Reuters
Mon 2 Jul 2007,
15:42 GMT
By Pascal Fletcher and Barry Moody
ACCRA, July 2
(Reuters) - African leaders argued fiercely on Monday over
whether to create
a single state stretching from the Cape to Cairo, and
Senegal said the
continent would only survive if it united now under one
government.
Delegates said the atmosphere in an African Union summit
was charged as a
group of states led by Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and
Senegal's Abdoulaye Wade
argued with a more gradualist group led by South
Africa's Thabo Mbeki.
"I think everybody is a little bit tense, because
they know how serious this
is" said Senegalese Foreign Minister Cheikh
Tidiane Gadio.
"It is getting heated between Gaddafi and the southern
Africans," said one
delegate, who did not want to be
identified.
While almost all the 53 member nations agree with the goal of
African
integration and eventual unity, most of the summit leaders want this
to be a
gradual process.
But passions ran high among the proponents
of unity, who want a federal
government immediately as the only way to fight
poverty and myriad other
challenges including globalisation.
"Some of
us think that Africa's unity has become a matter of survival ... my
president is here with his pen ready to sign," Gadio told
reporters.
He held out the prospect that a small group of states could
forge ahead by
themselves and sign up to federation.
"If Senegal
wants to build this union with two, three, four more countries,
there is not
a country in this room that has enough power to tell Senegal
you cannot do
it," he said.
"Some will start and the others will follow. ... Now, who
is ready to start?
Senegal is ready."
Gaddafi, known for his
impassioned rhetoric, was more restrained on Monday
despite a speech on the
summit's eve invoking the spirit of pan-African icon
Kwame Nkrumah, who led
Ghana to independence 50 years ago, to support his
vision of a United States
of Africa.
OPTIMISTIC
Asked by a crush of journalists during a
summit recess whether he was
optimistic about unity, Gaddafi, wearing dark
glasses and a black cap,
declared: "I am always optimistic."
The
Libyan leader, describing himself as a soldier for Africa, is impatient
with
the slow pace of integration. He did not attend the summit's opening
session
on Sunday and believes the decision over unity must be made by
Africa's
masses and not leaders closeted in a conference hall.
Kenya's President
Mwai Kibaki, a member of the gradualist camp, expressed
strong support for
unity on Monday.
"The advantages of Africa's unification are enormous for
our people. ... A
unified Africa will have stronger bargaining power," he
said.
But reflecting the views of many of the leaders, Kibaki added that
at a
recent conference on the issue in Kenya, "opinions were varied on the
pace
this process should take".
Kibaki said Africa's eight regional
economic communities should be the
building blocs of a united continent and
their integration must be
accelerated.
The summit leaders have come
under criticism for largely ignoring pressing
issues like Sudan, Somalia and
Zimbabwe at this meeting to concentrate on
unifying the
continent.
Many regard this as an unrealistic, if noble, dream. Sceptics
point to
decades of wars, coups and massacres that often sprang from ethnic
and
religious fault lines on a continent artificially carved up by former
colonial rulers.
allAfrica.com
2 July 2007
Posted to the web 2
July 2007
Robert Nolan
Accra
African officials and members of
civil society organizations across the
continent have been debating the twin
crises in Darfur, Sudan and Zimbabwe
ahead of the African Union Summit in
Accra, Ghana.
While the official theme of the conference is the so-called
"Grand Debate on
a United States of Africa," which would accelerate
political and economic
integration within the body's 52 member states,
discussions of the ongoing
violence in Darfur and the worsening political
and economic situation in
Zimbabwe are largely taking place outside of the
official forum.
Last Wednesday hundreds of students, religious
leaders and a handful of
officials gathered for an evening of music,
statements of solidarity and
images of atrocities being committed in Darfur,
Sudan.
Performances by local Ghanaian Afro-Roots musician Amandzeba and
South
African jazz legend Hugh Masekela called on Africans across the
continent to
speak out in support of the victims of Darfur. "We have to
inform our people
about what is really going on - to inspire a spirit of
outrage, for Africans
to say 'no more'," Masekela said. "It is pointless to
form a union at a time
when we are attacking each other. It is incumbent at
this time not to stand
by until a film is made called 'Hotel
Darfur'."
In a separate event, Sudan's President, Omar El-Bashir,
addressed members of
the press via satellite from Khartoum, and took
questions from journalists
in Accra, Ghana, as well as Washington D.C., New
York and nine other
countries around the world.
El-Bashir said
international coverage of the crisis in Darfur was
oversimplifying the
issue, which he said is largely driven by local
conflicts over land and
other resources. The Sudanese president also said
the U.S. was behind much
of the false information regarding the Sudanese
government's role in Darfur
and that it was supplying Darfurian rebels with
arms, in addition to slowing
Sudan's development through sanctions. "They
[the Americans] want to make
the same mistakes in Sudan as they did in Iraq
and Afghanistan."
The
Reverend Jesse Jackson, who attended the briefing in Accra, said the AU
Summit was the proper forum for debate on Sudan. "I wish that President
Bashir would come to this conference and meet with his peers to grapple
these issues," he said.
A similar public hearing on the current
situation in Zimbabwe took place on
Thursday. A number of speakers -
including journalists, student leaders and
human rights activists - offered
personal accounts of unwarranted arrests,
mistreatment and even torture by
Zimbabwean authorities.
Promise Mkwananzi, president of the Zimbabwe
National Students Union,
described his detention and beating by Zimbabwean
police and said he had
relocated to South Africa to avoid action against
himself and his family.
Despite finding refuge in South Africa, Mkwananzi
was critical of President
Thabo Mbeki for advocating greater African unity
without effectively
addressing the Zimbabwe question.
"Pan-Africanism
does not give a government the right to persecute its own
people," Mkwananzi
said, adding that the current situation in Zimbabwe has
resulted in a
massive outflow of both students and professors from the
country's
once-heralded universities.
Tabitha Khumalo, vice president of the
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions and
a longtime Mugabe critic, also painted
a bleak picture of the state of
affairs in Zimbabwe, noting that the current
lifespan for women there has
dropped to 34 years of age. Khumalo said a
united Africa must provide "room
for civil society to move quickly to raise
the alarm" on issues ranging from
women's health to the United Nations
Millennium Development goals, not just
in Zimbabwe but across the continent.
"When Zimbabwe sneezes," she said,
"Africa will catch a cold."
A
Zimbabwean official at the event was dismissive of the testimonials of
torture and other forms of government oppression. "Some of these stories
sound very touching, but there is lots of artistry going on," said Wilfred
Mumhura, a consular minister based in Addis Ababa, who said the growing
image of Zimbabwe as a "house on fire" was inaccurate. He said Zimbabwe's
main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, is an
"irresponsible group" funded by the U.S., Britain and other western powers
that wants "to create chaos and instability" in Zimbabwe. It was, he added,
incumbent on both the government and the opposition to behave responsibly
and respectfully.
Mumhura pointed to the meeting's organizers, a
consortium of civil society
organizations that included the Open Society
Institute for Southern Africa,
the International Federation for Human
Rights, CREDO-Africa and the Media
Foundation for West Africa, as evidence
of collaboration with western
governments out to demonize the government of
Robert Mugabe.
A number of Ghanaian students present for the discussion
agreed with some of
the sentiments expressed by the Zimbabwean minister.
"Yes, we believe there
are abuses taking place in Zimbabwe but we face much
worse here in Ghana,"
said Collins Dakurah, a student leader from the
University of Ghana. He said
there was a false impression that a country
like Ghana was good and a
country like Zimbabwe bad. "The two sides should
come together, first on the
land issue, and then deal with human rights," he
said, adding that media
propaganda against Zimbabwe could be countered
through Pan-African unity.
Others in attendance, including Masekela, were
not enthusiastic about the
African Union's ability to deal with both Darfur
and Zimbabwe. "These are
people who sit down and drink wine together, who
share meals together," he
said. "They are not going to confront each
other."
While neither Sudan nor Zimbabwe are part of the official agenda,
some
African foreign ministers and other officials attending meetings of the
AU
Executive Council offered comments to reporters. Zambian foreign minister
Mundia Sikatana said his country shares a natural border with Zimbabwe. "We
can't forsake nor can we benefit by demonizing [Robert] Mugabe or Zimbabwe,"
he said. "We believe in talking to Zimbabwe, and understanding their
problems, and showing them where we think they go wrong." Marginalizing the
regime "will not work, " he added.
The U.S. ambassador to the African
Union, Dr. Cindy Courville, a former
professor who wrote her dissertation on
Zimbabwe's liberation struggle, said
the AU was making significant strides
towards dealing effectively with Sudan
and Zimbabwe.
"When you look
at the AU and the stance they have taken, the AU now has a
policy of
non-indifference, that is, they cannot look the other way," she
said in an
interview. "The first concern in all of these situations," she
said, "is to
avoid a military situation."
Rev. Jackson agreed. "The strength of the
AU will be to unify the nation
states of African but ultimately must have
the moral authority to grapple
with the difficult issues in Zimbabwe and
Darfur," he said. "The human
rights standards must be honored, and the UN
and the AU should have access
to Darfur and ultimately Zimbabwe.
"
Robert Nolan is an editor at the American non-profit organization, the
Foreign Policy Association. His forthcoming Headline Series book on the
African Union will be published in early 2008. He writes for allAfrica by
special arrangement.
Accra Daily Mail
Isaac Essel |
Posted: Tuesday, July 03, 2007
The African Union (AU) has been
called upon to send its election observers
to a member state, at least four
months before an election is held. This
will enable observers to take note
of the situation on the ground to inform
their remarks after an
election.
The Vice President of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), an
opposition party in Zimbabwe, Ms Thokozani Khupe, flanked by some leading
members of the party made the call at a press conference in Accra on the
fringes of the ongoing AU Summit.
She said, most of the time,
election observers do not get the true
reflection of what characterizes an
election because they only observe the
day of election and base their
comments on it.
Using Zimbabwe as an example, she said election days are
usually peaceful or
seen as fair but, the processes that lead to the
election cannot be
described as such.
She noted, "The electoral
platform is not even.We demand to go to an
election in 2008 monitored by
SADC with the help of the African Union. The
only way the existing
environment of fear in Zimbabwe can be removed is if
our African brothers
are on the ground in Zimbabwe four months in advance of
the election in
order to guarantee their African counterparts that they have
nothing to fear
and that they can freely exercise their democratic right to
vote".
Ms
Khupe, who is also the Member of Parliament for Makokoba constituency
appealed to Africans to break the silence on "Mugabe's abuse of the
Zimbabwean people".
She said the problem in Zimbabwe is that of
African and, must be solved by
Africans, because, "the reality is that our
people are suffering".
She asked the government of President Mugabe and
like-minded people to stop
the blame game over who caused the current crisis
in the country.
Ms Khupe placed on record: "The problem in Zimbabwe is
not about Tony Blair
and George Bush, the problem is not about the West, the
problem is about a
dictator who will do everything necessary to cling to
power".
This is how she pictured the current situation in Zimbabwe:
"Inflation has
reached an unprecedented 6600%, 85% of Zimbabweans are
unemployed, the
productive sector of the economy has collapsed, there is
starvation in the
country with 4000 people dying of hunger and disease every
single week. The
life expectancy of Zimbabweans is now at 32 as opposed to
68 in 1995".
The MP placed on record that, her party was in support of
the land reform
process but, the idea that was first conceived by them, was
blown out of
proportion by President Robert Mugabe and the ruling Zimbabwe
African
National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) government.
"What
followed was a chaotic land reform process where land was taken from
the
white minority and given to a black minority in the form of ZANU PF
ministers and parliamentarians, the mass did not receive anything", she
alleged.
She accused President Mugabe of abusing state resources
especially the media
to create some misconceptions about the MDC to
Africans.
The MDC also wants a new constitution to replace the existing
one, which she
said is not democratic enough to encourage free and fair
election.
She said when her party is given the nod to govern Zimbabwe in
the coming
presidential election, it will ensure that rule of law works in
the country,
reconstitute a better constitution through a referendum and
among others
restart the country's economic status, which she said is in
shambles.
Reuters
Mon 2 Jul 2007,
11:34 GMT
By Orla Ryan
ACCRA, July 2 (Reuters) - The African
diaspora needs a voice in the African
Union and any future African unity
government to reflect the influence it
exercises across the world on the
continent's behalf, civil rights leader
Rev. Jesse Jackson said.
But
while he supported a push for greater African integration, Jackson said
issues like the conflict in Sudan's western Darfur region and the crisis in
Zimbabwe must be tackled if unity was to carry moral authority.
"The
crisis in Darfur and Zimbabwe must be on the agenda," Jackson told
Reuters
on the sidelines of an African Union summit in Ghana, which is
debating a
possible United States of Africa.
"Its moral authority would be
determined by its ability to resolve
conflicts, in Somalia, Darfur or
Zimbabwe, they must in a meaningful way use
their strength to fight for
democratic principles, human rights."
Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and a
small group of allies want a federal
government in Africa now, but most of
the leaders at the summit believe
integration must happen
gradually.
"They talk of the United States of Africa, it is inevitable,
it is a
question of time," Jackson told Reuters on Sunday
night.
"They need a common currency ultimately. Africa as a continent
cannot be in
the global family of currencies unless they make a move that
bold. It is
moving in that direction."
The strong influence of the
African diaspora around the world, lobbying
their governments for fairer
trade and more aid, gave it the right to a
voice within the African Union
and a future federal government, Jackson
said.
The AU has recognized
the importance of the diaspora, he added.
"The Africans come to America
and seek aid, they go to the (Congressional)
Black Caucus for support, they
know that we in the diaspora are of value to
Africa.
"It is a power
that cannot be ignored ... we need to find a way to talk
about the
relationship that is mutually beneficial."
The U.S. civil rights leader
said Washington had made a mistake by reducing
its influence in Africa at
the same time as China stepped up its presence,
sourcing raw materials on
the continent and investing in infrastructure.
"While we are pushing off,
China is about to build this huge structure for
the African Union," Jackson
said in reference to Chinese construction of a
new headquarters for the bloc
in Addis Ababa.
"While we are pushing back, China sees this raw material
base," Jackson
said.
Accra Daily Mail
GNA |
Posted: Tuesday, July 03, 2007
South African musician, Hugh
Masekela, has declared that the attainment of
African Union government would
be pointless if African leaders do not take
steps to stem the genocide and
other human right violations in Darfur and
elsewhere.
He noted that
Africans needed to see themselves as one state and therefore
consider the
boundaries dividing them as imaginary. With that in mind, he
said, the
ongoing African Union (AU) Summit in Accra should focus on
measures to stop
recalcitrant African leaders like Omar Basher and the evil
Janjaweed from
perpetrating genocide in Darfur.
In addition, other African leaders
should be stopped from continuing with
human rights violations in their
respective countries.
Hugh Masekela was the main guest artiste at a
solidarity concert, which
formed part of programmes initiated by African
civil society groups and
coordinated by the Media Foundation for West Africa
(MFWA) in connection
with the on-going AU summit.
Masekela was
invited as a goodwill ambassador for Darfur to lead the way for
African
artistes to launch an onslaught against the genocide in Darfur in
particular. Other guest artistes included Ghana's Amanzeba Nat Brew, Gonje
and the Sappers Band. Professor Kofi Anyidoho of the School of Performing
Arts, University of Ghana also performed a poem and a song for
Darfur.
Masekela, who spotted an all black outfit to signify he was in a
state of
mourning for the many perished lives in Darfur declared that
instead of
being a goodwill ambassador, he would be an angry ambassador
because his
soul bled for the innocent victims of the Darfur
genocide.
"My soul goes out to the people of Darfur and for the many
victims of human
rights violations in Zimbabwe, Angola, Somalia, Rwanda and
other places in
Africa," he said.
He said the gathering of all 52
heads of state and government of Africa in
Accra was a great opportunity for
consensus to be reached on how to save
innocent children and women of
Darfur, who had become victims of a conflict
they did not know anything
about.
"We must not wait for Hollywood to come out with yet another movie
called
'Hotel Darfur' just like they did Hotel Rwanda to make money out of
the
tragedy of our African brothers," he said.
Masekela said he was
sad that when a French Journalist who interviewed him
back stage asked other
artistes if they knew where Darfur was located, none
of the artistes said
yes. "That to me was indicative of our indifference
towards the genocide in
Darfur," he said.
He pledged to champion the cause of the innocent people
in Darfur by
organizing several of African artistes around the world to hold
solidarity
concerts to bring the world's attention to the need to help save
innocent
lives.
Mr. Salih Mahmoud Osman, MP and Human Rights Activist
from Darfur said he
was sad that African politicians and civil society
organizations were
largely silent about the genocide in Darfur and some
religious groups as
well.
Mr. Kwesi Adu Amankwah, Secretary-General
of the Trade Unions Congress (TUC)
of Ghana condemned the mass human right
violation going on in Darfur and
demanded that AU states should act in
concert with the United Nations to
stop the Sudanese President and the
Janjaweed from continuing in their evil
against innocent lives.
Dr.
Mrs. Rosemary Mensah-Kutin, Convenor of the Network for Women's Rights
of
Ghana (Netwrite) demanded that the Summit should evolve concrete measures
to
rescue innocent women and children from the Darfur crisis.
Mr. Dismas
Nkunda, Chairman of the Darfur Consortium, a network of African
Civil
Society organization dedicated to stopping the crisis in Darfur noted
that
the Darfur crisis had changed from genocide to "gendercide", where
women
were targeted for human right violations such as rape and murder more
than
any other group of people.
He told a sad story of a baby who was found
during the Rwandan genocide,
sucking the breast of the four days old corpse
of its deceased mother.
According to him the baby was found alive covered
with flies.
"We can only prevent a similar situation from occurring if we
act now as one
people to stop the Darfur crisis," he said.
Reuters
Mon 2 Jul 2007,
13:16 GMT
By Muchena Zigomo
JOHANNESBURG, July 2 (Reuters) -
Zimbabwe, once one of Africa's premier
safari destinations, has suffered
severe wildlife losses on private game
ranches and conservancies due to
forced farm seizures and the country's
economic crisis.
Animal
welfare group the Zimbabwe Conservation Taskforce (ZCT) said the farm
seizures ordered by President Robert Mugabe's government in 2000 triggered
an estimated 83 percent slump in wildlife on private farms and
conservancies.
The drop also closely followed a dramatic decline in
the number of
Zimbabwe's private wildlife ranches and conservancies, which
the group
blamed largely on government land policy.
"We based the
estimations on the fact that we believe there were 620 private
game farms
prior to the land invasions and according to our records, there
are only 14
left today," the task force said in a statement.
"According to our
records, there were 14 conservancies prior to the land
reform and now, the
only one left of any consequence is Save Valley
Conservancy," it
added.
Zimbabwe is home to some of Africa's largest game reserves but
experts say
several animal species such as impala, warthog, kudu and
wildebeest are at
risk from rampant poaching by people struggling with
hunger and rising
poverty and from cross-border trophy hunters.
The
welfare group said it studied 62 farms, 59 of which reported wildlife
losses
totalling 42,236 animals including the lion, elephant, python and
blue
duiker that were already on the list of endangered animals.
Zimbabwe's
state National Parks and Wildlife Authority says animals in its
larger game
reserves have not been affected by massive poaching and remain
safe.
The ZCT says the story on private land is different. It chose
17 of the 62
farms that kept proper records and supplied the task force with
up-to-date
statistics in order to estimate the total percentage of wildlife
lost on the
private ranches.
It estimates that at least 15,704
animals were killed on the 17 farms
between 2000 and 2007, an average of 923
animals per farm, largely to be
sold as meat.
"Because of the land
reform and the way that it was done it was just free
for all on the farms
and the animals were the first to go," ZCT chairman
Johnny Rodrigues told
Reuters.
"We are talking about the low rainfall areas where you can't
grow crops," he
added.
Rodrigues said a lot of the animals were
poached by the war veterans who
seized the farms for food and cash amid meat
shortages caused by the farm
takeovers.
The group said wildlife was
still "fairly abundant" in Hwange National Park
and Mana Pools but that in
other parks visitors were reporting far fewer
sightings.
Local
wildlife officials say the country's elephant population has soared to
more
than 100,000 -- twice as much as the 45,000 it can sustain.
The farm
seizures are partly credited with setting off the country's
economic
meltdown, which has resulted in widespread food shortages and
massive
commodity price hikes that have pushed inflation over 3,700 percent.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Editorial
Monday, July 02, 2007
There
is nothing like the indifference and powerlessness with which the
world has
regarded the destruction of Zimbabwe by its own leadership,
particularly its
president, Robert G. Mugabe.
Zimbabwe, which gained independence in 1980,
started out with a successful
mixed economy, including agriculture,
minerals, industry and strong
infrastructure. It inherited a lot of
international good will, given the
military struggle that preceded its
freedom and the fact that it emerged
from rule by a white minority to
government by an economically disadvantaged
black majority.
Mr.
Mugabe, now 83, looked good then and said the right things about racial
peace and inclusiveness. But in no time he sponsored a war by his majority
Shona tribe against an Ndebele minority, supported by North Korean military
aid. The world should have seen the way things were going and put the brakes
on, but it did not.
Now Zimbabwe is a large importer of food --
rather than an exporter, as it
used to be -- to keep large parts of its
population from starving. Its
economy is in a shambles. Inflation is guessed
to run at 4,500 percent. Mr.
Mugabe says he wants to give black Zimbabweans
total control over all parts
of the economy, following the same path he did
with agriculture, virtually
guaranteeing ruin, not to mention entailing
injustice.
South Africa, the one country that could put the squeeze on
landlocked
Zimbabwe, has been reluctant to do so, although in March it
accepted a
charge from other African states to try to foster dialogue
between Mr.
Mugabe's party and Zimbabwe's tormented opposition. There may be
hope that
the economic impact of numerous Zimbabwean refugees on South
Africa may
drive the Pretoria government to play a hands-on role with its
neighbor,
although there is no certainty of that.
No one would argue
that someone should pull a Saddam Hussein in Zimbabwe. At
the same time
there must be some middle ground, short of an interventionist
regime change,
to improve its awful situation. For South Africa it's a
little like being
obliged to put out a fire in the row house next door.
· Portugal sees
EU-African Union meeting as priority
· Britain and most members fiercely
opposed to move
Ian Traynor in Lisbon
Monday July 2, 2007
The
Guardian
Portugal is prepared to invite President
Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe to a
summit of European and African leaders in
Lisbon this year despite an EU
travel ban and sanctions against the
83-year-old dictator and figures in his
regime.
Senior officials in
Portugal, which took over the six-month presidency of
the EU yesterday, said
they were not keen to welcome Mr Mugabe to the
December summit, but would do
so if that was the price of salvaging a
meeting they see as their policy
priority while in charge of the EU.
"This is a summit for all African
countries at the highest level, heads of
government or heads of state. All
African countries must be invited," a
senior Portuguese official told the
Guardian.
Another senior official said the government could try to defuse the
issue by
having the African Union, rather than Portugal or the EU, invite Mr
Mugabe
to Europe for the meeting on December 8 and 9.
Britain, the
leading voice in the EU supporting five years of sanctions
against Mr
Mugabe, and a travel ban on his entourage, is fiercely opposed to
having Mr
Mugabe at a European summit.
Officials in Brussels say most EU members,
including the Portuguese, do not
want Mr Mugabe in Lisbon, but that the
African Union of 53 countries,
chaired by Ghana, is demanding that Zimbabwe
be treated the same as everyone
else.
The last EU-Africa summit took
place in 2000. Plans for a similar meeting in
2003 collapsed because of the
Mugabe dispute. The Portuguese are determined
their planned summit will not
fail. "We defined a summit with Africa as a
priority for our [EU]
presidency. We want to leave our mark on European
foreign policy," said Jose
Socrates, the Portuguese prime minister.
Mr Socrates has strong support
from the German chancellor, Angela Merkel,
who recently accused Mr Mugabe of
"unspeakable acts" but said the summit
should go ahead whether or not the
Zimbabwean leader attends.
Government officials in Lisbon said they have
not yet invited Mr Mugabe.
"There are other creative options," said a third
senior official, amid
intensifying diplomacy.
Since he stood down as
prime minister, Tony Blair has intervened with the
South African president,
Thabo Mbeki, on the issue, European officials said.
Mr Mbeki is trying to
mediate a settlement of the Zimbabwe crisis.
Tonight, said the officials,
Mr Socrates and Jose Manuel Barroso, the
Portuguese head of the European
commission, are expected to fly to Ghana to
talk to leaders at an African
Union summit which opened yesterday in Accra.
Mr Mugabe is attending that
summit.
Preparations for the Lisbon gathering of more than 80 African and
European
leaders are advanced, indicating that Portugal has accepted the
AU's terms
for treating Zimbabwe and Mr Mugabe like everyone
else.
The hope among Portuguese and European officials is that the
Zimbabwe crisis
can be defused before December. "We have to face the
political conditions
for such a summit. The AU insists that every member
state needs to be
treated the same," said Luis Amado, the Portuguese foreign
minister.
The Portuguese government argues that so much is at stake in
Europe's
relations with Africa that the issue of Zimbabwe should not be
allowed to
derail the summit. "We don't want to mix the two," said Mr
Amado.
But officials in Brussels and Lisbon are worried that if Mr Mugabe
comes to
Europe he will hijack the summit, turn it into a public relations
triumph,
and exact revenge on the British, who have headed the campaign to
isolate
his regime. "We don't want a Mugabe summit, a photo-opportunity
summit,"
said a Portuguese official.
Opposition to Mr Mugabe taking
part in the summit would melt away if he
renounced plans to be re-elected
president next year, predicted another
official in Lisbon.
"Most
people on the European side and privately on the African side would
prefer
Mugabe is not there [in Lisbon]," said a European official. "The real
question is whether there is a way of finding a satisfactory outcome."
iafrica.com
Mon, 02 Jul
2007
Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates on Monday side-stepped the
delicate
issue of whether Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe could attend an
upcoming
EU-Africa summit in Lisbon.
Socrates' government, which
took over the European Union's rotating
presidency for six months on Sunday,
is organising the 8-9 December summit,
but has not said if Mugabe, who is
banned from the EU, will be invited.
"What is important for the summit to
be a success is to be able to separate
the bilateral relations (EU-Zimbabwe)
from the relations between the two
continents," Socrates told reporters in
response to a question about Mugabe
being invited.
"I'm sure that we
will find appropriate diplomatic formulae so that the
EU-Africa summit and
dialogue can take place for the benefit of Europeans
and Africans," he
added.
The European Union imposed a travel ban on Mugabe and more than
100 people
closely linked to his regime after the Zimbabwean leader won
elections in
2002 that international observers said were rigged and marred
by
intimidation.
The octogenarian president has also been slammed for
leading the once-model
economy into ruin and trampling on democracy and
human rights. The southern
African nation currently has the world's highest
inflation rate.
On Friday, Portuguese Foreign Minister Luis Amado hinted
that Lisbon could
invite Mugabe while hoping that he would not take up the
offer.
"We are going to work out a substantial agenda so that it's not
all pretty
pictures in the newspapers," he said. "And then, we'll see who
comes."
"I don't expect to see all the (African) heads of state to be
there in
Lisbon," he added.
AFP
Gulf Times
Published: Monday, 2
July, 2007,
02:13 AM Doha Time
By John Lichfield
PARIS: The
Portuguese government faces a storm of protest over its decision
to invite
Zimbawean President Robert Mugabe to a Europe-Africa summit in
December.
A poisonous thicket of other problems awaits Portugal which
yesterday took
over the presidency of European Union governments until the
end of the year.
The unpredictable twins running Poland have challenged a
compromise
agreement on voting rights reached at an EU summit only 10 days
ago. French
President Nicolas Sarkozy is threatening to de-rail long-term
negotiations
on Turkish membership.
However, the most contentious
immediate issue is likely to be Lisbon's
decision to set aside an EU travel
ban and invite President Mugabe to an
Africa-Europe summit in early
December. Portugal argues that EU sanctions on
Zimbabwe allow Mugabe to be
invited to any meeting where his trampling of
democracy and human rights
will be challenged.
Nonetheless, the invitation will be disputed by
Zimbabwean opposition
groups and by some EU governments, including Britain.
Lisbon's decision
creates an awkward diplomatic conundrum for British Prime
Minister Gordon
Brown. Brown has pledged to make special efforts for
development in Africa
but will not welcome rubbing shoulders with Mugabe at
an EU-Africa
conference.
Under EU rules, any country can veto the
invitation to the Zimbabwean
leader. However, several other African leaders
are threatening to boycott
the meeting if Mugabe is excluded.
Portuguese
officials insisted yesterday that the invitation did not
infringe EU
sanctions. A travel ban on senior figures in Harare provides for
exemptions
for meetings to discuss human rights, they said. "He will be
hearing things
he does not want to hear," one senior Portuguese official
promised.
Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates, who took over the
rotating EU
council presidency from Germany yesterday, is a keen
long-distance runner.
He will need all his stamina - and the wisdom of his
ancient Greek
namesake - if he is to make a success of his six months in
office.
The main objective of the Portuguese government is to finalise the
small
print of a new EU 'reform' package to allow a formal signing of a
Treaty of
Lisbon at a summit in October.
However, part of the outline
agreement reached in Brussels last month is
already beginning to unravel.
Several European capitals traditionally close
down for the month of August,
reducing negotiating time. The most immediate
problem is a threat by the
Polish government to ditch a complex agreement on
member states' voting
rights reached in the early hours in Brussels 10 days
ago. Polish President
Lech Kaczynski and the prime minister, his twin
brother, Jaroslaw, had
opposed a proposal that decisions by EU governments
in the Council of
Ministers should be taken by a majority of member states,
representing 65
per cent of EU population.
At the Brussels summit, President Kaczynski, in
telephone contact with his
brother in Warsaw, agreed that the new system
should enter into force in
2014 instead of 2009. Poland could ask for the
old system to be used until
2017. Beyond that date, decisions that only just
reaching the "population"
majority could be delayed at the request of one
member state. - The
Independent
The Times
July 3, 2007
David Charter
in Brussels
Robert Mugabe will be invited to a European summit this year in
the hope
that he does not show up.
The decision to offer him a seat
at the EU/Africa summit in Lisbon is part
of a diplomatic attempt to exclude
the Zimbabwean leader while not upsetting
African rulers and relations
between them and the EU.
The Portuguese hosts are hoping that Mr Mugabe
will be talked out of
attending by senior members of the African Union, on
the grounds that his
presence will overshadow the meeting. Mr Mugabe is
subject to a European
travel ban but an official invitation would allow him
to visit, just as he
travelled to Paris in 2003 at the invitation of
President Chirac of France
for a meeting in 2003, infuriating many EU
leaders.
Opponents of the Mugabe regime attacked the strategy, which they
said could
backfire and hand the 83-year-old leader a publicity coup. But
Portuguese
officials are confident that even if he does appear, he will be
made to
listen to criticism of the catastrophic policies that have brought
the
Zimbabwean economy to its knees.
The Times
July 3, 2007
Jan Raath in Harare
Bread and other essentials all but vanished
from shops and supermarkets in
Harare yesterday after President Mugabe
ordered a 50 per cent cut in prices.
Price inspectors and police,
sometimes armed, descended on supermarkets in
the Zimbabwean capital to
enforce price controls. Their intervention
followed the order issued by Mr
Mugabe last week in an attempt to get to
grips with rampant
inflation.
The result was chaos. Bags of sugar burst open in struggles
between shoppers
who had streamed into supermarkets. Computerised checkouts
jammed, unable to
cope with the rapid price changes. There was further
confusion when
officials forced their way into storerooms and declared stock
items to be
"illegal hoarding," and ordered all goods to be moved on to
supermarket
floors.
At one store where the manager tried to restrict
sales to two of each item,
one worker was seriously injured in the mayhem.
Annual inflation reached
4,500 per cent in May, the result of nearly three
decades of economic
policies devoid of prudence or
forethought.
Related Links
a.. An offer EU hopes he will
refuse
Economists estimate that the real figure is closer to 10,000 per cent.
Prices are more than doubling every month as suppliers and retailers
struggle to keep up with the decline of the currency, which at lunchtime
yesterday traded at Z$260,000 to £1.
With hard currency earnings now
almost negligible, the central bank buys
foreign currency at black market
prices from finance houses and prints
mountains of increasingly worthless
currency to pay them.
Mr Mugabe, however, asserts that inflation is the
fault of "profiteering" by
retailers in league with the British Government
to oust him.
Last Tuesday the Government published an edict cutting the
price of 26
essential items by up to 70 per cent. Two days later another
edict imposed
price controls on a much wider range of goods. "Reports are
that some
businesses are resisting this order," said Obert Mpofu, the
Industry
Minister. "We will arrest them."
Mr Mugabe's attempt to
crush inflation reflects a growing sense that
economic collapse will bring
about the end of his 27-year rule.
The Government has been enraged by
remarks by Chris Dell, the outgoing
American Ambassador, who predicted that
Mr Mugabe would be out of office
within six months. No regime "has survived
five-digit inflation", said Mr
Dell. The Government was "affecting regime
change on itself," he added.
Mr Mugabe issued a warning that violation of
price controls would be dealt
with forcefully. "This nonsense of price
escalation must come to an end," he
said. "We will never admit to defeat by
British tactics."
UN Integrated Regional Information
Networks
2 July 2007
Posted to the web 2 July
2007
Harare
Zimbabwe's seven-year economic crisis has made the
elderly, who make up 10
percent of the country's 12 million people, even
more vulnerable.
"The situation for older persons, who, by definition,
are people over the
age of 60, and because of their mental, physical and
poor financial status
are considered vulnerable, is sad, owing to the
hyperinflationary
environment that is affecting the country," Priscilla
Gavi, director of Help
Age, a national voluntary organisation promoting the
welfare of the aged,
told IRIN.
The decline is evident in
institutions for the elderly, which are mainly
funded by independent donors,
but whose contributions were "too little and a
token considering what is
required on the ground", Gavi said.
Most homes have been hit hard by an
annual inflation rate of around 4,000
percent, and unable to cope with the
steep increase in the cost of essential
services such as health, water and
electricity.
Daily living in Zimbabwe has been characterised by
widespread shortages of
basic commodities and foreign currency. Since the
start of the crisis in
2000, donors have either scaled down operations,
citing a harsh operating
environment, or pulled out.
Unaffordable
cost of living
But even when donors were willing to help, Gavi said they
tended to insist
on income-generating projects for the old, a requirement
that "took a lot of
convincing" because the process of drawing up proposals
was long and took
time.
Irene Gwindi, a who has worked since the late
1990s as caregiver at
Chinyaradzo, an old-age home in the populous
southwestern suburb of
Highfields in Harare, the capital, recalled the days
when looking after the
elderly was easy because funds and donations were
never a problem.
"The speed at which things have deteriorated is
unbelievable," Gwindi told
IRIN. "In the winter season, like now, our
inmates would be guaranteed of at
least five blankets each from donors, the
business community and other
well-wishers, but now we have to struggle to
keep the old people warm
because donations are not
forthcoming."
Chinyaradzo's occupants include people abandoned by their
families or thrown
out of their houses after ownership wrangles; others were
picked up off the
streets and there are even some of foreign origin, with no
known relatives
to look after them in Zimbabwe.
Although the Harare
municipality subsidises the city's old age homes by
meeting a percentage of
their water and power expenses, the institutions are
struggling to foot
their bills.
"Old people's homes use a lot of water because there is much
washing that
takes place, while the consumption of electricity is high, and
on many
occasions the authorities have threatened to cut us off due to
non-payment,"
said Gwindi.
Elderly often face higher
risks
Water cuts are frequent, exposing the occupants to greater risk of
communicable diseases, while power cuts often force them to spend cold
nights in the dark. A severe shortage of foreign currency means service
providers cannot maintain or replace the ageing water purification and
distribution equipment, or import enough power from neighbouring
countries.
In the old days there used to be enough food to guarantee a
balanced diet,
now the old people at the home where Gwindi works survive on
plain tea and
two slices of bread in the morning, and thick maizemeal
porridge and beans
or dried kapenta [dried fish] for lunch and
supper.
"That means they easily fall sick because of poor nutritional
standards;
worse still, we have to struggle to meet their medical expenses,
considering
the high cost of ensuring treatment for them, that is if there
is any help
available at health centres," said Gwindi.
Like all other
sectors, the health-delivery system has been affected by the
plummeting
economy: drugs are in short supply in hospitals and clinics,
thousands of
doctors and nurses have fled to other countries in search of
better working
conditions, strikes are frequent, medication costs and
consultation fees
have shot through the roof.
Bumhudzo Old People's Home, in the dormitory
city of Chitungwiza, about 35km
south of Harare, is in a state of disrepair:
the roof leaks when it rains
and the broken windows cannot keep the cold
winds out.
The institution's 40 residents sleep on dilapidated beds and
despite
repeated calls for well-wishers to replace the old furniture, no
help has
been forthcoming for the last three years, said a caregiver, who
added that
their work had been made more strenuous by the flight of
assistants to other
countries in search of better jobs.
"Our wages
are poor because of the poor financial position of the
institution and, as a
result, caregivers are shunning the home, choosing
instead to become
cross-border traders or migrate to other countries, where
they get better
salaries as housemaids or nurse aides," she said.
It has also been
difficult to obtain wheelchairs for residents who needed
them, and there
were often no ambulances available to ferry the sick to
hospital, even in
emergency cases, which forced the home to hire expensive
private
transporters.
Life outside the homes
Life can be even harder for
the elderly living outside of institutions.
"Older persons' institutions are
limited and only cater for a fraction of
this needy section of the
population. Many of them are either living by
themselves or are looked after
by relatives, and their plight is more
disturbing in cases where, because of
the AIDS pandemic, they are forced to
provide care for children left behind
by their parents," Gavi said.
Most of those who lived outside
institutions would have been informally
employed and therefore had no
pensions to fall back on, she said, but even
those who had retired from
formal employment barely scraped by because their
pensions were too
small.
Maharagwe Munongwa, 70, a retired driver in Harare, received only
Z$10,000
(about US0.83 at the parallel market exchange rate of about
Z$120,000 to
US$1) as a monthly pension. He never collects it because it
would cost him
more than that to fetch it from the payout point.
Last
year his only son, who is divorced, moved to Canada to take up menial
jobs,
leaving him to look after three schoolgoing grandchildren, the eldest
of
which is 14 years old.
Zimbabwe closed all legal money transfer agencies
last year, so even though
his son regularly remits money to the family via
an informal cash-transfer
service, Munongwa is often at the mercy of the
agent who runs it.
"Sometimes we go for two months without receiving
anything from that young
man [the agent] who misinforms my son that he is
giving us the money. I am
diabetic, and when the money is delayed I suffer a
lot, while my
grandchildren sometimes go hungry," he told
IRIN.
"While I appreciate that things are tough in this country, and my
son is
toiling to make ends meet abroad, I now burden my children because I
frequently fall ill, while, given my advanced age, I cannot give them enough
attention."
Little state support
The government's social
welfare fund provides little financial support to
the elderly, disbursing a
paltry US$2 annually to each identified
beneficiary.
For years Help
Age had advocated the enactment of legislation that would
link pensions to
the cost of living, Gavi said. The bill has remained at
draft stage, even
though President Robert Mugabe had pledged full support,
but there were
fears that it could take a long time to be passed because the
government was
now broke.
At Dandaro, a retirement home for the wealthy elderly in the
northern suburb
of Borrowdale, Harare, the picture is very
different.
Tim Staunton, 73, a former commercial white farmer, lives a
comfortable
life, thanks to money he had saved before his farm was taken
over by the
government during the compulsory acquisition of farmland that
began in 2000,
in which around 4,000 farmers were displaced to make way for
land-hungry
black settlers.
The wheelchair-bound Staunton owns a
garden flat and is looked after by an
experienced nurse, while his children,
now living in South Africa and
Australia, send him enough money to ensure
his welfare; they visit him at
least twice a year and take him on
holiday.
"Things could have been better had it not been for the economic
crisis in
this country," he told IRIN, "but I would not say I am suffering
that much."
[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the
United Nations ]
Zim Online
Tuesday 03 July 2007
By Edith
Kaseke
HARARE - South African leader Thabo Mbeki should prioritise human
rights
issues in his mediation between Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe
and the
main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party, human
rights
groups have said.
Mbeki was in March this year tasked by the
Southern African Development
Community (SADC) to bring Mugabe's ruling ZANU
PF party and the MDC to the
negotiating table after an international outcry
over Mugabe's violent
crackdown on opponents.
Pictures of main MDC
leader Morgan Tsvangirai and several opposition and
civic group leaders
entering court with visible wounds and broken limbs drew
a chorus of
condemnation of Mugabe's leadership and forced SADC to call for
an emergency
summit in Tanzania to discuss ways to end Zimbabwe's
deteriorating political
and economic crisis.
More than 100 leading human rights and civic society
groups, led by Amnesty
International said SADC should pressure Mugabe to end
rights violations in
the country and mostly blamed on state security agents
and militant
supporters of the government.
"We call on President
Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, in his capacity as the
SADC-appointed mediator,
to ensure that human rights issues are prioritised
in any settlement to be
agreed by the government of Zimbabwe and the
political opposition party, the
MDC," the groups said in a statement made
available to ZimOnline
yesterday.
"We are concerned that since the SADC meeting, arbitrary
arrest and
detention, torture and organized violence have been on the
increase in
Zimbabwe," the rights groups said, chronicling cases of abuse
against the
opposition, civic groups and lawyers since the SADC meeting in
Tanzania.
Mugabe's critics say the veteran Zimbabwe leader, who is
bidding for another
five-year term in office in elections next year and that
will extend his
rule in the southern African nation to 33 years, has used
strong-arm tactics
such as deploying armed riot squads to stifle dissent and
protests against
his government.
The 83-year-old leader in turn
accuses Western powers, especially former
colonial master Britain of leading
a sabotage campaign against his
government and sponsoring the opposition to
dislodge him from power.
The ruling ZANU-PF and MDC have already held the
first round of preliminary
talks in a bid to set the agenda for more talks
but political analysts have
warned that the latest negotiation efforts are
likely to fail as both sides
accuse each other of negotiating in bad
faith.
Mugabe has vowed that he will survive the campaign to force him
out even as
internal squabbles over his rule grow in his own ZANU PF
party.
The rights groups said it was critical that any settlement agreed
by
Zimbabwe's main political parties should also ensure that "perpetrators
of
human rights violations are held accountable and that the victims have
access to justice. Any attempt to circumvent the needs of victims will not
bring a lasting solution."
The European Union and the United States
have slapped travel and financial
sanctions against Mugabe and his ruling
elite mainly as a result of
accusations of trampling on people's rights and
rigging past elections.
Zimbabwe has suffered a deep economic crisis that
has seen inflation spiral
above 4 500 percent leaving workers in poverty as
they battle against
shortages of basic commodities, including fuel, food and
hard cash.
The rights groups also said Mbeki and SADC leaders should
ensure that all
parties in the mediation process agree to clear timelines
and benchmarks,
including the respect and protection of human rights for
all, an end to
organised violence, and fulfillment of Zimbabwe's obligations
under the
African Union and UN human rights frameworks.
They also
urged Harare to cease its campaign of intimidation and harassment
of human
rights activists, civil society leaders, members of the political
opposition
parties and other critics of government policies.
Mugabe's government
should also "take immediate steps to end torture, other
ill-treatment and
serious human rights violations by the police and other
security forces
(and) relevant authorities in Zimbabwe should investigate
and hold the
perpetrators of violations of human rights accountable." -
ZimOnline
Zim Online
Tuesday 03 July 2007
By
Hendricks Chizhanje
HARARE - Zimbabwean police have since last week
arrested 194 people, among
them shop owners and street side traders, they
accuse of defying a
government ban on price increases and flouting foreign
exchange regulations.
Deputy police spokesman Oliver Mandipaka yesterday
said the people arrested
under the crackdown codenamed "Operation Dzikamai"
and who are in police
custody were expected to be brought to court for trial
but he did not say
when exactly that would be.
"We have arrested 194
people since the start of the operation. The people
will be charged for
various offences ranging from hoarding, overcharging and
failure to display
prices on goods on shop shelves," said Mandipaka.
The Harare
administration last week imposed a blanket freeze on price
increases it says
are unjustified and meant to incite popular revolt against
President Robert
Mugabe and his ruling ZANU PF party.
Police and soldiers drafted in to
enforce the price ban have since last week
raided shops, street vendors and
illegal foreign currency dealers, forcing
some factories to stop production
and some shops to shut down, while scores
of informal traders have fled the
streets fearing arrest.
But the crackdown has also seen most basic
commodities vanish from shop
shelves partly as consumers took advantage of
halved prices to stockpile and
also because some factories have stopped
producing saying they could not do
so at a loss.
A tour by ZimOnline
reporters of some of the major retail outlets showed
that most had run out
of beef, chicken, bread and confectionery products
among several other key
products.
However, the government yesterday stepped up pressure on
factories to resume
production with Vice President Joseph Msika promising
the state would seize
all factories that have stopped
production.
Addressing mourners at the burial of retired army major
general Taurai
Gideon Lifa, Msika said the state would hand over seized
firms to loyal
blacks he said were willing to roll back prices to June 18
levels as
directed by the government.
Mugabe last week also
threatened to nationalise businesses that defy the
price freeze imposed
following a spate of price hikes that saw prices of
basic commodities rising
by more than 500 percent in the space of just three
weeks.
Analysts
say government efforts to keep a lid on prices were meant to pacify
angry
workers ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections next year
but
would come at a heavy cost as this could force some companies to shut
down
and force more workers to join the growing jobless list. - ZimOnline
Zim Online
Tuesday 03 July 2007
By
Hendricks Chizhanje
HARARE - Zimbabwe's Acting President Joseph Msika on
Monday attacked Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) governor Gideon Gono for
putting a lid on maximum
cash withdrawals in light of the country's runaway
inflation.
Msika made the remarks during the burial of retired army major
general
Taurai Gideon Lifa at the National Heroes Acre shrine in the capital
Harare
on Monday. Lifa died in Harare last Tuesday.
In candid remarks
highlighting disagreements at the top echelons of the
government over how to
revive the comatose economy, Msika said it was wrong
for the RBZ to impose a
maximum withdrawal limit of just Z$3 million per day
in a country that is
battling hyperinflation.
"You bankers, I wonder what kind of people you
are. If I bank my money with
you, you then restrict me to $3 million. How
then do you expect me to
survive?
"Why should I put my money in the
bank and yet be prevented from withdrawing
it? Look for answers to this and
give us a feedback," said Msika in the
vernacular Shona
language.
Inflation - pegged at more than 4 500 percent and the highest
in the world -
is the most visible sign of Zimbabwe's deep recession that
has left more
than 80 percent of workers without jobs and spawned severe
shortages of
food, fuel, hard cash and just about every basic survival
commodity
Critics blame the economic crisis on repression and wrong
policies by
President Robert Mugabe in power since the country's
independence from
Britain 27 years ago.
The RBZ imposed cash
withdrawal limits for individuals and the corporate
sector last year in an
attempt to curb hyperinflation.
Individuals can only withdraw Z$1.5
million a day while corporate
institutions can withdraw a maximum of Z$3
million a day, money that is not
enough to cover running costs.
Gono
introduced the cash withdrawal limits in what he said was an attempt to
curb
speculative tendencies on the illegal parallel market where the bulk of
Zimbabwe's foreign currency is sold. - ZimOnline
VOA
By Jonga Kandemiiri and Carole Gombakomba
Washington
02 July 2007
Both factions of Zimbabwe's
opposition Movement for Democratic Change say
that the nationwide mobile
registration exercise kicked off last month has
been manipulated in favor of
the ruling Zimbabwe African National
Union-Patriotic Front
party.
Opposition activist Renson Gasela, spokesman on agriculture for
the MDC
faction headed by Arthur Mutambara, said he observed attempted voter
registrations in lower Gweru this weekend and found the exercise to be
seriously deficient.
He said many young people seeking identity cards
to register to vote could
not do so because officials sent by the Office of
the Registrar General were
out of photo film. He charged that the lack of
film was deliberate on the
part of authorities and intended to prevent
supporters of the opposition
from registering to vote.
Harare
recently launched a two-month mobile registration drive that is
supposed to
provide identity cards to those 18 years and over so they can
register to
vote.
Gasela, a former member of parliament, told reporter Jonga
Kandemiiri of
VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that the registration drive was
not properly
planned.
Elections Secretary Ian Makoni of the MDC
faction of Morgan Tsvangirai said
that his formation is similarly concerned
and will tell Registrar General
Tobaiwa Mudede in an upcoming meeting that
the mobile registration units
must return to many districts.
With
preparations for January and March 2008 elections picking up momentum,
local
observers and monitors are reporting mixed feelings on forthcoming
ballots.
A constitutional amendment sent to parliament by the
government proposing
major electoral changes has yet to be passed and signed
into law, leading
critics to say that official planning at this stage looks
hazy. But other
opponents of the ruling party say they mean to see elections
held on
schedule whatever the state of preparations.
Carole
Gombakomba of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe reported.
Despite repeated
calls to Zimbabwe Electoral Commission Chairman George
Chiweshe, ZEC
Spokesman Sly Gwana, and Registrar General Tobaiwa Mudede, no
official
response to complaints by opposition members and civil society
groups, or
comment on preparations for elections, could be obtained.
SW
Radio Africa (London)
2 July 2007
Posted to the web 2 July
2007
Lance Guma
Students at the University of Zimbabwe face
eviction from their halls of
residence following demands by the institution
that they pay Z$1 million in
top up fees for the remaining month of July.
Students reacted angrily
arguing the semester was extended by 7 weeks
because of a strike by
lecturers and yet government was making them meet the
financial consequences
of its own incompetence. To make matters worse
students say the announcement
was made on the 27th June while the deadline
was set for the 29th,
effectively giving them only 2 days to raise the
money. Those who fail to
pay have been told they will be evicted.
UZ
student's representative council president Lovemore Chinoputsa accused
the
regime of trying to thwart the 'robust and vibrant students movement' by
deliberately forcing students out of residence. Students from the Arts,
Social Sciences, Veterinary Science, Commerce and Science faculties are
mainly affected. Lecturers went on strike in February this year leading to a
serious disruption of lessons for the students. Students at the time urged
government to resolve the demands of their lecturers but met with the usual
stubbornness from the regime.
On Monday Benjamin Nyandoro a
Programmes Officer with the UZ SRC confirmed
plans by the union to file a
High Court application challenging the top up
fees. He also expressed
frustration with the judiciary saying students now
have a lot of
applications pending in the courts. Several of their leaders
were barred
from writing exams while others were expelled or suspended. He
warned they
might target judges in future protests if they continued helping
the regime.
Meanwhile the National University of Science and Technology has
not made any
demands for its students to pay top up fees despite being
affected by the
strikes. Other institutions like the Midlands State
University did not
extend their semester.
In another story highlighting challenges being
faced in the education sector
some private schools have begun charging fees
in foreign currency. The
Zimbabwe dollar has been in free fall and made it
hard for most schools to
budget expenditure. This has necessitated top-up
fees, which sometimes are
higher than the original fees charged. Others have
implemented new systems
to ensure parents pay fees on a monthly basis rather
than every term. One
school is reported to have sent out a circular pegging
fees at US$110 (Z$18
480 000) per month.
Business Report
July 2,
2007
Harare - Most of Zimbabwe's gold producers are operating at a fifth
of
capacity because the central bank is delaying paying them for their
output.
The bank owed mining companies about $17 million (R119 million)
for gold
already delivered, the Chamber of Mines, which represents most of
the
country's top mining companies, said at the weekend.
The bank is
the sole buyer of Zimbabwean gold. The inflation rate has pushed
many mining
firms close to collapse as they struggle to contain costs. -
Bloomberg
SABC
July 02,
2007, 09:30
Pius Ncube, the Archbishop of Bulawayo, says that President
Thabo Mbeki is
facing an uphill battle in his attempt to mediate in
Zimbabwe. Mbeki is in
Accra, Ghana, where the AU summit is taking
place.
Mbeki is expected to brief SADC delegates on South Africa's
mediation role
between ZANU-PF, the ruling party, and Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC),
the opposition.
Ncube earlier said that he
believed Britain would be justified in invading
its former colony in order
to rid it of Robert Mugabe, the Zimbabwean
president. The Roman Catholic
archbishop is one of the most outspoken
critics of Mugabe.
"But we
know Mugabe, we have been with the man for 27 years. We know how
arrogant he
is and transparent and how he can sacrifice lives for power. So
I know that
Mbeki has goodwill, but you are dealing here with a man who is
absolutely
stubborn and insensitive," said the clergyman.
BBC
Monday, 2 July 2007, 09:20 GMT
Foreign governments should intervene to remove President Robert
Mugabe, says
a Zimbabwean Roman Catholic Archbishop.
"We have to choose
between two evils," Archbishop Pius Ncube told the BBC.
"A government
which is ready to sacrifice the lives of its own people, or
bringing it down
at the risk of being called imperialistic."
The archbishop has previously
said he would be ready to die leading street
protests, but he says
Zimbabweans are too afraid to try to oust Mr Mugabe.
Zimbabwe's
opposition says its activists are often arrested for no reason,
tortured and
even killed, while elections are rigged by Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF
party.
"You can't mobilise when one out of every 10 Zimbabweans is a
spy for
Mugabe," Archbishop Ncube told the BBC's Focus on Africa
programme.
During the Gukurahundi campaign, Pius Ncube witnessed
the suffering
and was desperate to speak out
Profile:
Turbulent archbishop
He was quoted in the UK's Sunday Times as saying
former colonial power
Britain should intervene to remove Zimbabwe but he
told the BBC that any
"strong" country should do so.
In May, Mr
Mugabe warned Roman Catholic bishops they were on a "dangerous
path" if they
become too political.
He was responding to an open letter published over
Easter, in which they
warned of a mass uprising unless free elections are
held.
"Many people in Zimbabwe are angry, and their anger is now erupting
into
open revolt," the letter said.
Mr Mugabe is a Catholic - the
largest single religious group in the country.
Zimbabwe has the world
highest rate of inflation - 3,700% - and just one
adult in five has a
regular job.
Mr Mugabe blames the worsening economic crisis on a Western
plot to remove
him from power.
The Guardian
The Portuguese
government should send the Zimbabwean president an arrest
warrant, not a
summit invitation.
Peter Tatchell
July 2, 2007 7:00 PM
One of
the first acts of the new Portuguese presidency of the EU is announce
plans
to roll out the red carpet for the Zimbabwean dictator, President
Robert
Mugabe. It is planning to invite him to December's European
Union-African
Union summit in Lisbon, despite a prohibition on the
blood-stained tyrant
entering the EU.
While Zimbabwe burns and millions starve, Mugabe will be
wined and dined by
the Portuguese president, Aníbal António Cavaco Silva,
and received by other
African and European heads of state.
What is
the point in having an EU travel ban if it is not enforced? Nearly
every
time Mugabe wants to come to Europe, the EU caves in and agrees to
waive its
ban.
Portugal's invitation is an insult to the many victims of his
murderous
regime, especially to black Zimbabweans who once looked to Mugabe
as a
liberator but who are now the main victims of his slaughterhouse. They
don't
want him feted. They want him arrested and put on trial.
Only a
few months ago the EU strengthened its travel restrictions against
Zimbabwean leaders. Now Portugal wants to weaken them. What is going on?
Where is the consistency?
At December's EU-AU summit, Mugabe's sole
aim will be to grandstand, play
the world statesman and capture the
headlines. He has run rings around the
EU before, and now the Portuguese are
willing to hand him another PR coup.
Where is the sense or morality in
that?
It is time to stop playing diplomatic games and cease treating
Mugabe as a
legitimate head of state. No recent Zimbabwean election has been
free and
fair. There can be no business as usual with any regime that is
guilty of
disappearing, jailing, torturing, raping, starving and murdering
its own
people.
Instead of sending the Zimbabwean dictator an
invitation to the summit, the
Portuguese government should send him an
arrest warrant under international
human rights law, on charges of torture
and other crimes against humanity
(the same goes for other murderous heads
of state, they should get arrest
warrants too).
Mugabe is killing
black Africans on a scale that is even greater than the
killings by the evil
apartheid regime of PW Botha. Yet there is no global
campaign to boycott and
sanction his regime. Nor is there any international
solidarity movement to
support the democratic, trade union, church and
student opposition inside
Zimbabwe. This is betrayal on a monumental scale.
It is also de facto
racism. If Mugabe was white (like PW Botha) there would
be a worldwide
campaign against him. But a black tyrant killing black people
somehow merits
less concern and outrage. Why?
We have a precedent for legal action
against human rights abusers, and it is
a precedent here in Europe. In
response to the killing fields of Bosnia and
Kosovo, the international
community said these vile crimes were a violation
of humanitarian law.
President Milosevic was indicted and eventually
arrested and put on trial in
The Hague.
Given this precedent, why are Portugal, Britain, the EU and
the UN, refusing
to prosecute Mugabe? How many Zimbabweans have to die
before the world's
governments start enforcing the human rights laws they
have signed and
pledged to uphold? One million? Five million? What will it
take to finally
provoke the international community to put Mugabe in the
dock?
The latest outrage is Mugabe's use of food as a political weapon.
He is
withholding food aid from drought-stricken regions that voted for the
opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Six million Zimbabweans,
out of a population of 12 million, face starvation and death.
Didymus
Mutasa is Mugabe's right-hand man and minister of national security
and
land. I knew him in the 1970s, when I was a supporter of Mugabe's war of
liberation against Ian Smith's illegal white minority regime. We went to
China together in 1975. This once kind, gentle Christian man has, like his
mentor Mugabe, turned into a monster. Mutasa now says it doesn't matter if a
few million people die because most of the dead will be MDC supporters. "We
would be better off with only six million people, with our own people who
support the liberation struggle ... We don't want all these extra people,"
he boasted. This policy of genocide-by-starvation is unprecedented since the
mass hunger inflicted on Cambodia by Pol Pot and the Khmer
Rouge.
President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa has argued against a
get-tough policy
with Mugabe. He says "quiet diplomacy" is the way forward.
But Mbeki has
nothing to show for six years of behind-the-scenes
negotiations. On the
contrary, the human rights situation in Zimbabwe has
worsened dramatically.
Mbeki's quiet diplomacy has been a spectacular
failure, yet he is still
flogging the dead horse of dialogue, and most
African and EU leaders are
still falling for this dead-in-the-water
policy.
For the Portuguese, human rights in Zimbabwe don't seem a
priority. Despite
signing international human rights conventions against
genocide and torture,
Portugal is doing nothing to enforce them. The British
government has been
no better. Tony Blair talked hard against the Mugabe
regime, but bottled out
of any effective action. He pushed through
Zimbabwe's suspension from the
Commonwealth. This was a weak, futile
gesture. It did nothing to undermine
Mugabe.
Instead of empty
gestures, why doesn't the world community do something
effective to
challenge Mugabe's tyranny? International human rights laws
could be used to
put him on trial, just like Slobodan Milosevic. The laws
against torture are
the strongest and easiest to enforce.
The UN convention against torture
1984 has been ratified and incorporated
into domestic law by Portugal,
Britain, other EU member states and by most
of Africa. It requires the
arrest and prosecution of any person (especially
a high state official) who
commits, authorises or condones torture anywhere
in the world.
In
Zimbabwe, the use of torture by the police, army and the intelligence
services is routine and systemic. It is inconceivable that Mugabe is unaware
of what is going on. He has not condemned or stopped it. That makes him
guilty of complicity under Portuguese, European and international
law.
Reports from the Zimbabwean human rights groups - the Amani Trust
and the
Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace - confirm that torture is
endemic.
What more evidence does Portugal want? The legal and moral case for
Mugabe's
arrest is overwhelming.
Unlike the EU's current feeble,
slap-on-the-wrist sanctions, the issuing of
an international arrest warrant
would be effective and dramatic. It is
something many nations could do - not
just Portugal. Britain and the rest of
the EU could give a lead. If a
warrant was issued, it would create real
anxiety for Mugabe; haunting him
with the nightmare of ending up behind
bars, just like Milosevic did. This
might make him think twice before
ordering more torture and killings. It
could help ameliorate his worst
excesses; saving at least some
lives.
Better still, the Portuguese government could lure Mugabe into a
trap. It
could invite him to December's European-African summit and, when he
arrives
in Lisbon, arrest him on charges of torture. There is no point in
Portugal
having human rights laws if it is not prepared to enforce
them.
Legal precedent is on Portugal's side. The 1946 Nuremberg tribunal
on Nazi
war crimes established the principle that in cases of crimes against
humanity, such as torture, nobody is above the law - not even heads of
state.
This was reiterated in the case of Slobodan Milosevic. He was
indicted for
crimes against humanity in 1999, while he was head of state of
Yugoslavia.
The international tribunal in The Hague ruled that a head of
state does not
have immunity from prosecution for grave human rights
abuses.
The indictment of Milosevic sets a contemporary precedent for the
arrest of
the Zimbabwean president in Lisbon in December. If Slobodan
Milosevic can be
put on trial, why can't Robert Mugabe?
Two old Mugabe themes at the Vigil -
gays and cricket. Despite the
attempted mass murders in London on Friday,
life went on more or less as
normal today. Some roads were closed in the
search for more bombs, but the
annual Gay Pride march went ahead as planned,
although somewhat dampened by
the edges of a weather front which has flooded
people to the North. We are
always pleased that so many of the people on
the march sign our petitions
and express such concern for
Zimbabwe.
Vigil supporters were also pleased at the outcome of the
cricket meeting in
London. The International Cricket Council has launched an
investigation into
the finances of cricket in Zimbabwe because of the
looting by the current
bosses. We were going to hold a protest at the
meeting at the request of
Free-Zim Youth, but they suddenly made an
about-turn and called for everyone
to accept the Zanu PF case (see
http://www.zimdaily.com/news/117/ARTICLE/1797/2007-06-27.html#).
We are
puzzled as to why Free-Zim Youth feel that giving the Zimbabwean
cricket
authorities more money will help cricket on the ground in Zimbabwe.
Surely
they know it will just go into the pockets of Zanu-PF
cronies?
Vigil supporters were happy that our Caribbean brothers have
called off
their cricket tour to Zimbabwe. We are encouraged by their
support, which
shows that, despite their sympathy for Zimbabwe's freedom
struggle, they are
no longer taken in by the Mugabe propaganda.
Now
that Free-Zim Youth are safely in the UK they have identified "the real
enemy ". They say, in the above mentioned article in Zimdaily, " We have a
crisis here of Zimbabweans in diaspora who have to face hard life with no
legal status, no accommodation, no access to health, young Zimbabweans
subjected to all forms of abuse and cannot obvious reasons yet we have a
host nation that says its so much concerned about the humanitarian crisis in
Zimbabwe, well charity begins at home" (sic) . . . . sounds like they would
be better off there.
You may be wondering what happens to all the
videos people take at the
Vigil. Doubt and Patson have posted some of
theirs on the youtube website.
Check: http://www.youtube.com/46664dehwa
to see if you feature. You might
catch pictures of the Ancilla dancing and
singing with some of the many
people who stopped to join us. Ancilla has
started raising money for the
women's wing of MDC Central London Branch by
selling peanuts and has already
raised £20.
For this week's Vigil
pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/zimbabwevigil/
FOR
THE RECORD: 53 signed the register.
FOR YOUR DIARY:
- Monday,
2nd July 2007, 7.30 pm. Central London Zimbabwe Forum.
The speaker will be
leading political analyst and senior lecturer in UZ's
Faculty of Political
Science Dr John Makumbe. Dr Makumbe will talk about the
prospects of the two
MDC factions uniting to fight the 2008 elections
together. There is varied
speculation in the media on the chances of unity
between the MDCs. This only
confirms how crucial this subject is in Zimbabwe
today. Being a member of
the steering committees of both the Save Zimbabwe
Campaign and Christian
Alliance, which first brought Morgan Tsvangirai and
Arthur Mutambara
together, Dr Makumbe is well-placed to address this
subject. This week's
forum presents a chance you should not miss. Come and
enjoy Dr Makumbe's
sharp humour and critical analysis. He will also answer
your questions from
the floor after his speech. Upstairs at the Theodore
Bullfrog pub, 28 John
Adam Street, London WC2 (cross the Strand from the
Zimbabwe Embassy, go down
a passageway to John Adam Street, turn right and
you will see the
pub)
- Friday, 17th August 2007, 12:00 - 14:30. The Zimbabwe
Solidarity
Campaign in Belfast plans to hold a Vigil outside City Hall,
Belfast. All
supporters welcome.
Vigil co-ordinator
The
Vigil, outside the Zimbabwe Embassy, 429 Strand, London, takes place
every
Saturday from 14.00 to 18.00 to protest against gross violations of
human
rights by the current regime in Zimbabwe. The Vigil which started in
October
2002 will continue until internationally-monitored, free and fair
elections
are held in Zimbabwe. http://www.zimvigil.co.uk
IOL
July 02
2007 at 06:46PM
By Nelson Banya
Zimbabwe on Monday
threatened to close businesses defying its order to
halve prices, accusing
them of working to topple President Robert Mugabe.
Panicky buyers
rushed to stock up on household essentials that were
increasingly hard to
find as Zimbabwe's deepening economic crisis sparked a
fresh wave of
desperation.
Mugabe's government last week ordered a 50 percent cut
in the prices
of basic goods and services after prices shot up by as much as
300 percent
in a week.
However, some retailers who say they
cannot afford to operate if they
cut prices, have resisted the order while
some products have disappeared
from shop shelves.
The government - which has deployed a special unit to ensure
compliance with
the order - has arrested more than 20 business executives,
including a
senator belonging to the ruling party, for not implementing the
price-cut.
Acting President Joseph Msika told a gathering at
the burial of a
former top military officer on Monday that shops and
businesses not obeying
the decree were "sell-outs" working with outside
forces to destabilise the
economy and topple Mugabe.
"We will
not brook any attempts to thwart our efforts to correct this
undesirable
state of affairs. Some unscrupulous manufacturers have remained
defiant and
are creating artificial shortages of goods," Msika said.
Supermarkets in Harare were flooded by panicky buyers rushing to stock
up on
basic consumer goods including soap, powdered milk and flour that were
fast
disappearing from shop shelves and emerging on black market stalls.
Bread, cooking oil and salt have become increasingly scarce since the
government ordered the price cut last week and some shoppers fear worse
shortages in the weeks ahead, while others were hoping to cash in on their
purchases.
"I have no option but to buy whatever we can while
it's still
available. I do not normally buy this powdered milk, but look at
its
price... I can resell it once the fresh milk vanishes," said Ernest
Tembo, a
shopper from the Dzivaresekwa township, west of the
capital.
Supermarket attendants at one of the country's largest
retail chains
told Reuters the fear of arrest by state price monitors had
forced
management to slash prices on several product lines, triggering a
stampede
for the goods.
"The worry, though, is how we will
restock because the manufacturers
tell us they have run out and cannot
supply, certainly at the recommended
price," said one supermarket official
who requested anonymity.
Mugabe, in Ghana this week for a summit of
the African Union, is
facing the worst economic crisis since Zimbabwe's
independence in 1980 with
inflation at an annual 4 000 percent and dire
shortages of food, fuel and
foreign exchange.
"We will not
allow sell-outs, renegades and money mongers to interfere
with our good way
of life. You are warned to stop what you are doing... do
not distort our
prices. Stop it or we will force you to close shop, or we
take over your
factory," Msika added.
Last Wednesday Mugabe threatened to seize
and nationalise foreign
companies, including mines, that have raised prices
and cut output in what
he says is a campaign to oust him from
power.
Analysts say Mugabe's tough response to the worsening
economic
situation was aimed at pacifying an increasingly restive
population, but
could further hurt the economy.
A defiant
Mugabe, 83 and in power since independence from Britain,
blames Western
sanctions for the economic crisis and has said he will seek
re-election in
2008.
New Zimbabwe
By
Lindie Whiz
Last updated: 07/02/2007 20:12:07
A SUPERMARKET manager in the
small town of Ruwa, near the capital Harare,
escaped death Friday after
suffering a brutal attack by
government-controlled price freeze enforcement
squads.
The shock developments came as a House of Assembly senator Siriro
Majuru
(Zanu PF) was arrested for alleged over-pricing and
hoarding.
The Zimbabwe government ordered a 50 percent cut in prices of
all essential
goods last week, before imposing a price freeze on all goods
on Thursday
last week.
Retailers and manufacturers have been jacking
up prices, sometimes more than
once a day, as they grapple with the impact
of the world's highest inflation
rate, which economists believe has
surpassed 5 000 percent.
Many retailers have been reluctant to lower
their prices, arguing that their
suppliers had not lowered their
prices.
A manager with leading supermarket chain, TM supermarket, was
seriously
injured in an attack by a gang of youth militias after failing to
comply
with the government's order to slash prices.
The manager,
identified by workers as a Mr Chimhini, was attacked at the
supermarket's
Ruwa branch in Goromonzi district.
Workers said the government-hired
squads, who doorstep shops to check
compliance with the government order,
travelled in two trucks, and
identified themselves as officers from the
government's Anti-Corruption
Commission.
Said one worker: "The men
arrived in Ruwa in a white Isuzu and a grey Nissan
Hardbody pick up truck
and discovered that the supermarket was in defiance
of the government's
order as prices of most goods were still very high.
"They demanded to see
the manager and ordered an immediate lowering of
prices before they
proceeded to Ruwa supermarket owned by some white
farmers.
"While
harassing the white businessmen at the supermarket, the gang
received
information that TM had hiked the prices again soon after their
departure.
"Part of the gang drove back to the supermarket to pick up Mr
Chimhini. The
manager was beaten up and bundled into the back of the truck
despite his
attempts to proffer justification of the increases to the
men."
He was driven to Ruwa Supermarket where he was further beaten up.
The men
left him slumped to the ground in agony, witnesses
said.
Chimhini was taken to a local hospital, but he could not be
attended to, as
nurses required a police report confirming that he had been
assaulted.
Meanwhile, prominent Goromonzi businessman and Zanu PF senator
Siriro Majuru
has been arrested on allegations of over-pricing and hoarding
of controlled
commodities after police and the price control teams recovered
various goods
hidden at his residence.
Police recovered tones of
sugar, rice, cooking oil and soap stashed in
various rooms including the
toilet. He is expected to appear in court this
week.
New Zimbabwe
By Mutumwa D. Mawere
Last
updated: 07/02/2007 09:51:50
AS THE African Union (AU) deliberates the future
of the continent's
political and economic architecture, there is no doubt
that Zimbabweans are
more confused by the fate of one man than what the
country has to do to move
forward.
Anyone talking about the
resolution of the Zimbabwean crisis cannot avoid
discussing the fate of
President Robert Mugabe. While the opposition has
laid out a road map for
Zimbabwe, it is clear that behind the camouflage of
constitutional and
electoral changes, the real agenda is to remove Mugabe
through whatever
means. Mugabe and his party appear not to be blind to the
underlying regime
change agenda.
The outgoing US Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Christopher
Dell, and Dr Ibbo
Mandaza, seem to share the view that Mugabe will bow out
of the political
scene by the end of the year. While Mandaza's prediction is
based on his
understanding of the internal dynamics in Zanu PF, Ambassador
Dell's
prediction is based on the unsustainable economic situation that now
characterises contemporary Zimbabwe.
Notwithstanding what Mandaza and
Dell think, there is nothing on the ground
in Zimbabwe to suggest that
Mugabe has any intention of quitting let alone
that Zanu PF has any
alternative candidate than Mugabe. When one looks at
the political scene,
Zanu PF and Mugabe have not been persuaded that
Zimbabwe needs a new
constitution as suggested by the MDC-led opposition. On
the contrary, they
believe that there is no constitutional crisis and the
current government is
not only capable of conducting free and fair elections
but is competent to
do so more than many other African states.
What is clear is that Zanu PF
has not missed any election since independence
and there is no reason to
believe that next year's election will not be
held.
With respect to
constitutional amendments, Zanu PF believes that parliament
is competent to
pass any amendment and there is nothing undemocratic about
this. On the
other hand, the opposition believes that the current government
is
illegitimate and has no mandate to amend the constitution let alone to
govern. While the same opposition has no problem being part of the state
through its members being representatives in the Parliament, they do believe
that issues concerning the constitution should be handled outside the
framework of the state.
On constitutional issues, there is no
consensus on the way forward and it is
unlikely that Zanu PF will be
persuaded even through the Thabo Mbeki
mediation effort to commit political
suicide and agree on any changes that
will weaken the party by removing its
most potent weapon, Mugabe, from the
scene. Even within Zanu PF, the much
talked about factions appear to be
leaderless and when subjected to even a
small test are never there to defend
their interests. If there was any
lesson from the Tsholotsho debacle, it is
that there is no constituency
within Zanu PF (with the exception of Jonathan
Moyo who may never have
understood the psyche than informs the party) to
change the great
leader.
This brings us to the issue of the economy. While many may argue
that Zanu
PF policies are the cause of the economic collapse of the country,
Mugabe
and his followers are convinced that Zimbabwe is a victim of a well
orchestrated campaign by imperialists whose real motive is regime change and
not the interests of Zimbabwe. They link the economic crisis to the land
issue in a manner that is digestible by any rank and file member of the
party. While many argue that there is no causal link between the economic
crisis and the land issue, no one has been able to explain why the
international community would be so angry with Zimbabwe and not with
Nigeria, Pakistan or Ivory Coast if democracy was the real
concern.
The emergence of Chavez and the redefinition of the
post-colonial state as a
developmental state by many former colonial
countries clearly show that Dell
and Mandaza may be misinformed about what
is going on in Zimbabwe. If Mugabe's
thinking about the role of the state in
post colonial state and the nature
of a national democratic revolution and
the tactics and strategies required
to sustain the gains of the revolution
is spreading throughout the
developing world, why then should he bow out? It
may not be inconceivable
that Mugabe received the buy-in from the SADC Heads
of State about his
understanding of the broader context of the Zimbabwean
crisis to the extent
that they may all have agreed about the need to defend
his legacy.
It is ironic that even at the just ended ANC policy
conference, a key
consensus among delegates was the need for South Africa to
advance as a
developmental state, with increased state intervention to drive
growth and
create employment. The policy thrust of ANC may not be any
different from
that of Zanu PF. In as much as ANC is not happy with the
monopolisation of
the economy and the role of the unions, Zanu PF is one
party that feels that
it has borne the brunt of counter-revolutionary and
reactionary onslaught
targeted at undermining the role of the state in the
transformation of the
economy.
It is not surprising that Mugabe
remains convinced that the state must lead
the defence of the nation against
any attempt to reverse the gains of the
revolution. In this regard, even
selling a car above the state determined
price (like the Willowgate
scandal); selling foreign exchange above an
arbitrarily determined exchange
rate, and selling goods and services above
prices the state thinks are
justified is seen as a sign of treason or as
part of some regime change
agenda.
Mugabe remains in control of Zanu PF's agenda and it would be
naïve to
suggest that he has lost the control of the party. Any right
thinking member
of Zanu PF knows what Mugabe wants to hear in terms of the
party's ideology
and the role of business in transformation. Mugabe still
believes that the
state can manage businesses better than the private sector
and no market
system can address the developmental challenges of a post
colonial state. I
am convinced that within Zanu PF there are many who share
his approach to
development although in practice they may not subscribe to
socialist
policies.
Last week, Mugabe did not mince his words when he
said: "We will seize the
mines ... we will nationalise them if they continue
with the dirty tricks.
All companies, we will take them over if they
continue with their dirty
game. Take note, we will be equal to the
challenge. We are capable of
playing that game too."
It falls to
reason that he is surely planning to go nowhere.
The nationalisation
threat by Mugabe is not new but is shared by many
African governments. In
such an environment, any profitable enterprise is
easily seen as a negation
of the struggle.
On Tuesday last week, Industry and Trade Minister Obert
Mpofu said Zimbabwe
will transfer control of all companies, including
foreign banks and some
mining operations, to locals if a planned black
empowerment bill is passed
by the country's ruling-party dominated
parliament. The domestication of
enterprises using the state is not unique
to Zimbabwe and, therefore, it
would be unlikely that Mugabe would choose to
resign now when the fun has
just begun given the extent of the asset
ownership architecture in Zimbabwe
after 27 years of independence.
In
light of the above, it would be wrong to think that Mugabe is concerned
about the status of the Zimbabwean economy and shares the view that he is
the problem. In the circumstances, the starting point for people who want to
remove him would be to convince Zanu PF that its ideology will not move
Zimbabwe forward rather than merely replacing its leader.
Mutumwa
Mawere's weekly column appears on New Zimbabwe.com every Monday. You
can
contact him at: mmawere@ahccouncil.com
2 July 2007
The Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) has today
asked its lawyers
to explore the possibility of applying to the High Court
for an interdict
stopping the illegal commission running the City of Harare
from implementing
the proposed Supplementary Budget.
The
Supplementary Budget, totalling $1, 44 trillion, was advertised in the
Herald of 8 and 15 June 29007. Residents are expected to have made their
objections to the proposed budget by 8 July, while the budget has already
been implemented, making a mockery of the objections-making
process.
This clearly violates sections of the Urban Councils Act
(Chapter 29:15)
which stipulate that residents must be given thirty days to
lodge their
objections from the day of the first advertisement in the
media.
CHRA believes that the supplementary budget is illegal. Justice
Lawrence
Kamocha ruled on 2 March 2007 that the Harare Commission is illegal
and has
no mandate to act on behalf of the City of Harare.
The
Association is particularly concerned with the attitude of the
commission on
issues of procedure. The illegal commission disregarded the
residents'
objections to the 2007 City Budget in January and proceed to
implement the
2007 it.
Residents need to also take note of the directive on all rents'
increases
issued by the Cabinet Taskforce on Price Monitoring and
Stabilisation
(herald 29 June 2007). The taskforce said all rentals must
return to the
levels of 18 June, meaning the City of Harare cannot therefore
introduce new
rates for residents of Harare. The Commission is not exempt
from Cabinet
Taskforces' directives.
The lawyers' response to the
Association's queries will determine how it
responds to the crisis of the
supplementary budget.
"CHRA for Enhanced Civic Participation in Local
Governance"
Ends
_____________________________________________________________________________________
For
further details please contact us on info@chra.co.zw, and on mobile 0912
924
151, 011 862 012, 011 443 578 and 011 612 860 or visit us at Exploration
House, Third Floor, Corner Robert Mugabe Way and Fifth
Street
Regards
Precious Shumba
Information
Officer
Combined Harare Residents' Association
Mobile: 011 612 860 or 0912
869 294
Tel: 04-705114
Website: www.chra.co.zw
"Stand Firm. Be of Good
Courage"
Zim Online
Tuesday 03 July
2007
JOHANNESBURG - Four South African farmers who are
facing charges of
attempted murder after they severely assaulted two
Zimbabwean illegal
immigrants last weekend were on Monday granted bail of R1
000 each.
The four, Kobus Janse van Vuuren, 41, Jaco Janse van Vuuren,
19, Barend
Troskie, 21 and Liandre Botes, 20, appeared in the Thabazimbi
Magistrate's
Court in the northern Limpopo province.
The farmers
accused the illegal Zimbabwean immigrants, who work on one of
the farms in
the area, of stealing their clothes.
One of the Zimbabweans told the
police that he was severely assaulted with a
rubber hammer while the other
one was tied up with a chain during the
assault that happened last
Saturday.
The police arrested the four after the illegal immigrants
escaped and later
reported the matter to the police.
Cases of
ill-treatment and harassment of illegal Zimbabwean immigrants are
common in
South Africa. Human rights groups have in the past accused South
African
farmers of abusing Zimbabweans who work on their farms.
There are
millions of Zimbabweans living in South Africa, the majority of
them
illegally, after fleeing home because of economic hardship and
political
persecution at home. - ZimOnline
VOA
By Marvellous Mhlanga-Nyahuye
Washington
02
July 2007
Zimbabwe Cricket, under intense scrutiny following the leak
of a damning
financial report presented at an International Cricket Council
meeting in
London last week, has agreed to allow auditors engaged by the ICC
inspect
its books.
The report, alleging financial abuses, was the
latest blow to an
organization that has seen tours canceled by Australia,
India and the West
Indies in recent months.
Sports commentator
Michael Kariati told Marvellous Mhlanga-Nyahuye that an
audit could shed
light on some of the problems that have plagued Zimbabwe
Cricket.