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A Day In the Life of
Mafikizolo Jonathan Moyo
07/01/04
ON Monday night, I retired to bed early
hoping to wake up refreshed for a
long journey to the north of England. No
sooner had I dozed off did I get
into a nightmare! I dreamed that somehow I
had been transformed to be
President Robert Mugabe's Minister of Information
and Publicity, the erudite
but rudely ignorant Jonathan Moyo.
As Jonathan
Moyo aka 'Mafikizolo', I got to my lavish office at nine in the
morning. I
opened the large refrigerator and took a long gulp of the Scotch
whiskey I
had left diluted with imported tonic water the previous day. After
the brief
encounter with the gift of the Scottish people of Britain, I felt
ready to
start work.
I took a copy of the latest issue of the Herald newspaper and
browsed
through. I was riled by the non-inclusion of the impromptu speech I
had
given during a dress rehearsal for the video shooting of my latest
musical
composition on the virtues of extolling the fatherly leader from
Zvimba.
Without any amount of self-praise, I can safely conclude that the
jingle is
a masterpiece. It took all my imagination in allegro, soprano,
innuendo,
alto, moderato, andante, adagio and all other complex stuff that
makes up
the subject of music. Instinctively, I picked up the phone to call
the
editor of the Herald for a word on his omissions.
After the harsh
words with the ever-learning editor of the Herald, I picked
up the phone
again to harangue the Chief Correspondent Rueben Barwe for not
focusing on me
during the launch of a rural based newspaper for Murombedzi
village. The
energetic correspondent apologized profusely and suggested that
we re-do the
television footage from the comfort of my office. Knowing that
the chance to
appear on national television was up for grabs, I accepted the
offer without
reservations.
The prospects of appearing on national television to remotely
launch a rural
newspaper is a grand idea. I know that my detractors claim
that I have a
monopoly on appearing on national television. I do not regret
this; I
actually take it as a compliment! Who am I anywhere? Am I not the
Minister
of State for Information and Publicity in the President's Office?
Where
would you expect me to spend my time? In the president's office? No;
that is
almost a coup detat! I have to spend most of my time regulating and
giving
information to the nation using the state organs of publicity.
From
my ever busy facsimile machine I retrieved four documents from the four
heads
of the nation's radio stations. Each document was a detailed schedule
for the
day with details on what music will be played, when, why and for how
long. I
drooled with self-importance as I discovered that seventy-five
percent of the
music time would be the clear variations of my compositions.
The schedules
also gave details on all phone-in programs for the day for the
public. My
plan for pre-selected callers seemed to have been embraced with
zeal as the
list proved. Only people with proven loyalty to the party were
listed as
possible contributors in the phone in programs.
Having satisfied myself that
the nation was going to listen to acceptable
propaganda from the radio
service and watch party dogma on national
television, I then called the
intelligent officers to map out a way to ban
or interfere with subversive
material on the internet. Well, I have to admit
that I have never claimed to
be a computer genius, but I know that internet
could be tempered with for the
purpose of national security and sovereignty.
It is not a secret that after
successfully banishing the Daily News to the
obscure streets of Johannesburg
and a one-off in Abuja, the internet has
become the medium of choice for
spreading malice against the dear president,
myself and the ever humorous
Chinotimba!
The head of computer espionage from the security department was
quick to
brief me that the internet could be monitored using sophisticated
equipment
that could be obtained from the USA. I prodded him for the
possibility of
getting such equipment; even if it were of an illegal generic
release from
the People's Republic of China. The intelligence officer
promised to brief
me later on the day. If I can avoid giving back to the
Americans those
American Dollars we are taking from the people, I would. At
that point, I
wondered why the Chinese Yuan did not attract as much financial
weight as
the green buck in international financial circles!
When the
intelligence officers had left my office, it dawned on me that the
previous
night I had tuned into very damaging radio broadcasts on shortwave.
I was
just playing with the tuner when the mention of Zimbabwe got my
attention.
There in clear terms, some imperialist in London was barking that
Mugabe and
I were like Hitler and Gobbels. Whilst the kind president has
metaphorically
accepted to be called Hitler ten times, I think that
comparing me with
Gobbels is a bit on the silly side. As such, radio
stations that spew
malicious comparisons should be blocked from the
airwaves.
It was then
that I decided that we beam to the people of Zimbabwe a stronger
signal at
the same frequency to the foreign broadcasts in order to counter
them.
Experts in my department told me that radio receivers would naturally
lock on
the strongest signal. For the better part of the day, I remained
pondering
the possibility of even beaming Hondo Yeminda jingles to London!
This way,
the Queen, Tony Blair and all of West Minister would feel the
cruelty of
interfering with other nations' airwaves! I formally declared
that this
project will be planned, implemented and managed by me.
I spent the better
part of the afternoon pondering on what new law I could
promulgate for the
further sustenance of the fatherly leader and our
vanguard party. I could
have dreamed on proposing a law that would make it
compulsory for all
citizens to wear a breast badge with the smiling face of
the great leader. My
learned wanderings on this subject were interrupted by
a call from the
airwaves monitoring bureau. They wanted to tell me that the
imperialist
broadcasting corporations were at it again. I would have asked
the
electricity people to give us a deliberate black-out to make it
impossible
for citizens to listen to the vulgarity from the imperialists.
As the end of
the office day was approaching, I received a call from the
greatest leader
ever born asking me what I thought on soccer as a strong
field of political
play. I advised the leader that it was an untapped field
were my propaganda
machine could reap rewards. I reminded the astute leader
that as we were the
fowl party, some people were bound to say we were up to
playing foul
political games with the nation's most followed game. The
consolation is that
the most supported party has a right to exploit the most
followed sporting
activity in order to remain the most viable political
entity. The most
eminent leader hung up the phone in satisfaction!
At the point Mugabe hung up
the phone on Jonathan Moyo I work up. I was
sweating and shivering at the
same time. I could not really stomach the idea
of being Jonathan Moyo, not
even in a dream! I could not stand the ridicule
that the man has to endure
for a paltry ministerial post in a dying regime
that terms itself a war
cabinet! I could not want to spoil my obscure
reputation by being top in the
deck of wanted war criminals. I could not be
part of murder of
democracy!
The wickedness of dreams! I would want to dream dreams; not
nightmares in
the form of Jonathan Moyo and his master, Robert Gabriel Mugabe
-
hopemasola@hotmail.com
New Zimbabwe
Aids is politics in Zimbabwe
07/01/04
IN ZIMBABWE,
when a woman married to a truck driver dies of AIDS leaving two
small
children to be cared for by grandparents, the story is at least
partly
political.
Politics is about power. Women in Zimbabwe have
little power, in government,
in business, in the bedroom.
Priscilla
Misihairabwi, 37, is an exception, an elected member of Parliament
in a
nation where fewer than 10 percent of the seats are held by
women.
Priscilla exudes power. Perhaps it's her elegant navy pantsuit or
her
confident stride in narrow heels. Most likely, it's the plain way she
talks
about leadership and about the relationship between women and
men.
"You can't separate issues of governance from issues of HIV
infection," she
says. "In Zimbabwe, we knew there was HIV as early as 1985,
but the
leadership decided HIV was not going to be spoken about.
Prevention
strategies did not start at a smaller level. If we concentrated on
the
commercial sex workers then, it could have been contained in that
core
group. By the time we started dealing with the issues, it had spread to
the
entire population: pregnant women, married women, young girls with
sugar
daddies. We had lost the battle."
Consider the contrast in
Uganda, where the minister of public health passed
out condoms on the street.
The HIV infection rate there has dropped from 33
percent to 5 percent. In the
U.S. and Europe, AIDS has been largely
contained in targeted high-risk
populations.
Priscilla launched her political life with a petition drive
to register the
female condom. In 1989-90, a research group had conducted an
acceptability
trial of the female condom. When the study was over, the
condoms went away.
Women wanted them back. But the product was not
registered with the ministry
of public health. So Priscilla crisscrossed the
country, educating women
about HIV and female condoms and asking them to sign
their support. She and
others from the Women in AIDS Support Network
collected 52,000 signatures; t
he female condom was registered for use in
Zimbabwe on Dec. 1, 1998, World
AIDS Day.
Priscilla continues to hold
workshops for women all over the country. She
encourages them to know their
bodies, to refrain from using herbs vaginally,
to get tested, to tell their
husbands condoms are for contraception — a less
inflammatory purpose than
protection. Talk about sex and HIV before trouble
starts, she
urges.
"It's amazing how the same issues pop up whether she's a poor
woman in a
rural area or an educated professional woman," Priscilla says. "I
actually
think in Zimbabwe, the greatest risk factor for AIDS is marriage.
Most women
in Africa — they're just sitting ducks." - Seattle Times
The Australian
'Imposters' play soccer international
From
correspondents in San Salvador
January 07, 2004
A GROUP of imposters
pretended to be the national El Salvadorean team in the
0-0 draw with
Zimbabwe last Sunday according to the El Salvador
Football
Federation.
The federation's
president Humberto Torres told a press conference he would
be investigating
the matter which has been labelled by Zimbabwean newspaper
The Herald as "one
of the great frauds in the history of football".
"This is a serious
matter," Torres said.
"That could cause us problems with FIFA as they
might believe we had
authorised this team to represent us as the national
side.
"These players did not have this authorisation, we are going to
study this
matter in fine detail," he added.
He admitted the
federation were aware of a match in Zimbabwe concerning a
Salvadorean First
Division side Isidro Metapan, but in no sense of the word
was it the national
side.
Salvadorean daily Diario de Hoy, citing Zimbabwean press reports,
claimed
three of the players didn't actually have a club and the remainder
played
for several different teams and were coached by former national
coach
Ricardo Guardado.
The match was the beginning of the hosts'
preparations for the African
Nations Cup which runs from January 24 to
February 14 in Tunisia.
Mail and Guardian
Battling it out in Zim
Iden
Wetherell
06 January 2004 13:59
Working as a
journalist in Zimbabwe today is something of a challenge, it
might
euphemistically be said. Zimbabwean editors have to tip-toe their way
through
a legislative minefield designed to cause them and their
publications as much
harm as possible.
The misnamed Access to Information and Protection of
Privacy Act, passed
after President Robert Mugabe's disputed re-election in
2002 -- ostensibly
to stop the media "lying" about him -- has transformed the
practice of
journalism into a criminal enterprise by specifying a wide range
of offences
that any self-respecting newspaper would have difficulty
avoiding. Causing
public disaffection towards the president is just
one.
Looking out for unwary offenders is a media and information
commission,
which is the chief weapon of Mugabe's menacing Minister of
Information,
Professor Jonathan Moyo.
He appoints all seven members of
the commission, which is headed by a state
newspaper columnist, Dr Tafataona
Mahoso, who laments the fall of the Iron
Curtain and makes no secret of his
hostility towards the independent media.
Other members include former
state-media editors and journalism lecturers at
state institutions. The
commission is responsible for licensing journalists.
The state lost
several high-profile court cases under the Act in 2002, but
won its first
significant scalp last year when it closed the Daily News, the
country's only
independent daily, for operating without a licence. The
Supreme Court, which
is widely seen as sympathetic to the executive, has
declined to hear the
Daily News's appeal against the constitutionality of
Mugabe's media
legislation, but a lower court has ruled that the media
commission is
improperly constituted and its members biased. The government
has ignored the
court's ruling that the paper should be allowed to
resume
publication.
The closure of the Daily News should not be seen
in isolation. Since Mugabe
lost the 2000 referendum on a new Constitution
that would have legitimised
his dictatorship and came within a whisker of
losing the subsequent
parliamentary election, he has embarked on a campaign
of vengeance against
political opponents. While commercial farmers and their
workers were
previously the main victims of his wrath, more recently lawyers
and civic
activists have been in the firing line.
At the same time the
government has been anxious to manage the message. It
accuses the independent
press of tarnishing the government's reputation and
"demonising" Mugabe.
Inevitably, newspapers that have exposed the ruling
Zanu-PF's career of
misrule and violence have been threatened with closure.
The question we
are most commonly asked is whether this has led to a degree
of
self-censorship. While we are obviously keen to avoid giving hostages
to
fortune, we cannot at the same time be any less bold than our
readers.
Mugabe holds no terrors for a younger generation of Zimbabweans who
are
quite clear as to how he has pauperised the nation while enriching
his
followers. Mugabe has lost every single electoral contest he has fought
in
the capital since 1996. His blandishments about sovereignty and land have
no
purchase here.
So editors have a duty, not only to tell it like it
is, but to recognise the
popular imperatives around them. None of our readers
are saying: "Please
don't be so critical of the president." And Mugabe
certainly doesn't mince
his words when referring to us. Nor is this an equal
battle.
In addition to an energetic propaganda department in the office
of the
president, Zimbabwe has a powerful state media, which runs a stable
of
long-established newspapers and enjoys a monopoly of broadcasting.
The
country is thus treated to a steady torrent of invective against
civic
activists and outspoken journalists. We are accused of working with
the
British and Americans to unseat Mugabe. We are the targets of hate
speech
and personal vilification in the columns of newspapers like the Herald
and
the Sunday Mail that are mouthpieces of Mugabe and Moyo.
These
same papers have misled the country into believing 300 000 people have
been
resettled under the badly managed land reform programme when the
president's
own audit revealed only 134 000. They have downplayed the
seriousness of the
food crisis Zimbabwe is facing and misrepresented the
views of senior United
Nations officials and diplomats based in Harare. None
of this has raised
objections from the media commission.
While civil society in South Africa
has provided important moral support for
the struggle for democracy north of
the Limpopo, there is not always a full
understanding of the issues at play.
Some South African editors for instance
cannot understand why those of us
working in the independent media are
reluctant to get into bed with
hate-mongering state publicists, closely
allied to Mugabe's intelligence
network, masquerading as journalists. South
African editors have even
collaborated with government journalists in
Zimbabwe to form a rival editors'
forum to the one already in existence
because they feel our scope is too
narrow. In fact we have repeatedly said
our door is open to all editors who
subscribe to the principles of a free
press.
But the most
disappointing aspect of South African attitudes to Zimbabwe is
the notion
that Mugabe should be indulged to render him more amenable to
dialogue.
Behind this convenient smokescreen the steady subversion of the
rule of law
and erosion of democratic institutions has intensified. Lawyers
have been
assaulted in police stations when visiting their clients, trade
unionists
have been arrested for exercising their right to freedom of
expression, and
women have been jailed for protesting the soaring cost
of
living.
South African President Thabo Mbeki's quiet diplomacy is so
quiet as to be
inaudible. When he does find his voice, as on the ANC Today
website, it is
to express sympathy with Mugabe's predicament and claim
Zanu-PF has been
unfairly treated by its critics whose attachment to human
rights values he
deplores.
With the closure of the Daily News,
independent weeklies now carry a heavier
burden in getting news to the public
that the government media won't
publish. Whatever Mugabe may throw at us, the
Zimbabwean media -- at least
that part of it still operating freely --
remains committed to the struggle
for democratic rights. We have a very clear
obligation to the majority of
Zimbabweans who want to see change. Democracy
can't function in the absence
of an informed electorate. And without
accountability the government can do
what it likes.
Mugabe has the
armed forces, a suborned police and a compliant judiciary. We
have the one
thing we know he cannot suppress: an idea whose time has come.
Iden
Wetherell is editor of the Zimbabwe Independent and chairperson of
the
Zimbabwe National Editors Forum.
This Day, Nigeria
FG Woos Southern African Farmers
From Andy Ekugo in
Abuja
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
There
were indications yesterday that the Federal Government may have given
its
approval for fleeing farmers from the Southern African sub-region to
come to
Nigeria to invest in what has been described as large scale
integrated
farming.
This was the issue before the meeting of a Committee which was
formed to
work out the modalities "on Southern Afri-can farmers and
investment
opportunities in Nigeria" hosted by the Minister of Agriculture
and Rural
Development Malam Adamu Bello, in Abuja yesterday. The meeting was
at the
instance of President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Members of the
Committee are governors of Oyo, Ogun, Nasarawa, Kwara,
Kaduna, Ebonyi, Cross
River, Benue and Adamawa. The rest are the National
Security Adviser (NSA)
Lt. General Aliyu Mohammed Gusau (rtd), who was
absent and the Economic
Adviser to the President, Prof. Charles Soludo.
Bello in his speech at
the opening ceremony said "these large scale farmers
are leaving the Southern
African sub-region and seeking investment
opportunities elsewhere and some of
them have identified Nigeria as a
possible place for investment." He added
that the forum was for an
articulated "discussion on the opportunities and to
coordinate our positions
and take a collective decision on the best
approaches."
THISDAY investigations, however, reveal that the Southern
African sub-region
farmers who are interested in settling and "investing" in
Nigeria are mostly
those who were expelled from Zimbabwe. They first came to
Nigeria in the
initiation of Kwara State Governor, Dr. Bukola Saraki, after
which the
Federal Government took over the initiative.
The meeting
also explored possible advantages derivable from the expected
influx of those
farmers more especially in the area of technology transfer
since according to
Bello, Southern African sub-region farming is "highly
mechanised and profit
oriented with effective cooperative system."
Areas that the farmers are
interested in are in the livestock sub-sector
under which are dairy
production and processing, beef production and
processing, veterinary drugs
and vaccines production, small ruminants-sheep
and goat production, animal
feed production and day-old chick production.
Others include poultry eggs
processing for mayonnaise and ice cream
production, ostrich and quail
farming.
Under the crop sub-sector, the interests are mostly on rice and
maize
production, roots crops processing, oil seed production and
processing,
cocoa production as well as rubber and sugar cane production and
processing.
Also areas of interest expand to the fisheries sub sector,
which include
industrial fishing and canning and aquaculture development
under which
ornamental fish and fingerling productions are of major
interests.
Furthermore, the Committee would also work out the modalities
for the
advantages of rural development, which was highlighted as rural
energy
supply.
The insult
Roy Clarke is from Northampton but has lived in Zambia for 40
years. Now he
is threatened with deportation. His crime? Comparing the
president to an
elephant. He speaks to Emma Brockes
Wednesday January
7, 2004
The Guardian
From what has otherwise been a dark and difficult
week, Roy Clarke has
gleaned some reasons to be cheerful. On Monday, the
62-year-old's name was
splashed across the Zambian Daily Mail in a headline
that must have puzzled
its readers: "Roy Clarke to Be Deported." The
Northampton-born writer was,
at that time, largely unknown to the Zambian
public. This is no longer the
case. In fact, Clarke, a former teacher and
metallurgist, is rapidly
becoming the most famous man in Lusaka. In peril of
losing his house, his
job, his whole way of life, Clarke is determined, with
the blitz spirit
peculiar to expats, to stay in good sorts. "It's been quite
marvellous
reading about myself in the press," he says. "Not all of it's
true, of
course, but the embroidery is in my favour, so I don't
object."
Clarke is in hiding. He has a bad chest ("Bronchitis and deportation
all at
once, oh dear!"), and is under threat of being thrown out of a country
that
has been his home for 40 years. "It's just silly," he says down a
crackling
phone line, sounding like Richard Briers after a bothersome morning
in the
vegetable patch. Clarke's crime was to compare the Zambian president,
Levy
Mwanawasa, to a fat elephant, an offence not obviously catered for
in
Zambian law, but one which evidently struck home enough for it to be
broken.
In the same article, published in the Lusaka-based Post newspaper,
Clarke
compared the chancellor to a "long-fingered baboon", the home
secretary to a
"hungry crocodile", the agriculture minister to a "knock-kneed
giraffe" and
the lord chancellor to a "red-lipped snake". In his weekly
column The
Spectator, Clarke filed this Zambian version of Animal Farm, and
on
publication day was curtly invited to leave the country. "I have
some
slender hopes," he sighs, "that the judge may be an educated gentleman
who
knows something about the art of political satire." But he is not
holding
his breath.
This has all come as rather a surprise to Clarke,
and to many Zambians, who
have with good reason regarded President Mwanawasa
as a great improvement on
his predecessor. Mwanawasa was elected two years
ago on an anti-corruption
platform and one of his first acts in office was to
arrest the former
president, Frederick Chiluba, on embezzlement charges. He
called his
programme of change, the New Deal. There was some bother over the
validity
of the election - Mwanawasa snuck into office with a 1% lead over
his
rivals - but on no more evidence of foul play than attended George Bush's
US
election victory. What's more, since his election, political debate
in
Zambia has been as robust as any in African politics. Mwanawasa is
subjected
to insults that would make the House of Commons blush. Since
suffering a
head injury in a car crash 10 years ago, he has been dubbed "the
cabbage" by
his opponents and accused of being brain damaged. (He did once
refer at a
press conference to the boxer "Tike Myson" and to president
Chiluba as his
"sister". But this also has a certain neat parity with US
politics, circa
Ronald "Princess David, I mean Diana"
Reagan).
Clarke's insults weren't nearly so crude. He has been writing
The Spectator
column in the Post for seven years, inspired, he says, by the
columns
Michael Frayn wrote for the Guardian in the 1960s. It was in 1962
that
Clarke first travelled from his home in Northampton to what was
then
Northern Rhodesia, having read about it with interest in the papers.
After a
year working in the mines, he returned to London to complete a degree
at
Imperial College and then went back to what had been renamed, in
the
interim, Zambia, to take up a job as a metallurgist. England never
reclaimed
him. He met his wife, Sara Longwe, and together they had four
children. In
the 40-odd years since, Clarke has worked as a teacher, an
administrator,
and finally, in his 50s, a journalist. "My dear wife didn't
want to go to
Britain, which is a terribly racist place. I could see her
point. It was far
better for me to be a white man in Zambia than for her to
be a black woman
in Britain. This opinion has held quite well for 35 years; I
may now have to
reconsider."
In spite of recent improvements, and
benefiting hugely from comparison to
Zimbabwe to the south, Zambia is not a
happy place. This is why, when the
president made a pre-Christmas address
congratulating his government on
another excellent year, Clarke felt moved to
protest. Out of a population of
10 million, more than a million people have
HIV; 80% live below the poverty
line and life expectancy at birth hovers
around 35. "It left people a bit
gobsmacked," says Clarke. "I thought that if
there was a lot of prosperity
somewhere, perhaps we would find it in the
Mfuwe gamepark." The column sent
up the government as a pack of duplicitous
jungle animals, taking the
Zambian people for fools. "Just as the [humans]
are becoming thinner," he
wrote, in the voice of the elephant president, "so
we in the game park are
becoming fatter. As hospitals fall down in the rest
of the country, so we
are building veterinary clinics all over Mfuwe ... by
closing schools, we
now have the funds to send our monkeys abroad to Harvard.
They are studying
for MBAs, degrees in Manipulating Budget
Allocations."
Reaction was swift. President Mwanawasa's name was kept off
the deportation
order, which was issued by the home affairs minister, Peter
Mumba. "Suddenly
I was an enemy of the president," says Clarke, "I was
calling people animals
and monkeys, I was obviously a racist, and they were
seeking my deportation.
Later that day it turned out that a rentamob of thugs
from one of the
townships had been hired to demonstrate in front of his own
ministry and
call for me to be chased out of the country before they murdered
me. They
were even carrying a mock coffin with my name on it." Mumba told
Clarke to
pack his bags. "Perhaps that was his interpretation of protecting
me from
the mob. He said he'd give me 24 hours to leave the country. That's
about
half an hour for each of my 40 years."
A few tart comments came
with it, revealing perhaps a darker purpose behind
the order. Clarke's wife,
Sara, is a prominent women's rights campaigner,
who is described by her
husband as "a bit of a thorn in the flesh of the
patriarchal government". So
it was with well-directed spite that Clarke was
told he "should not imagine
that he's got any position or status here
because he married a Zambian
woman". He says, "You can't be sure whether
they're trying to get me or her."
There is currently one other Zambian
citizen awaiting deportation - Emily
Sikazwe, a feminist campaigner.
Clarke's editor at the Post, Fred
M'membe, has backed him magnificently,
even going so far as to reprint the
column yesterday under his own byline.
"I am responsible and totally
answerable for Roy's column," he said. "It's
me who published it, not Roy.
Come for me and deport me." Lawyers at the
Post meanwhile have secured an
injunction which ensures that the matter will
at least be heard in court, at
an unspecified date. The case promises to be
interesting, since for Clarke to
fall foul of Zambian law, under which it's
illegal to insult the president,
the prosecution will have to prove that the
fat elephant in his piece shares
sufficient characteristics with Mwanawasa
(eg, shambolic, clumsy,
untrustworthy) as to be recognised.
Opposition politicians have loudly
defended Clarke and the letters pages of
the Zambian press are full of
support. Even those who dislike him to the
extent of urging him to slit his
wrists, are appalled by the deportation
order and the damage it does to the
image of Zambian democracy. If, after
all this, Clarke and his wife are
thrown out, will they return to Britain?
"Oh no," he says, laughing at my
idiocy. "I don't much like that idea. I
left it 40 years ago, I can't go
back. There'd be all those people saying,
'I told you so.' I have nothing in
England, not even a pension. In fact, I h
ave no prospects anywhere else -
I'm too old to be deported. But if I had
to, I'd go to Cape Town, where my
youngest is studying."
Clarke does not consider himself brave. He has an
alter ego for that, who he
occasionally inserts into his column under the
name "Kalaki", given to him
by his late father-in-law. "It's a corruption of
Clarke, of course. When he
first heard that his dear daughter was going out
with a white man by the
name of Clarke, he said, 'Kalaki? Who is this
Kalaki?' In my column, Kalaki
is brave and forthright, unlike myself. I am a
terrible coward." All the
evidence is to the contrary. Clarke is still "sort
of in hiding", he says,
"not least because this mob may be on the rampage.
It's not very nice."
There is a small, anxious pause, after which he suddenly
brightens.
"Somebody was quoted in the press calling for the 'white punk' to
leave now.
White punk! I like that. It makes me sound rather dashing, don't
you think?"
Clarke's Post column
He lumbered out of the state
lodge, staggered towards the massive wooden
chair that had been made ready
for him, and fell backwards into it. His
dishevelled safari suit was
unbuttoned, and his huge belly hung over his
trousers. In front of him sat
all assembled animals of Mfuwe, waiting for
the Great Elephant Muwelewele to
begin his Christmas Message.
"Distinguished elephants, mischievous
monkeys, hypocritical hippos,
parasitic politicians, bureaucratic buffaloes,
and other anonymous animals,"
he began, "My message to you is that the last
year has been a resounding
economic success, and Mfuwe has never been more
prosperous!"
"Ee ee eeyee," squealed the monkeys, dancing around in
circles, and waggling
their bottoms, each painted with a picture of the Great
Elephant.
"When I was elected," continued Muwelewele, "I promised that
only those
constituencies that voted for me would see development. That is
why Mfuwe is
the only constituency that has seen development."
"Iwe
wakhonza!" shouted the crowd.
"All the humans in the rest of this country
refused to vote for me, so they
have had no share in our marvellous
development! It was only you, my friends
from the game park, who went out
there and brought in 29% of the vote. The
snakes of the Shushushu slithered
into the ballot boxes and stuffed them
with votes. The horrible hyenas were
the party cadres who chased away the
opposition voters. Our reliable rhinos
moved the polling stations to unknown
places in the forest. And our merry
monkeys played hide and seek with the
voters cards!'
"The law of the
jungle!" laughed the crowd.
"So now the MMD is the Movement for Mfuwe
Development. All my development
programmes are located in Mfuwe, and all my
appointments have been from
amongst you. The previous government would not
put you in government, saying
you were just monkeys and crocodiles, who
shouldn't be given the vote. But I
have changed all that. I have nominated
hippos to parliament, and made them
my ministers! I have appointed jackals as
my district administrators, and
put the long-fingered baboons in charge of
the treasury. I have put the
knock-kneed giraffe in charge of agriculture,
the hungry crocodile in charge
of child welfare, and the red-lipped snake in
charge of legal reform. And
best of all, all the pythons are now fully
employed, squeezing the
taxpayers!
"Our beloved Mfuwe," said
Muwelewele solemnly, "is now a state within the
state. We control everything
in the rest of the country. Everything is now
run for our benefit. I am
pleased to report that the past year has been the
best ever. Just as the
others are becoming thinner, so we in the game park
are becoming fatter. As
hospitals fall down in the rest of the country, so
we are building veterinary
clinics all over Mfuwe."
"Education is another of our great success
stories," continued Muwelewele.
"The heartless humans built schools and
universities for themselves, but
provided absolutely nothing for the animals
in Mfuwe. By closing these
schools we now have the funds to send our monkeys
abroad to Harvard. They
are studying for MBAs, degrees in Manipulating Budget
Allocations.
"Just as employment is falling rapidly amongst the humans,
so it is
increasing rapidly here in Mfuwe. Just as factories are closing in
the
remainder of the country, so they are increasing here. I have declared
Mfuwe
a tax-free zone, and our new manufacturing industry will soon be
exporting
directly to South Africa."
"Our Saviour," shouted the crowd.
"A new Saviour is born! A New Deal! A New
Direction! Let's roast a few street
kids, and have a real feast!"
The jumbo glided to a halt at Lusaka
International Airport. Out came the
Great Leader Muwelewele, lumbering down
the steps like an elephant. A
reporter managed to thrust a microphone in
front of him.
"Your Divine Majesty, how did you enjoy your holiday in
Mfuwe?"
"What!" exploded the Great Leader, his face turning purple with
rage. "I was
not on holiday! This was a very busy working trip, to look at
current
economic developments in Mfuwe, which has been privatised. Shoprite
has
already bought the place, and is busy putting in an abattoir
and
meat-processing factory. We will soon be exporting game meat to
South
Africa!"
· This is an edited version of the column that appeared
in the Post
Sunday Times (SA)
Zim depositors panic at crackdown on
banks
Wednesday January 07, 2004 06:54 - (SA)
HARARE - Panicky
Zimbabwean depositors have been moving their money from
some recently
established commercial banks following an announcement by the
central bank
that it is investigating the operations of banks suspected to
be experiencing
liquidity problems, officials said.
"It's bad, our deposits are moving up
and down," an official at one bank
said.
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
announced last week that it had launched an
extensive review of the
operations of some banking institutions, leading to
the closure of a leading
asset management company on New Year's Day.
Another banking official said
only big clients were moving their deposits to
the traditional banks such as
Standard Chartered and Barclays.
State media reported that these
long-established traditional banks had been
turning down cheques issued by
the banks suspected to be under investigation
by the central
bank.
Zimbabwe has about 16 registered commercial banks. About two-thirds
of them
have been established in the past decade.
The central bank has
warned that in the process of its review of the
financial sector, "some
banking institutions may experience liquidity
difficulties as they justify
their assets (or) liability mixes".
The bank said it was probing the
banks in an effort "to rid the sector of
speculative and non-core banking
activities which had become rampant in this
sector".
On New Year's Day
the central bank shut down Century Discount House and
cancelled its banking
licence after it failed to pay out some funds owed to
investors.
Two
directors of ENG Capital, which had in April last year bought
Century
Discount House, were arrested and they appeared before a court
yesterday.
Cuthbert Muponda, 32, and Nyasha Watyoka, 32, were accused of
defrauding
several clients of more than 61 billion dollars (about 76 million
US
dollars).
The state alleges that the clients' money, which was
intended for investment
on the money market, was used by the two to buy
properties in Zimbabwe and
overseas as well as to import luxury
vehicles.
AFP
Jerusalem Post
Jan. 7, 2004
Zimbabwe's rabbi revives community
By
MICHAEL FREUND
In the four months since becoming spiritual leader of
the Bulawayo Hebrew
Congregation in Zimbabwe's second-largest city, Rabbi
Nathan Asmoucha has
had more than his share of challenges.
Shortly
after his arrival in the sub-Saharan African nation, the
century-old
synagogue burned to the ground, with the flames consuming prayer
books and
other ritual objects, though not the Torah scrolls.
Several
Jewish families from the dwindling community then decided to
emigrate because
of the country's deteriorating economic situation, and a
harshly written
anti-Semitic article appeared in the local press falsely
accusing Jews of
hoarding increasingly scarce staples such as fuel.
But the 33-year old
native of Vancouver, Canada, who received his rabbinical
ordination in
Israel, remains undeterred.
"The most important thing," he said in an
interview this week while
attending a rabbinical seminar in Jerusalem, "is to
reunite the community.
We can create a sense of togetherness if we know how
to stick together." But
sticking together may prove increasingly difficult,
as Zimbabwe's Jewish
community continues to shrink.
From a peak of
7,000 in the mid-1960s, the number of Jews remaining in the
country has
fallen to an estimated 450, with 300 residing in the capital
Harare and the
remaining 150 in Bulawayo. Two-thirds of the members are over
the age of
65.
Though Bulawayo continues to boast a Jewish day school, only 8 of its
180
students are actually Jewish. The school principal is a non-Jew, and
just
two members of its faculty are Jews.
As the country's only rabbi,
Asmoucha must also travel to Harare to perform
life-cycle ceremonies such as
weddings and funerals for the community there.
He also serves as a shohet
(ritual slaughterer) for fowl, with other kosher
meat being brought in
periodically from neighboring South Africa.
Despite its small membership,
the Bulawayo synagogue continues to have
weekly Sabbath services, as well as
a daily minyan for the afternoon and
evening prayers. Morning services also
take place on Mondays and Thursdays,
when the Torah is read.
"I walk
around with a kippa and have no problems," Rabbi Asmoucha said,
asserting
that anti-Semitism is largely non-existent.
The biggest problem, it
seems, is economic, as Zimbabweans have endured
several years of
hyper-inflation and severe shortages of basic goods such as
food and fuel.
Unemployment is reportedly over 70 percent, with inflation
exceeding 500%
annually.
"A lot of people have left this past year," according to
Asmoucha, noting
that virtually all of those Jews who remain now have
relatives living
abroad. "The tragedy of the community is that there are so
many elderly
people stuck in Bulawayo with children spread throughout the
world." Whereas
the Zimbabwean dollar was once on par with its American
counterpart, the
official rate is now over 800 per US dollar. A loaf of bread
can cost as
much as Z$3,000, while filling up a tank of gas can run as high
as
Z$200,000.
"People are depressed because of the economic
situation," he said. "They
don't know what to do." Since the Bulawayo
synagogue went up in flames on
October 4, between Rosh Hashana and Yom
Kippur, the rabbi and his flock have
had to hold services in the local Jewish
community center, though plans are
afoot to construct a new house of
worship.
"There is a lot of sentiment to rebuild, but the community has
decided to
build a new synagogue in a suburb of the city, where many Jews now
live,"
said Asmoucha. "There is no way we can build what was. And for 150
people,
nor do we need to."
Though he believes that "ideally, the best
place for the community is
Israel," Asmoucha said "that isn't realistic for
the older members."
"My responsibility," he notes, "is to keep a viable
community going as long
as possible. And I think we can do it."
7 Jan 2004 12:53 GMT
Six Zimbabwe Banks Unable To Honor Checks In
Financial Crisis
Copyright © 2004, Dow Jones Newswires
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP)--More than a third of
Zimbabwe's commercial
banks are unable to honor their customers' checks,
threatening to cause
gridlock in the southern African nation's already
troubled financial sector,
economists said Wednesday.
For the
past two weeks, six of the 16 institutions have been suspended
from the daily
clearing of interbank debt because they don't have the cash
to pay other
banks.
Some stores have issued lists of banks whose checks they
will no
longer accept, independent economist John Robertson
said.
"This was a crisis in the making for the past year," he
said.
Last year, the government kept maximum
interest rates at a fifth of
the official inflation rate, now running at 625%
- one of the highest levels
in the world.
Many Zimbabwean
businessmen were borrowing money at cheap rates and
buying forward in
expectation of a quick profit as prices increase due to
inflation, Robertson
said.
They were investing in limousines, real estate, building
materials and
foreign currency. But a sudden drop in demand coupled with
sharply rising
interest rates at the end of last year left many unable to
repay their
loans, he said.
In a Dec. 16 policy statement,
Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono said
the institution would no longer
intervene to keep interest rates down.
Lending rates surged from below 100%
to over 500%.
"There are very real dangers of gridlock," said
Anthony Hawkings, an
economics professor and leading banking
consultant.
He said the amount of money owed by the suspended banks
to the 10
still trading was bound to increase, exacerbating liquidity
difficulties and
threatening the viability of some institutions.
Officials at the affected banks couldn't be reached for
comment
Wednesday.
Information Minister Jonathan Moyo on
Wednesday dismissed South
African and British media reports that the banking
crisis could trigger
"economic meltdown," calling them "the hallucinations of
a wishful thinker."
In an article in the state-run Herald
newspaper, he said a slump in
the black market rates for foreign currency
showed the economy was
recovering. The U.S. dollar currently buys 4,500
Zimbabwe dollars, down from
about 6,000 Zimbabwe dollars last month. The
official exchange rate is
824-1.
Moyo said a government
clampdown on cross-border traders who buy
comparatively cheap Zimbabwean
goods for resale in neighboring countries was
behind the drop.
Analysts said the troubled banks and indebted businesses were selling
hard
currency and other assets to try to repay their loans, contributing to
the
drop in the unofficial exchange rate.
The six suspended banks, the
largest of which is Trust Bank, are all
new institutions started by local
businessmen.
The government has eased banking regulations in recent
years to assist
Zimbabweans, including one prominent ruling party politician,
to open their
own finance houses.
The government accuses
international institutions like Standard
Chartered Bank (SCZ.ZM) and Barclays
Bank (BARC.LN) of profiteering and bias
against local black
entrepreneurs.
But most Zimbabweans still prefer banking with more
established
institutions.
Last week, the ENG Capital asset
management group collapsed amid fraud
allegations, and the central bank
closed one of its subsidiaries, Century
Discount House. Two ENG directors
have been arrested.
Reuters
UK Activist Seeks Pinochet-Style Arrest of Mugabe
Wed January
7, 2004 11:03 AM ET
(Page 1 of 2)
By Haroon Ashraf
LONDON (Reuters)
- A British rights activist went to court Wednesday to seek
the arrest of
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe whom he compared to
international pariahs
like Slobodan Milosevic, Saddam Hussein and Augusto
Pinochet.
Peter
Tatchell asked the court to issue an arrest warrant and extradition
order for
Mugabe on the grounds of torture.
"Torture has become an instrument of
state policy (in Zimbabwe)," said
Tatchell, who in 2001 was beaten by
bodyguards as he tried to make a
citizen's arrest on Mugabe in
Belgium.
Tatchell told Bow Street Magistrates' Court that serving leaders
should not
be immune from prosecution -- as stated in current international
law -- and
cited the indictment of Milosevic, ex-leader of the former
Yugoslavia, and
the two "assassination" attempts by coalition forces on
Saddam during the
Iraq war.
He also quoted the 1998 case of former
Chilean leader Augusto Pinochet, who
was held in London, but eventually
released, on charges from a Spanish judge
of torture and murder.
The
case against Mugabe, which Tatchell backed with signed affidavits from
two
men who said they were tortured by Mugabe's regime, has no chance in
Zimbabwe
because of "the current climate of state-sponsored terror,"
he
said.
Godfrey Magwenzi, deputy head of the Zimbabwe High Commission
in London,
dismissed the veteran rights campaigner as an "attention seeker."
"We will
not dignify this case with a comment," he told Reuters.
After
Tatchell's two-hour submission, Judge Timothy Workman adjourned the
case
until Jan 14 to study the documents.
GABRIEL SHUMBA'S
STORY
British legal experts are doubtful a warrant could be issued under
English
law.
However, speaking from South Africa, Zimbabwean human
rights lawyer Gabriel
Shumba told Reuters: "Immunity and sovereignty for
perpetrators of gross
human rights violations are now perceived as archaic
and irrelevant
concepts."
Shumba, alongside Zimbabwean journalist Ray
Choto, submitted affidavits with
Tatchell's case stating they have been
repeatedly tortured for opposing the
Mugabe government.
"I had to flee
for my life from Zimbabwe," Shumba said.
On returning in 2002, he was
arrested. "I was shackled and handcuffed in a
seated position and had
electric shocks administered for nine hours
continuously," he told
Reuters.
Shumba's interrogators demanded he renounce his political
beliefs and join
Mugabe's Zanu PF party, he said.
After three days, he
signed a statement that said he had committed treason.
A Zimbabwe court threw
out the case against him after deciding the statement
had been made under
coercion.
Lambasted by the West over human rights and democracy, the
79-year-old
Mugabe, who has ruled Zimbabwe since its 1980 independence from
Britain,
claims London is spearheading an international "racist" witch-hunt
against
him.
Doctors And Nurses Return to Work
UN Integrated Regional Information
Networks
January 7, 2004
Posted to the web January 7,
2004
Johannesburg
Authorities in Zimbabwe expect most doctors and
nurses to be back on duty in
public hospitals by the end of the
week.
A public relations officer with the Ministry of Health told IRIN
on
Wednesday that "by yesterday 75 percent of nurses were back at work"
and
doctors were starting to return to their posts.
This follows
months of wrangling over a pay increase demanded by health
workers, who have
complained that runaway inflation has severely eroded
their earnings. The
crippling strike now seems to be over.
Hospital Doctors Association
president Dr Phibion Manyanga told Radio
Zimbabwe that "doctors are returning
to work, starting today [Wednesday] -
but we are going in order to help our
patients, not because of the offer
that the government has put in front of
us. What has been offered is all
right, but that is not what we expected. But
we cannot abandon people to
continue suffering," he said.
Manyanga
added that doctors were going to give the government "two months to
look into
our grievances and address them - from our salaries to those
things that we
use in executing our duties, including medicines".
Zimbabwe's doctors
went on strike in October last year, demanding salaries
of Zim $30 million a
month (US $36,000 at the official rate and $6,000 at
the black market rate) -
a massive increase from their current Zim $4
million to Zim $5 million (US
$6,000 to $1,000) a year.
The doctors argue that such a hike was
necessary to keep pace with
inflation, now officially over 600 percent, in a
country where the black
market sets the real cost of living.
"We hope
that by the end of the week things will be back to normal," said
the health
ministry official.
ABC Australia
January 7, 2004. 5:31pm (AEDT)
Mugabe meets Megawati in
Jakarta
Zimbabwe's Prime Minister Robert Mugabe met President Megawati
Sukarnoputri
on Wednesday during what was described as a private visit to
Indonesia.
The foreign ministry said Mr Mugabe was holidaying in the
country and
described the meeting with Megawati Sukarnoputri as a private
courtesy call.
It had no details of his itinerary.
The Zimbabwean
embassy in Kuala Lumpur, which also handles Indonesia, could
not immediately
give any information on Mr Mugabe's visit, which follows a
trip to
Malaysia.
Mr Mugabe's visit to Malaysia was also unannounced and the New
Straits Times
said he was in the country on holiday.
It said he met
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi privately for 30 minutes
at his office
on Tuesday.
No details were given of issues discussed but the two leaders
are said to
have reiterated their commitment to enhancing ties, particularly
in trade
and investment.
The Zimbabwean president, who was an ally of
former prime minister Mahathir
Mohamad, has previously made similar
unannounced visits to Malaysia.
Mr Mugabe is the subject of a travel ban
imposed by the European Union and
the United States in March 2002 after he
was re-elected in polls marred by
alleged vote-rigging and
violence.
The Commonwealth of former British colonies has suspended
Zimbabwe from its
ruling councils, prompting the veteran leader to withdraw
from the grouping
last month in protest.
--AFP
IOL
Zimbabwean farmers put down roots in
Zambia
January 07 2004 at
02:01AM
By Zarina Geloo
Lusaka -
Exiled white Zimbabwean farmers have helped Zambia break a
crippling food
shortage that saw millions rely on food aid last season.
The
roughly 100 Zimbabwean exile families have settled in central
Zambia's
fertile maize-growing district of Mkushi. Even critics have
conceded they
have revolutionised commercial agriculture by introducing
hi-tech commercial
techniques through partnerships with local landowners.
They have
been so successful that Zambia's Investment Centre has
issued certificates
for 31 Zimbabweans to begin commercial farming in their
own name and on their
own, newly-acquired land.
Now Zambia's government intends luring
even more disillusioned
Zimbabwean farmers across the border - regardless of
possible strains to
relations between Lusaka and Harare.
'People initially saw them as the enemy'
"People initially saw them as
the enemy, seeking refuge in Zambia.
Because they were white, people were
also scared that racism would
resurface," said Deputy Agriculture Minister
Chance Kabaghe.
He said that even people in the government thought
there should be
solidarity with Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and that
the farmers
should be refused entry.
"But we saw them as
potential investors who could improve our food
security. We have now been
vindicated."
The exiles fled to Zambia after being forced off their
properties in
Zimbabwe during the fast-track land reform programme that began
in 2000.
They rented land from the locals or went into partnership
with owners
who did not have the capacity to till huge tracts.
The official support for the Zimbabweans forms part of a wider,
multi-pronged
strategy to revive Zambia's agricultural sector, reeling from
the effects of
two successive droughts, with a shortfall of 635 000 tons of
grain last year.
- African Eye News Service/IPS
New Zimbabwe
EDITOR'S MEMO: MTHULISI MATHUTHU
2004: Stopping
connivance with official lies
07/01/04
FOUR quotations will suffice.
"Freedom is the right to tell people what they
do not want to hear," writes
George Orwell in The Road to Wigan Pier.
From Nadine Gordimer we quote:
"Repressive laws can no longer, by any
standards, be divided between those
that affect writers and those that do
not."
Her second and final one,
in this case, goes like this: "For the word,
written or spoken, is our
precious common property".
From Poland we quote radical poet, Czelaw
Milosz: "What is poetry which does
not save nations or people? Connivance
with official lies!".
As we enter the year 2004 we affirm, through the
above four quotations, our
tmost commitment to the noble principle of
freedom. We have, therefore,
elected to take stock of the past twenty three
years - a period of steady
and painful throttling of the free word, the
banning of the media, sheer
blood letting and the seizure of our national
broadcasting space by
rapacious and vindictive few villains.
We look
back to wonder by what alchemy a nation of supposedly literate
populace has
been reduced into a captive audience of few people. How we have
been hit by a
magical schism pitting a powerful minority against a pathetic
and powerless
majority.
If we are all agreed in the wisdom that a nation shall be
judged by the food
it eats, words it utters, things it does, songs it sings
and the friends it
keeps what
shall we be deemed to be today? Who are we
if all our space for working,
playing and self expression has been seized and
narrowed down into a mere
zone for a few men and women masquerading as
custodians of freedom and
democracy?.
What have we become if we have
no more friends left and our government is
banning journalists and
registering newspapers at the G.P.O so it can close
them?
The answers
lie in the four adages.
At this website it is our belief that the first
casuality of paranoid
tyranny is free speech. To clear the ground for maximum
oppression the word
should not
be heard. It should be obliterated and
prickled. To it, everything bad has
to be done and attached.
Once a
nation can not speak to its self and its newspapers are closed by the
police
and its journalists are hunted down, driven into exile and ridiculed,
tyranny
takes root and blooms. At once the thin line between the rights of
the Fourth
Estate and the rest of the citizenry becomes invisible.
That a nation's
airwaves, newspapers, publishers, bookshops, record
companies, footballers,
academics and musicians operate at the mercy of a
makeshift office run by a
vindictive and paranoid handpicked minister should
instill a sense of outrage
in all of us today.
It is our hope that 2004 will be the year Zimbabweans
reviwe and renew their
commitment to ending chaos and tyranny. It should be
the year our poets,
writers, academics and journalists should take Milosz's
words seriously.
There should be no room for "academics" and "musicians"
who turn President
Robert Mugabe's delusional graveyard speeches and rhetoric
into their
intellectual property and songs.
It should be the year
violence and propaganda are rendered meaningless.
At New Zimbabwe.com we
affirm our commitment to safeguarding free speech to
forestall the
flourishing of all forms of fundamentalism - be it political
or religious.
Zimbabwe should be free to chose, laugh, wonder, ask, refuse,
accept,
protest, talk, write and to play. The word, written or spoken,
should indeed
be our precious common property.
Those whose bows and arrows are out to
get at the free word we warn and ask:
Haven't you see how much attention
words get when they are banned? What use
is there to bark at a computer and
the entire telecommunications system?
We will therefore let the words
out.
IOL
Dispossessed want 20% of SA's farmland
January 07 2004
at 01:45PM
By Alistair Thomson
Families and communities
evicted by the apartheid state are claiming 40 to
50 percent of commercial
farmland in some provinces and around 20 percent
nationally, the land claims
chief said on Wednesday.
Currency traders have cited foreign media
reports that land restitution
would be accelerated ahead of elections this
year as a concern for foreign
investors given the land grab in next-door
Zimbabwe, which South Africa has
vowed not to repeat.
A new law that
has focused attention on land issues will allow the
government to expropriate
land for restitution where negotiations on a
"willing buyer, willing seller"
basis fail.
The New York Times reported that in KwaZulu-Natal up to 70
percent of
farmland was subject to land claims - a figure Chief Land
Claims
Commissioner Tozi Gwanya said was exaggerated partly because many
claims
concerned conservation land.
"This figure is just exaggerated.
The real figure is around 40 to 50
percent," Gwanya told Reuters, saying
Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces had a
similar figure.
"A rough
estimate is 20 percent of national farmland is subject to claims,"
he said.
"We think that a significant percentage of those claims are going
to go
through as valid."
The white apartheid government used land acts to evict
black South Africans
from their land, and after the end of apartheid with
free elections in 1994,
those who lost land had until 1998 to lodge claims to
get back their land or
a comparable property.
Already 45 096 of a
total 70 000 claims have already been settled,
representing 810 292 hectares.
The rest are meant to be settled by the end
of 2005.
A separate
redistribution scheme hopes to ensure 30 percent of farm land is
transferred
to the victims of apartheid by 2015.
Farmers who give up lands under
restitution settlements get their market
value but any subsidies granted to
them by previous governments are deducted
from the final payment. In some
cases, farmers continue farming the land and
pay rent to the
community.
Land reform in Zimbabwe has been much more acrimonious with
legal seizures
and illegal occupation of white-owned farms slashing
commercial farm
production and contributing to food shortages.
Gwanya
said President Thabo Mbeki would sign the new expropriation
legislation into
law once he returned from leave, but said the powers would
only be used in
five to 10 percent of outstanding claims, and only as a
last
resort.
He said 155 000 hectares of KwaZulu-Natal were due to be
handed back to nine
separate communities in February or March in one of the
biggest transfers to
date.
Mail and Guardian
Indonesia 'understands' Zimbabwe's
land-grabs
Jakarta
07 January 2004
10:50
Indonesia said on Wednesday its shared colonial past with
Zimbabwe meant it
could "understand" that country's controversial programme
of seizing
white-owned farms and giving them to blacks.
Foreign
Minister Hassan Wirajuda made the comments after attending a meeting
between
President Megawati Sukarnoputri and Zimbabwean President Robert
Mugabe, who
is visiting Indonesia on an unofficial trip.
Mugabe's government has
confiscated more than 5 000 white-owned farms for
redistribution to
impoverished blacks since 2000, sparking widespread
international
condemnation. He is also under international pressure for
alleged human
rights abuses and poll rigging.
Wirajuda said Mugabe had explained the
reasons for the land programme to
Megawati during the two leaders' brief
meeting at the state palace in
Jakarta.
"As a country that has also
experienced land reform and a colonial past, we
understand," said Wirajuda.
"We have empathy toward the problems that
Zimbabwe is
facing."
Indonesia was ruled by the Dutch for more than 350 years before
winning its
independence in 1945. Wirajuda said Mugabe would attend an
Asian-African
conference in Indonesia next year to mark the 50th anniversary
of the
grouping's inaugural meeting.
The 1955 conference in the
Javanese hilltown of Bandung was hosted by
Megawati's father, Indonesian's
founding President Sukarno. It led to the
birth of the Nonaligned Movement,
which today groups 116 mainly developing
nations.
Mugabe is due to fly
back to Zimbabwe on Friday, Indonesian officials said.
He has no other
official appointments.
Mugabe's land reform programme, along with erratic
rains, have crippled
Zimbabwe's agriculture-based economy, and helped plunge
the nation into its
worst political and economic crisis since
1980.
Mugabe says the land reform programme is an effort to correct
colonial era
imbalances that gave much of the country's most productive land
to the
descendants of British, South African and other white
settlers.
Mugabe quit the Commonwealth in December after leaders,
including British
Prime Minister Tony Blair, voted to extend by a year
Zimbabwe's 12-month
suspension for election irregularities and human rights
abuses. - Sapa-AP