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Robert Mugabe's militia burn opponent's wife
alive
The Times
June 12, 2008
Jan Raath in Mhondoro
The men who pulled up in three white pickup
trucks were looking for Patson
Chipiro, head of the Zimbabwean opposition
party in Mhondoro district. His
wife, Dadirai, told them he was in Harare
but would be back later in the
day, and the men departed.
An hour
later they were back. They grabbed Mrs Chipiro and chopped off one
of her
hands and both her feet. Then they threw her into her hut, locked the
door
and threw a petrol bomb through the window.
The killing last Friday - one
of the most grotesque atrocities committed by
Robert Mugabe's regime since
independence in 1980 - was carried out on a
wave of worsening brutality
before the run-off presidential elections in
just over two weeks. It echoed
the activities of Foday Sankoh, the rebel
leader in the Sierra Leone civil
war that ended in 2002, whose trade-mark
was to chop off hands and
feet.
Mrs Chipiro, 45, a former pre-school teacher, was the second wife
of a
junior official of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) burnt alive
last
Friday by Zanu (PF) militiamen. Pamela Pasvani, the 21-year-old
pregnant
wife of a local councillor in Harare, did not suffer mutilation but
died
later of her burns; his six-year-old son perished in the
flames.
Related Links
a.. Analysis: Mbeki's national unity talks
doomed to fail
a.. Mugabe's thugs turn to burning people alive
a..
Zimbabwe braced for its traumatic endgame
Yesterday about 70 local MDC
supporters gathered in Mr Chipiro's small yard
in Mhondoro, 90 miles south
of Harare, to protect him. Inside the hut where
his wife of 29 years died,
women sang softly to a subdued drum beat next to
the cheap wooden coffin.
The thatched roof had been destroyed in the fire so
they sat under the open
sky. The lid could not be closed because Mrs Chipiro's
outstretched arm had
burnt rigid. Her charred hand was found as women swept
the hut.
Mr
Chipiro, 51, a small, determined man, arrived from Harare on Friday
afternoon to find his three brick huts ablaze. "I was trying to put the fire
out," he said. "I thought my wife was hiding in the bushes."
His
four-year-old nephew, Admire, heard him calling her. "He ran to me. He
said,
'Auntie has been beaten and they threw her in the fire'."
Bright Matonga,
the Deputy Information Minister and the MP for the area,
lives just over a
mile away. There is also a Zanu (PF) youth militia camp
near by. Mr Matonga
routinely blames the violence - in which nearly 70
people have died and
25,000 have been left homeless since the elections on
March 29 - on Britain
and the United States. He claims that they pay the MDC
to put on Zanu party
regalia and attack Mr Mugabe's opponents.
When Mr Chipiro went to the
police, they refused to give him an official
crime incident report. They
fetched the body at about 10pm, he said. A
post-mortem examination was
carried out at St Michael's Catholic mission
hospital. At first police gave
Mr Chipiro a report that left out the causes
of death. An officer intervened
and produced an authentic report.
The report said that seven men
assaulted Mrs Chipiro "before dragging her in
one of the houses and set all
three houses on fire". It said that the body
showed "signs of assault since
all hands and legs were broken". The doctor
who carried out the post-mortem
described the cause of death as
haemorrhaging and severe burns. "These
youths are taught cruelty," Mr
Chipiro said. "They get used to murdering.
They enjoy murdering. They are
doing it for money."
He said that
thugs returned for him two nights ago but fled when they saw
his supporters.
"I am very frightened," he said. "They want to kill me. But
I have no
alternative. My presence here as a leader is very important. If I
leave,
everyone else will leave. I intend to fight the battle, from here."
Zimbabwe crisis: Robert Mugabe accused of bringing war to
Harare
The Telegraph
By Peta Thornycroft in Harare
Last Updated: 11:41PM BST
11/06/2008
President Robert Mugabe was accused of bringing "war" to Harare
after his
militias attacked the poorest townships of Zimbabwe's
capital.
The new onslaught marked a major escalation of his campaign to
guarantee
victory in the presidential election's final round on June
27.
Remote rural areas had borne the brunt of the violence and suffered
most of
the 53 murders confirmed so far. Harare, a stronghold for Morgan
Tsvangirai,
the leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, had
been
relatively quiet.
On Sunday, hundreds of men from the ruling
Zanu-PF party raided Harare's
township of Epworth.
Lidia Mulenga, 26,
fled after her house was burned down. "They were shouting
about Zanu-PF and
wearing Zanu-PF T-shirts. I think they were youth
militia," she
said.
"They used petrol on the house and then set it alight. I ran with the
kids.
Other houses were attacked. I don't know how many as I was running
away."
Mrs Mulenga, a single mother whose husband died in 2003, lives in
a derelict
part of Epworth, bordering an old farming district that has been
devastated
by Mr Mugabe's seizure of white-owned land.
The treeless
area, where nothing grows, has been taken over by Zanu-PF's
militias, who
claim to be veterans of the war against white rule.
Mrs Mulenga and her
children, Kisha, seven, and Tariro, five, are now
sheltering along with
hundreds of others in the Harare headquarters of the
MDC. Willias Madzimure,
an opposition MP, was trying to help another influx
of displaced
people.
"There are so many houses burned or destroyed. They come and loot
first,
then they burn or destroy the property they don't want. These people
are
very, very poor. The war is now in Harare," he said.
The MDC put
the number of murders at 66, with another 200 people missing and
3,000
seriously injured. A Western diplomat in Harare estimated that 50,000
had
been forced to flee their homes.
As well as targeting Harare, Zanu-PF has
tried to break the MDC's
organisation by assassinating key activists. Five
have been murdered so far.
Another tactic is to create vast "no-go"
areas, where the party exerts total
control and can murder and intimidate at
will. This may explain why Mr
Mugabe has stopped foreign aid agencies from
operating inside Zimbabwe.
His behaviour has stirred concern among his
neighbours. President Thabo
Mbeki of South Africa said the "incidents of
violence and reported
disruption of electoral activities" were a "cause for
serious concern and
should be addressed with all urgency".
But he
studiously refrained from apportioning any blame.
Pressure on opposition to halt poll and share power with Mugabe
· Southern
Africa leaders push MDC to accept deal
· Tsvangirai rejects plan but violence
may force U-turn
Chris McGreal, Africa correspondent
The
Guardian,
Thursday June 12 2008
Zimbabwe's opposition is under intense
political and violent pressure to
agree to call off a second round of
presidential elections in a fortnight
and join a coalition government that
keeps Robert Mugabe in power.
Morgan Tsvangirai, the Movement for
Democratic Change leader won the first
round of elections in March but
narrowly failed to win an outright majority.
He has rejected any deal that
leaves Mugabe in office, and says there can be
no agreement on power-sharing
before a run-off vote.
But there is concern among some opposition
politicians that, if the MDC
insists on taking power, the government will
use escalating state-sponsored
violence as a pretext to call off the polls
at the last minute and impose
emergency rule.
South Africa's
president, Thabo Mbeki, the former Zambian leader Kenneth
Kaunda, and
Mugabe's former finance minister, Simba Makoni, are pressuring
Tsvangirai to
accept a deal modelled on the recent post-election "African
solution" in
Kenya. This would see Mugabe remain as president but Tsvangirai
become prime
minister. Hoever. the MDC regards Kenya as a bad example
because the
opposition victory was overturned through violence.
Makoni said that he
has been acting as an informal mediator between the MDC
and Mugabe's Zanu-PF
party, along with Mbeki, to press the opposition to
agree to a transitional
government, because of rising violence. "In the
current situation, there is
no hope that a free and fair election can be
undertaken," Makoni
said.
Kaunda has added to the pressure on Tsvangirai with a public call
for him to
accept the post of prime minister under a Mugabe presidency. "The
authority
between president and prime minister must be fairly shared,"
Kaunda said.
The MDC replied that, as it is Mugabe who has created the
violence and
political instability, it would be perverse to reward him by
allowing him to
remain president - when Tsvangirai should serve as the
country's leader
during any transitional government, because he won the
first round of
voting.
Tsvangirai said that while the MDC is prepared
to accept Zanu-PF into a
power-sharing government, Mugabe has to go and his
party must be in a
minority. "The Kenyan model of a government of national
unity is not an
option because ... our circumstances are different. The
people's choice must
be respected," he said.
But there is fear among
some of Mugabe's opponents that he will use the
violence as a pretext to
claim there is too much instability to hold a vote.
The state-run press
has laid the groundwork with an attempt to blame the
victims by portraying
the MDC as responsible for the campaign of beatings
and killings, which the
opposition says has left at least 60 dead and about
200 missing. More than
3,000 people have been treated in hospital after
severe beatings, and tens
of thousands have been forced from their homes, as
a result of the violence
across Zimbabwe. Tsvangirai said the campaign had
been devastating: "The
structure of our party has been decimated and our
polling agents remain
prime targets."
Yesterday Mbeki described the violence as a "serious
concern" which needs to
be addressed by regional leaders. The South African
president has angered
the MDC by declining to specifically identify the
government as instigating
the attacks.
An offer that can be refused
Editorial
The Guardian,
Thursday June
12 2008
Morgan Tsvangirai is under intense pressure to form a government
of national
unity with Robert Mugabe. It comes from South Africa's
president, Thabo
Mbeki, Zambia's founding president, Kenneth Kaunda, and the
Zanu-PF rebel
candidate Simba Makoni. They argue that the run-off cannot be
held on June
27 in current conditions of violence. The best way forward,
they say, is the
Kenyan model: there, a disputed election disintegrated into
communal
violence and the solution only came when the president shared power
with his
main opponent as executive prime minister.
There are several
flaws in drawing a parallel with Kenya. The violence in
Zimbabwe has not
erupted, as it did in Kenya, between rival groups of
supporters. Some of the
worst ethnic violence, in towns like Kisumu in
western Kenya, was
perpetrated by opposition supporters. This is not
happening in Zimbabwe,
where violence is state-sponsored and targeted at
specific constituencies
where Zanu-PF lost. This is, by now, a
well-documented fact, which even Mr
Mugabe's shock troops do little to
disguise. Yesterday Zanu-PF officials in
southern Masvingo province boasted
of setting up units of war veterans
"against troublesome spots" where the
opposition Movement for Democratic
Change had taken root. Even if Mr
Tsvangirai won the second round, Mr Makoni
argues, the country is so
traumatised from the violence and exhausted from a
decade of economic
collapse that neither Zanu-PF nor the MDC could govern on
their own.
This is true, but it sidesteps the cause and chief sponsor of
the violence -
an 84-year-old man who will not release his grip on power. Mr
Tsvangirai is
right to reject talk of a national unity government until the
central demand
of the MDC is met: that Mr Mugabe step down. Only after he
goes does
power-sharing and reconciliation become possible. The Kenyan model
would
merely serve as another device for keeping him as
president.
Perhaps this is why Zanu-PF is attracted to the idea. If
Zanu-PF was
confident it could beat the rural heartlands into submission,
why would the
party be putting out feelers to the opposition? Why would the
first lady,
Grace Mugabe, say that the opposition leader will never step
foot inside
State House, or Major General Martin Chedondo, the army chief of
staff, call
on troops to remain loyal? Mr Mugabe can not be sure that the
stick he
wields is having the desired educational effect. His former
information
minister Jonathan Moyo insists his old boss has lost the country
for good.
If this is true, the run-off remains the only game in town and the
country
should be flooded with thousands of African observers to ensure that
it is
held.
Govt secretly registers voters:
MDC
Zim Online
by Tendai Maronga Thursday 12 June
2008
HARARE - Zimbabwe's opposition has accused the
government of
clandestinely registering new voters in its rural strongholds
in a bid to
boost support for President Robert Mugabe ahead of a run-off
presidential
election later this month.
Mugabe - who garnered
43.2 percent of the vote compared to 47.8
percent won by opposition leader
Morgan Tsvangirai in the first round ballot
on March 29 - starts the run-off
contest as underdog, the first time in more
than two decades he has been
billed as the most likely loser in a major
election.
The
opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party on Wednesday
said the
government was registering new voters in the provinces of
Mashonaland East,
Central and West and back dating their registration
certificates to enable
them to vote in the June 27 run-off poll.
MDC spokesman Nelson
Chamisa said: "We have gathered that all those
who are registering to vote
are being given back-dated voter registration
certificates so that they can
vote in the coming election.
"We are taking this seriously with the
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission
(ZEC) because the registration of voters for
the purposes of this election
ended on 14 February."
There was
no immediate comment from the ZEC and Home Affairs Minister
Kembo Mohadi on
the opposition allegations.
The ZEC oversees voters' registration
and runs elections in the
country but the MDC says the commission lacks
independence and that it
favours Mugabe and his ruling ZANU PF
party.
The electoral commission, which insists it is independent
and
impartial, announced last month that it would use the same voters' roll
used
during combined presidential and parliamentary elections on March 29,
automatically disqualifying anyone who registered after the February 14
deadline from voting in the month-end presidential poll.
Chamisa said registration of voters has taken place in Murehwa,
Mutoko,
Wedza and Marondera in Mashonaland East province as well as in
Shamva, Mt
Darwin, Rushinga and Chiweshe in Mashonaland Central province.
Zimbabwe's voters' roll has been in shambles for years, with millions
of
names of voters who died or left the country to live abroad still
appearing
on the register, while thousands more voters have failed to vote
in previous
polls either because their names were listed under wrong
constituencies or
did not appear at all on the register.
This makes any fidgeting
with the roll difficult to prove. - ZimOnline
American Aid Is Seized in Zimbabwe
New York Times
By CELIA W.
DUGGER
Published: June 12, 2008
JOHANNESBURG - Zimbabwean authorities
confiscated a truck loaded with 20
tons of American food aid for poor
schoolchildren and ordered that the wheat
and pinto beans aboard be handed
out to supporters of President Robert
Mugabe at a political rally instead,
the American ambassador said Wednesday.
"This government will stop at
nothing, even starving the most defenseless
people in the country - young
children - to realize their political
ambitions," said the ambassador, James
D. McGee, in an interview.
The government ordered all humanitarian aid
groups to suspend their
operations last week, charging that some of them
were giving out food as
bribes to win votes for the opposition leader,
Morgan Tsvangirai, in a June
27 presidential runoff against Mr.
Mugabe.
But political analysts, aid workers and human rights groups
contend that it
is, in fact, Zimbabwe's governing party that has ruthlessly
used food to
reward supporters and punish opponents in a country where
agricultural
production has collapsed over the past decade and millions of
people would
go hungry each year without emergency assistance.
The
seizure of the truck laden with food aid is a case in point, Mr. McGee
said.
It occurred Friday in an area called Bambazonke near the town of
Mutare in
eastern Zimbabwe.
The truck was hired by one of three nongovernmental
organizations - CARE,
Catholic Relief Services and World Vision - that form
a consortium and
contract with the United States Agency for International
Development to
distribute food aid in Zimbabwe. Its cargo of wheat, beans
and vegetable oil
was intended for 26 primary schools, American officials
said, part of a
school food program that provides hungry children with one
solid meal a day.
Misheck Kagurabadza, a former mayor of Mutare and a
newly elected member of
Parliament from Manicaland Province, said the cutoff
of food from aid groups
was devastating. The government has a monopoly on
buying corn, Zimbabwe's
main staple food, from farmers and will sell it only
to those who hold
ZANU-PF party cards, he contends.
"The relief
agencies stopped distribution of food a few days ago," said Mr.
Kagurabadza,
one of many opposition leaders who have gone into hiding to
avoid being
beaten or arrested in a sweeping crackdown by ZANU-PF, the
governing party.
"I don't know how we'll survive until the next harvest."
The Famine Early
Warning System, an operation that forecasts global hunger
emergencies and is
financed by Usaid, put out an alert on Thursday warning
that Zimbabwe's corn
harvest this season is less than half of last year's.
The cereal production
this season will amount to only a little over a
quarter of the food needed
to feed the country, it said.
Last year the United States, the world's
dominant food aid donor, provided
about 175,000 tons of food to Zimbabwe,
worth $171 million, American
officials said. It already has about $96
million worth of food in the
pipeline for Zimbabwe this year, with more on
the way, they said.
The food aid that was confiscated was on a truck that
began its rounds last
Thursday, but it had a mechanical breakdown and wound
up seeking a safe
haven by parking overnight at the Bambazonke police
station, American
officials said..
It had been a very eventful day.
American diplomats who had gone to
investigate political violence north of
the capital were detained for five
hours at a police roadblock after a
six-mile car chase and threats to burn
them alive in their vehicle, American
officials said.
That evening, a government released a letter ordering the
suspension of all
field operations by aid groups, but it reached many of the
groups only last
Friday - too late to head off the truck on its
rounds.
At one of the schools, the truck's driver, a Zimbabwean, was
approached by
police officers and war veterans led by an army colonel. They
informed him
that they had been sent by the governor of Manicaland Province,
Tinaye
Chigudu, and accused him of trying to bribe people with food, Mr.
McGee
said.
"The group threatened the driver and forced him to return
to the Bambazonke
police station," Mr. McGee said.
In the meantime,
Mr. Chigudu and other ZANU-PF officials organized a rally
near the police
station.
There "the governor instructed the war veterans to distribute
the food to
ZANU-PF supporters at the rally right down the street," Mr.
McGee said.
"Some police officers tried to intervene to stop the looting.
The governor
told them, 'Stand down.' Those were his exact
words."
Mr. McGee said officials with the nongovernmental organization,
which he
declined to name publicly for fear it would be harassed, arrived
within
hours of the episode at the police station. They were not allowed
into the
station until the rally was over. They were not allowed to file a
report
either, but were instead referred to the Mutare rural district police
headquarters.
At that station, the officials told the police what had
happened, but were
not given a copy of any report to document their
complaint. The food
delivery waybills were confiscated, American officials
said.
Wayne Bvudzijena, spokesman for Zimbabwe's national police, did not
respond
to the substance of Mr. McGee's charge when contacted on his
cellphone on
Wednesday, but instead contended there was no place named
Bambazonke in
Zimbabwe.
"If you can go back to the honorable
ambassador and verify your facts,
madam," Mr. Bvudzijena said, then
disconnected the call.
In an interview, Mr. Kagurabadza, the former mayor
of nearby Mutare,
confirmed that Bambazonke did exist. It also appears on a
recent report of
parliamentary constituencies by election monitors. But when
the American
ambassador, Mr. McGee, and Karen Freeman, the Usaid mission
director in
Zimbabwe, met Tuesday with a senior official at the Foreign
Ministry, they
were presented with a similar denial.
Mr. McGee said
the official told them, "I've never head of this place
Bambazonke. Are you
certain this even happened?"
The ambassador added, "At the end of the
argument, he promised he would look
into the situation and get back to
us."
UN envoy to visit Zimbabwe to discuss elections
Reuters
Wed 11 Jun
2008, 20:53 GMT
UNITED NATIONS, June 11 (Reuters) - A senior U.N.
official will visit
Zimbabwe next week to discuss the political situation
and forthcoming
presidential elections, a U.N. spokeswoman said on
Wednesday.
Haile Menkerios, Assistant Secretary-General for Political
Affairs, will
visit the southern African country from June 16-20,
spokeswoman Marie Okabe
said.
Zimbabwe will hold a presidential
election run-off on June 27. (Reporting by
Patrick Worsnip, Editing by
Sandra Maler)
Why Thabo Mbeki's national unity talks are doomed
to fail
The Times
June 12, 2008
Catherine Philp: Analysis
The horrors of Zimbabwe's political
violence will not feature on the agenda
of the United Nations Security
Council meeting today. Thanks to South
Africa, which blocked an attempt to
put the crisis on the agenda, the
council will discuss only the dire
humanitarian situation.
It is hard to see how the two can be divorced.
The deliberate displacement
of thousands of people, the militarisation of
food aid and the ban on
international aid agencies are all political tactics
that have greatly
deepened Zimbabwe's suffering.
The US and Britain
are furious with South Africa's block, achieved with
Russia's help. They had
lobbied to raise the Zimbabwean crisis as an urgent
matter after embassy
staff who met victims in the countryside were detained
and
harassed.
But President Mbeki is determined to keep Zimbabwe off the
international
agenda, insisting that it is a problem for Africans to solve.
Relations
within his own regional grouping, the Southern African Development
Community, however, are splintering over his attempts to prevent them from
doing exactly that.
Yesterday Mr Mbeki publicly denounced
Zimbabwe's violence for the first
time, calling it a matter of "serious
concern". Yet he failed to lay blame
on the Mugabe regime. This suits Harare
fine. In President Mugabe's parallel
universe, it is the Opposition that is
terrorising the people - not his
party. Mr Mbeki's statement seeks to have
it both ways.
President Mbeki still appears to believe that he can settle
the crisis. His
officials are said to have brokered talks between the
Movement for
Democratic Change and Zanu (PF) to form a government of
national unity. But
neither side is likely to accept the role of junior
partner, so the process
will almost certainly fail.
Zimbabwe Political Violence Claims Another Victim in Rural
Bindura
VOA
By Jonga Kandemiiri
Washington
11 June
2008
Political violence continued unabated in Zimbabwe
this week despite
expressions of concern by regional leaders including South
African President
Thabo Mbeki and an impending briefing Thursday in the
United Nations
Security Council.
The latest death occurred in Bindura
South constituency in Mashonaland
Central province where activist Chenjerai
Kahari of the opposition Movement
for Democratic Change was shot to death by
war veterans backing President
Robert Mugabe in the presidential run-off
June 27 in which he will face MDC
leader Morgan Tsvangirai.
MDC
sources said Kahari was shot dead by self-styled war veterans at the
Chireka
shopping center following an incident earlier Tuesday in which war
veterans
and ruling party youth militia members forced villagers to a
ZANU-PF meeting
there. The MDC sources said the militia has set up a torture
base at a
Chireka primary school.
In Bindura, Mashonaland Central, a source said
that the homes of four
opposition members were attacked by ZANU-PF
supporters Tuesday night and a
married couple was beaten. The sources said
200 ZANU-PF youths in party
regalia believed to be from Mount Darwin,
Mashonaland Central, were dropped
at Tendai Hall in the mining town on
Wednesday in preparation for another
attack later in the
night.
Opposition activist Taurai Chiveso of Bindura South told reporter
Jonga
Kandemiiri of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that Kahari's body was still
lying
in a pool of blood in the store where he was murdered, as police
refused to
take the body to the mortuary.
The Zimbabwe Medical
Doctor's Association on Wednesday issued a statement
urging an immediate end
to political violence, days after the European Union
terminated the
consultancy contract it maintained with ZIMA President Paul
Chimedza upon
receiving information accusing him of inciting violence in
Gutu, Masvingo
province.
Dr. Chimedza denied the charges and accused the Zimbabwe
Association of
Doctors for Human Rights of launching the allegations, which
that
association's chairman, Dr. Douglas Gwatidzo, denied, as correspondent
Sylvia Manika reported.
Zimbabwe Report: How Mugabe is
Tying Up Postal Votes
http://iaindale.blogspot.com
Wednesday, June 11,
2008
Iain Dale 9:20
PM
A friend of mine just sent me the
following message from Zimbabwe...
Now
it looks like the vile dictator Mugabe has added yet another weapon to his
vote-rigging armoury. Not content with driving 25,000 suspected MDC supporters
from their homes, beating up a further 3,000 and killing 65 (to date), he's now
moving on to the next stage of his "electoral cleansing" campaign: Stealing the
postal votes.
It drives me crazy that this man is allowed to get away with stealing an
election, while literally starving his own country - as well as destablising an
entire region - and there is literally nothing I can do about it from here.
Anyway, here is the latest:
Through abuse of the electoral laws relating to postal votes, Mugabe
looks set to win between 30,000 and 50,000 illegal votes, and potentially may
score tens of thousands more.
Only
members of the Zimbabwean military (or other parts of the government) and their
families are supposed to be eligible to vote. George Chiweshe, head of the
Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC), confirmed that approximately 8,000
applications for postal votes were received in respect of the Harmonised
Elections of 29 March 2008 – entailing elections for President, Parliament and
local government authorities. In the event, less than half of these applications
were approved despite 600,000 postal ballots having been
printed.
Now
credible reports, including a leaked internal police document entitled “Postal
Voting Mechanism” indicate that police and army officers, their spouses and
dependents will be required to vote in the run-off by postal ballot and will be
compelled to do so under supervision. This is likely to yield Mugabe between
30,000 and 50,000 votes, but may – because of the excessive number of ballots
printed for the first round — mean tens of thousands
more.
Stepping Up Crackdown, Zimbabwean Police Shut NGOs In Two
Towns
VOA
By Carole Gombakomba
Washington
11 June
2008
Zimbabwean police on Wednesday ordered all civic
organizations in Gweru,
Midlands province, and Gwanda, Matabeleland South
province, affiliated with
the National Association of Non-Governmental
Organizations to close their
doors.
The crackdown followed last
week's directive by Labor and Social Welfare
Minister Nicholas Goche telling
non-governmental organizations to halt
humanitarian activities, saying they
were backing the opposition ahead of a
June 27 presidential
run-off.
On Tuesday, 65 NGOs meeting in Harare vowed to defy Harare's
order.;
NANGO spokesman Fambai Ngirande said more than 1,000 NGOs are
threatened by
the crackdown and on high alert, fearing the expansion of such
raids
nationally could lead to the confiscation of stocks of food and other
humanitarian supplies.
Chairman Peter Muchengeti of NANGO's Midlands
branch said organizations
affected included the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade
Unions, the Bulawayo
Agenda, the Musasa Project, Doctors Without Borders and
hundreds of others
providing food aid, HIV/AIDS medication and support, and
assistance to the
victims of political violence.
Muchengeti told
reporter Carole Gombakomba of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe
that the raids
Wednesday set the stage for a legal challenge against Harare.
Unions: Labor leaders abused in Zimbabwe
Yahoo News
By ELIANE ENGELER,
Associated Press Writer 24 minutes ago
GENEVA - Labor leaders in Zimbabwe
are increasingly being arrested and
harassed by police as this month's
presidential election approaches, union
representatives from the region said
Wednesday.
Federations of national labor unions representing as many
as 15 million
people in 11 southern African countries said the abuse of
labor activists'
rights has multiplied since the first round of presidential
elections March
29.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai out-polled
President Robert Mugabe in
the first round but, according to official
results, failed to win the 50
percent plus one vote necessary to avoid a
runoff. The second round of
voting is scheduled for June 27.
In New
York, Zimbabwe's U.N. ambassador, Boniface Chidyauskiku, did not
immediately
respond to a request for comment about the charge by the union
representatives.
Many May Day meetings organized by labor unions in
Zimbabwe were forbidden
or canceled at the last minute. The country's union
leaders were arrested
for 12 days and then released on bail, said Alina
Rantsolase, of the
Congress of South African Trade Unions.
"Police
were in their houses, heavily armed, and they had to hand themselves
over to
the police station," Rantsolase said in Geneva during the annual
meeting of
the 182 member countries of the U.N.'s International Labor
Organization.
Despite their release, the Zimbabwean union leaders
were unable to travel to
Geneva for the U.N. meeting because of the bail
terms.
The opposition, foreign diplomats in Zimbabwe and Zimbabwean and
international human rights groups accuse Mugabe of unleashing violence
against Tsvangirai's supporters to ensure Mugabe wins the runoff. Zimbabwean
government and party spokesmen repeatedly have denied the
allegations.
Jan Sithole, general secretary of the Swaziland Federation
of Trade Unions,
said he was disappointed that the countries in the region
and the African
Union did not pressure Mugabe to stop his violent
campaign.
The Southern African Development Community, or SADC, should
immediately put
peacekeeping troops in place to restore security and
guarantee a peaceful
election, Sithole said.
"SADC and AU are not
giving this issue the gravity it deserves," said
Sithole. The AU is the
African Union, an organization of 53 African
countries.
The members
states of the Southern African Development Community are Angola,
Botswana,
Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique,
Namibia, South
Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Sithole said the
regional group should also pressure Mugabe to allow aid
workers to resume
the distribution of food aid.
He said the government's order last week
for humanitarian groups to suspend
work, was a "clear strategy" of Mugabe's
election campaign. Food was now
supplied to Mugabe supporters only, he
said.
Meanwhile, the election campaign continues in Zimbabwe.
On
Wednesday, Tsvangirai's bus rolled slowly through Harare, the capital,
then
halted in a cloud of thick black smoke, a symbol of the difficulties he
has
had campaigning.
Cheering crowds briefly disrupted traffic as the bus
moved down Nelson
Mandela Avenue. The plan had been to drive 15 miles west
to Norton to greet
voters and kick off a nationwide tour, but that did not
happen.
The smoke appeared to indicate engine trouble.
Before the
tour halted, Tsvangirai told reporters on the bus he wanted to
liven up his
campaign.
"We are heading out to make sure that the message goes home,"
he said.
His campaign has been beset by violence blamed on Mugabe's
forces.
Tsvangirai, who has said he is the target of a military
assassination plot,
has only been back in Zimbabwe since May 24 after
leaving soon after the
first round.
Since returning, he has twice
been briefly detained by police as he tried to
campaign, and police have
stopped several attempts to hold rallies. The
state-controlled media have
all but ignored him in a country where few have
access to the Internet or
satellite television.
Eroding The Fundamental Right to Liberty & Protection of the
Law: Attorney General’s Office Denying Bail As A Matter Of Policy
Sokwanele
ERODING THE FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT TO LIBERTY & PROTECTION OF
THE LAW: ATTORNEY GENERAL’S OFFICE DENYING BAIL AS A MATTER OF POLICY
ZLHR Press Statement: 11 June 2008
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) has noted with alarm the expressed
intention of the Attorney-General (AG) to “deny bail to all suspects arrested on
charges of either committing or inciting political violence”. In a front-page
story headlined “AG’s Office Gets Tough: No bail for political violence
cases” reported in The Herald on Monday 9 June 2008, as well as in repeated
television interviews on the state-run broadcaster, the Deputy AG (Criminal
Division), Mr. Johannes Tomana, was quoted saying: “We have made it a point
that those arrested are locked up right to trial. Bail is opposed as a matter of
policy“.
The statement by Mr. Tomana expressing the intention of the AG’s Office to
“deny bail” to accused persons as a matter of policy is regrettable and
unfortunate, as it clearly confuses the role of the AG’s office with that of the
final arbiter, the judiciary.
In terms of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, all accused persons have a
fundamental right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.
They also have the right to protection of the law and the right to their liberty
as guaranteed in sections 18 and 11, respectively. Bail is an entitlement that
is provided to accused persons to ensure that, from the time of their arrest to
the finalization of their trial, their right to liberty is not unreasonably and
unnecessarily violated. Thus an accused person has a right to apply for bail
before the criminal court, which bail must, in the interests of justice, be
granted where an accused person has convinced the court that:
- s/he is of fixed and known abode and is not likely to abscond from attending
trial if set free on bail;
- s/he will not interfere with the witnesses or evidence while on bail; and
- s/he will not commit further offences while on bail.
Further, when bail is applied for, the State as represented by the AG’s
office, cannot simply oppose the granting of such bail without providing the
court with substantive and credible reason/s (supported by evidence) for such
opposition. It would have to convince the court that there is a material
likelihood that the accused may flee from justice if released on bail, interfere
with witnesses, or commit further offences. It is then solely within the
mandate and function of the court and not the AG’s office to decide, on the
basis of the evidence before it, whether bail should be granted. These
are elementary tenets of criminal procedure and constitutional law.
The State, as represented by the AG’s office, now seeks to unilaterally
remove in totality the right to even make an application for bail by publicizing
its intention to make it mandatory that no bail is granted at all to those
arrested on the mere suspicion of “political violence”. To simply “deny bail as a matter of
policy” because the crimes for which accused is charged amount
to political violence is clearly unconstitutional.
All and any criminal acts of violence, whether politically motivated or
otherwise, and whoever the perpetrator, are deplorable and must be discouraged.
The perpetrators, where known, must be prosecuted impartially and within a
reasonable time. This discourages repetition of the offences, provides redress
to victims, whilst punishment of perpetrators counters the unacceptable impunity
which is so rife in our society. However, as a civilized nation which purports
to adhere to the rule of law and the principle of separation of powers, there
must, of necessity, be compliance with our Constitution and accepted
international human rights norms and standards which act as safeguards for all
people of Zimbabwe where they, as accused persons, face the might of the State
and its resources.
It is therefore unacceptable at law and in practice for the State, through
the AG’s office, to override the function of the judiciary, by issuing widely
publicized policy decisions to deny bail without just and reasonable cause. This
usurps the functions of the judiciary, and places unacceptable executive
pressure on an independent arm of government.
With the reality that the wheels of criminal justice in Zimbabwe’s courts
turn slowly, such a process would mean that accused persons, constitutionally
presumed innocent, would have to spend long periods of time in remand prison
before even being heard. Indeed Zimbabwe’s remand prisons are on record for
keeping people on remand for unacceptably long periods of time, from months to
as much as nine years. This has been highlighted and condemned by the Judge
President of the High Court of Zimbabwe, Rita Makarau.
The effect of such denials of bail was witnessed following the 29 March 2008
elections when Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) officials who had been
charged with fraud and other offences were denied bail in areas such as
Masvingo, Zaka and Buhera, yet to date their trials have not taken off due to
the state still gathering and preparing its witnesses and evidence. The reason
given by the public prosecutors for denying the ZEC officials bail was not one
of genuine fear that the accused would breach bail conditions but simply that
they had received instruction to deny bail from “higher powers”.
This policy change by the AGs office to deny bail without just cause comes at
a time when many are preparing to cast their vote in the presidential election
run-off set for 27 June 2008. This means that those who are arrested now and
denied bail may be kept in remand prisons for weeks or months, thereby resulting
in them failing to cast their vote from within the prison cells. This
unprecedented policy by the AG’s office thus stands to deny many Zimbabweans who
may in fact be innocent of any criminal offence their right to participate in
the governance of their country through voting or campaigning for their
political party.
ZLHR is further saddened that the Deputy AG’s statement expresses
insensitivity of the pitiful state of our prisons wherein prisoners, including
the innocent and still to be proven guilty, are living in inhuman and degrading
conditions. The Deputy Attorney General in fact admits to the overcrowding,
stating that the condemning of accused persons to remand without any hope of
bail “is going to choke
the prison population….Jail is not nice. It is not meant to be
nice“. Zimbabwe’s prisons are indeed already battling to provide prisoners
with adequate clothing, food and health care.
The attitude of officials in the Ministry of Justice, Legal &
Parliamentary Affairs further exhibits the inability to accept state obligations
and comply with constitutional provisions. Instead of addressing the conditions
of prisons, Mr. Chinamasa expressed his intention, as reported in The Herald on
10 June 2008, to propose an amnesty “in order to create space for those
convicted of political violence“.
ZLHR calls upon the Attorney General’s office to respect the right to liberty
and protection of the law, and recognize and accept that every accused person is
entitled to apply for bail without such bail being denied without just cause. In
line with this, there should be an immediate retraction by the AG’s office of
public statements made, and a public reaffirmation that it is the constitutional
duty of the courts, and not the AG’s office, to decide whether an accused person
is a fit candidate for bail. ZLHR further calls upon the courts not to be
intimidated by such public pronouncements and executive pressure, and to
continue to safeguard and protect the right to liberty of accused persons by
granting them bail where there is just cause to do so.
This entry was written by
Sokwanele on Wednesday, June 11th, 2008 at 7:34
pm
Arrested Media Monitoring Staff Released By Police in Binga
SW
Radio Africa (London)
11 June 2008
Posted to the web 11 June
2008
Tererai Karimakwenda
A group of staff members from the
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe
(MMPZ) who were arrested and detained
by police at a meeting in Binga on
Sunday were released without charge on
Wednesday.
The group included Abel Chikomo, Maureen Kademaunga, Abel
Kaingidza and 10
members of the MMPZ's Public Information Rights
Forum.
They were accused of holding a public meeting without police
clearance, but
MMPZ coordinator Andy Moyse said the meeting in question was
private and
included their staff members only. For this reason they did not
require
police notification or clearance according to the Public Order and
Security
Act.
Chikomo and the others had been considered missing
after their arrest
because the police refused to disclose any information
about their
whereabouts. The MMPZ said lawyers only managed to access them
on Tuesday,
following the intervention of police officers from Hwange Police
law and
order section.
Moyse said the arrested group had committed no
offence and had nothing to
answer to. He attributed the arrests to the
ongoing government crackdown on
opposition officials, activists, civil
organisations and the media, ahead of
the presidential runoff election
scheduled for June 27.
This crackdown on civil society was highlighted on
Monday when heavily armed
police, CIO's and military agents raided the
Ecumenical Centre, a religious
complex that houses the offices of the
Christian Alliance and several other
faith based organisations. They
arrested 10 people, ransacked offices and
confiscated computers, digital
cameras and a mini bus. The arrested included
the officials from the Student
Christian Movement of Zimbabwe and the
veteran journalist Pius Wakatama. He
was later released along with two other
people. The others are still in
detention.
Moyse said: "They are targeting civil society organisations,
especially
those dealing with human rights because there are many rights
currently
being abused and they do not want that information to be
distributed or
published."
Meanwhile the National Constitutional
Assembly reports that it's offices in
Masvingo and Matabeleland South have
been forced to close down by police and
Zanu PF militia. In Masvingo the
group's offices were attacked by mobs who
shattered the windows last week
Friday. NCA staff have also been exposed to
personal threats with the
militia's claiming the operations of NGO's have
now been banned. On Sunday
police arrested the NCA Chairperson for Guruve
Constituency, Biggie Bangira,
on baseless grounds. On the same day, the home
of the NCA Information
Secretary in Epworth, Musa Mabika, was torched by
ZANU PF militia. Mabika's
wife and sister were severely beaten and are
currently recovering in a local
hospital.
Zim bars aid agencies from diverting food to
Zambia
Zim Online
by Tinotenda Kandi Thursday 12 June
2008
HARARE - Zimbabwe's government has barred a
coalition of relief
agencies from moving a stockpile of food to neighbouring
Zambia, a week
after it ordered aid groups to stop relief operations
accusing them of
supporting the opposition.
Sources in the NGO
community said the coalition known as C-Safe - and
bringing together Care
International, Catholic Relief Services, and World
Vision International -
sought permission from the government to divert a
consignment of food to
Zambia after Harare's refusal to allow the
humanitarian groups to distribute
the food locally.
Social Welfare Minister Nicholas Goche turned
down the request. The
food, imported from the United States under the "food
for peace programme",
was initially meant for vulnerable Zimbabweans
especially orphans and people
living with HIV/AIDS.
The food,
whose tonnage was unclear but which our sources said
included substantial
quantities of cooking oil and wheat, remains stockpiled
in warehouses in
Harare, with aid officials worried it might expire and
would have to be
thrown away.
"We had requested that the food be moved to Zambia,
where a similar
programme is running unhindered but there was a big no from
the government
last week," said a C-Safe official who did not want to be
named because she
did not have permission from the group to speak to the
media.
It was not possible to get official comment on the matter
from either
C-Safe or Goche.
The National Association of
Non-governmental Organisations (NANGO)
expressed fear that the government
might seize the stockpiled food and use
it for political gain by
distributing it to potential voters to induce them
to back President Robert
Mugabe in a second round presidential election
later this
month.
Mugabe faces opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the June
27
run-off poll after Tsvangirai won the first round ballot on March 29 but
failed to secure the required margin to takeover power.
NANGO
spokesman Fambai Ngirande said: "Fears that the government could
raid NGOs'
food stocks for political purposes are very real. We would not be
surprised
(if that happened) because they have shown that they are acting in
bad
faith.
"On one hand they ban NGOs from assisting those in need, and
on the
other hand they stop the movement of that same food to another
country in
need. The motive is questionable," said Ngirande.
The government last week suspended all work by aid agencies, accusing
them
of using aid distribution to campaign for Tsvangirai.
Relief
agencies deny interfering in Zimbabwe's political affairs while
the European
Union, the United States, local church and human rights groups
have
criticised the ban and called for it to be lifted.
United Nations
(UN) agencies in Zimbabwe earlier this week called the
ban on humanitarian
aid a violation of fundamental human rights principles
and said it had
"created life threatening conditions" for more than two
million vulnerable
people who survived on donor support.
Meanwhile police earlier this
week seized tones of food aid from a
private warehouse in
Harare.
The food allegedly belonged to the Catholic Agency for
Overseas
Development but this could not be immediately confirmed with the
aid group.
NGOS normally rent private warehouses to keep their
stocks before it
is distributed across the country.
The police
however claimed the food was intended to be given to
Tsvangirai so he could
use it to buy support from hungry votes.
Information Minister
Sikhanyiso Ndlovu defended the warehouse raid
that took place on Tuesday
night, claiming that most of the food seized
during the raid consisted of
locally produced basic commodities that were in
short supply in the
country.
Ndlovu said: "The food was manufactured locally, yet the
NGOs tell us
they are importing it from outside. There is something fishy
here because
local manufactures that are starving the formal market are
feeding the NGOs.
"The police are widening their net and they will
continue seizing any
basic commodities stocked in suspicious warehouses." -
ZimOnline
A
spontaneous crowd gathers to welcome Morgan Tsvangirai
Sokwanele
These images were sent to us by someone who witnessed a crowd gathering on
the street with spontaneous cheering and applause at the sight of Morgan
Tsvangirai arriving at Harvest House in Harare. Apparently they were chanting
“President, President”.
You will remember that Morgan Tsvangirai was detained last week in Lupane,
and according to an MDC media statement, one of the reasons the
police gave for holding him was that he “attracted a large number of people
around him at Lupane growth point”.
These images show just how that can happen and why the Zanu PF regime is
becoming more and more panicked by the fact that their hold on power is so
obviously threatened.
This entry was written by Hope
on Wednesday, June 11th, 2008 at 3:29 pm.
ZANU-PF guile
marks Makoni's proposal
OhMyNews
Tsvangirai Rejects Unity Gov't
Isaac Hlekisani Dziya
Published
2008-06-12 06:56 (KST)
This article was only lightly edited.
<Editor's Note>
As reported by Reuters, Morgan Tsvangirai of the
Movement for Democratic
Change rejected calls on Tuesday in Zimbabwe for a
national unity government
as proposed by failed presidential candidate Simba
Makoni, whose credentials
have always been doubtful, as the electorate saw
his candidacy as another
front for ZANU-PF.
Tsvangirai prefers a
presidential runoff vote. He is sure his party will win
the election despite
government violence.
In previous articles I have alluded to a silent
coup. Tsvangirai has now
confirmed that a de facto coup has taken place and
that the country is being
run by a military junta.
ZANU-PF wants a
hand in governing to cover up their poor failings. Why
didn't ZANU-PF
propose a government of national unity when they had the
upper hand in June
2000 parliamentary elections, when it won 62 of the
constituency-based
seats, against the 57 held by the MDC?
Now that the tables have been
turned against them, and they know that in the
absence of a third detracting
candidate (Simba Makoni), ZANU-PF is surely
going to lose the
runoff.
ZANU-PF
A defector from the ZANU-PF party, Simba Makoni, a
former finance minister,
feels that the June 27 run-off between President
Robert Mugabe and
Tsvangirai must be called off because a free and fair vote
was impossible.
Obviously, he is still a surrogate for Mugabe, his initial
participation in
the March 29 election having had the tacit approval of the
president. His
candidacy was meant to sow confusion and chaos, which it
almost succeeded in
doing.
The international consultations to look at
what practical steps could be
taken by the international community to ensure
a real runoff election are
pleasing. The June 27 runoff election should be
as free and fair as
possible, so as to reflect the will of the Zimbabwean
people.
With campaigning made next to impossible for the MDC due to
brutal
intimidation and murder by Mugabe's supporters, the economic harsh
realities
and the maiming of fellow Zimbabweans by state sponsored agents
will
definitely deal the final and decisive blow to the Mugabe regime.
Zimbabweans are raring to go and vote, and put this nightmare government
into the annals of history once and for all.
Following a European
Union-United States summit in Slovenia on Tuesday,
there was a call for the
Zimbabwean government to end state-sponsored
violence. The summit urged UN
Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to send monitors
to deter further
violence.
Thus in the face of these circumstances, Makoni, who came a
distant third in
the March election, has no moral or legal authority to
suggest the
cancellation of the presidential runoff.
The continued
polarization between the MDC and ZANU-PF through the
systematic campaign of
murder and torture unleashed on the MDC make the
immediate contemplation of
a government of national unity a great joke.
Voice of reason Jacob Zuma,
South Africa's ruling African National Congress
president, is right to be
alarmed and anxious about the reports of violence.
His calls on ZANU-PF to
ensure free campaigning are still falling on deaf
ears. The playing field is
not level.
Zuma confirms that there is a crisis in Zimbabwe, something
the current
South African president, Thabo Mbeki, denies. Zuma, a
frontrunner to succeed
Mbeki next year after toppling him as leader of the
ANC, remains outspoken
about the Zimbabwe crisis. Mbeki is still in the
woods, as he preaches his
quiet diplomacy that has failed hitherto to
resolve Zimbabwe's impasse.
What if Robert Mugabe was white?
http://www.thoughtleader.co.za
Michael
Trapido
I want you to close your
eyes and imagine for a moment that Zimbabwe was
being ruled by Robert
Mugabe, the duly elected white, rather than black,
president. Everything
else must remain exactly the same as it is right now.
The overwhelming
majority of Zimbabwe's population remains black, the murder
and torture
continues, the destroyed economy with its 100 000% plus
inflation, the 80%
unemployment, the average lifespan of 37 years, the ban
on the media, the
election rigging and the total onslaught on the population
is all still
there, but done in the name of a white, instead of a black
president.
In other words I'm asking you to leave everything the way
it is except that
all the indescribably despicable acts, currently being
perpetrated against
an overwhelming majority of black people is being
carried out by a white
president.
Let's accept that Zimbabwe is now
considered to be one of the most violent
regimes in Africa's history. This
is a country wherein the disregard for
black lives can almost be described
as breathtaking in its arrogance. No
consideration is given to their health,
living standards or future, save as
it affects the ruling elite.
A
few weeks ago an election was held wherein this white president refused to
allow the opposition to campaign without fear of murder or torture.
Candidates were arrested, the electoral commission was being controlled and
only monitors or peacekeepers of his choice were allowed into the field. He
then refused to release the results when he realised that he had
lost.
Then, in contemplation of a run-off, he instituted a campaign of
butchery
and intimidation that Human Rights Watch speaks of as unprecedented
in the
history of this violent country. Simultaneously, a de fact coup takes
place
wherein the message is sent out that whoever wins, the president
stays.
In those circumstances, under this white president, what would
have been the
response?
a.. A UN Security Council that is nervous to
intervene?
a.. SADC grudgingly acknowledging the seriousness of the situation
and
deciding on mediation that allows this brutality to continue?
a..
Mediation that slowly grinds on its way and makes no effort to stop the
violence and contemplates keeping this white president who has committed
these atrocities?
a.. Allows a de facto coup to have taken place with a
poorly kept secret
that if Tsvangirai wins the run-off this white president
has no intention of
handing over power?
a.. An entire planet stands back
and watches as soldiers, war veterans,
police and intelligence pummel the
electorate into oblivion?
a.. Allows anywhere between a third and a quarter
of the population to go
into exile rather than tell this white president to
behave?
a.. Allows an entire region to become destabilised and called the
author of
its destabilisation a liberator?
The answer to all this is that
the white president would have had his
backside handed to him a long time
ago. In addition he would have been
styled a butcher, not a liberator. He
would be facing a future along the
lines of Saddam Hussein rather than
president in a government of national
unity.
That is, of course, my
opinion and one that I sincerely hope that the bulk
of the planet
shares.
Which brings me to my next question: Why should a population that
is
overwhelmingly black be at a disadvantage simply because their leader is
black? Why are their lives considered forfeit simply because the planet is
scared to be called racist if they clamp down hard on their
oppressor?
How can the planet ever listen to Africa when it comes to
removing its
dictators? Our history confirms that the millions and millions
of Africans
who don't have access to sophisticated communications, through
choice or by
design, are being denied rescue, for that is what this is, by
the elite few
who scream racism every time the world wants to take concrete
steps against
their abuse.
What the planet has to do is ask itself
this: If this African president was
any other race but black, how would we
respond?
This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 11th, 2008 at 5:52
pm and
Government Imposes Punitive Duty On Imported Publications
Media
Institute of Southern Africa (Windhoek)
PRESS RELEASE
11 June
2008
Posted to the web 11 June 2008
In yet another move that will
worsen the flow of - and lack of access to -
information in Zimbabwe, the
government has slapped an import duty on all
newspapers, magazines and
periodicals coming into the country.
On 8 June 2008, the state-owned
"Herald" newspaper reported that all
"foreign newspapers sold in Zimbabwe
will now have to pay import duty, as
the government moves to protect
Zimbabwean media space". The newspaper went
on to say that this move is
meant to curb the entry into the country of what
it called "hostile foreign
newspapers".
Citing new regulations published in an extraordinary
government gazette, the
paper said foreign publications - including
newspapers, journals, magazines
and periodicals - were now classed as
"luxury goods" and would attract an
import duty of 40 percent of the total
cost per kilogram.
The Information Ministry's permanent secretary and
President Robert Mugabe's
spokesperson, George Charamba, hinted at the
measures when he told guests at
a media awards ceremony in early June 2008
that foreign publications were
reaping profits from sales in Zimbabwe while
paying nothing or very little.
"The government is looking at the whole
regime, which allows anyone to push
their publications here without paying
anything or paying very little, yet
when sales are done, profits have to be
turned into foreign currency which
leaves the country," said
Charamba.
"We lose the politics, we lose money. As the ministry
responsible, it is our
duty to protect and defend the national media space,"
he added.
Zimbabwe has only two dailies, both controlled by the
government, since the
only privately-owned daily, the "Daily News", was
banned in 2003. The
country has no private radio or television stations and,
for an alternative
to the official line, most Zimbabweans turn to foreign
radio stations and
regional newspapers, mostly from South Africa, which
carry stories about
Zimbabwe.
The newspapers that are to be affected
by this move include "The
Zimbabwean", a tabloid highly critical of the
Zimbabwe government, "The Mail
and Guardian", "Sunday Times" and many others
published in South Africa.
South African newspapers were filling in the void
left by the banning of
four newspapers in Zimbabwe since 2003. Local
independent newspapers in
Zimbabwe operate under a harsh legal environment
in which they are forced to
sell copies at a government-stipulated
price.
The import duty, coming as it does while Zimbabwe prepares for a
run-off
election, will worsen the already bad flow of - and limited access
to -
information in Zimbabwe. The state media, meanwhile, has stepped up its
campaign against civic and opposition groups, leaving no room for
alternative voices to be heard.
The
UN must act
http://www.theherald.co.uk
YOUR LETTERS June 12 2008
The full tragedy of
Zimbabwe lies far beyond the borders of that once
prosperous nation (Ian
Bell, June 7, and Letters, June 10). The inability of
the international
community, in all its various forms, to take decisive
action will
undoubtedly lead to a slow burning genocide. The message that
Mugabe and his
murderous Zanu-PF regime sends out to the rest of the African
continent is:
yes, you can destroy your economy, ignore election results,
intimidate and
murder your own people and remain in power.
Experts believe that it would
take an international force of just 5000
troops to ensure a fair election
and resultant blood-free regime change.
The ineffective African Union
refuses to get involved and so the door is
open for a United Nations task
force. If we are to continue to believe that
the UN is a relevant and
worthwhile institution, then it must act now in
Zimbabwe, not just to avert
another humanitarian crisis but also to set an
example to other oppressive
African regimes and give hope to their people.
Mark Hogarth,
Ardrossan
Doug Maughan is right to feel outraged (Letters, June 10) but
the world will
continue to wring its hands and do nothing until oil is found
in Zimbabwe.
Ruth Marr, Stirling