The Zimbabwe Situation

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 07:31

HARARE
The Robert Mugabe regime has warned the non-governmental organisations
(NGOs) operating in the country to halt operations of aid distribution
because it belieevres they are working with the MDC.
Mugabe sidekick Ignatius Chombo said NGOs were driving an anti-Mugabe
agenda by distributing food in local communities.
“NGOs should not interfere in the politics of Zimbabwe and neither
should they dictate the pace of politics at the local level. We want to
remind all NGJunta bars aid as crackdown intensifies
HARARE
The Robert Mugabe regime has warned the non-governmental organisations
(NGOs) operating in the country to halt operations of aid distribution
because it belieevres they are working with the MDC.
Mugabe sidekick Ignatius Chombo said NGOs were driving an anti-Mugabe
agenda by distributing food in local communities.
“NGOs should not interfere in the politics of Zimbabwe and neither
should they dictate the pace of politics at the local level. We want to
remind all NGOs that such behaviour is not acceptable,” he said.
Chombo also added that it was up to the government to approve who got
aid in rural and urban areas.
“It is instructive for NGOs who wish to enter urban or rural district
council areas to ensure that they secure express written authority from the
Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare as a prerequisite for
approaching local authorities,” he said.
In all past elections, The Zimbabwean government has distributed food
only to its loyal supporters, whilst those suspected to be pro-opposition
were starved.′′
Os that such behaviour is not acceptable,” he said.
Chombo also added that it was up to the government to approve who got
aid in rural and urban areas.
“It is instructive for NGOs who wish to enter urban or rural district
council areas to ensure that they secure express written authority from the
Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare as a prerequisite for
approaching local authorities,” he said.
In all past elections, The Zimbabwean government has distributed food
only to its loyal supporters, whilst those suspected to be pro-opposition
were starved.′′

Pro-Zanu politics ‘delivered’ to junior ranks

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 09:36

ZRP.
While police are expected to be apolitical in carrying out their
duties, a leaked memorandum shows that officers have been advised by their
commanders to vote for Zanu (PF) in the run-off presidential election
scheduled for 27 June.
The Zimbabwean can reveal that an inter-office memo, dated May 13,
from Superintendent Balele and Superintendent Moyo, who lead the Police
Project Team covering Nkayi and Lupane District was sent the to officer
commanding Matebeleland North Province. It listed seven police stations in
Lupane District and five in Nkayi that had “been visited” as part of the
project.
The memo said that only Lupane District Headquarters staff were yet to
be visited, and that attendance in both districts was good for officers,
their spouses, dependants and residents of the camps.
The memo further stated that the “history of Zimbabwe, the land
question, the reasons for the stand-off between the west and Zimbabwe, the
historical and constitutional role of the police and postal ballots are
topics that were discussed”.
It also said “the need to defend the land in Zimbabwe was very much
emphasised alongside the need for officers to vote properly. Members were
made to appreciate the true cause of the current economic problems in
Zimbabwe”.

Chinamasa admits ZANU PF committing atrocities

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 11:54
PRETORIA: ZANU PF's losing Parliamentary candidate and interim Justice
Minister Patrick Chinamasa has for the first time admitted that his party
supporters were behind heinous crimes in Zimbabwe perpetrated on MDC
members.

Chinamasa mistakenly admitted as he vented out his frustrations on
that victims of violence were being treated in Harare hospitals with alleged
assistance of foreign diplomats.
The venom mouthed Chinamasa accused the US Ambassador to Zimbabwe
James McGee of sympathizing with MDC supporters who have suffered most from
Mugabe's state sponsored torture.
"The US ambassador had been collecting from the scene of crime only
MDC victims," Chinamasa told reporters at the Zimbabwean embassy in South
Africa on Friday as he made fresh remarks that MDC supporters were being
victimised.
"He drove them to hospital where he paid in full, in advance, for
their medical expenditure," said the heartless Chinamasa expressing anger
over the hospitalization of MDC supporters who are being terrorized for
landing Mugabe his first defeat since independence.
The MDC accuses ZANU PF for killing, raping and displacing its
supporters ahead of a run off that Mugabe is tipped to lose even after
unleashing terror on the people of Zimbabwe.
Confirmed reports shows at least 50 MDC members have been killed since
the 29 March polls that ended ZANU PF's dominance of Parliament since
independence in 1980 from the Ian Smith's colonial government.
About 50 thousand citizens have been displaced most of them in areas
that voted overwhelmingly for MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai. If a free and
fair process is executed Mugabe will lose the election argues analysts.
"Mugabe can no longer win any election in Zimbabwe" said Professor
Jonathan Moyo in one of his opinion columns.--
It is the search for justice, equality and truth that forced me into
this profession

Junta’s deliberate starvation of under-5s shocks doctors

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 10:49

…MDC families suffer after voting for change

HARARE - Robert Mugabe has been accused of stepping up a campaign of
mutilating torture, extrajudicial killings and starvation of ordinary
Zimbabweans ahead of the June 27 presidential election run-off, which he
wants to win at any cost.

An independent inquiry by human rights doctors in Harare says the
attacks appear to be aimed at destroying support and structures for the
government-in-waiting, the MDC, and its leader, Morgan Tsvangirai.
The upsurge in anti-MDC violence follows an explicit warning by Mugabe
immediately after his unprecedented electoral loss on March 29. He reminded
his supporters of the modus operandi at a rally in Harare last weekend.
“You saw who our opponent really was after the announcement of the
results,” Mugabe told a Zanu (PF) rally last Sunday. “You saw the crowds of
Rhodesians who had left the country coming back into the land and even
demanding that the people who had settled on the land quit? You saw the joy
the British had, the joy the Americans had and you saw through their
representatives here as if Zimbabwe was an extension of Britain or an
extension of America.
“We should make them run. If they haven't run before, we will make
them run now,” he told his supporters at the Zanu (PF) headquarters.
On Tuesday the top UN human rights high commissioner, Louis Arbour,
expressed shock at the extra judicial killings and called on the authorities
to punish the perpetrators.
The doctors' report accuses Mugabe’s supporters of also denying food
to tens of thousands of people in drought-stricken areas, where millions are
facing food shortages because they backed the MDC.
While estimates vary of the number of people who could starve -
between 600,000 and three million - the report's authors estimate a
shortfall of supplies of maize, the staple food, of between 400,000 and one
million tonnes.
People in rural areas have three main ways of getting maize: through
government 'food for work' programmes; buying it from the
government-controlled Grain Marketing Board and through donor schemes for
school pupils and the under-fives.
All three sources are being manipulated politically to deny food to
the families of opposition supporters, the study says.
“Those who do not carry a Zanu (PF) card are not allowed to purchase
maize from the board, and known MDC supporters report having maize stolen
from them if they are lucky enough to buy it.”
The researchers have documented cases of MDC families told they cannot
take part in the 'food for work' schemes.
The most serious allegations about maize, however, concern denial of
supplementary food to children. In one area of the Midlands, visiting
doctors found evidence of the deliberate starvation of under-fives from MDC
families by local Zanu (PF) headmen.
Tsvangirai told The Zimbabwean: “They are implementing a systematic
campaign of violent retribution against all those suspected of voting for
the MDC.”

Brutality shocks Zimbabweans into silence

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 10:55
HARARE
Almost four weeks before Zimbabwe's presidential election run off,
Kumbi Mutepfa stood in line with hundreds of people on Friday waiting for
mealie meal and pleading for help to feed his hungry family.
His country's economy has crashed. Hundreds of thousands of people are
desperately short of food. And political violence is rampant across the
land. But when he is asked about the election, he grows quiet.
''I can't talk too much. I don't know what might happen to me,'' the
36-year-old gardener said.
As Zimbabweans prepare for the June 27 run-off, many are terrified to
express an opinion.
Pictures showing the brutality being meted to suspected MDC activists
have shocked the nation, including the recent gory find of an MDC supporter
whose tongue was cut out and eyes gouged from their sockets by an alleged
Zanu (PF) goon squad.
In a market in the poor Glen Norah neighbourhood of Harare, people
spoke on Thursday of militants from Mugabe's party living in a nearby camp
who invade the area every evening, drag off MDC supporters and torture them.
''The electorate is totally intimidated,'' said Kucaca Phulu, the
director of Zim Rights, a local human rights group.
MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, 56, is promising to revive the economy,
end corruption and promote a more orderly land reform system.
At a campaign stop this week in Harare, Tsvangirai urged screaming
supporters to vote despite the ''intimidation on a massive scale.''
''We will have the last laugh,'' he said. ''We must ensure this
victory is not stolen by Mugabe.''
Human rights groups and many political analysts say the election
already is too tainted to be free and fair.

Anti-riot police get army training

Chinese AK47s weapon of choice for Mugabe thugs

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 08:56

“Instead of being a source of hope to the people, the police have
become a threat.”
HARARE
Deadly AK47 rifles have become the weapon of choice for thugs involved
in murder, kidnapping and torture throughout Zimbabwe.
Suspiciously, though, the police have not been able to apprehend a
single suspect in all the cases involving the illegal use of AK47s or other
firearms. A substantial number of the 50 Movement for Democratic Change
(MDC) activists murdered after March 29 were kidnapped by men with AK47
rifles.
Over the years, this Gukurahundi style of abduction and disappearance
of activists has left the state as the lead suspect.
At Murambinda in April 2000, for example, two alleged killers driving
a Zanu (PF) Manicaland Nissan twin-cab truck approached MDC activists
Tichaona Chiminya and Talent Mabika. The two killers pointed AK47s and
petrol-bombed the MDC group. Mabika and Chiminya died.
Later that year, David Coltart’s chief polling agent, Patrick
Nabayana, was abducted by men carrying AK47 rifles. His body was found
months later dumped on the banks of Khami River.
The following year, 10 men with AK47 rifles abducted Bulawayo war
veterans leader Cain Nkala. His decomposing body was later found in a
shallow grave near Solusi University. MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai blamed
Zanu (PF) for Nkala's death.
A pointer to who the perpetrators of these abductions really are is
contained in an Amnesty International (AI) report, dated June 2002, and
entitled Toll of Impunity.
The human rights agency says “these violations were primarily
committed by members of ‘state sponsored militia’ and also by state security
forces – police officers, army officers or agents of the Central
Intelligence Organisation (CIO)”.
The carnage continues. In the early hours of May 14, nine men armed
with AK47 rifles abducted MDC Harare Province Secretary for Security
Tonderai Ndira. He was found dead a few days later with severed lips and
tongue. Tragically. Ndira is just one of more than 45 MDC supporters already
reported murdered.

Mercy mission halted by militia torturers

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 08:57
MUTASA
An MDC driver and youth secretary have been arrested and tortured as
they set off on a mercy mission to help people injured by youth militia
members and war veterans.
Godwin Sithole and Denis Simango were on their way to Mutasa to
provide transport for MDC supporters who had had their limbs broken in
recent attacks when Zanu youth militias, camped at the Ministry of Youth
Development Offices in Mutasa, spotted their car. The gangs blocked it in
all directions and the two men were grabbed by two senior officers. Seven
youths, who had come to the rescue of the party’s white Isuzu pick-up, were
also attacked. The group was threatened by war veterans armed with machetes,
logs, iron bars and rifles, including an AK47.
Lloyd Munguma, an MDC activist in the area, said one police officer
was beaten after he tried to reason with the war veterans.
Sithole and Simango were then handed over to police custody.
Torture and trauma – a double-edged sword
With mass beatings, torture on a widespread scale and thousands being
displaced, it is certain that the run-off election in Zimbabwe will be
neither free nor fair. But, writes our special correspondent, group torture
is also having an untold effect on the psychological health of the nation.
A report by the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) on the spread and scale
of the onslaught of state-sponsored violence since the March 29 elections
makes grim reading. Zimbabwe seems to be a country divided into torturers
and their victims.
A conservative estimate by an NGO, which has been documenting the
impact of violence on victims in Zimbabwe for the past four decades, shows
that one in 10 people in Zimbabwe is either a torture survivor or has
witnessed some form of violence.
Zimbabweans are no strangers to violence. Many experienced or
witnessed torture during the liberation war of the 1970s. In the 1980s,
Mugabe committed quasi-genocide on the members of the minority tribe, the
Matabele, in order to cement his position and ensure a one-party state. The
man who proudly proclaims that he has “degrees in violence” learned valuable
lessons from this period and has used torture and intimidation to ensure the
compliance of a downtrodden population, from the farm invasions in 1998
until the present day.
The nature of the violence is truly sickening. Most disturbingly,
schools are being shut down across the country and set up as torture bases.
Young people, Zanu (FPF) youth, across the country are being recruited and
trained to torture their own people. Villagers are being rounded up in the
middle of the night with their children and taken to the bases where they
are tortured and made to sing liberation sings whilst being beaten. They are
often forced to participate in the beatings of their friends and family.
As a result, thousands are fleeing their homes. The ZPP say that most
are small-scale farmers who leave their fields, livestock and property
unattended and this has created untold psychological trauma for individuals.
In some cases victims have abandoned children while trying to save their
lives but this has resulted in these children being taken and held at
torture bases as ransom.
In some areas, the victims of violence were as young as three. One
child is reported to have been killed and many more are traumatised after
the burning of their homes.
SACST’s report says: “Survivors of organised violence and torture
represent a disabled group which may require targeted assistance by the
State in order to overcome the social adversity that they experience.”
Victims of torture are unable to fully contribute to the economy because of
the physical and psychological trauma resulting from torture.
It is clear that a lot needs to be done for victims of torture in
Zimbabwe. Care of the psychological and physical health must be given to
those who were brave enough to use their votes, and suffer the consequences,
for the political freedom of the country.

Focus on horror

Saturday, 31 May 2008 08:24

Evidence of violence
Yet more of the ugly evidence of violence that has become an everyday horror for Zimbabweans. These victims were burnt or beaten in attacks by armed thugs.

Burnings and beatings as violence rages
HARARE
Despite pleas to end violence from organisations worldwide, regional bodies like the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and Zimbabwean main political parties, hundreds of people are still fleeing their rural homes to seek refuge in the towns.
According to the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), the Zanu (PF)-sponsored militia, the army, the police and war veterans have assumed new tactics, in which they now abduct key opposition activists and kill them in the dead of night.
Runyararo Mugauyi (27) confined to bed with appalling wounds on his buttocks after being beaten up by Zanu (PF) thugs in Mashonaland Central, told MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, as he visited the hospital: “I need someone to carry me back home so I can vote the old man out.”
After his visit, Tsvangirai told a media conference that he had been inspired by the “heroic” suffering of the victims – among them Tonderai Ndira, a prominent activist who was abducted from his Harare home by 10 armed men. His body was found by accident when opposition activists, who had gone to the Parirenyatwa Hospital in Harare to collect corpses of two other murdered party members, recognized him in the mortuary.
Professor John Makumbe, an independent political analyst, said it was misleading for people to think that a call by Mugabe to end violence was genuine.
He said: “As our politicians squabble, debate, impose conditions and argue, as international statesmen fudge and mumble their vague support for our suffering, it is easy to forget that down the dust roads and rural tracks of this country, a daily horror is taking place.”
The MDC says more than 45 of its members have been murdered since the March 29 elections and nobody has been arrested for the crimes. More than 25,000 people have been displaced countrywide, and 8,000 homesteads, mostly belonging to opposition supporters, have been torched by suspected Zanu (PF) youths and war veterans.
MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa said, after former Minister of Justice Patrick Chinamasa challenged them to produce evidence of their claims over violence, they had given names of 38 murder victims to the police to investigate, but there had been no feedback.
“We told them that they should investigate the cases. People are dying like flies and we now have churches and our head office to cater for those people who are all afraid to return to their homes,” Chamisa said.
At the launch of his campaign for a sixth term last Friday, Mugabe condoned violence.
“I say no to violence, but that is not to say if you are attacked remain stationery. You should also attack back,” he said.
Jabulani Sibanda, War Veterans Association Chairman, was on the defensive.
“War veterans are not a violent people and it is very clear that our responsibility as an association is to educate the masses so that they will not be gullible to the opposition’s propaganda and hunger caused by sanctions and their violent activities,” he said. – CAJ News

Civic group warns of “forces of evil”

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 07:40

HARARE – The Centre for Community Development in Zimbabwe (CCDZ) is
advising all MDC activists and members of civic groups to be on the look-out
for against what they are calling “the forces of evil” – the state agents
who have been abducting opposition officials and civic leaders.
In an advisory statement, the group said: “We have it on good record
that the Central Intelligence Organisation would like to wipe out leaders of
the above mentioned organisations before the presidential run-off scheduled
for the 27th June, 2008.We urge all the political leaders to take
precautionary measures and avoid isolated places where they can be easily
ambushed by the notorious CIOs.”
The CCDZ also urged prominent lawyers in Harare and Bulawayo who had
handled MDC cases, and journalists who had reported on the MDC, to exercise
extreme caution in the face of the many numbers of assassinations and
abductions.
Mfundo Mlilo from the Combined Harare Residents Association, which is
working with the CCDZ, said four of their members had been abducted from the
Kuwadzana high-density area of Harare. Two were still missing. Murdered MDC
activist Tonderai Ndira was also a CHRA member for the Mabvuku district. –
SW Radio Africa

ZESN calls for accreditation plans to be dropped

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 10:35

HARARE
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network (ZESN) has called for the
Minister of Justice to drop plans to require local election observers to
reapply for accreditation.

Foreign observers who came to Zimbabwe for the March 20 vote still
have valid accreditation, but the Minister for Justice has insisted local
observers had to be re-invited and accredited anew. The Minister also added
that accreditation fees would go up.
The ZESN called on the Minister of Justice to waive the second
accreditation and allow all local observers who had been accredited for the
29 March elections to observe the 27 June run-off. ZESN also urged the
Minister to allow for additional local observers to be accredited and the
decentralisation of the accreditation process to other provinces to ensure
efficient processing.
“These new requirements for new invitations to observe the run-off
suggest a deliberate attempt to curtail domestic election observation that
has become critical in promoting transparency, accountability and voter
confidence,” said a statement from the Network. “Domestic observation of
elections is important not just on election day but in the run up to
elections and during the post election period when foreign observers are
gone.”

Trillions set aside for Zanu’s constituency battle

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 10:33
HARARE
Defeated but determined, Zanu (PF) has budgeted Z$1.5 trillion to
bankroll the embattled party’s legal challenge in 53 constituencies it lost
to the MDC in the March 29 general poll, The Zimbabwean has established.
Zanu (PF) insiders say about 10 lawyers from the private sector have
been engaged by Zanu (PF)’s legal department to defend the former ruling
party in a case that legal experts say could drag on for months.
The party has filed petitions challenging the results in 53
constituencies and the MDC has challenged 52. This amounts to 105 seats,
exactly half of Zimbabwe’s 210 parliamentary seats.
The petitions were filed by losing candidates for alleged electoral
malpractice such as vote-buying, intimidation and corruption. The Electoral
Court began hearing the legal petitions last week.
Top Zanu (PF) sources said this week the party’s legal affairs boss,
Emmerson Mnangagwa, had approached several law farms to handle the lawsuit
and a budget of about Z$1.5 trillion had been allocated to the defence team.
Under the law, the court has six months to deal with the cases, with
another six months allowed for appeals.

Farmers still waiting under eviction threat

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 10:34
WINDHOEK
Eighty white Zimbabwean farmers faced with eviction are still in limbo
after the State persuaded a regional tribunal to postpone the case on
Wednesday.
“We considered the application of Zimbabwe’s Deputy Attorney General,
Prince Machaya, and his reasons for not having their papers ready for today
and allow them time to file until June 16,” ruled Judge Luis Mondlane,
President of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) tribunal.
“The next tribunal hearing on this case will be July 16,” he told the
court in the Namibian capital Windhoek.
Two months ago, the tribunal gave a respite to the farmers, led by
William Michael Campbell, allowing them to stay on their property until the
full hearing began.
Machaya had earlier argued before the tribunal that he had been unable
to compile his case in time because his team “had neither the material and
financial resources, nor the manpower to do so”. Campbell's legal
representative, however, told the tribunal that this was a “delaying tactic
and the oldest forensic trick in the book”.

Mbeki talking nonsense - Annan

The Zimbabwean

BY TRUST MATSILELE
PRETORIA
The former United Nations Secretary General has lashed out at South African
President Thabo Mbeki for his reckless statements dismissing the need for
external intervention in Zimbabwe.
"The tendency for some to think this is an internal matter is nonsense,"
said Kofi Annan.
“The crisis in Zimbabwe has sent millions of refugees into neighbouring
countries and has prevented countries that once bought from food from
Zimbabwe from doing so -- proof that the problems are not simply an
"internal matter," Annan said.
His harsh words come a few days after Mbeki wrote a letter to United States
President George Bush telling him (Bush) to “butt out” of the Zimbabwean
crisis.
The South African President and his Ambassador to the United Nations have
barred the Zimbabwean crisis from being at the United Nations Security
Council saying, its magnitude did not warrant attention by the UN body and
other international forums.
Mbeki, who has made no secret of his support for Robert Mugabe, has in the
past few months made inflammatory statements that have even angered some
members of his cabinet and his peers in the ruling African National
Congress.
Zimbabwe Youth Network coordinator Munjodzi Mutandiri dismissed Mbeki does
as a hypocrite.
"We expect Mbeki to do exactly what he advises other countries and leaders
to do. If he advise some countries to back out as our crisis is an internal
matter then we expect him to back off as he is not qualified to speak on
behalf of Zimbabweans," said Mutandiri.
The ANC was at the forefront of organising international solidarity against
apartheid and enjoyed support from Africa and most of the west. The ANC
leadership lived in exile in many SADC countries, including Zimbabwe. Nobody
told them that it was an internal matter and that they should not seek
international intervention.

ZCTU leaders in Geneva for International Labour Organisation Conference

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 12:09
Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) President, Mr. Lovemore
Matombo and Secretary-General, Mr. Wellington Chibebe, are in Geneva
attending the International Labour Organisation (ILO) annual Conference.
The two leaders went to Geneva after their court case hearing, in
which they are being accused of inciting the public to rise against the
government, was postponed to 23 June 2008.
There has been doubt that the union leaders would make it to the
annual conference after a Harare magistrate had initially denied them bail.
However, they were eventually granted bail by the High Court.
The State prosecutor wanted the trial to start on 16 June 2008, but
the ZCTU leaders’ lawyers sought postponement citing the Geneva Conference.
The postponement was only granted after the ZCTU leaders produced evidence
of their invitation to Geneva.
Speaking from Geneva, Mr. Chibebe said their registration went
smoothly unlike last year when the government tried to sneak through the
back door a bogus worker representative, Linda Manyenga at the Conference.
Zimbabwe is among 40 countries set to appear before the Application of
Standards Committee to answer charges of contravening ILO Conventions 87 and
98 on Freedom of Expression and Association.

When a country goes off the rails…

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 07:48

When a country goes off the rails…
…its people take to the road'.

Train smoke filters through the congested carriages. The smell of
sweat dominates the carriage walls. Standing up are haggard-looking people
of all ages, who cluster around each other as the commuter train speeds
forward to deposit them in their respective destinations.
But the chatter cannot wipe away any of the anxiety on their faces –
the anxiety of what the future in Zimbabwe holds after the June 27
presidential run-off.
Commuter trains – introduced in 2006 as a mechanism to shield
inflation-weary Zimbabweans against runaway transport costs – have become a
political and social landscape for mini political rallies or political
discussions.
As the nation moves towards the election next month, it is worry about
the country’s future, the unprecedented economic decline and the grinding
poverty that dominates the talk on the trains.
“We will all leave Zimbabwe if Mugabe wins after rigging, or refuses
to step down after losing the polls despite rigging, as the future of the
country will be doomed. There will be no future in Zimbabwe,” said Joseph
Mandevana, speaking on the evening commuter train from Harare city centre to
Mufakose high-density suburb.
Mandevana adds: “We cannot lie to each other about a change of the
situation if Mugabe stays in power after the June 27 elections. Those who
will remain in the country will be condemned to eternal suffering if there
is no change of government.”
Critics accuse Mugabe of employing populist economic policies that
have run down the economy – once one of most thriving in Africa. Despite
widespread calls for him to step down, Mugabe has dug in his heels and
refuses to cede power.
Mugabe says he is defending the country against western imperialism.
He also says he is defending the nation’s sovereignty.
But for Luke Chinyama, a civil servant, ordinary Zimbabweans do not
eat sovereignty and it does not bring jobs.
Chinyama said that if Mugabe remained in power, he would “pack his
bags and go” to any nation where there is hope for a future.
“We remained after the 2002 elections and we are worse off now. What
more after five years?” Chinyama asks similar distraught faces.
Tapfuma Moyo replies to bursts of laughter: “Mugabe should take back
the country to 1980 and we liberate it. It no longer makes sense and it will
never make sense to remain in the country with Mugabe in power. I will just
leave and go to South Africa.”
In street interviews in Harare, many Zimbabweans, despite predicting a
win for Tsvangirai in the presidential poll, said they feared Mugabe would
refuse to step down. They said Zimbabweans, brutalised by Zanu (PF) forces,
would be too scared to rise up against Mugabe and force him out of power.
“People have seen horrors of what Mugabe is capable of doing. We don’t
see Mugabe conceding defeat and stepping down. He will want to fight
Zimbabweans who are hungry, suffering, brutalised, emotionally abused and
tired,” said Dyke Nyatanga. “Zimbabweans will not fight, they will just go
to other countries.”
His friend, Blessing Shoko quipped: “We will all just leave Mugabe and
his sovereignty after the elections if he refuses to step down. We have
suffered under Mugabe’s government and there is no hope for a future under
him in the coming years.”

We need a God-fearing nation

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 07:30

As a Christian, I was thrilled when I heard the President-in-Waiting,
Morgan Tsvangirai, saying on TV, “We need a God-fearing nation” as part of
the MDC manifesto.
Every Zimbabwean must embrace this principle because the absence of
the fear of God in those leading us since 1980 is what has taken us to where
we are today. The Bible says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of
wisdom.”
I hope the MDC president and the entire MDC meant it with all their
hearts when they made it part of their manifesto. I am deeply saddened by
what is happening in our country. But it all comes back to one thing. Our
government leaders have never acknowledged God as the Supreme Being in
Zimbabwe.
They have never had the fear of God in their hearts. That is one
reason why we had the embarrassing when our government leaders believed the
claims of a traditional healer who told that there was diesel coming out of
a rock in Chinhoyi. Our leaders have given themselves to the devil. The
devil is controlling their every strategy of survival as a government. Jesus
said, “The devil comes to kill, steal and destroy.” (John 10 vs 10)
We see in Zanu (PF) today the devil-inspired men and women. They lie
through their teeth, they destroy - they have destroyed the economy, they
destroyed people’s livelihood when they embarked on Murambatsvina and many
other atrocities they embark on when everyone is asleep. They can even
destroy your conscience. They kill and they steal. I’m not writing this
article to raise people’s anger against our government. I’m writing this so
we can see the kind of a battle we are in-it’s a spiritual battle, and we
need to fight it from a spiritual angle as well. After all we need to pray
for these people-for they do not know what they are doing. The devil is upon
them. They need deliverance.
“The battle is mine, not yours” says the Lord.
I call upon every Zimbabwean wherever you are to realize that we need
God to take us out of this quagmire and to take our country beyond its
former glory. Let us pray for our leaders in the struggle to freedom, the
MDC leadership. I know many Christians will say how can we be so political
to the extent of praying for the opposition?
But are we being so political when we stand in that booth and vote for
the opposition? I believe there are so many mighty men and women of God who
have voted for the opposition. Why not take a step further and pray for the
leaders we believe in to take Zimbabwe to where we all want it to be. Of
course, we still need to pray for the leaders in the current government, but
our prayers for them are different-we need to pray for their deliverance.
These men ought to know that there is God in heaven. They need to know
that they don’t have a license to torture and kill as they wish. They need
to know that Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans and not just for the Zanu (PF)
leadership. Righteousness exalts a nation but sin is a curse on any nation.
Their selfishness has caused so much pain to defenceless people. Their acts
of wickedness have created so many graves, so many widows, orphans and
broken hearts in our midst. They have created disunity even among families.
These people need to repent.
One tool that the devil uses is fear. Many agree that Zanu (PF) is
very good at this.
As Zimbabweans we need to pray that God may give our leaders in the
opposition courage.
I understand the pressure that Tsvangirai faces, together with his
family. He needs the prayers of Zimbabweans. Above all at this juncture he
also needs the counsel of not only security experts and political leaders
but also mature men and women of God.
We need a team of prayer warriors praying for every leader at every
structure in the movement.
If God is on our side, who can ever be against us? Nobody; not even
Zanu (PF) with all its degrees in violence. God bless Zimbabwe. May His
divine will be done.

Journalists’ union calls for investigation

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 07:42
HARARE
The Zimbabwe Union of Journalists has condemned the abduction and
torture of two media workers who were delivering copies of The Zimbabwean on
Sunday.
The truck, carrying a consignment of 60,000 newspapers, was carjacked
70km from Masvingo town by unidentified people wielding military issue AK47
automatic rifles.
Gunmen assaulted the two and doused the delivery van and the
newspapers with diesel before setting them on fire.
The Union said the episode was a further indicator that the run-up to
the presidential election run-off had witnessed an escalation of violence
against journalists and media workers.
“We call on authorities to sincerely investigate the matter in order
to bring the culprits to book,” said the Union. “We call on authorities to
complete investigations connected to media atrocities such as the bombing of
The Daily News printing press, Voice of the People offices and the murder of
journalist, Edward Chikomba.”

New play takes audience on journey underground

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 08:14

Mandla Ncube and Michael Kudakwashe in Great Escape.
Theatre at the Mannenberg moves into high gear this month with a
Scorpion Theatre production – Great Escape by Andrew Whaley, directed by Ian
White and featuring renowned actors Michael Kudakwashe and Mandla Moyo.
Much has been said about Zimbabwe’s special brand of ‘gallows’ humour
that says more about social reality, sense of identity and life than any
erudite political commentary. Playwright Andrew Whaley has a pedigree in
plays that capture the tortuous turning points in Zimbabwe’s history (Rise
and Shine of Comrade Fiasco, Nyoka Tree, Platform 5).
Great Escape, a surreal journey through one kind of Zimbabwean
subconscious, is funny, thrillingly told and strangely haunting.
A mob of angry mourners pursues Osborn at Jay-Jay’s unexpected burial,
and it is Memory who leads them to their destination, underground through
the catacombs.
A fantastical creation, a machine, has instruments and calibrations to
tunnel them to their promised land, providing it can be so compelled. Truth
is warped beneath the rubble of lives and graveyards. Osborn and Memory take
the low road to make their escape.
Is their magical journey an encounter where nobody escapes who they
are, what they've done? Be brave. Sit tight. Put on your goggles. Set the
moral compass and descend into the bowels of the earth.
Great Escape is set for its premiere at Harare’s Mannenberg Jazz Club
on June 7 (opening night), and then from June 10 to 13 at 6pm.

ANC is real culprit in xenophobic attacks

The Zimbabwean

Saturday, 31 May 2008 16:09
The attacks on foreigners in South Africa, in which more than 40
African immigrants have been killed by mobs, and tens of thousands forced to
flee back to their countries, are appalling, but should not be unexpected,
writes Charles Onyango-Obbo in The East African, Nairobi.

The anti-apartheid struggle was one of the great global movements of
the 20th century, and South African liberation the biggest single
pan-African project ever. No liberation movement has had bases in as many
African countries as the ANC did.

There’s a school of thought that holds that the decisive event for the
end of apartheid happened not in South Africa, but in a small town in
Angola.

After Angola and Mozambique became independent from Portugal in 1975
and Zimbabwe shook off white supremacist rule in 1980, they allowed South
African groups to establish military and political bases on their territory.
So, where previously only Tanzania and Zambia offered sanctuary to SA
liberation movements, now the frontline expanded dramatically.

South Africa, with its superior military might, punished these
countries with deadly raids and also propped up brutal rebel groups — Renamo
in Mozambique, and Unita in Angola.

Apartheid forces wreaked so much havoc on Mozambique that, in 1984,
Maputo signed the Nkomati Accords with Pretoria, under which each country
would no longer support the other country’s opposition movements.

Next, South Africa turned its full attention to Angola and invaded.
With its back to the wall, Angola called upon Cuba for help. Fidel Castro
obliged, sending in thousands of troops and heavy weapons.

After nearly four years of war, apartheid South Africa’s Waterloo came
in 1988 in the tiny town of Quito Canavale in southeastern Angola.

The battle of Quito Canavale is considered easily the biggest military
confrontation in modern Africa. At the end, the mighty South African army
had been bloodied.

Humbled. South Africa was forced to begin peace talks with Mozambique,
and talks for a transition to democracy at home. In short order, it withdrew
from Angola and Namibia, with the latter gaining independence in 1990.
Without Quito, perhaps democracy wouldn’t have arrived in South Africa in
1994.

The point, first, is that the defeat of apartheid was not a result of
the ANC’s strength. Secondly, that it might have come when the ANC was not
fully ready to lead. Thirdly, that South Africa’s neighbours paid a very
high price for its freedom, and deserve better.

Now an impotent anger rages in South Africa. The ANC, at least under
Thabo Mbeki, has come up terribly short. On Aids, Mbeki took a bizarre view
has allowed the disease to ravage the country. Then, on Zimbabwe, he became
the biggest apologist for President Robert Mugabe as the latter ruined the
once-rich nation, sending nearly three million Zimbabweans fleeing into
South Africa. As one observer put it, these immigrants, “turned the scramble
for scarce jobs into a deadly struggle.”

After insisting that “there is no crisis in Zimbabwe,” Mbeki has been
made to look a fool and inept, as poor and jobless South Africans take out
their anger on foreigners.

This anger is impotent because the South African masses know that the
ANC government is the culprit. They have watched as a tiny black elite and
South Africa’s white society grow richer under the rule of a self-serving,
greedy political class. However, they can’t get rid of the ANC.

So they turned on their women, notching up the worst rape rates in the
world. They set upon each other, handing South Africa the highest crime
rates in the world. Now, with the xenophobic insanity, South Africa might
finally have fallen from grace.