 12 members “of
whom the
following nine members shall be appointed by the President after
consultation
with the Minister and the Committee on Standing Rules and
Orders: three
members shall be appointed by the President from a list of six
nominees
submitted by the Committee on Standing Rules and Orders.”
However, the
Parliamentary committee has not been consulted. Several major
agreements were
reached on AIPPA, including the establishment and
composition of the Zimbabwe
Media Commission (ZMC), to replace the Media and
Information
Commission.
The ZMC, according to AIPPA, provisions, “shall consist of a
chairperson and
eight other members appointed by the President from a list of
not fewer than
12 nominees submitted by the Committee on Standing Rules and
Orders.”
Once again, the committee has not been consulted.
Reforms to
broadcasting laws also sought to ease the entry of new players
into the
industry. But no new applications for licenses have been invited
and the
ZBC’s monopoly remains intact.
FinGaz
Njabulo Ncube Political
Editor
WITH three strong candidates locking horns in the Presidential
election next
month, debate on the possibility of President Robert Mugabe
being forced
into a second round of voting has gained
currency.
However, that eventuality depends on how the veteran
nationalist responds
between now and March 29 to the threat posed by his two
opponents, Morgan
Tsvangirai and Simba Makoni.
According to amendments to
the Electoral Act made in 2002, a candidate needs
a clear majority, or at
least 51 percent of the total vote, to be declared
the winner.
Should no
candidate garner this required majority, a run-off would be held
within 21
days. In the event of a stalemate remaining after this,
Parliament, sitting
as an electoral college, will vote to elect a President.
Before the 2002
amendments, a candidate only needed a simple majority to be
declared the
winner.
Analysts who spoke to The Financial Gazette, noting the support all
three
candidates are likely to enjoy, see President Mugabe needing to
work
overtime to avert the possibility of a run-off.
“In terms of the
Electoral Act, a run-off is provided for, but in terms of
the politics and
the political culture around this election, I do not see
the incumbent
allowing the situation to go as far as a run-off,” said
political analyst
Takura Zhangazha. “I think the incumbent is clearly aware
of the threat of a
run-off, but he might use other processes, such as
rigging or intimidation,
to eliminate it. I certainly do not see the
incumbent allowing himself to be
embarrassed by a run-off.”
There is fear in ZANU-PF that Makoni could chew
off a large chunk of the
ruling party’s support, mainly consisting of those
disgruntled with
President Mugabe’s continuing hold on power, leaving the
incumbent to face a
second round.
However, the question is, which of his
two opponents is most likely to push
President Mugabe to the wire.
An
insider aligned to the Tsvangirai faction of the Movement for
Democratic
Change (MDC) said his faction’s permutations point to a run-off
pitting
President Mugabe and their candidate.
The official said: “Our
permutations show that President Mugabe will come
out the winner in the first
round, but without a clear majority, followed by
Tsvangirai. Makoni will come
a distant third.
The official said the basis of his forecast was that Makoni
would “eat into
(President) Mugabe’s rural vote”.
In terms of the urban
areas, the opposition analyst predicted that Makoni
would only erode the
ZANU-PF vote and a “trickle” of the Arthur Mutambara
faction’s support. The
faction threw its weight behind Makoni last week.
“Makoni will not take much
of the Tsvangirai vote. So the final presidential
run-off will result in
Tsvangirai winning, in that those voters who voted
for Makoni will switch
their votes to Tsvangirai, as (President) Mugabe is
the common enemy. The
President will also lose some of the votes he would
have gained in the first
round.”
But Zhangazha said such projections were too simplistic. “The
incumbent is
working overtime to ensure that scenario does not happen. He has
all the
state machinery in his favour to do that.”
Gorden Moyo, executive
director of Bulawayo Agenda, a pressure group, said
the probability of
pushing the President into a second round depends on how
much rural support
Makoni can lure.
“The run-off will only take place if Makoni goes to the
rural areas and
mounts a successful campaign to convince ZANU-PF supporters
to vote for his
independent candidacy,” said Moyo.
“As long as Makoni is
fishing from the same pond, that is, targeting
Tsvangirai’s votes in the
urban areas, it is really unlikely there will be a
run-off.”
But Moyo said
a divided MDC gave President Mugabe a major advantage in the
race, and that
only “total rebellion against him in rural areas” would block
him from
gaining a clear majority.
“So, for a run-off depends on Makoni moving away
from fishing in the pond,
but in the ocean in rural areas, where the
incumbent has his stronghold,”
Moyo said. “Makoni should deliver the rural
vote, especially in Mashonaland,
which since Independence has kept
(President) Mugabe in power despite the
majority of the people there
wallowing in poverty.”
ZANU-PF insiders however, fear that Makoni could
feature in the run-off,
from whichever way one looks at.
They said voters
in the rural areas, the bedrock of ZANU-PF’s support, might
warmly welcome
Makoni as “part of a reformed ruling party” and ditch
President Mugabe in the
process. The former finance minister still maintains
that he is part of
ZANU-PF despite the party’s pronouncements that Makoni
expelled himself when
he offered his candidacy for the top office.
Makoni, ZANU-PF insiders say,
might also attract a sizeable number of
voters, particularly among the
intellectuals, youths, business and those who
think the MDC has failed to
bring about political change.
“His colleagues, who remain within ZANU-PF’s
ranks would also hype the
momentum for Makoni by weakening the party from
inside and throwing votes in
Makoni’s way,” said a ZANU-PF insider.\
FinGaz
Rangarirai Mberi News
Editor
THESE are really strange times, especially if you are Morgan
Tsvangirai.
One day you are coasting along just fine, nose in the air
lest the unwashed
masses offend the royal nostrils.
You are bathed in the
glow of the lucrative “Zimbabwe opposition leader”
prefix, showing everybody
the scars of March 2007, which you wear like a
gleaming badge.
Then,
suddenly, some fresh-faced upstart arrives, out of ZANU-PF, of all
places, to
suddenly grab the spotlight.
Even the state media are reserving their
choicest abuse for this new guy,
only mentioning you when you throw your own
barbs at the new kid on the
block.
Now, your already tenuous relevance
looks decidedly wobbly. What do you do?
“I am the leader of the MDC,”
Tsvangirai told reporters last Sunday, just to
make sure they knew exactly
who he was.
“(Simba) Makoni is nothing more than old wine in a new bottle,”
he said.
On the roll, Tsvangirai continued: “Dr Makoni has been part of
the
establishment for the last 30 years and has witnessed our
country
deteriorate to this unprecedented level. He is equally accountable
as
(President) Robert Mugabe for the omissions of ZANU-PF.”
Tsvangirai is
well within his rights to take digs at his opponents; it’s all
part of the
game. And indeed, Makoni still has many questions hanging over
his candidacy
and strategy. He may yet even do poorly at the polls.
But Tsvangirai fails to
do one important thing for himself — a bit of
self-examination.
Evidently,
Tsvangirai is so deep up to his eyeballs in self adoration he
hasn’t found
the time to come back up to the real world, look in the mirror,
and ask
himself some hard, honest questions.
Tsvangirai needs to ask why there has
been so much public excitement —
justified or not — over this “old
wine”.
Why are people looking right past his MDC, and gobbling up every scrap
of
news they find on Makoni?
Have people suddenly become mindless ingrates
who forget the personal
sacrifices Tsvangirai has made?
For the answer,
Tsvangirai need not look further than the utter bankruptcy
of his own
leadership.
In 2000 and 2002, on a wave of anger against President Mugabe’s
dismal
administration, Tsvangirai had ZANU-PF on the ropes, getting nearly
half of
the seats at the general election and 43 percent of the vote in
2002.
Then came 2005, and this motley band of interests came apart.
When a
vote of Tsvangirai’s top executive on the senate election went
against him,
that whole model democrat façade fell.
Next thing we knew, ZANU-type thugs
were being sent out to whack those who
dared oppose “the
president”.
ZANU-style bigotry took root; just as ZANU-PF saw a grubby old
British hand
behind every critic, so did the MDC see shifty CIO agents behind
every door.
Tsvangirai was reading from the ZANU-PF rule-book; the thugs, the
refusal to
accept criticism, the bands of sycophants, each rewarded only in
proportion
to how low they were prepared to stoop for their leader.
Now,
see how even all that “Gushungo” tribal baloney has been carried to the
MDC
rallies, where Tsvangirai comically sways to fawning odes to his
clan
name.
As Welshman Ncube candidly conceded last year, “in the course
of fighting
the monster, there was the danger of becoming the
monster”.
Many had looked past the many indiscretions of the MDC, arguing
that the
bigger job at hand was to get rid of President Mugabe and his
ZANU-PF. These
were times when voters simply put their “X” on the MDC and
ignored the
quality of the candidate.
And so the MDC began to talk of
“safe” constituencies, signs of complacency.
The MDC began to put on an air
of entitlement.
Roy Bennett, a Tsvangirai ally, wrote in a letter to a South
African
newspaper at the weekend that Zimbabweans knew that the genuine
opposition
was only that whose leaders had “suffered with the people”.
In
other words, Tsvangirai alone is entitled to challenge ZANU-PF. Not
because
he has any competence, but because he has scars.
Rather like President
Mugabe’s belief that his own sacrifice in the
liberation struggle entitles
him to do as he pleases. As for the rest of us,
well, we should all be
grateful for their sacrifices, keep quiet, and let
these two owners of our
struggles be.
So how are we to tell the MDC from ZANU-PF?
Many — outside
the diehard fringe of the MDC of course — had been patient,
defending the
MDC, hoping sense would one day prevail. But the final straw
was the MDC’s
failure to unite, especially because the reason for that
failure was not some
grand ideological dispute, but because there were petty
chieftainships to be
protected.
Tellingly, listening to MDC activists speak over the past two
weeks, it is
Makoni they now want to beat. Tsvangirai just has to keep his
“Zimbabwe
opposition leader” mantle. Beating President Mugabe is a secondary
priority.
None of Tsvangirai’s people have stopped to ask why their man, with
nine
years in the trenches, is having to fight for attention with a man who,
up
to only three weeks ago, sat in the ZANU-PF politburo.
Tsvangirai’s
groveling “kitchen cabinet” will not tell him this, but this
excitement over
Makoni — some of it, admittedly, over the top — is because
voters have
scanned the existing field and found that, increasingly, the two
options
previously available differed only in the depth of their depravity.
FinGaz
The quality of a
parliamentarian must never be measured by the size of
his
wealth
Parliamentary elections are around the corner and much
excitement can be
felt in the atmosphere. On March 29 2008, Zimbabweans
across the political,
tribal, racial and social divides will march towards
polling stations to
exercise their right to elect leaders of their
choice.
My advice to eligible voters is that this time around, they must
vote with
their minds rather than their emotions as has been the case in the
past.
This I say because I have learnt over the years that there appears to
be
appalling ignorance among the electorate on why they elect leaders.
A
regrettable and unfortunate tendency by contestants to win people's
favour
through dishing out horrible, false promises of developmental projects
in
exchange for votes has persisted.
The victims of these well designed
and timed falsehoods have always been
both urban and rural voters who have
been fed mouthfuls of tacit lies,
exaggerations, fiction, impossibilities and
myth.
Around this time, exaggerated generosity, only common at election time
by
contestants, especially those from the ruling party, multiplies to the
point
of overt bribery.
Despite relatively high numbers of voters coming
forward to exercise their
right to universal franchise, it appears the
majority of the electorate
misunderstands the role their Members of
Parliament play.
Others have in the past voted merely because of impulse, or
because they saw
others voting, or because they just wanted to see their
adored politician in
parliament, or mostly because they were promised dams,
roads, bridges,
schools, clinics, electricity, and any other false grandiose
projects the
gullible and comical politicians thought of
promising.
Therefore, it appears the culture of misrepresenting is now
entrenched, and
parliamentary contestants fully exploit it to ensure access
into parliament,
at election periods.
In terms of our constitutional
set–up, it is not parliament that plays the
role of building schools, dams,
or bridges.
The construction of infrastructure and capital projects is a role
that is
thrust into the hands of the executive and not the
legislature.
Further still, it is not the role of an individual
parliamentarian to
finance projects in his constituency, unless out of
natural benevolence and
out of his own resources he does so. Treasury does
not, and will never
allocate funds directly to parliament to ensure that
parliamentarians get
funding for their so called projects in various
constituencies, such an
institutional structure or process is non existent in
our law.
However, it is not at all surprising that parliamentarians fighting
for
votes deliberately twist facts to take advantage of people's lack
of
sophistication and knowledge to mislead them for the sole purpose of
going
into parliament.
Contesting parties and their members must ensure
that people are elected, on
the basis of their maturity, wisdom, integrity
and ability to articulate the
concerns of their electorate rather than the
ability to make the highest
number of grandiose promises.
The quality of a
parliamentarian must never be measured by the size of his
wealth, but rather,
by his commitment to transparency, fairness and
community development, among
other things.
In terms of clearly laid down provisions of our constitution,
parliament has
two main roles to play. These are the legislative one as well
as that of
scrutinizing the performance of the executive.
A
parliamentarian therefore plays a significant role in overseeing the
passage
of development oriented, just and democratic laws through
parliament. Through
the committee system members of the parliament monitor
the conduct of the
various arms of government to ensure that abuse of public
funds or the any
other manifestations of corruption are curbed. This
scrutiny process involves
the investigation by parliamentarians of certain
government departments,
publishing of reports on performance of those
departments, making
recommendations as well as making cabinet ministers
account for their
decisions.
The way to go for parliamentarians is perhaps to make promises
based on the
overall performance of one's political party. It would not be
wrong for a
contestant to campaign through pointing to some tangible
developments
brought by his party in national or local development. Serious
questions
will have to be raised about the bona fide of a contestant if he or
she
claims personal credit for government projects or goes a step further to
lie
that he shall build bridges, or set up clinics and schools, when the
truth
points to the fact that he lacks capacity and ability.
The body or
bodies with constitutional mandate to do administrative work and
undertake
infrastructural development is government through cabinet,
governors,
provincial councils, district councils and local councils in
urban areas.
Implementation of development projects is therefore done by
these organs and
not parliamentarians. However, it must be noted that the
role of some
governors, and cabinet ministers overlap into legislature. Thus
they play a
dual role of being both lawmakers and implementers of projects.
Only cabinet
members who are constituency parliamentarians may to some
extend justifiably
promise that they will cause certain infrastructure to be
set up for their
electorate.
The public needs to be educated thoroughly about the true
role of
parliamentarians to ensure that their vote is exercised wisely. There
is no
justification whatsoever for allowing a larger portion of the
electorate to
participate in an election they hardly know of its
significance. It appears
such a development favors the government because an
ignorant or
unsophisticated voter, especially the rural voter may easily be
manipulated
to further the interests of the incumbent political organization
as has
happened in the past elections.
An electoral process that has
an electorate with little or no knowledge of
the meaning of a vote is
dangerously flawed. It is both undemocratic and
fallacious. People need to
benefit from voter education to enable them make
informed choices about
individuals they want to represent them in
parliament.
By Vote
Muza
Legal practitioner with Muza & Nyapadi
Email: muzalaw@yahoo.co.uk
FinGaz
James D.
McGee
THE citizens of Zimbabwe will go to the polls on March 29 to choose
their
representatives for public office. Despite concerns about whether
conditions
in Zimbabwe are propitious for free and fair elections, I urge
all
Zimbabweans to exercise their rights and vote.
Effective democracy
places demands on citizens as well as on governmental
institutions.
The
SADC Principles and Guidelines outline what governments of member states
must
do to hold democratic elections, and include such critical factors
as
assuring freedom of association, equal access to state media,
equal
opportunity to vote, and independence and impartiality of
electoral
institutions.
On the other side of the equation, though,
democracy requires that citizens
participate.
Democracy cannot flourish
unless at election time the people educate
themselves about their choices and
express their preferences by voting.
Democracies rest upon the principle that
government exists to serve the
people; the people do not exist to serve the
government.
The people are citizens of the democratic state, not its
subjects. As such,
they enjoy liberties, but they also bear
responsibilities.
In an immediate sense, voting is the means by which
citizens hold government
accountable and make their views heard on matters of
policy. In a broader
sense, though, the act of voting is an important element
in the defence of
liberty.
In the American Declaration of Independence,
Thomas Jefferson set forth a
fundamental principle upon which democratic
government is founded when he
noted that “we hold these truths to be
self-evident, that all men are
created equal, that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain
inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty
and the pursuit of
happiness.
“That to secure these rights, governments
are instituted among men, deriving
their just powers from the consent of the
governed.”
Governments in a democracy do not grant the fundamental freedoms
enumerated
by Jefferson; governments are created to protect those freedoms
that every
individual possesses by virtue of his or her existence.
But
unless citizens vote, government can assume the consent of the governed
and
abrogate unto themselves powers above and beyond those necessary to
secure
the rights of the citizenry.
It is understandable that voters in Zimbabwe may
find obscure this linkage
between liberty and the act of voting. Past
experience may engender
skepticism.
Moreover, a growing chorus of voices
is expressing doubt about the coming
poll.
My government shares the
concerns expressed in recent weeks by a wide
variety of organisations about
the pre-election environment, including
reports of voter confusion and
inadequate preparation, evidence of
irregularities associated with
registration and inspection of the voters
rolls, and concerns that the
violence of the past year will inevitably
affect the campaign and
election.
Despite all these ominous signs, however, we urge all Zimbabweans
to vote.
While the Zimbabwean people do not have the power alone to ensure
that
democracy prevails, it will surely not prevail unless they play their
part.
James D. McGee is the Ambassador of the United States of America
in
Zimbabwe.
FinGaz
Kumbirai Mafunda Senior
Business Reporter
What hope is there for Zimbabweans as prices keep
skyrocketing?
RAVAGING inflation, which accelerated to 66 212.3 percent
year-on-year in
December from 26 470.8 percent in November, is forcing
Zimbabweans to forgo
even the most basic necessities.
Prices of basic
commodities, such as toothpaste, toilet paper and bath soap,
are now beyond
the reach of many.
A packet of cheap quality toilet tissue, which cost about
$3 million three
weeks ago, is now priced at $15 million, while bath soap now
costs $15
million, up from around $5 million at the start of February.
“We
are faced with an unpleasant choice. Imagine having to forgo such
basics? I
can forgo lunch or breakfast but not brushing my teeth or
bathing,” said
Tamuka Shoko, a nurse at Harare Hospital.
Yet many, faced with the
ever-declining value of the domestic currency, now
consider some of these
basic items luxuries.
That is how bad the situation has become, as citizens
battle for survival.
At times they even scramble for poor quality food as
their incomes are
insufficient to purchase ISO-certified products.
Harare
resident Farai Ncube says his family now buys beef from backyard
butcheries
and he has taken to drinking cheap alcohol to drown sorrows.
Prior to this
dramatic turn of events, Ncube used to drink lager beer, whose
price now
makes it a luxury for him.
“We have resorted to eating odd relish and buying
from backyard butcheries.
Some of the food we are eating is taboo in our
culture,” says Ncube, a
father of four.
The most enterprising workers have
increasingly turned to not-so-pleasant
deals to supplement meagre incomes. At
times their superiors turn a blind
eye on them especially if they are going
to benefit as well.
Workers selling commodities to colleagues to supplement
incomes have often
turned workplaces into markets.
It is not uncommon to
find workers going to work clutching baskets or
carrier bags containing
cakes, buns, sweets, imported cooking oil, sugar and
clothes for sale to
colleagues.
Takura Zhangazha, a political commentator, said most people are
now
increasingly turning into small entrepreneurs as the battle for
survival
intensifies.
“Zimbabweans are coping. They are not depending on
the (formal market) for
basic goods and services but on the parallel market,”
said Zhangazha.
Some women interviewed by The Financial Gazette said they
have had to make
do without sanitary ware, which is now expensive.
Some
workers said they were converting their local earnings into foreign
currency
on the black market immediately after getting paid as a safeguard
against
runaway inflation.
“This has been helping me to hedge my earnings against
inflation since last
year,” said Tafadzwa Kwidini, a sales executive with a
car dealer.
The inflation scourge has even caught up with
newspapers.
Publishers have reviewed subscription terms, which used to run
for six
months, to just one month.
They say longer terms are hurting them
because quotations for raw materials
are surging almost on a daily
basis.
Suppliers of raw materials are giving publishers quotations valid for
less
than a week hence the shorter subscription terms.
Still there are
Zimbabweans who attribute their endurance to divine
intervention.
“It is
by the grace of God. Otherwise how do you explain how we are
surviving? The
Lord is providing for us,” commented Tatenda Maadza, a
widowed mother of
two.
Tony Hawkins, a lecturer at the University of Zimbabwe’s Graduate School
of
Management, warned that inflation, which central bank governor Gideon
Gono
has labelled an economic HIV/AIDS virus, will maintain an upward
trajectory
because of government ineptitude.
“Things are out of control.
The government is doing nothing about it. We are
looking at horrible figures
for January and terrible ones for February,
March and April,” said
Hawkins.
The government last week awarded increments to a few categories of
civil
servants, among them soldiers, teachers, nurses and doctors,
acknowledging
that inflation was eroding incomes at a much faster rate than
incomes were
being reviewed.
But the new salaries, some as high as $1.5
billion, still trail inflation as
net pay falls below the breadline now
estimated at around $1 billion for a
family of five.
Zhangazha noted that
the government’s failure to put the brakes on inflation
and the weekly and
daily changes in commodity prices are indicative of a
failed
economy.
This, he said, should worry President Mugabe as he enters next
month’s
election against the fiercest opposition from ruling party rebel,
Simba
Makoni, and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
“The existing
economic reality shown in high poverty levels, lack of jobs
and lack of
access to health care will work against (President) Mugabe.
People will turn
against (President) Mugabe at the ballot box,” observes
Zhangazha.
In
other countries, the situation could have raised tensions and
triggered
massive street protests.
But economic and political analysts say
Zimbabweans are resigned to fate and
are not prepared to risk life and limb
through street protests against
President Mugabe’s government, accused of
having presided over an economic
recession now in its ninth year.
“You
would expect it in normal countries but Zimbabweans just don’t see any
light
at the end of the tunnel,” observed Hawkins.
Zhangazha concurs, saying the
government has mastered the art of
intimidation and this had cowed people
into a tepid reaction to the crisis.
“The government has maintained a strict
security regime and Zimbabwe has
largely a rural population that has not been
integrated into the national
economy,” Zhangazha said.
But it remains to
be seen how long Zimbabweans will survive and keep on
invoking their bag of
tricks to keep body and soul together in a country,
which the World Bank
describes as the worst performing country outside a war
zone.
Only time,
and the March 29 elections, will tell.
FinGaz
MOVEMENT for Democratic
Change (MDC) leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, has sent the
clearest sign yet that
his political formation will not forge an alliance
with anyone formidable
enough to brighten up the prospects of deposing
President Robert Mugabe who,
at 84, incredibly still wants to extend his
rule by another five
years.
Tsvangirai, who has put up a brave fight against ZANU-PF since
1999, when
the MDC was formed, has accumulated, as evidence of his sacrifice
and
determination to end ZANU-PF’s rule, court and police records, scars
and
emotional bruises the naked eye cannot see.
But today, and rightly so,
the MDC leader is under a barrage of criticism
for closing the door on what
appeared to be a godsend for the opposition to
eclipse ZANU-PF on March
29.
After giving the nod to the 18th Constitutional Amendments, which have
had
the effect of increasing the number of rural constituencies — known to
be
ZANU-PF’s strongholds — MDC backers were expecting Tsvangirai to move
with
lightning speed to close ranks with the Arthur Mutambara-led faction
to
atone for the opposition’s error of judgment, but alas.
The collapse of
the MDC talks early in month had all but sealed the
fractured opposition
party’s fate until two weeks ago when Simba Makoni
broke ranks with ZANU-PF
to add an interesting twist to the Presidential
race, whose outcome had
looked certain to go in President Mugabe’s favour.
Mutambara, whose inner
cabal, comprising Gibson Sibanda, Welshman Ncube and
Paul Themba-Nyathi, has
been in the trenches together with Tsvangirai from
the formative years of the
MDC, has thrown his weight behind the former
finance minister, but Tsvangirai
looked determined last week to go it alone.
Tsvangirai was quoted saying
Makoni was merely “old wine in a new bottle,”
and that “fundamental
differences” between them meant that they could not
sing from the same hymn
sheet.
In our humble opinion, Tsvangirai has hoisted himself as the epitome
of a
change crusader and the country’s only hope. He sees no one else, other
than
himself, leading the struggle to bring about change in Zimbabwe.
It
would appear that his judgment has been clouded to a point where he is
now
failing to draw the line between sectional/personal interests and the
broader
objective that should crystallise a coalition.
While we hold no brief for the
MDC or Makoni, we believe that the need to
minimise suffering among the
people should bring the so-called progressive
forces together rather than for
the opposition to be kept poles apart by
issues of style, form and approach
to the achievement of the underlying
objective.
The MDC might find itself
perpetually in opposition if it cannot rise above
self-serving interests and
if it cannot put the interests of the people
before everything else.
If
Tsvangirai was able to rope in a wider spectrum of interest groups in
1999,
what are the “fundamental differences” making an alliance with
Makoni
impossible?
If Tsvangirai can work with Jonathan Moyo, the
architect of the draconian
Access to Information and Protection of Privacy
Act, and a rabid critic of
the MDC during his days in President Mugabe’s
Cabinet, why should it be so
difficult for him to embrace Makoni?
Joshua
Nkomo, the PF-ZAPU leader, exhibited rare leadership qualities when
he
accepted to subordinate himself to President Mugabe in order to end
the
Gukurahundi massacres. Up to this day, the late vice-President is a hero
in
Zimbabwe and beyond.
While ZANU-PF’s backers are interpreting
Mutambara’s gesture to mean he
lacks the leadership qualities to run the
country, his decision should be
seen more as a show of political maturity and
an accurate reading of what
needed to be done under the circumstances.
No
one doubts Tsvangirai’s sincerity in the struggle to bring about change
in
Zimbabwe and while it may be premature to pass a verdict on him,
history
might judge the opposition leader harshly for capitulating at the
last hour
by lacking a strategic mind and becoming a prisoner of his “kitchen
cabinet”,
which seems to be driven by selfish interests.
After coming
close to pipping President Mugabe at the post in 2000 and 2002,
when the MDC
was still a formidable force before being riven by internal
conflicts, which
led to the October 2005 split, the writing should be on the
wall for
Tsvangirai.
A coalition of all opposition parties makes a lot of sense and it
is not too
late for Tsvangirai to change course, neither would it be taken
as
confirmation of allegations that he is an “indecisive” leader.
Rallying
behind Makoni’s candidature might win the opposition support from
ZANU-PF
members disgruntled with the economic tsunami unfolding right under
their
noses, the youth, intellectuals and the business community, which has
long
castigated the ruling party’s Soviet Union-style running of the
country’s
economy.
By refusing to embrace other progressive forces,
Tsvangirai is no different
from a captain of a losing team who protests at
the entry of a
super-substitute for fear that the fresh pair of legs might
steal the show.
As it is, the MDC leader is playing straight into ZANU-PF’s
hands, unless of
course, his intention is to beat Abdoulaye Wade, the
Senegalese President’s
record of being one of the longest serving opposition
leaders after he ran
for president four times before he was elected in
2000.
Perhaps Tsvangirai should revisit the comment he made in July last year
in
reaction to his nemesis’ accusation that he was a “weak and
indecisive
leader.”
This is what Tsvangirai said: “We need unity of all
progressive forces in
this country. The enemy is not Tsvangirai. The enemy is
(President) Mugabe.
If you focus on Tsvangirai, urikupedzera matombo
pazvidhiidhii.”
It should never be about Tsvangirai.
FinGaz
Mavis
Makuni
A call made last week by Police Commissioner-General Augustine
Chihuri on
political parties to observe the law and to shun violence during
campaigning
for next month’s presidential, parliamentary, senatorial and
local
government elections would have been a welcome and timely reminder if
it
were sincere.
However, an examination of the modus operandi of the
police and the
allegations of brutality and political partisanship regularly
levelled
against them would leave no one in any doubt as to who is
responsible for
fomenting hostilities. Chihuri was quoted as saying: “I
challenge all
political parties to organise rallies and meetings in
accordance with the
law of the land. Right now, what our people need is peace
and tranquility
and not aimless demonstrations, marches or processions, which
waste their
precious time for development.”
Chihuri further urged
candidates campaigning for various positions in the
harmonised polls to use
their words to promote healing among the people and
focus on solving problems
rather than apportioning blame.
“Let me, therefore reiterate that police will
never treat perpetrators of
violence with kid gloves.” The
Commissioner-General may not be aware of it,
but his very utterances are part
of the problem.
Chihuri cannot seriously talk about the police not treating
culprits “with
kid gloves” when they cannot explain their failure to arrest
and bring to
book individuals accused of killing or assaulting opposition
activists and
leaders over the years
Regular reminders by the press that,
in all these years, the police have not
tracked down and brought to justice
these criminals as well as those who
bombed the printing press of the banned
Daily News continue to elicit a
deafening silence from the authorities. Not
only have these callous
individuals been treated with kid gloves and allowed
to go scot-free, some
have been rewarded handsomely with cushy diplomatic
jobs according to media
reports that the police have not refuted.
Does the
Commissioner-General remember the brutal attack on opposition and
human
rights leaders in March last year that left Lovemore Madhuku of the
National
Constitutional Assembly and Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for
Democratic
Change with fractured skulls and swollen faces and dozens of
their supporters
with various forms of serious injuries? Does he recall
pictures of two
defenceless women, Sekai Holland and Grace Kwinjeh, arriving
in South Africa
on stretchers after they had been brutally battered by the
very law
enforcement agents that Chihuri claims are “geared up …to put in
place
measures to combat any violence during and after the polls.” Not long
after
this, the same police force had no qualms about setting the riot squad
on the
president of the Law Society of Zimbabwe, Beatrice Mtetwa and her
male
colleagues in broad daylight.
What has happened to the perpetrators of these
heinous crimes and those who
brutalised leaders of the Zimbabwe Congress of
Trade Unions (ZCTU) in
October 2006 as a way to scupper a protest march they
had organised to
highlight the deteriorating economic conditions and collapse
of service
delivery systems?
The Commissioner-General cannot convince any
reasonable person that the
police force operates professionally and
impartially when it openly
interprets and enforces the law selectively and is
often guilty of gross,
politically expedient dereliction of duty.
Chihuri
talks glibly of the people of Zimbabwe needing “peace and
tranquility and not
aimless demonstrations, marches or processions, which
waste their time for
development”. But only just over a month ago in
December, the police had no
problem dealing with the “million-man”
procession in the capital and
solidarity marches that were staged in support
of President Robert Mugabe’s
candidature in next month’s elections. Can the
Commissioner-General explain
why he was un-perturbed over the national
resources and time devoted to these
activities but bristles when other
stakeholders seek to similarly exercise
their right to assemble and petition
the government of the day?
When will
the Commissioner-General tell the nation truthfully once and for
all why it
is that the police force can enthusiastically handle a march by a
million
people, but goes berserk when 200 members of Women of Zimbabwe Arise
(WOZA)
embark on a peaceful Valentine’s Day procession to spread a message
of love
and tolerance? The police cannot expect to be taken seriously for
implying
that they can successfully escort a procession of a million people
through
the Harare central business district but find four or five lawyers
walking
towards the offices of the Minister of Justice, Legal and
Parliamentary
Affairs to present a petition such a threat to national peace
and security
that they have to deploy the riot squad.
Moreover, it is not up to the Police
Commissioner-General to say which
peaceful demonstrations or marches
organised by citizens are aimless or a
waste of time because it is the
marchers who know how deeply felt their
grievances are. The role of the
police should simply be limited to crowd
control and maintenance of law and
order. In this respect, Zimbabwean police
should learn the techniques used by
law enforcers in other countries who
routinely cope with demonstrations
involving millions.
In the build-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, whole
cities in Europe, the
Americas and Asia were out in full force demonstrating
either for or against
the war and the role of law enforcers in these
countries was to control the
multitudes and not to crush their processions.
In Zimbabwe what
Commissioner-General Chihuri’s police force does is to allow
or ban
processions or rallies along partisan political lines. It is no secret
and
the Commissioner-General cannot deny that while events organised
by
opposition and civic groups are routinely banned, disrupted or
crushed
altogether, this never happens with regard to those organised by the
ruling
party.
Last week, this newspaper published a disturbing report
giving statistics on
pre-election violence collated by the Zimbabwe Peace
Project. The research
shows that the majority of violent incidents were
perpetrated by members of
the ruling party. While all culprits must be
brought to book regardless of
political affiliation, it is an open secret
that the police would rather
fabricate charges against innocent members of
opposition groups than
prosecute members of the ruling party even if the
evidence against them is
as high as the Nyanga and Chimanimani mountains. My
question is what action
do the police plan to take in connection with the
political violence already
raging in the provinces.
It is not enough to
issue ambiguous statements about police preparedness to
ensure peace during
the elections without responding to allegations about
the deployment of youth
militias to intimidate rural voters.
Independent presidential candidate Simba
Makoni has hit the nail on the head
by declaring that he wants next month’s
polls to be a “contest of ideas”
during which no stones, knives, fists should
feature. “No one is worth dying
for”, he was quoted as saying. “Not President
Robert Mugabe, Arthur
Mutambara, Morgan Tsvangirai. Certainly not Simba
Makoni. No one is worth
killing for.”
A refreshingly clear, direct and
un-ambiguous message that every
presidential candidate should be preaching.
It would also make a potent
theme for law enforcement agents if the police
force had not been so
seriously compromised and suborned.
FinGaz
Clemence Manyukwe
Staff Reporter
A DIAMOND mining company partly owned by top ZANU-PF
figures, River Ranch
Limited, has instituted a $12 trillion defamation suit
against Terrence
Hussein, a lawyer, over his assertions that their company
could have been
involved in smuggling.
ZANU-PF bigwigs Solomon Mujuru
and Tirivanhu Mudariki, together with
controlling shareholder Adel Aujan, a
Saudi billionaire, own the company.
The company’s lawsuit, filed on February
1, is in response to Hussein’s
complaint to the United Nations (UN) over the
conduct of River Ranch
Limited, whose occupation of River Ranch diamond mine
in Beitbridge is the
subject of a legal dispute.
River Ranch Limited is
fighting a legal battle over the control of the mine
against Bubye Minerals,
which is represented by Hussein.
This week, Hussein said River Ranch
Limited’s legal suit was “poorly
advised”.
Hussein’s complaint to the UN
resulted in the World Diamond Council
instituting a probe into diamond
smuggling in Zimbabwe last year.
The lawsuit filed by River Ranch Limited and
its employees, says letters
written to the UN by Hussein as part of his
complaint against the company
were defamatory and “tarnished the image” of
the country.
“The letters referred to above were defamatory and tarnished the
image of
not only the plaintiffs but also of Zimbabwe.
“They resulted in
the chairman of the World Diamond Council requesting the
Kimberley Process
Committee to visit Zimbabwe and investigate the report,”
part of the lawsuit
reads.
The Kimberley Process exonerated River Ranch Limited after the
probe.
However, Hussein is contesting the verdict, arguing that investigators
had
falsely claimed that he had appeared before the committee and that he
had
withdrawn complaints against River Ranch Limited.
In response to the
lawsuit, Hussein on Monday wrote to River Ranch Limited’s
lawyers, Costa and
Madzonga, accusing the company of intimidation.
“My clients and their minor
children have been subjected to unlawful
surveillance…we are fully mindful of
the dangers that my clients and myself
face in this matter,” Hussein
said.
“However, having said that, I wish to place it on record that we hold
you
and your client’s directors Mr Aujan, Mr Solomon Mujuru, Mr Mudariki and
Mr
Mulla personally responsible for any harm that may be contemplated
against
our client.”
FinGaz
Shame Makoshori Staff
Reporter
SOUTH African mining baron Patrice Motsepe’s African Rainbow
Minerals (ARM)
is planning to invest in the country’s resources sector,
despite threats of
expropriation and outlawing foreign control of companies
operating in the
country.
The Financial Gazette is informed that ARM
is planning to invest in the
country’s mining sector with a specific focus on
coal and platinum group
metals.
ARM has already made overtures to the
government and is fine-tuning
proposals for presentation to the Zimbabwe
Investment Authority for
consideration.
Motsepe is one of South Africa’s
richest black businessmen who owns several
companies in that country.
The
Financial Gazette was told that Motsepe was in the country on a private
visit
early this month, apparently laying the groundwork for the
planned
investments. He is said to have met President Robert Mugabe and some
of his
top lieutenants during the visit.
ARM’s business development
executive for Africa, Dan Simelane, confirmed the
plans by ARM to invest in
Zimbabwe by declined to give details.
“Our company African Rainbow Minerals
is exploring mining investment
opportunities in coal and platinum group
metals in Zimbabwe,” Simelane said.
“As you are aware, any mining investment
is both capital intensive and long
term in respect to time frame and as such
we are not able to give you the
quantum of investment and the time
frame.”
Simelane added: “At the appropriate time a decision will be taken by
our
company as to which vehicle we will be using and can not determine at
this
stage as to how many employment opportunities will be
created.”
Motsepe held various influential positions in South Africa
including the
deputy chairman of Ubuntu-Botho, and chairman of Harmony
Gold.
In 2004, Motsepe led a broad-based black empowerment consortium to buy
10
percent shareholding in Sanlam in what was to become one of the
most
far-reaching black empowerment transactions in South Africa.
In the
Ubuntu-Botho deal, he managed to bring together various stakeholders
to
empower small businesses.
The success of the venture has been remarkable,
media reports in South
Africa have indicated.
While the Ubuntu-Botho deal
has contributed to the significant increase in
Sanlam’s share price, this
far-sighted venture has helped Sanlam fast track
its transformation into a
truly representative South African company.
At the annual general meeting of
the South African Institute of Mining and
Metallurgy in 2005 Motsepe, who was
chairman of ARM, was awarded the
Brigadier Stokes Memorial Award.
The
award, which comprises a medallion of platinum, is presented to
individuals
who demonstrate achievements in and commitment to the South
African Mining
and Metallurgical industry.
The 2005 award recognised Motsepe’s substantial
contribution to the South
African minerals industry over the years as well as
his leadership role
within South African society.
FinGaz
Staff Reporter
A SERIOUS
shortage of sugar is looming after the country’s producers were
last week
forced to halt production due to crippling shortages of sugarcane
and
coal.
Industry sources told The Financial Gazette that Hippo Valley and
Zimbabwe
Sugar Refineries (ZSR), the country’s major producers of sugar,
had
exhausted their supplies of sugarcane and were now waiting for
fresh
supplies from the next harvest, which would be after April.
The
shortages of sugarcane are believed to have worsened an already
precarious
situation as companies had been battling acute power shortages,
foreign
currency and spares supply constraints.
Sources said milling companies had
put aside substantial buffer stocks to
use during the time of shortages. But
reports said the government, worried
about annoying the electorate ahead of
next month’s polls, had ordered the
firms to produce sugar from their buffer
stocks, leading to the depletion of
stocks.
starafricacorporation chief
executive officer Patterson Sithole said he was
not aware of the disruptions
when contacted for comment.
The former Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries
president was not even
willing to shed light on the extent of the production
deficit in the
industry.
He said: “We supply only part of the market, I do
not have that
information.”
ZSR is a subsidiary of starafricacorporation,
which listed on the Zimbabwe
Stock Exchange in 1947.
Hippo Valley
executives were not immediately contactable for comment.
A source said
production could resume this week if coal supplies were
restored, although
this was not guaranteed.
Despite the unavailability of sugar on the domestic
market, some
unscrupulous merchants have however, been managing to secure the
commodity
but have been selling it outside the country to earn foreign
currency.
Sugar shortages in Zimbabwe could force the country to revert to
expensive
imports. This would divert foreign currency, which could have been
utilised
in improving productivity by importing spares, into importing basic
food
commodities.
The current sugar production constraints have also been
blamed on the
failure by new farmers to produce on land they took up from
white commercial
farmers in 2000.
Close to 180 new farmers were said to
have settled on the Hippo Valley
Estates and were allocated hacterages of
between 20 and 60 per family.
Many of the resettled farmers had initially
celebrated bumper harvests from
crops grown by former landowners, but these
have since disappeared from the
sugarcane fields.
Besides, the new farmers
have struggled to harvest the crop due to lack of
expertise and implements
and working capital, among other things.
According to the Zimbabwe Cane
Farmers Association, 772 739 metric tonnes of
sugarcane were produced before
the seizure of farms in 2002.
The land reform had resulted in a 440 percent
decrease in hacterage,
significantly affecting output, which went down to 148
723 metric tonnes in
2004 and 219 100 metric tonnes in 2005.
FinGaz
Shame
Makoshori Staff Reporter
BRITISH property tycoon Nicholas van
Hoogstraten, on trial for alleged
violation of foreign exchange regulations
as well as possession of
pornographic materials, last week cast doubts on
prospects for a fair trial,
with his lawyer George Chikumbirike complaining
that the investor’s rights
had been “compromised” by the State’s
attitude.
After expressing grave concern over the failure by the police
to produce a
Zimbabwe Revenue Authority declaration form he signed to
indicate that the
foreign currency confiscated by the police had been legally
brought into the
country, van Hoogstraten on Friday alleged violations of his
right to a
“fair trial”.
He accused the State of concealing evidence,
producing them only when it
suited the prosecution.
“The rights of the
accused person to fair trial has been compromised in
several respects,”
Chikumbirike told judge Morgan Nemadire.
“Evidence has been contrived to suit
occasions,” he complained, adding that
the State had delayed producing a
crucial inventory of properties taken from
the businessman’s home.
And
when the inventory was produced, it did not bear van
Hoogstraten’s
signature.
“Some evidence was not there when the docket was
produced, but suddenly they
are made available when it suits the State,”
Chikumbirike told the court.
“This inventory, according to the police, was
done on the day of the arrest.
“But the suspect must accept the removal of
the property (by signing) to
avoid abuse especially where money is
involved.
“His part is not signed. Why was he not allowed to sign?
“The
inventory was only given to us after several requests from January 24,
but it
only came to us yesterday (February 14). Something is not
right
somewhere.”
When Nemadire asked prosecutor Obi Mabahwana if it was
true that van
Hoogstraten had not signed the inventory, the tycoon, who spent
the one-hour
session calm and sometimes yawning, shook his head and looked
straight at
the magistrate.
Van Hoogstraten, an international businessman
well known for his love for
properties, but has a controversial history in
his home country, has
exhibited a totally different personality during
pre-trial proceedings in
Harare.
In contrast to the notoriety that he is
commonly known for, he shared jokes
with strangers at the Harare Magistrate’s
courts.
But in his cool and composure, he has made life difficult for
prosecutors.
Van Hoogstraten declared on Wednesday had had done nothing wrong
by keeping
foreign currency at his Emerald Hill home.
“Not guilty!” was
his answer when Mabahwana asked for his plea on the charge
of possessing
foreign currency.
And Chikumbirike backed him on Friday. He said the
“sniffing business” that
had become the police’s duty across the country,
even in the streets, was
not proper.
“It is not an offence in this country
to possess foreign currency unless one
contravenes the Bank Use Promotion and
Money Laundering Act,” Chikumbirike
argued.
“It is not an offence to
receive foreign currency for services or goods in
this country, so the main
count (of receiving foreign currency for rentals)
cannot stand.
“The
possession of foreign currency is not prohibited, it is actually said
that
where you have access to foreign currency do all you can to bring it
into the
country.
“What must be done is to change the money in the bank at the
prescribed
exchange rate,” he said.
Nemadire is expected to make a
judgment this week on a plethora of
objections raised by van Hoogstraten
before the trial continues.
FinGaz
Staff Reporter
THE
money market finally relinquished a liquidity crunch and went into
surplus
last week after huge cash injections into the market from
government
expenditure.
With harmonised elections scheduled for March
29, market watchers said
liquidity conditions were likely to persist on
increasing government
spending.
Analysts and dealers said cheap funding
for the productive sector as well as
loans for the agricultural sector had
poured into the market, contributing
to excess liquidity.
Funding for gold
purchases from miners and related undisclosed fiscal
expenditures had also
led to enormous cash injections into the market, a
stock broking analyst
said.
As a result of the cash injections, the market opened $18 trillion up
on
Monday last week, having closed the previous week with a surplus position
of
$1.6 trillion.
The market was expected to have opened this week up $162
trillion.
“Investment rates in the market came off from their previous week
highs as a
result of the excess liquidity conditions,” said Kingdom
Stockbrokers (KSB)
in a commentary to investors.
“Investments for 7-14 day
monies were being quoted in the range of 0-50
percent during the closing days
of the week, down from the previous week
average of 300 percent.
“The
longer-dated 60-90 day monies were being quoted at rates ranging from
200-300
percent while inter-bank overnight placement rates also took a
nosedive to an
average rate of 100 percent as the week came to an end,” said
the KSB
commentary.
A KSB analysts noted: “We expect the easier liquidity conditions
to persist
during the pre-election period propelled by government
expenditure.
“This should see investment rates in the money market declining
to their
lowest level, making interest bearing assets very unattractive given
the
persistent inflationary pressure affecting the financial markets.”
FinGaz
Staff Reporter Shame
Makoshori
JAMES Kawara hugged his envelope, which contained a number of
important
personal documents, including a diploma in civil engineering, as he
trudged
the rugged terrain in Beitbridge, the town at the border with South
Africa.
He had been dropped by a truck from Harare, and was weighing his
options as
he pondered making the second attempt at illegally crossing the
border to
South Africa, the continent’s economic powerhouse.
His bid in
January had failed because of the flooded Limpopo River, that
crocodile
infested waterway separating the two countries.
But this time, the
31-year-old father of two was determined to take the
ultimate risk, and move
on.
“I paid locals 100 rands to take me to the South African side,” Kawara
said,
somberly. He was part of a group of other Zimbabweans anxious to cross
that
dreaded river, but had depended on old timers in the area who charge
to
smuggle people across the border through the Limpopo River.
“But we
came across robbers who took all our money,” said Kawara, almost
sobbing. His
real lure was the boom in South Africa’s construction industry,
and many
former classmates had landed lucrative jobs in the sector after
fleeing
Zimbabwe’s domestic crisis.
South African companies have been on a massive
recruitment in Zimbabwe, but
Kawara said he had not been lucky to get a job
that would enable him to
apply for a work permit while in the country before
migrating to South
Africa. He is now back home, and always judges himself
unkindly for failing
to take care of his aged parents, his two children and
school-going
siblings.
Kawara’s predicament epitomises that of thousands
of dejected Zimbabweans
battling to survive under Zimbabwe’s economic crisis,
now in its ninth year.
Most of them have fled to South Africa and other
neighbouring countries in
search of better lives.
The passport offices
across the country are daily flooded by thousands of
Zimbabweans anxious to
migrate into neighbouring countries or overseas to
escape a battered economy
punishing its people.
Zimbabwean researcher and labour economist, Godfrey
Kanyenze, said in a
recent paper that until the hostile political and
economic environment was
over, the flight of Zimbabweans would
continue.
Analyst Eric Block told a recent meeting discussing the Zimbabwe
staff
crisis that fast declining productivity, ageing technology and
collapsing
infrastructure were the driving forces behind massive migration
of
professionals.
“We have a massively hiking inflation (rate) and very
few of those who are
migrating will come back,” Bloch said.
“They want to
earn real money to support their families, buy cars and get
capital to start
their own businesses,” he added.
Mobile phone companies are almost crumbling
because of an accelerating staff
flight.
A spokesman, Douglas Mboweni,
recently said critical staff in the sector
were joining telecommunication
networks outside the country.
He said mobile network operators were losing
close to 150 technical staff to
regional and international competitors every
year.
This adds to technical staff in the mining and engineering sectors, as
well
as nurses, doctors and teachers joining the exodus of professionals into
the
regions and abroad.
President of the Zimbabwe Council for Tourism
Chipo Mtasa said the brain
drain had caused head aches in the hospitality
industry.
“It in not only in South Africa (where they are going), they are
going
everywhere,” she told this newspaper recently.
The civil service
lost more that 1 200 professionals in its ranks by June
last
year.
Analysts project the tide of labour migration from Zimbabwe could
escalate
this year.
Zimbabwe’s mining industry has lost 45 000 workers in
the past decade,
according to the chamber of mines.
FinGaz
Kumbirai Mafunda Senior
Business Reporter
The concept targets to help the low–income earners and
disadvantaged groups
A SHORTAGE of financial resources could delay the
ambitious plan by the
government to construct a network of ‘people’s shops’,
which will offer
basic goods at hugely subsidised prices.
Industry and
International Trade Minister Obert Mpofu last month revealed
that President
Robert Mugabe’s cabinet had approved plans by the Zimbabwe
Development
Corporation (ZDC), to open low price shops in an attempt to help
hard hit
citizens access basic commodities, which are currently priced
beyond their
reach due to rampaging inflation.
Mpofu gave the new board forty days from
the end of January to set up the
shops.
But Jonathan Kadzura, the chairman
of the ZDC board of directors, told The
Financial Gazette that the state–run
firm was still waiting for funding to
begin construction of the shops.
“It
is going to be a function of resources. We are generally ready. We are
just
waiting for funding. We are waiting to get resources so that we can
fly. We
have identified places countrywide,” said Kadzura.
The “shops concept” was
taken from Angola and is aimed at providing basic
commodities for the
low–income earners and disadvantaged groups at cheaper
prices.
Mpofu
recently said this would help cushion the poor from rampant price
increases,
shortages and “monopolistic tendencies in the market”.
Apart from
constructing people’s shops, the ZDC will also seize firms
engaging in what
government describes as “dirty tactics” aimed at
undermining President Robert
Mugabe’s government.
Last year government cracked down on enterprises it
accused of frequently
hiking prices of commodities in an attempt to foment
anger against President
Mugabe’s government.
But business leaders denied
the charges, arguing that a slow down in
production and company closures were
sparked by myriad problems facing
industrial operations, among them shortage
of foreign currency to import raw
materials and machine parts, the power and
fuel crises and government price
controls.
Zimbabwe is in the grip of a
severe economic recession blamed on repression
and inapt policies by
President Mugabe’s government which have seen
inflation reaching 66 000
percent and a rapidly contracting GDP, the fastest
for a country not at war,
and shortages of basic commodities.
President Mugabe, in power since 1980 and
contesting next month’s
presidential election under the ruling party ticket,
denies ruining the once
prosperous economy and instead blames the country’s
troubles on sabotage
fuelled by Western countries.
The election we want and
beyond...
EDITOR — The future of Zimbabwe interests me
because that is where I am most
likely to spend the rest of my days on earth.
For a country that has some
claim to enlightenment, I was one of those
disappointed that after 28 years
of independence all we could offer by way of
leadership material from a
whole nation of 14 million people was “vaMugabe
chete-chete” and Morgan
“zvichanaka chete” Tsvangirai.
This national
drought of leadership was spreading despair, alarm and
despondency among the
populace until the entry of Simba Makoni.
One of the reasons we have been
wandering in the ‘economic and political
desert’ is because we are unable to
detach ourselves from our parochial view
and take a long term vision of what
is good for Zimbabwe not just MDC or
ZANU-PF.
Applying a Solomonic
judgment view, both MDC and ZANU-PF would rather have
Zimbabwe, the baby,
sawn in two and each one of them taking a dead piece
just to spite the other,
rather than let one of them two nurture the baby.
So to extricate ourselves
from this mess we need to stop being emotional and
rationally weigh our
options.
While the leaders of both MDC and ZANU-PF behave like the big
“chefs” by
failing to avail themselves during the registration process,
Makoni showed
better humility, personally filing his own papers.
My MDC
compatriots in South Africa went hysterical when I suggested that
what
Tsvangirai did to humiliate Mbeki by asking him to show more spine
was
strategically a wrong thing to do.
We as a nation need to learn that
if we do not do anything about our
situation, we should not expect a Knight
in shining armour from SADC, AU and
UN to come to our rescue.
We have
about a month to go before the elections and do not have the time
to
micro-analyse the context and background to Makoni’s candidacy.
Every
politician, including Simba, is an opportunist and potentially a liar
and
whatever they say has to be taken with a pinch of salt.
Collaboration
between ZANU-PF and MDC has already occurred through the 18th
constitutional
amendments so what would be wrong with collaborating now in
the Makoni
project for the benefit of Zimbabwe? What principles would the
MDC be using
to say that they won’t work with Simba but are prepared to
forge electoral
pacts with Jonathan Moyo who personifies the ultimate
political prostitution
and excesses of what is wrong with our politics.
For example Moyo, who has
expressed his disgust with the events of
Gukurahundi, was prepared at
Tsholotsho to install as future president,
Emmerson Mnangagwa, a key player
in the tragedy. Politicians are not driven
by principles but by
opportunities.
I have a dream that on March 29, we will hold an election not
accompanied by
violence or the barbaric use of “pasi nanhingi” slogans that
have been
rampant across Zimbabwe’s political landscape.
To me an ideal
outcome would be a scenario where MDC would win the
parliamentary vote with
no more than 45 percent of the vote, ZANU-PF no more
than 38 percent and the
fringe parties and independents the balance of 17
percent.
If Makoni wins
the presidential election, this would really result in the
proper balance of
power between the executive and legislature while at the
same time keep
everyone humble. Makoni can then “institute a process of
national healing and
reconciliation” and restoration of Zimbabwe into the
international
community.
The winner-takes-all scenario is bad for national healing in a
polarised
society as has been shown in Kenya.
>From a ZANU-PF
perspective, Makoni has been the first to volunteer to bell
>the cat and
for that the people of Zimbabwe should be grateful.
This ‘mugoti unopiwa
anyerere’ strategy of vana Mnangagwa was useful during
the liberation
struggle but has no place in a modern day democracy.
Zimbabweans should all
be free to express their views without fear of being
lynched by Chinotimba
and Jabulani Sibanda’s mob. Village bullies thrive on
fear and it is time
Zimbabweans say enough is enough.
We need to release our mindset from events
of the past and set it to
contemplate what is possible in the future. A
national hostage crisis
perpetuated by a few mercenaries masquerading as war
veterans that began in
1980 seems set to continue in 2008. Sacrifice was not
a preserve for the war
veterans that survived the war.
For example my
uncle who is one of many, lost five of his children in
Mozambique during the
war of liberation and he received neither
acknowledgement nor
compensation.
Teachers, clergymen, peasants and various communities across
Zimbabwe
contributed in kind to the struggle for independence.
I lost two
years of my schooling life supporting the struggle but that
should not in any
way give me a sense of entitlement. That was the essence
of
sacrifice.
When I was in Zimbabwe in January, I passed through an almost 500
hectare
farm and the proud owner had ploughed just five hectares.
Clearly
this was a peasant farmer masquerading as a commercial farmer but
the
agricultural officials have no guts to get this gentleman off the
land
because he is a war veteran. Land is a finite resource and everyone who
goes
onto it must be able to produce optimally.
We have systematically
decimated the commercial and manufacturing industry
that we inherited intact
from the Smith regime.
Masimirembwa should stop presiding over the
de-industrialisation of Zimbabwe
and stick to chicken farming while allowing
the few manufacturers we still
have to thrive.
Hordes of people have to
cross the border everyday to buy soap and cooking
oil thereby exporting even
the most menial jobs still available in Zimbabwe.
The only people thriving in
this environment are rent seeking parasitic
black market dealers straddling
the economy from fuel to foreign currency.
Guarantees we need to extract from
Makoni between now and 29 March are that
he will only run for one term during
the stabilisation period and no matter
how well he does during that period he
must know that no one is
indispensable.
We also need to know that he will
not be beholden to a ZANU-PF Mafiaso ring
to the extent that he may not allow
the law to take its course.
After all the indigenisation boo-hoos nearly all
the gold and platinum mined
in Zimbabwe is still owned by South African
companies?
Even uncle Thabo has done much better in SA in the short time he
started
setting targets instead of just perpetuating the big talk. We need
Simba to
preside over an empowerment process that is fair, transparent and
equitable.
As a result these elections represent opportunities for those who
desire
genuine change.
By the way I am not just one of those diasporan
armchair commentators but I
am a registered voter who has voted in every
election. I was eligible to
vote since independence and by God’s grace will
vote in the March 29
elections.
Tafirenyika
Makunike
Johannesburg
---------------
Let us not polarise the nation
any further
EDITOR — It is with great dismay that we have
witnessed polarisation of the
populace mainly by/because of those we look up
to, to advise our beloved
nation on the way forward, from our government
institutions, civic society,
churches, politicians and the so-called
commentators.
We hear ‘President Mugabe/Tsvangirai is a dictator’, ‘Makoni is
a spoiler’,
‘Mutambara has no constituency besides Welshman Ncube’, and we
await Langton
Taungana’s fate soon. Individualism/party-politics take us back
way beyond
civilisation.
I feel we no longer have papers and commentators
that independently
criticise and present facts without being too lenient
towards one leader or
party.
I would like to appeal to my fellow
countrymen, let us not polarise the
nation with pronouncements that urge
hatred/violence towards one section of
society to the other — in Africa we
have recent examples to learn from.
A common factor in the March 29th
elections is that we are all suffering
across the board and we need to invest
as a nation in leaders who have the
will to move the country in the direction
that enriches all.
Manifestos can be a starting point not
name-calling.
William
Gasseler
Zimbabwe
------------------
Ndlovu’s words have no place in a
true democracy
EDITOR — The recent announcement by
Information and Publicity Minister
Sikhanyiso Ndlovu that foreign journalists
who come from what he termed
“hostile western countries” will not be
accredited ahead of March 29
elections is absurd. Ndlovu went on to say that
only those journalists from
friendly nations will be invited to cover the
elections.
This highly obnoxious move by the government exposes its
dictatorship and it
is clear that the government does not want the true
Zimbabwean story to be
told.
ZANU-PF is desperate to rig the elections and
as such they know fully well
that their selected group of journalists will
only report in favour of the
ruling party. It will not be difficult for such
people to expose the flawed
electoral process.
Media laws have to be
changed as soon as yesterday such that all parties are
given enough airplay
ahead of the elections.
Of late we have been watching the developments from
the ZANU-PF primaries
and the only time you hear of the opposition is when
they are being
denigrated.
The SADC principles and guidelines governing
democratic elections stipulate
that all political parties should be given
equal opportunity to access the
state media but in Zimbabwe it is the other
way round.
The MDC/ZANU-PF talks also agreed that a new body called the
Zimbabwe Media
Council is to be set up to deal with the accreditation of
journalists but
the commission is still to be set up. The government will
make sure that
they have an influence over the commission as is the case with
the MIC.
We salute newspapers like The Zimbabwean who are launching a
Sunday
publication because people are desperate to know the truth not
the
propaganda dosage from The Herald.
The environment is not going to be
an easy one during election time as it is
obvious that ZANU-PF will unleash
its machinery to terrorise opposition
activists and journalists.
The
students of Zimbabwe will forever salute all the media players that
are
exposing ZANU-PF and ZINASU urges them to stand for the
truth.
Together we will conquer.
Blessing Vava
Information and
Publicity Secretary
Zimbabwe National Students
Union
--------------
Makoni sounds good but...
EDITOR
— The declaration by Dr Simba Makoni that he is going to stand
against
President Robert Mugabe came to me as refreshing news because, on
paper, his
credentials are impeccable and he is the only man possibly
capable of
dislodging President Mugabe from office.
But I have a gut feeling that Makoni
is only a decoy for ZANU-PF whose
mandate is to split the urban vote where
the ruling party has consistently
lost to the opposition. I sincerely hope I
am wrong but knowing how cunning
President Mugabe is I cannot put this past
him.
Critical questions regarding Dr Makoni’s candidature remain
largely
unanswered.
a) Why has Dr Makoni not publicly dissociated himself
from ZANU-PF?
b) Assuming he wins, how is he going to form a government
seeing that he
does not have a party? Surely not with the current crop of
ZANU-PF
legislators.
c) He (Dr Makoni) claims to have consulted widely
from within and without
ZANU-PF. Where are the so-called heavyweights who are
reportedly backing
him?
Until the above questions are satisfactorily
answered, much as I may like
him, I would not vote for him.
Masawi
Munyanyi
Greendale
Harare